Participants:
Series Code: ICJ
Program Code: ICJ190021A
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00:01 Why do people say that when a person dies
00:04 he doesn't die, he goes on living? 00:09 Are our eyes deceiving us? 00:35 The book of Revelation starts out with that 00:37 glorious Jesus telling us that He has the keys 00:41 to the grave and to death. 00:43 Now that's good news for those of us 00:45 who are mortal and we are dying, 00:48 and we pass graveyards all the time and we see 00:50 death and destruction all around us. 00:53 And then He tells us why. 00:54 He says, "I was dead, but now I'm alive forever more." 00:59 He's referring, of course, to His resurrection. 01:01 The resurrection of the dead is a huge issue 01:05 and a big wonderful picture, both in the Bible, 01:08 the New Testament, and in the book of Revelation. 01:11 And today we want to take a look and see what 01:13 Jesus actually teaches. 01:15 You know, we live in a world today where people... 01:18 In fact, I had it happen not long ago. 01:21 Somebody passed away and the family thinks, 01:24 "Well, you know, they're up in heaven and they're watching us, 01:29 and they can see us." 01:30 And other people who have had people that didn't live 01:33 too good of a life, they're not too sure 01:35 where they're going. 01:37 In fact, I had a friend of mine who was holding a funeral, 01:40 and somebody had passed away that maybe hadn't 01:42 lived too good of a life. 01:44 And the family came in to him and just insisted 01:47 that he make sure that everybody knows that 01:49 this person is in heaven. 01:51 Well he didn't do that. 01:53 He worked it out. He's a pretty diplomatic fellow. 01:55 But at any rate, we're living in a world today, 01:58 a world that is, what can we say, 02:02 that just believes that you don't die when you die. 02:06 So my question is, are our eyes, our eyes, 02:11 are they deceiving us? 02:14 Well let's look at the teachings of Jesus. 02:16 There's no one more authoritative than Jesus. 02:19 He's the final word. 02:22 He's got the real authority. 02:24 I mean, after all, He's paid it all on Calvary's cross. 02:28 He's the resurrection and the life. 02:30 Let's go to hear what He has to say. 02:33 And we're going to go to John chapter 5. 02:36 And the picture here is the death of somebody 02:40 that's very precious to Jesus. 02:42 One of the homes He loved to go to was the home of 02:44 Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. 02:46 They believed Him, they trusted Him. 02:48 They believed He was the Messiah. 02:50 Jesus was seemingly always surrounded with all kinds of 02:54 controversy and people trying to attack Him, 02:56 and people trying to get Him to say something that 02:58 they could condemn Him with. 03:00 Trying to trap Him because they hated Him so much. 03:04 It's hard for me to believe why people could hate 03:08 this wonderful Savior, this wonderful Savior. 03:11 He loved to go to the home of Martha, and Lazarus, and Mary; 03:15 the three of them, brother and two sisters. 03:19 And He would find peace there. 03:21 He was out teaching somewhere, and Martha and Mary 03:25 sent Him an urgent message. 03:28 And they said to Him, "The one You love is sick." 03:34 And they were hoping, they knew the power of Jesus 03:37 and how God answered His prayers. 03:39 And they were hoping that Jesus would indeed come 03:44 and touch their brother with healing power. 03:48 So here's what Jesus taught. 03:50 When Jesus got there Martha comes out to meet Him, 03:53 and He talks to Martha and He talks to Mary. 03:57 And this is the teaching that He gave them. 04:00 So we're going to John 5:24-30. 04:03 But before He gets to Mary and Martha, 04:05 He's also going to talk to His disciples. 04:08 And we'll see that interchange as well. 04:10 We'll see that interchange also. 04:13 He says, "Most assuredly, I say to you..." 04:16 I want to back up just a little bit. 04:17 I'm telling you the story of Martha and Mary. 04:19 We'll get to that in a moment a little bit more. 04:22 But I'm going to one of the teachings of Jesus 04:25 in John chapter 5, John 5:24-30. 04:29 This is not in the direct story of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, 04:33 but it certainly will fit. 04:34 In just a moment we'll see. 04:36 "Most assuredly, I say to you, that he who hears My word..." 04:41 This is the teaching of Jesus. 04:42 "...and believes in Him who sent Me..." 04:45 Talking about His Father. 04:47 "...has everlasting life..." 04:49 Well, what a great promise that is. 04:51 "...and shall not come into judgment..." 04:53 Amen. 04:55 "...but has passed from death to life." 04:57 What a great promise that is. 04:59 Right from the lips of Jesus. 05:01 So everlasting life comes from having faith in Jesus. 05:06 Faith is how you lay hold on the Son of God. 05:09 And when you lay hold on the Son of God, 05:11 John says in another place, "He who has the Son has life." 05:16 So if you believe in Christ, then you get this 05:19 wonderful promise of everlasting life. 05:21 Now when a person believes, he possesses everlasting life. 05:26 That's a wonderful possession. 05:28 It's a possession you want, I want. 05:31 But the question is, how is it that he possesses 05:35 everlasting life when he still dies? 05:39 And we see people die who give their lives to Christ. 05:42 Many Christians are sleeping in the grave, so to speak, 05:45 that have given their life to Christ. 05:47 Well Jesus is going to explain that. 05:49 And He goes on in chapter 5 verse 25, 05:54 "Most assuredly..." 05:55 I like the old King James that says, "Verily, verily." 05:59 "Most assuredly..." 06:01 That's a good way of translating it too. 06:02 "Truly, truly." 06:04 "...I say to you, the hour is coming..." 06:08 Now notice how Jesus explains this. 06:10 "...the hour is coming, and now is, 06:14 when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God." 06:17 Now that, "now is," I think He's referring to what 06:19 He's about to get ready to do a little later in John 06:23 in resurrecting Lazarus from the dead. 06:25 And we'll see that in a few moments. 06:29 "Most assuredly, I say to you, the hour is coming, and now is, 06:32 when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God; 06:36 and those who hear will live." 06:40 So He's saying that the dead actually will hear 06:45 the voice of the Son of God. 06:46 And it's the hearing of the Son of God 06:48 that makes them live. 06:50 Let's let Jesus go ahead and explain this some more. 06:53 Because it's a very fascinating explanation that Jesus gives. 07:00 So here we go, we'll continue here. 07:02 And He says, "For as the Father has.." 07:05 Let me finish that. 07:06 "...will hear the voice of the Son of God; 07:08 and those who hear will live." 07:09 Verse 26, "For as the Father has life in Himself, 07:13 so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself..." 07:16 So I mentioned in another one of our sessions together 07:20 that Jesus' life is unborrowed and underived. 07:24 Our life is borrowed and derived. 07:28 We do not have immortal life, so to speak. 07:32 We don't just go on living. 07:33 We don't control our own life. 07:35 But God does. He has life within Himself. 07:38 And Jesus has that life. 07:40 Now let's go ahead and listen. 07:42 Verse 27, "...and has given Him," Jesus, "authority 07:46 to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man." 07:52 Now notice several things here. 07:54 And this will get re-emphasized when we get down to verse 28. 07:57 Notice that the dead... 07:59 And verse 28 will tell us, "...who are in the grave..." 08:02 We'll come back to that. 08:04 ...hear the voice of Jesus. 08:07 It's the hearing of the voice of Jesus that makes them live. 08:11 That means that none of the dead right now 08:15 are in heaven, or purgatory, or in hell. 08:20 We're going to talk about hell before we're done here. 08:23 And to my knowledge, there's not a line of Scripture 08:25 that supports purgatory. 08:27 It's totally an invention of the papacy. 08:31 Let me go on here. 08:34 So the dead are not alive right now, but are in the graves 08:40 waiting for the voice of Jesus. 08:43 Now when does that voice come? 08:44 According to the apostle Paul in 2 Thessalonians 4, 08:49 or 1 Thessalonians 4, it comes at the voice 08:53 of the archangel, the trump of God. 08:56 It comes when Jesus comes again. 08:58 And Jesus is that voice that awakes the dead, you see. 09:04 Okay, let's go on here. 09:07 It tells us also that it's at the resurrection 09:11 that Jesus will execute judgment. 09:13 So He's not executing judgment right now. 09:15 He's not sending people to heaven, or to hell, 09:17 or to a non-existent purgatory, so to speak. 09:20 And we'll talk about what hell is too later. 09:23 A lot of people have a lot of misunderstanding 09:25 about that subject. 09:27 And I think the Bible will be clear about it. 09:29 But let's go ahead. 09:31 So notice that the judgment comes at the resurrection. 09:34 Now Jesus goes ahead and explains 09:36 even more what He means. 09:37 And so we're going to verse 28, chapter 5 of the book of John. 09:40 Jesus is speaking. 09:42 "Do not marvel at this." 09:43 He says, "Don't think this can't happen." 09:47 One author that I know says, you know, for us 09:50 the resurrection of the dead is an amazing thing. 09:53 We can hardly understand it. 09:55 In fact, in Jesus' day the Sadducees 09:58 had rejected the resurrection. 10:00 They rejected the resurrection because they couldn't figure out 10:03 scientifically how you could take a body that decomposes 10:07 and returns to the dust, how that could ever come back 10:11 into any kind of living being. 10:12 But that's because they didn't understand the power of God. 10:16 And that's exactly what Jesus told them. 10:18 He said, "You have got a problem." 10:20 In fact, they brought Him a trap question. 10:22 They brought Him a question that says, 10:23 "Here's a man..." 10:25 These are the Sadducees. 10:26 These are the political people that are not really believers, 10:29 but they like power. 10:31 And they're basically in control of Israel when Jesus is there. 10:34 The Pharisees had a lot of power, but they weren't 10:37 sitting in the high priest's seat. 10:39 So these Sadducees brought Jesus this puzzling question. 10:43 They said, "Here's a man who had a wife. 10:45 There are seven brothers. 10:47 And the first brother died." 10:48 And they went all through the whole seven. 10:50 And each one of them married her. 10:52 And finally the seventh brother died, 10:55 and the woman is still alive. 10:56 And they said, "So tell us, in heaven or in the resurrection, 11:02 whose wife will she be?" 11:08 And Jesus' response to them was, 11:10 "You don't know the power of God. 11:11 And you don't know the Scripture." 11:14 And He went ahead and inserted the fact 11:15 there is coming a resurrection. 11:18 You can find Jesus' answer there. 11:20 But I just wanted to underline that fact 11:22 that judgment comes at the resurrection. 11:24 Now let's go on, "Do not marvel at this; 11:26 for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves..." 11:31 Now Jesus is very specific here. 11:34 Those who are in the grave. 11:36 You're not in heaven, not in hell, not in purgatory. 11:38 Not anywhere but in the grave. 11:40 The dead are in the grave, according to Jesus. 11:44 Now if you believe something else, you can argue with Jesus. 11:47 But that's clear as it can be. 11:50 "Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming 11:52 that all who are in the graves will hear His voice..." 11:57 In other words, He wakes them up in the grave 12:00 and brings them out of the grave. 12:03 "...will hear His voice," and notice, "and come forth..." 12:07 Now that's all the dead. 12:09 Everybody that has ever died. 12:11 All the good people, all the wonderful people, 12:14 all the apostles who are in the grave, 12:17 they're going to be resurrected. 12:18 All the bad people like Mao, and Hitler, 12:22 and all those horrible people, and you might can think of 12:25 plenty more, I'm sure, they're all coming up 12:28 out of the grave too. 12:30 Now if you're in Christ, you're not going to be 12:32 subject to judgment. 12:34 Isn't that good news? 12:35 But if you're not in Christ, you're going to face 12:37 the judgment bar of God. 12:40 A judgment bar that many people would fain be 12:43 relieved from, would like to be excused from. 12:49 He goes on to say, "...will hear His voice; 12:52 those that have done good..." 12:53 Two resurrections here. 12:55 "...those who have done good, to the resurrection of life..." 12:58 So there is a resurrection of life. 13:00 And it comes first. 13:03 "...and those who have done evil, 13:06 to the resurrection of condemnation." 13:08 So the resurrection of condemnation comes second. 13:11 Two resurrections. 13:13 Resurrection of life, resurrection of condemnation. 13:16 And Jesus says, "Of Myself I can do nothing. 13:19 As I hear, I judge; and My judgment is righteous, 13:24 because I do not seek My own, but I seek the will of God 13:28 who sent Me." 13:30 We should not be amazed at the ability of Christ 13:34 to resurrect the dead. 13:35 I mean, He knows where every atom is in the universe. 13:39 He doesn't have to put all the same atoms back together, 13:41 I'm not saying that. 13:42 But Jesus has great power. 13:44 He's the incomparable Jesus. 13:46 And He can and will resurrect the dead. |
Revised 2019-11-04