Easter Monday

Welcome back to FCA I hope you enjoyed your Easter weekend. I was on vacation so I know I did. Anyway since Easter is kind of a big deal for us Christians I figured why not have an Easter Monday service. Hopefully we all know about Easter and its meaning. You could call Easter the great trade. I remember in elementary school always trading items in my lunch for other better items. Of course the idea was to trade up. For example if you had carrots you would try to get something like pudding and if you did man you scored. We learn trading at an early age. Now this concept stays with us through our entire life. When we get older we start trading cash for something you want or need. Hopefully before you make that purchase you ask yourself “is it worth it?” For those of you who drive these high gas prices you may seriously be asking yourself “is it worth it?” Now what happens when you have nothing of value to trade? What do you do then? The message of the Gospel is a message of love; it’s a message of grace. See we don’t have to clean up before coming to God; he loves us just as we are. And we can come to him with all our brokenness all our sin. And he takes it…all of it. And he exchanges it for righteousness. See Jesus who was without sin, who knew no sin, took on every sin, every sinful thought, and every sinful action, which would ever take place, so that in him we could become right with God. He made the exchange. See the cross was a symbol of shame and death, but through Christ, death and resurrection becomes a symbol of hope. Today we have a beautiful picture of an exchange that took place. It’s a picture of Jesus on the cross taking on all the sin of the world. And in return we received grace, love and mercy. My prayer is that when we see the cross on a wall, or on a necklace, as a piece of jewelry that we look at it as much more than that.  That we look at it as everything God wants to communicate to us, through the message of the cross.

As we look today, there are 3 messages that are being proclaimed from the cross. The first is that God, HE LOVES YOU. He loves you completely, just the way you are. He demonstrates that love for us. In Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”God didn’t just say “I love you.” He proved it. He sent his son for you. See we are limited by our capacity to love. The world has shown us a different kind of love. That says I’ll love you as long as you love me, but the moment you don’t treat me fairly or right, I’m going to stop loving you. And somehow we take that image of love and we pin it on the idea of how God loves us. And that limits our relationship with him; the bible says that he loves us with an EVERLASTING love. There is nothing you can do to make God love you, there is nothing you can do to make him love you more or make him love you less. And get this there is nothing you can do to make him STOP loving you. The first message of the cross is that he loves you. The second message is that we stand forgiven today; we are cleansed because Jesus paid the price for us. Jesus was perfect, he knew no sin, yet he took on the world’s sin, so that we could become right with God. Jesus paid the price so that we could be forgiven. The third thing that we learn from the cross is that God wants to have a relationship with us. It’s why Jesus did all that he did. It’s not about religion, it’s not about coming to a church on Sunday, it’s about walking with God, knowing him and being known by him, it’s about the relationship. Several important things happened when Jesus died. The first is that the curtain, the veil in the holy of holies was ripped in 2. It separated the place where God came down and talked with a priest. The moment that Jesus died, that curtain ripped from the top to the bottom, that was God’s way of saying no longer will your relationship be with me through some priest one time a year. I want to have a relationship with you. Some of Jesus’ last words on the cross were “it is finished.” And in the original language it’s pronounced totalisté.

Totalisté and it would be used by 4 different types of people. This means that it meant 4 different things back in the time. It would be used by a priest, and it would mean that the sacrifice has been offered. Totalisté. It is also seen in historical documents as an accounting term, and it means that the debt has been fully paid. Totalisté. The phrase was also used by conquering kings and rulers. Caesar would use that phrase and hold up the scepter as his conquering army came back into town and he would say ‘TOTALISTÉ!” The enemy has been defeated! And it was also used by a servant that would look to his master and it would mean that the task is now complete. Totalisté. And when Jesus said that word on the cross, it meant all of that, for each of us today. So what is our response to that, what is our response to the cross today. You were given a little note card upon entering here, if not then raise your hand and we’ll get you one. Let me suggest a few things that we can bring to the cross today, first our sin because it was taken care of there, all of us today could bring our gratitude to the cross, maybe you have a loved one or friend that needs Jesus and they need this grace and redemption, maybe put their name on that paper and bring it to the cross today. We’re going to pray and then you’re welcome to come to the front and nail your card to the cross. This is where I’m going to end the typed version; I hope you enjoyed reading this. My prayer for you is that even if you can’t come to our meeting and nail your concern to the cross, I pray that you lift up that concern to God.

Remember there is only 1Way2Live and that’s for Christ!