Our Beliefs : Sermons : Sermon Archive - 2006 : April 16, 2006

Theme: Jesus' Empty Tomb Shouts, "It Is Finished!"

Church year occasion: Easter Sunday

I'm going to need some help this morning. First, I need help from the kids. How many of you know who Eeyore is? He's from the Hundred-Acre Woods and one of Christopher Robin's good friends. What cartoon am I talking about? Winnie the Pooh, that's right. How does Eeyore talk? Kind of slowly, doesn't he? He never gets excited about anything. If the Hundred-Acre Woods caught on fire and Eeyore had to warn everyone about it, how would he say it? (Lazily, in a very slow, Eeyore-like voice): "The woods are on fire. Run for your lives." That's why I love Eeyore. It doesn't matter how important something is -- he never talks with exclamation points. If we were going to say it, we'd say (excitedly): "Hey! The woods are on fire! Run for your lives!"

Now I need help from sports fans. How many of you know who Bob Uecker is? He's the announcer for Brewers games. What does Bob Uecker say when someone hits a home run? "The count is full. It's the bottom of the ninth with two outs. The Brewers are down by one run with a man on first. Here's the pitch. It's a hit to deep left field! It's got a chance, folks! Get up! Get out o' here! Gone! A home run! And the Brewers win!" Now just try saying that like Eeyore! "Get up. Get out of here. It's gone. A home run. And the Brewers win." It totally changes everything if you don't say it with exclamation points.

If our congregational chairman Don Wilke would get up and tell us that someone gave us the best ten acres in town to build our church on for free, how would he say it? You get the idea. He wouldn't say it like Eeyore, would he? He'd say, "We have our land! And it's free! In six months you'll never have to sit in a cold chair in church again!" There are just some things in life that you can't say without using exclamation points.

On Good Friday just before Jesus died, he said, "It is finished." By that, Jesus meant he had finished his work as Savior of the world. He had "paid in full" the punishment for your sins and mine. If ever there are words that deserve to be punctuated with an exclamation point, they are the words "It is finished." But that hardly seemed to be the case when Jesus first spoke them. With darkness covering the land like a death shroud from noon to three? On Golgotha, a place soaked with the blood of countless past executions so that no grass could probably grow there anymore? Moments before our bloodied and beaten Savior bowed his head and gave up his spirit?

Yet the exclamation point did come! Three days later! With an earthquake! A rolled away stone! Angels of God sharing the greatest news of all time! From the very place where Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus had laid the lifeless body of their master after wrapping it with spices in strips of linen. The exclamation point for our Christian faith came on Easter morning. Can you hear it? Jesus' empty tomb shouts, "It is finished!"

How many of you were able to watch Mel Gibson's movie, The Passion of the Christ? Jesus' suffering and death were shown in graphic detail to the point of it being too much for some people to see. Many people came out of the theater saying it was the most powerful movie they had every seen -- that they had never realized how excruciatingly painful and horrific Jesus' suffering was. Now, I don't want to ruin it for you if you haven't seen it yet, but at the end of the movie Jesus rises from the dead. It was the last 20 seconds of the movie -- but it was the most important part because it showed what the whole rest of the movie leading up to that point meant. It meant that Jesus knew what was going to happen, that he had planned it, that he was in control, that he was victorious, that death didn't have the last say, but that he did, and it meant that our sins were now forgiven. I remember one of our members saying he just loved those last 20 seconds because Jesus had such a strong, determined, victorious look as he stepped out of the tomb. Without saying a word, he was telling us that if we are on his side, we don't have to fear anything, not even death itself.

But what if the movie didn't have those last 20 seconds in it? What if it didn't have it because it has never happened? What if Jesus' story had ended on Good Friday? What if there were no empty tomb? Wouldn't you and I be plagued by a lot of nagging questions? Questions like, "Did the Father really accept Jesus' payment for my sins?" "Do I really have a living Savior who will come back one day to take me home to heaven?" "Is Jesus my Savior?"

Nagging questions? No, much worse. If there were no empty tomb, then you and I would have a God who doesn't keep his promises. Like the promise in Isaiah 53:10-11:

Though the LORD makes his life a guilt offering,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand.
After the suffering of his soul,
he will see the light of life and be satisfied.

We understand this verse to speak about Christ. But, if Christ has not been raised, it would have been meaningless.

Or what about Psalm 16:8-10?

I have set the LORD always before me.
Because he is at my right hand,
I will not be shaken.
Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices;
my body also will rest secure,
because you will not abandon me to the grave,
nor will you let your Holy One see decay.

Another prophecy. This one contains the confident prayer of our Savior Jesus. But, if Christ has not been raised, it would have meant nothing.

Jesus himself said, "Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days," (John 2:19) and from what we read earlier in Luke 18:31-33, "Everything that is written by the prophets about the Son of Man will be fulfilled. He will be handed over to the Gentiles. They will mock him, insult him, spit on him, flog him and kill him. On the third day he will rise again."

If Jesus has not been raised, all those prophets would have been liars. Worse than that -- if Jesus has not been raised, Jesus would have been a liar. If there were no empty tomb, St. Paul tells us the terrible consequences: "If Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins." (1 Corinthians 15:14,17) In other words, without the exclamation point provided by Easter, our Christian faith falls like a house of cards. Without the empty tomb, Jesus' word, "It is finished," is nothing but a whisper. Maybe even a whimper. And would have meant nothing for us. If there is no empty tomb, maybe all Jesus meant was "My life is over. My hopes and dreams are finished. I have lost." Then we would have to be "pitied more than all men." (1 Corinthians 15:19) Because then we'd be living a lie.

But, thank God, Jesus' story didn't end on Good Friday! All the eyewitnesses agree. There was an earthquake. A rolled-away stone. Angels. There was an empty tomb that stamped an exclamation point on Jesus' Good Friday words "It is finished!" On Easter morning, Jesus Christ, the carpenter's son, was once and for all "declared with power to be the Son of God by his resurrection from the dead." (Romans 1:4)

On Good Friday, Jesus Christ said he had paid our sins in full. On Easter morning, the Father issued us a receipt for the payment of his Son. That's what Paul is getting at when he assures us, "He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification." (Romans 4:25) Jesus' empty tomb shouts that our sins have been paid for in full! And it shouts, our eternity in heaven is guaranteed.

This is what the empty tomb shouts to us: "Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive." (1 Corinthians 15:20-22)

This is what the empty tomb shouts to us: "Because I live, you also will live." (John 14:19) Jesus' promise is guaranteed.

This is what the empty tomb shouts to us:

I know that my Redeemer lives,
and that in the end he will stand upon the earth.
And after my skin has been destroyed,
yet in my flesh I will see God;
I myself will see him with my own eyes -- I, and not another. (Job 19:25-27)

The victory chant of Job can be our own.

This is what the empty tomb shouts to us: "It is finished!" Hold that confidence in your head and heart the next time you sit in a funeral home, shoulders slumped, handkerchief in hand, staring at the open casket of your loved one. If Satan uses that casket to whisper his lies, "Your loved one is gone. You'll never see him again," send the devil packing with the confident confession of St. Paul: "We believe that Jesus died and rose again and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him.... We will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage each other with these words." (1 Thessalonians 4:14,17-18) For the Christian, death is not an end -- it is the beginning of the kind of life God has always wanted us to enjoy -- eternal life with him forever where no sin or results of sin will ever trouble us ever again.

But we don't have to wait until heaven to enjoy the blessings of the resurrection. Jesus himself told his disciples, "Peace be with you." That means that no matter how difficult our life on this earth might be, no matter what trials we are experiencing right now, now matter how hopeless it might seem, we are never without hope, we are never without peace. Two members of our congregation will deploy for Iraq this week, and one is already halfway through his second tour of duty. I'm sure they and their parents and siblings have been thinking about this already. Because of Jesus' words, "It is finished!" and his exclamation behind those words shouted by the empty tomb, even if the worst would happen and they lose their lives, they would be with their Savior. As one of their grandmothers said it, "No matter what happens to them -- it's a win-win situation."

That's what it is for every Christian. "Whether we live or die, we are the Lord's." Assured our sins are paid in full, assured of our eternity in heaven, Jesus' empty tomb shouts, "It is finished!" And we shout that everyday by the way we live our Christian lives -- in the hope and certainty of our own resurrection. Amen.