What's So Special About Jesus?
Tom Shrader presents the second message in a four-week evangelistic series called 'How to Know,' making the case that Jesus is uniquely God incarnate based on His miraculous birth, His own claims to forgive sin and be one with the Father, and His predicted and confirmed resurrection. Drawing from John 10, Matthew 1, Luke 1, and Acts 2, Shrader walks through ten questions that distinguish Jesus from every other person who has ever lived. The teaching closes with a call to personal faith, urging listeners to place their trust in Christ rather than in their own goodness, and to live in light of His promised return.
“The resurrection is God's amen to Jesus — 'It is finished.' Jesus cried out on the cross, 'It is finished,' and on that Sunday resurrection morning, God says amen. It's true. Jesus rose from the dead.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: How to Know (2006)
Recorded: 2006 at East Valley Bible Church
Duration: 45 min
Themes: who is jesus, salvation, resurrection, faith, sin, eternal life, trust in christ, evangelism, seeking answers about faith, skeptic, new believer, questioning christianity, spiritually lost, young adult, unchurched, exploring christianity
Scripture: Luke 1:26-33, Matthew 1:18-25, John 1:1, Colossians 1:16-17, Acts 2:22, Matthew 9:2-8, John 10:24-31, Matthew 16:21, Acts 2:29-32, Luke 24:50-53, Acts 1:9-11, John 14:1-3, Revelation 22:20, 1 Thessalonians 4:14-18
Theological Themes: incarnation, deity of christ, virgin birth, atonement, justification, soteriology, forgiveness of sin, second coming
Full Transcript
Introduction
We started last week a four-week series, a follow-up to Easter, and we titled the series *How to Know*. I told you last week, and I believe it with all my heart, that if you could only attend one series in this church — or really any Bible study anywhere — this was the most important series you could ever study. If you don't get this, then everything else we share with you may have some value and may be good advice, but it will ultimately fail you. Because if you don't get this, you'll spend eternity separated from God. I could not exaggerate or overemphasize the importance of this series.
Here is what we said we are going to do. We said we are going to expose a need, present the solution, try to explain that solution, and in the fourth week ask you to respond. You can respond at any place along the way, and we'll stop and say that maybe God is talking to you and now is your time. The four titles are these: *What's the Matter with People?* — last week; *What's So Special About Jesus?* — today; *What Was Behind the Death of Jesus?* — next week; and on the fourteenth of May, *How You Can Know Him*.
Review: What's the Matter with People?
We did this last week, and again this week, with a series of questions. Last week there were ten questions, and the basic question was this: what's the matter with people? The answer is sin. When we break God's law, God doesn't call it a misjudgment or a mistake or a miscalculation — He says you have sinned. Sin came into the world through Adam, and every person who has ever lived or ever will live is contaminated by sin. God will deal with that sin.
All of us fall short. We miss the mark. We sin. In and of ourselves, there is no hope. The consequence of sin in this life is that we are enslaved to it, in bondage to it. The consequence of sin in the next life is that we spend eternity separated from God in a place called hell. There is nothing you can do on your own to remedy that situation.
Someone was talking to another person before the first hour this morning. They mentioned that some friends had been here last week, and as they summarized it, they said it was a very, very negative message. I understand that. If you are sitting there listening for forty-five minutes and listening closely, you are hearing that there is something desperately wrong with you — that everything isn't okay, that everything isn't going to turn out okay, and that you are not a child of God by nature.
By nature, the Bible says, you are a child of wrath. You are a son of disobedience. When Jesus was dealing with the Pharisees, He said to them even more strongly, "You are of your father — the devil." That is how we are naturally as we come into the world. It is so important for us to establish that.
So often it seems we race off to talk about Jesus the deliverer, Jesus the Savior, Jesus the one who will rescue you — and the person on the other side has no idea what they need to be rescued from, delivered from, or saved from. They don't see that there is anything wrong at all. The view of sin becomes very casual: nobody's perfect, I'm not Saddam Hussein, I'm not Hitler, I'm not Jeffrey Dahmer, I'm just me, I've made a few mistakes, and if God is a God of love, I don't see how He could possibly send someone like me — flawed but sincere and nice — to hell. That is the view, and I understand it.
There was a sense of heaviness last week, and I acknowledged it. When somebody tells you that you are hopeless and helpless and there is nothing you can do, that is serious business. It is not positive thinking. It is not how to thrive in a difficult world. This is serious business.
What's So Special About Jesus?
Here is where the solution begins. Today we are going to ask ten questions, and they are going to flow around this: what is so special about Jesus? What separates Jesus from everyone else? What makes Jesus unique and different?
There are seven billion people on the earth now. As many as seven billion people may have already lived — perhaps more. Let's say fourteen, fifteen, sixteen billion people have inhabited the earth since God's creation. In this whole span, what makes Jesus different from every other person who has ever walked the face of the earth?
Question One: What Did God Tell Mary Before Jesus Was Conceived?
Here is the first question. In Luke chapter 1, verse 26, an angel is sent to Mary. Elizabeth, her cousin, is in the sixth month of her pregnancy — her son will be John the Baptist. The angel appears to a virgin, a woman who has never been with a man physically, engaged to a man whose name is Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name is Mary. Coming to her, he said, "Greetings, favored one. The Lord is with you."
Mary begins to hear this entire account, and she begins to hear about the virgin birth. Look at verse 29 — she was perplexed. Can we acknowledge that the virgin birth is a difficult thing to get your arms around? If you don't believe in miracles, you are going to have a hard time at this point. If you don't believe in the supernatural, this is never going to work for you.
If you are wondering about the virgin birth, you are in very good company — because the first person to question the virgin birth was Mary herself.
The Angel's Announcement to Mary
The very first thing Mary is told is that this will be an extraordinary birth. The angel says, "Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name Him Jesus. He will be great. He will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David. He will reign over the house of Jacob, and His kingdom will have no end." The message is clear: Mary's son will be God incarnate.
What Made Jesus' Birth Different?
Matthew chapter 1 gives us the backdrop. "The birth of Jesus Christ was as follows. His mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph before they came together. She was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit." Mary and Joseph were engaged, Mary was pregnant, and they had not yet come together physically.
There is a point here that could cause some confusion. The text refers to them as engaged, yet Joseph is called her husband, and some translations even speak of him intending to divorce her secretly. In that day and age, engagement was almost the same as marriage, without any physical union. There was a betrothal period of about a year, and the relationship was so binding and so intended to lead to marriage that severing it required a formal decree of separation.
Joseph's Very Human Response
It is important not to sterilize this account or treat these two as cardboard cutout biblical characters with no emotion or feeling. Slide into Joseph's sandals for a moment. You are engaged, you know you have never been with this woman physically, and now you hear she is pregnant. That is a crushing thing to process. Every natural human reaction — the questions, the anger, the hurt — would flow out of that moment.
And yet, even in the midst of what was surely some anger and frustration, Joseph is deeply concerned about Mary. Even as he decides to end the relationship, verse 19 tells us he plans to do it secretly. It is my personal view that Joseph and Mary carried this stigma with them all through life. Even as Jesus was being addressed publicly, people would scoff back to His beginnings. Everyone in the community would have known about the cloud hanging over this birth and conception from the very outset. People love this kind of thing — the minute it hit the street, they could not wait to tell one another.
Do Not Be Afraid
There is another practical piece here in Matthew chapter 1, verse 20. "When he had considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said to Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid." It is the very same thing the angel said to Mary in Luke chapter 1, verse 30: "Do not be afraid."
This is worth pausing on, because this is the most frequent prohibition Scripture gives us. Do not be afraid. We see it throughout the Old Testament — to Abraham, to Joseph, to David, to Joshua — over and over again. We see it throughout the New Testament as well, spoken to the disciples and to those gathered around. Do not be afraid. And it is entirely applicable to you and me today.
Why should we not be afraid? Not because the world is not scary — it is a very scary world. Not because we will avoid trauma — we will not. In fact, this idea absorbed me so completely that I developed an entire talk around it, which I have delivered in many different settings — cross-generational, across economic differences, all kinds of demographics. I ask people what they think other people are afraid of, and no matter the group, I get the same list every time: loneliness, rejection, suffering, not having enough money, physical pain, death. There are a few others, but that is the core of it.
Jesus says to you and me today, "Do not be afraid," because He is the antidote to every one of those fears. You will be lonely — sometimes because everyone around you has left, and sometimes in the middle of a crowded stadium. You will be rejected by people you love and have invested in heavily. There will be physical pain. There will be emotional and physical suffering. There may be times of economic insufficiency, times when you wonder whether you will have enough. Jesus is the antidote to all of those.
Fearless, Joyful, and Troubled
A Christian should be completely fearless, continually joyful, and constantly in trouble. We should have placed our faith and trust in Jesus Christ, and He said, what are they going to do to you? Kill you? No matter how bad things get, it can only last a lifetime. We should not be afraid of anything. Whatever you are afraid of, Jesus is the antidote.
Death is the number one fear. We are not afraid of death. We may be a little intimidated by the dying process, but not by death itself, because to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.
I am convinced — and this is the first time I am trying this out in public — that God wants to make certain our circumstances never get too stable. That we are always in flux and never quite sure, circumstantially, what is going to take place. Because as things get stable and predictable and solid, we tend to rely more on ourselves than on Him.
When He really jerks our chain, pulls the rug out from under us, kicks the slats out of our plan, we find ourselves saying, this wasn't what I wanted, this wasn't what I thought, this isn't the way I scripted this. And now we are running to Him and clinging to Him. That is why I think we are constantly troubled — that is the Christian life.
But if I know Jesus and understand who God is, all of a sudden I have His perspective on everything, and things fall into place of their own accord. It does not mean things get better. It just means I now understand that God is in control.
The Prophecies Surrounding Jesus' Birth
We are still in Matthew 1. The angel appears and makes the statement: she will bear a Son, you will name Him Jesus, and He will save His people from their sin. This took place in fulfillment of prophecy, and they quote from the Old Testament — the coming Messiah, the one the nation had heard about again and again for thousands of years, and for whom they had long anticipated this moment.
If we take just Jesus' birth and life, there are as many as 62 or 63 specific prophecies fulfilled in His birth and His life. If we calculate that numerically, it makes it almost statistically impossible that He could be anything but the Messiah.
There is also a practical note I cannot pass over. Look at verse 24: "Joseph awoke from his sleep and did as the angel of the Lord commanded him." That is pretty good advice. Your life is going to work a whole lot better if you do what God commands you to do.
And then, because we have guests here, I will not skip verse 25: he kept her a virgin until she gave birth to his son, and she called him Joseph. If you are from a Catholic tradition, as I am, you were taught that Mary was perpetually a virgin. That is simply not scripturally accurate. And practically speaking, that is not a model for marriage.
When Did Jesus' Life Begin?
Here is the next question: when did Jesus' life begin? In John chapter 1, Jesus is mentioned, referred to as "the Word," something like 14 or 15 times in that chapter. You will see the capital W, which indicates it refers to Jesus. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."
When did Jesus' life begin? Never. Jesus existed eternally. When I think of eternity, I tend to hit fast forward and go that direction — but it is not just that way, it is both ways. He is eternal.
Paul writes in Colossians chapter 1, verse 16: "For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and the earth, visible, invisible, thrones, dominions, rulers, authorities — all things have been created by Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together." Jesus did not begin to exist at the point of His birth. He is God and He is eternal. His physical life, as we know it, began at the point of birth.
The Question of When Life Begins
I cannot resist making a practical application here, because we as a nation continue to wrestle with this. We still have 1.234 million abortions every year, and the question in the debate used to be: when does life begin? Even those who were pro-choice would raise that question. They have subsequently given that argument up, because the more technology we have, the more quickly we can see life and the beginnings of life.
I read an article recently where a group of neurologists suggested that if you are going to abort a baby at 11 weeks or after, you should administer something to the fetus to kill the pain. If that is the case, what is it if not a baby? That argument, by the way, is being won — even if it does not feel like it. The latest statistics show that younger people, college freshmen and sophomores —
The Logic of Life
These people are not just pro-life but they are anti-abortion. I understand how emotionally charged that issue is, but as you begin to peel away the emotion, it becomes a very easy, logical argument to win.
The illustration that slams the door shut for me is this: suppose you have an uncle, and you get a call and go to the hospital, and your uncle is lying there in a coma. The doctors come out and say, "He is a flat-liner. There is nothing here. We are sustaining life, but he will never recover. There is no hope." Now, I understand that is a very difficult question. But if someone came in and said, "Yes, right now he is in a coma, yes, right now there are not many signs, but if you just wait seven months, he will be up jumping around, bouncing around, crying, taking food," there is not one person who would say, "Pull the plug on the guy." That is exactly what we do with an abortion.
I think it is a very easy argument to win logically, but emotion is what clouds it. A few years ago, during Christmas week, I was sitting at home when a lady called me. I did not know her — she had gotten my name from this church and from Priority Living and some other things. She came over and she was pregnant, and the doctor who had impregnated her, along with other doctors, told her — she was due in about two or three weeks — that they needed to take the baby, that there was no chance the baby would live.
I said, "What do you want me to do?" She said, "I want you to pray for me, because I am going to keep this baby. I do not know what God will do, but I know the baby is alive — I can feel him kicking." Maybe a year or two ago, she was here at the back with a little two-year-old boy, bouncing him around.
What Did Jesus Do to Distinguish Himself?
That brings us to the next question: what did Jesus do to distinguish Himself from everyone else? Peter is delivering this extraordinary message, recorded by Luke in Acts chapter 2, verse 22. He says, "Men of Israel, listen to these words: Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs, which God performed through Him in your midst, just as you yourselves know."
I wrote down the phrase "supernatural miracles" and then laughed, because it is a bit redundant. We throw that term around rather loosely — "I'm going to get home by five o'clock, it'll be a miracle," or "The kids' room was cleaned, it was a miracle." A miracle is a suspension or a reversal of the laws of nature. Webster struggles a little here and offers several definitions, but the one that applies is this: "An extraordinary event manifesting divine intervention in human affairs." Again — a suspension or reversal of the laws of nature.
I turn on the television or read the religious section of the newspaper and see announcements all the time: "We're going to have a miracle service." Then I watch, and it is really not much. There is a ringing in someone's ear — well, I have ringing in my ear and it goes away and comes back. There is a soreness in someone's neck — well, you are getting old. I want to see actual miracles. I want to take one of these miracle workers right over to Green Acres cemetery, get the TV cameras, let them pick any tomb they want, and watch someone come popping out. That is what I want to see.
I love Jesus at Lazarus's tomb. "Lazarus, come forth." Lazarus has been dead four days. He certainly smells. And Lazarus comes forth. Jesus distinguished Himself from everyone else by the miracles He performed under His own power.
What Did Jesus Claim to Be Able to Do?
The next question is: what did Jesus claim to be able to do? In Matthew chapter 9, we have an account we see echoed throughout the Gospels. They bring a paralytic, lying on a bed, to Jesus. In verse 2, Jesus said to the paralytic, "Take courage, son; your sins are forgiven." The scribes said to themselves, "This fellow blasphemes."
Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said, "What are you thinking? What kind of evil is in your hearts?" They said He was blaspheming because He claimed He could forgive sin. Only God can forgive sin — that is what we see throughout Scripture. When someone sins, what do they say? "I have sinned against the Lord." When David is confronted with his sin with Bathsheba, that is exactly what he said: "I have sinned against the Lord." Only God has been sinned against, and therefore only God can forgive sin.
Jesus understood this is what these men were thinking, so He said, "What is easier to say — 'Your sins are forgiven,' or 'Get up and walk'?" The answer is obvious. Anyone could say "Your sins are forgiven" — it is hard to collect empirical data for that. It is far easier to say than "Get up and walk" to a man who has never walked. So Jesus turned to the paralytic and said, "So that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sin" — and He said to the paralytic — "Get up, pick up your bed and go home." He got up and went away. The crowd saw this, was awestruck, and glorified God who had given such authority to men.
Here is what Jesus claims to be able to do: to forgive sin. Only God can do that.
Who Did Jesus Say He Was?
That leads us to the next question: who did Jesus say He was? John chapter 10 is one of those chapters you return to again and again — it is so rich. In verse 24, the Jewish leaders gathered around Him and said, "How long will you keep us in suspense?"
Jesus Claims to Be God
"If you're the Christ, tell us plainly." If you're the Messiah, if you're the one that's been promised, if all of the Old Testament is pointing to you, tell us plainly. Now, you will have people in your life who will say Jesus never claimed to be God. Great man, great teacher, did some extraordinary things, but He never said He was God. Well, flip right here and look at His response. He does a little commentary in verses 25 through 29.
Jesus said, "I told you this already, but you don't believe. The works that I do, I do in My Father's name, but you do not believe because you're not of My sheep. My sheep hear My voice, I know them, and they follow Me. I give eternal life to them, they'll never perish, no one can snatch them out of My hand." That is a wonderful, condensed version of the doctrines of grace. My sheep are out there, and only My sheep hear My voice, and I give them eternal life, and they will be with Me forever. No one can separate this. "My Father who has given them to Me is greater than all. No one is able to snatch them out of My Father's hand."
John 10:30: "I and the Father are one." We may be somewhat confused by that in this day and age, but the Jews were not. Verse 31: they picked up stones again to stone Him. Jesus answered and said, "I showed you many good works from My Father; for which of these are you stoning Me?" And the Jews answered, "For a good work we do not stone you, but for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself out to be God."
Who did Jesus say He was? He said, "I am God." I can forgive sin, I do these miracles, I am God. There is no ambiguity. When you see Me, you have seen the Father. If you want a sense of who God is, look at Me. If you want to understand the attributes of God, here they are in the flesh. "I and the Father are one."
What Jesus Predicted
Consider what Jesus predicted. Matthew chapter 16, verse 21: "From this time on, Jesus began to show the disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, be killed and be raised from the dead."
He predicted two things, and both are important. The first is His death — which, by the way, is not a major accomplishment on its own. A couple of years ago when Steve Allen died, I love Steve Allen. I thought Steve Allen was just so brilliant and clever. I knew Larry King would do something special that night, so I tuned in to watch the tribute. That night, Don Rickles, Carl Reiner, and Larry King all predicted that one day they too would die. That just is not a big thing. If you want to make a prediction you know is going to come true, go with that one — you are going to die.
So yes, Jesus predicted His death. But He also predicted the resurrection, and you cannot separate the death of Jesus from the resurrection of Jesus. Jesus predicted that His death would involve suffering, hardship, and pain. He is a suffering Messiah. He predicted that He would die, and He predicted that He would rise from the dead.
The Resurrection: God's Amen
What happened to Jesus after He died? Return to that sermon in Acts chapter 2, where Peter is speaking to a predominantly, if not exclusively, Jewish audience. He reminds them of David the patriarch — the great man, the prophet, the wonderful king. He says in verse 29, "Brethren, I may confidently say to you regarding the patriarch David that he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us today."
Peter is saying: David is about as great as it gets when you are talking about the Jewish people. David lived, David died, David was buried, and he is still buried. We have his tomb with us today. Then verse 32: "This Jesus God raised up again, to which we are all witnesses."
I love this. The resurrection is God's amen to Jesus. Jesus cries out on the cross, "It is finished." We have been redeemed. And on that Sunday resurrection morning, God says amen — it is true. Jesus rose from the dead. This is a big deal. No one else has done this. He said He forgives sin, which makes Him God. He claimed to be God. He did the miracles. And then He rose from the dead.
Disproving the Resurrection
I said it to you on Easter morning, and maybe you are here today still in the same condition. If you want to take Christianity and knock it over, blow it down, all you have to do is disprove the resurrection. I encourage you to try, because many — perhaps some of them bigger and better than you — have tried, and they have not only failed, but many have been converted in the process.
I had not been a Christian very long when I was invited out on a Saturday to Scottsdale Bible Church, where Josh McDowell was speaking. Josh McDowell has done so many different things over the years. He wrote that classic work that everybody recommends. Most of the time it will be a lady who comes to me and says, "Do you have something for my husband? He's really analytical, he's really bright." I will always say, give him a copy of *Evidence That Demands a Verdict*, Volume 1 and 2 — which probably Josh himself has not read all the way through — and let him knock himself out with it. Somewhere in *Evidence That Demands a Verdict*, there is a section —
The Resurrection
Jesus predicted that He would rise from the dead, and in fact He did. He rose from the dead — indisputable, really. Josh McDowell addressed this thoroughly in his work *Evidence That Demands a Verdict*, and at one point he lifted that material out and took a resurrection seminar around the country. There was also a little book published called *The Resurrection Factor*. It has long been out of print, but you can find it every once in a while at Central Christian where they carry used books. Both resources ground you in all of the empirical data that supports the resurrection.
The Ascension
The next question to consider is: what was the concluding event of Jesus' time on earth? Luke wrote a gospel that bears his name, and sometimes we forget that he also wrote volume two, called the book of Acts. At the end of Luke's gospel, he talks about how Jesus led them out as far as Bethany, and He lifted up His hands and He blessed them, and while He was blessing them, He parted from them and was carried up into heaven. And they, after worshiping Him, returned to Jerusalem with great joy and were continually in the temple praising God.
I want to apply this before moving on. Do you see that? When they understood and saw not just the resurrection but now the ascension, they praised Him, they worshiped Him — verse 52 of Luke 24 — and they were filled with great joy. Why? Because a Christian is completely fearless and continuously joyful and constantly troubled.
In the book of Acts — volume two — Luke has them together again. Jesus imparts to His disciples and followers these extraordinary, familiar, important words: "You'll be My witnesses when you receive the power of the Holy Spirit come upon you. Be My witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, even the remotest parts of the earth." And after He had said these things, Acts 1:9, He was lifted up while they were looking at Him and received in a cloud, and as they were gazing intently into the sky while He was departing.
I want you to get that scene if you can imagine it. There He is — and there He goes. I always think of a space launch or a shuttle launch where they have the camera not on the rocket ship but on the audience, and you always see everyone doing the same thing. Nobody is looking around. Everybody is watching as it goes up. They are gazing intently, gazing intently, wondering, dreaming.
Then behold, two men in white clothes stood beside them and said, "Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus who has been taken up from you" — the same Jesus, by the way, the same Jesus that walked with you, the same Jesus that died, the same Jesus that rose again — now it is the same Jesus that has ascended into heaven. "He will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go."
Living After the Ascension
Now we take that and marry it with Luke's gospel. They praise Him. They worship Him. They understand who He is. That is what happens when we understand this — all of a sudden we get to praise Him and worship Him, and we are filled with joy. But then an interesting thing happens: they go back to living.
Everything in me would want to hold onto that moment. There has to be a sense in which the rest of life, whatever you have left of it, feels like a letdown. If your life were somehow charted as a curve, it would seem like that was the peak and everything is over after that. We are not going to top that one. So what do they do? They go right back and start to live for Him.
And I think they do top it, because they begin to see now not just Jesus as who He was, but how Jesus has transformed them. Their lives change. God uses them to share the gospel. God demonstrates His power all around them.
The Promise of Christ's Return
That brings us to the last question: what did Jesus say He would do in the future? Look at John chapter 14. The night before He was killed, Jesus gathered all the disciples together and said, "Do not let your hearts be troubled." There it is again — similar to "do not be afraid." Jesus understands what is about to happen. He understands that difficulty is coming. "Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God. Believe also in Me. In My Father's house are many dwellings. If it were not so, I would have told you. For I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am there you may be also."
Jesus says He is going away to prepare a place for us, but He will come again. When? The very last words Jesus gives us in the New Testament, in Revelation chapter 22 verse 20, are these: "Yes, I am coming soon." Jesus is coming again, and we are to live in light of that as though it could happen at any moment.
Paul writes in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, speaking about these last days, resurrections, and all that goes on. He says this, in verse 14: "For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Christ" — those who have died first. "For this we say to you by the word of the Lord" — God has told us this, we know it is true — "that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord shall not be preceded by those who have fallen asleep." Here is what is happening: "For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ" — those who are saved, those who know Jesus Christ —
He Is Coming Again
Those who have placed their faith and trust in Him as Lord and Savior will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and thus we shall always be with the Lord. He is coming again for His people. He is coming again, and there will be that moment of condemnation and judgment and reward.
We so often focus on this event that we miss the application of it. Look at 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, verse 18: "Therefore comfort one another with these words." He is our hope. He is our future. Death is not the end.
What It Means to Be in Christ
We talked last week about how hopeless and helpless we are, but this can be your future. Did you see the little phrase Paul uses? If I am in Christ — what does that mean? It means that I believe Jesus is who He said He was, that I believe I am who God says I am, and that I trust Him, not myself, for my salvation.
There is this moment of believing that Jesus is God come in the flesh, and that when He died on the cross, He died in your place. You believe it and you accept it. It is not just a mental ascent — it is as though I say, not only do I believe it, I am going to live the rest of my life based on this.
That is why I said at the beginning: if you do and follow all the other things we talk about — money, family, how to live, lifestyle — you can follow all of those, but if you do not have this, it is nothing more than good advice.
The Flip Side: A Reason to Fear
When He says, "Do not be afraid," let me give you the flip side of this. If you do not know Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you should be afraid of everything. You should be petrified to pull out onto Elliot today, for fear somebody would make a poor judgment of distance and — bam — there you are, spending eternity separated from Him in a place called hell.
Looking Back at This Series
Over these four weeks I have been very deliberate. What is the matter with people? Sin — and our sin has separated us from God. What is so special about Jesus? Jesus is who He said He was. He is God come in the flesh.
He did miracles. He said He could forgive sin, and then He did miracles to verify that. He said He would be killed, and then He said He would rise again — God's amen to Jesus: it is finished. Then He ascends into heaven, not before predicting that He will come again.
What Is Next
What about that central event in the history of mankind — the epicenter in the history of mankind — the death of Jesus? What was behind His death? What does the Bible tell us about His arrest and His trial, about the crimes He was charged with, His guilt or innocence, and what happened when He was crucified? And is there a connection between Jesus' mission on this earth to save His people from their sins and the crucifixion? Next week we will pick up right there.
Closing Prayer
Father, we come before You as Your people, and we thank You that we are completely fearless and can be continuously joyful, and yet we are constantly troubled. Father, I pray for those who are here who are saying, not quite yet — I do not get it. God, open their eyes.
We continue to pray individually and collectively for those that You bring into this building, that You would save them, that You would make them aware of their sin, and help them in a sense to connect the dots — to explain the frustration in their life, the emptiness in their life — that they do not need to live this way, because there is hope, and hope in You and You alone. God, open our eyes to see that. We pray it in Jesus' name, amen.