Remember the Example of Jesus' Victory

Remember the example of Jesus’ Victory

Text: I Corinthians 15:50-57

Proposition: Why remember Jesus’ Victory?

When Jesus was crucified His apostles thought that Jesus was dead, and their dreams of Jesus being the Messiah turned into a nightmare. They thought the last several years of their lives with Jesus had ended without Jesus being made known as the Messiah. They thought they had spent those years in vain following Jesus.

When Jesus was arrested the apostles all fled. One young man with them was wearing only a linen sheet. The soldiers grabbed him, but he left the sheet behind and ran away naked. Peter denied Jesus three times. He was afraid of being known as someone who followed Jesus.

When the women who went to Jesus’ tomb and saw the empty tomb, the angel told them to report to His disciples that he had risen no one would believe them. The two men on the road to Emmaus were talking with one another about Jesus.

Luke 24:13-24, these two men were discouraged they thought Jesus had been defeated by death. They hadn’t recognized the victory yet.

Luke 24:25-35, they recognized the victory. They were so excited they didn’t stay in Emmaus. They walked seven miles (Luke 24:13) back to Jerusalem that evening.

When you have victory you are excited and you can’t wait to tell everybody about your victory.

I. Because His Victory gives us an immortal body

II. Death is swallowed up in victory

III. Our toil is not in vain in the Lord

I. Because His Victory gives us an immortal body (What kind of body will we have?)

A. One young man said, “That scares me when you talk about the dead coming to life.”

I said, “Why does that scare you?”

He said, “Zombies.”

I said, “Zombies! What, do Zombies have pieces of flesh missing on their bodies or something?”

He said, “Yes, you can see some of their bones, and they might be missing an arm or a leg because it rotted off.”

He said, “They say when Hell is full. The dead walk the earth, and that’s when the zombies come out.

I said, “You have been watching too many horror movies. When the dead are raised they won’t come out with pieces of flesh missing or missing an arm or a leg. They have a new body. One that is better that the one they had when they died, and you don’t have to worry about Hell getting full. God has plenty of room for all the people who will go there.”

B. Our bodies will be more glorious than what we have now.

1. I Corinthians 15:35-37

2. A seed isn’t that impressive to look at they aren’t very glorious. I visited Seymour this week and Melvin Striet was there. They were talking about musk thistle. Melvin said, “It is amazing that that little tiny seed fall into the dirt and grow into a plant. You wouldn’t think they would be able to survive.” A musk thistle seed doesn’t look anything like the plant it grows into. I don’t like musk thistle, but they do make some pretty purple flowers.

3. People don’t spend much time admiring the beauty of a seed, but they do admire the beauty of the plant that they become.

4. Our bodies are like that seed. Someday they will be glorious.

5. I Corinthians 15:38-44

6. There will be no more hip replacements. No more knee replacements. No more surgery. No more sickness. No more X-rays. No more cat scans.

7. One old man said, “It is terrible getting old. I can’t do anything, but sit here.”

8. Solomon called old age the evil days.

9. Ecclesiastes 12:1-6

10. Remember your Creator while your eyes can see. While you can stand up straight. Before your teeth fall out. Before your hearing goes bad, but you can’t sleep very good and you wake up at the sound of a bird. Before you are afraid of slipping on the ice in the winter so you stay home and don’t go anywhere. Remember him before you return to the dust.

11. Revelation 21:3-4

12. If you remember him while you are young and don’t forget him when you are old you will one day have a body like that of Jesus.

C. Our bodies will be like Jesus' body

1. I Corinthians 15:45-49

2. I don’t know exactly what Jesus’ resurrected body was like, but we do know some things.  Between His resurrection and His ascention:

a. He had flesh and bones

b. He could appear and disappear at will through closed or locked doors

c. He could ascend or descend

d. He could change his appearance (Mark 16:12)

e. He could be recognized or not at will

f. He was not merely a spirit Luke 24:39. He could eat food. Jesus ate a piece of broiled fish after he resurrected

g. Our physical bodies are just like Adam’s, but our spiritual bodies will be like Christ’s

II. Death is swallowed up in victory   (How is death swallowed up in victory?)

A. The sting of death is sin

1. Jesus has removed the sting of death

2. If I catch a wasp and I get some tweezers and pull out his stinger, how much power does he have over me now? None

3. If there were no sin there would be no death.

4. Genesis 2:16-17

5. Adam and Eve ate from the tree. They sinned and death entered into the world.

6. Sin is the reason that we die.

7. Jesus has given us the power to overcome sin and have eternal life.

8. Romans 6:15-23

B. The power of sin is the law

1. Romans 4:15

2. If there is no law. There is no transgression.

3. Jesus took the law and nailed it to the cross.

4. Colossians 2:11-14

5. The law has no more power over us.

6. Jesus' death took the place of my death for breaking the law. All of us have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We deserve eternal death for our sin, but Jesus has given us life by the sacrifice of himself.

C. The gates of Hades can’t overpower the church.

1. Matthew 16:18-21

2. Hades – the unseen abode of the dead.

3. Death overpowers almost everything. Jesus promised to build His church and the gates of Hades would not overpower it. Then Jesus told the disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, be killed, and rise the third day. Peter and the apostles didn’t understand this. When Jesus was crucified they thought that the gates of Hades had overpowered the church; it hadn’t. Jesus came out of the tomb and the gates of Hades have never stopped his church. His kingdom has no end.

4. Sometimes we get discouraged and we think the church is going to die. Churches in certain locations do die. The church at Ephesus is dead. There is no church in Ephesus today. There is not even a city where Ephesus was.

5. Jesus said the Church in Sardis was dead, Revelation 3:1.

6. There were still churches in other places that were alive and growing.

7. There may be times when the situation for the church may not be good. There were times in the Old Testament when the truth almost disappeared.

a. II Kings 22:8, the book of the law was lost, but Hilkiah the priest found it and there was a great revival. Josiah broke down all the idols and altars to foreign gods.   He removed the sodomites, witches, and mediums from the land, II Kings 23:24

b. Daniel 8:9-14 During the days of the little horn, the Grecian Ruler Antiochus Epiphanies, truth was flung to the ground. Now it came to pass, after two years, in the hundred forty and fifth year, on the twenty-fifth day of that month which is by us called Chasleu, and by the Macedonians Apelleus, in the hundred and fifty-third Olympiad, that the king came up to Jerusalem, and, pretending peace, he got possession of the city by treachery; at which time he spared not so much as those that admitted him into it, on account of the riches that lay in the temple; but, led by his covetous inclination, (for he saw there was in it a great deal of gold, and many ornaments that had been dedicated to it of very great value,) and in order to plunder its wealth, he ventured to break the league he had made. So he left the temple bare, and took away the golden candlesticks, and the golden altar [of incense], and table [of shew-bread], and the altar [of burnt-offering]; and did not abstain from even the veils, which were made of fine linen and scarlet. He also emptied it of its secret treasures, and left nothing at all remaining; and by this means cast the Jews into great lamentation, for he forbade them to offer those daily sacrifices which they used to offer to God, according to the law. And when he had pillaged the whole city, some of the inhabitants he slew, and some he carried captive, together with their wives and children, so that the multitude of those captives that were taken alive amounted to about ten thousand. He also burnt down the finest buildings; and when he had overthrown the city walls, he built a citadel in the lower part of the city, for the place was high, and overlooked the temple; on which account he fortified it with high walls and towers, and put into it a garrison of Macedonians. However, in that citadel dwelt the impious and wicked part of the [Jewish] multitude, from whom it proved that the citizens suffered many and sore calamities. And when the king had built an idol altar upon God's altar, he slew swine upon it, and so offered a sacrifice neither according to the law, nor the Jewish religious worship in that country. He also compelled them to forsake the worship which they paid their own God, and to adore those whom he took to be gods; and made them build temples, and raise idol altars in every city and village, and offer swine upon them every day. He also commanded them not to circumcise their sons, and threatened to punish any that should be found to have transgressed his injunction. He also appointed overseers, who should compel them to do what he commanded. And indeed many Jews there were who complied with the king's commands, either voluntarily, or out of fear of the penalty that was denounced. But the best men, and those of the noblest souls, did not regard him, but did pay a greater respect to the customs of their country than concern as to the punishment which he threatened to the disobedient; on which account they every day underwent great miseries and bitter torments; for they were whipped with rods, and their bodies were torn to pieces, and were crucified, while they were still alive, and breathed. They also strangled those women and their sons whom they had circumcised, as the king had appointed, hanging their sons about their necks as they were upon the crosses. And if there were any sacred book of the law found, it was destroyed, and those with whom they were found miserably perished also. (Josephus, Book 12, Chap.5, Sec. 4)

c. Daniel 8:25, Antiochus didn’t win. He was broken without human agency. Mattathias and his 5 sons known as the Maccabees fought against Antiochus with small armies and defeated Antiochus many times.

d. Finally God struck Antiochus 2Ma 9:4 Then swelling with anger. he thought to avenge upon the Jews the disgrace done unto him by those that made him flee. Therefore commanded he his chariotman to drive without ceasing, and to dispatch the journey, the judgment of God now following him. For he had spoken proudly in this sort, That he would come to Jerusalem and make it a common burying place of the Jews.

2Ma 9:5 But the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, smote him with an incurable and invisible plague: or as soon as he had spoken these words, a pain of the bowels that was remediless came upon him, and sore torments of the inner parts;

2Ma 9:6 And that most justly: for he had tormented other men's bowels with many and strange torments.

2Ma 9:7 Howbeit he nothing at all ceased from his bragging, but still was filled with pride, breathing out fire in his rage against the Jews, and commanding to haste the journey: but it came to pass that he fell down from his chariot, carried violently; so that having a sore fall, all the members of his body were much pained.

2Ma 9:8 And thus he that a little afore thought he might command the waves of the sea, (so proud was he beyond the condition of man) and weigh the high mountains in a balance, was now cast on the ground, and carried in an horselitter, shewing forth unto all the manifest power of God.

2Ma 9:9 So that the worms rose up out of the body of this wicked man, and whiles he lived in sorrow and pain, his flesh fell away, and the filthiness of his smell was noisome to all his army.

d.  Daniel 2:44, All the kingdoms in the kings statue dream Babylon, Medes and Persians, Greece, and Rome all came to an end. In the days of the Roman Empire God set up a kingdom that will have no end.

e. Daniel 7:13-18, the victory belongs to Jesus and to us because we are a part of his kingdom, the church.

f. Many have fought against Jesus and his kingdom. All of the apostles were executed except John. The church has been persecuted and is still persecuted all over the world. Men try to prove His word as false

g. Jeremiah 23:29, His word is like fire and a hammer it destroys whatever comes against it.

h. The gates of Hades tried to keep his kingdom from coming. The gates of Hades have tried to keep his kingdom from existing, but victory belongs to Jesus. Hades has lost its power.

III. Conclusion:  Our toil is not in vain in the Lord (Why is our toil not is vain?)

A. Jesus has given us the victory. When you lose a war all the hard work, blood, sweat, tears, planning, and money you have put into the effort, is lost. It is in vain. But when you win all the spoils of war are yours. All the time, money, blood, sweat, tears, planning and money have paid off. There is rejoicing in the streets and the soldiers can come home.

B. The church is a victorious army. Paul told Timothy, “Suffer hardship with me as a good soldier of Christ Jesus,” II Timothy 2:3

C. A good Christian soldier has to be steadfast and immoveable. He may get discouraged sometimes, but the goal of victory is in his mind. He pursues his enemy and gives him no rest. When his enemy attacks he stands his ground and doesn’t give in. Sometimes he may lose a battle and have to retreat and be in hiding for a while. His comrades may fall and the numbers in his army may shrink, but he has faith in his supreme commander that victory is coming. Even if his enemy kills him. He knows that his enemy hasn’t won. Because He will rise again. His supreme commander will destroy all the enemies

D. Revelation 19:11-21

E. The victory is ours. Jesus our Supreme Commander is unstoppable