1
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,000
Paul, I won't have a chance to say this to you at the end of the service, I know.

2
00:00:05,000 --> 00:00:11,000
But if you keep this music up, you're going to have to get a new pastor.

3
00:00:11,000 --> 00:00:14,000
My heart can't take this.

4
00:00:14,000 --> 00:00:22,000
I tell you, I have been lifted to ecstasy this morning as we have listened to this glorious music of Easter.

5
00:00:22,000 --> 00:00:28,000
And so thank you to you and to your staff of musicians for your concert this morning

6
00:00:28,000 --> 00:00:32,000
and for ministering so effectively to our hearts.

7
00:00:32,000 --> 00:00:37,000
I would like, however, to bring us to focus in the Word of God for just a couple of minutes.

8
00:00:37,000 --> 00:00:45,000
Would you open your Bible with me please to 1 Peter chapter 1 verses 20 and 21.

9
00:00:45,000 --> 00:00:51,000
1 Peter chapter 1 verses 20 and 21.

10
00:00:51,000 --> 00:01:00,000
For Christ was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but has appeared in these last times

11
00:01:00,000 --> 00:01:07,000
for the sake of you, who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead

12
00:01:07,000 --> 00:01:15,000
and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God.

13
00:01:15,000 --> 00:01:21,000
The story of Easter is the greatest love story ever told.

14
00:01:21,000 --> 00:01:31,000
In the events surrounding Easter, we learned that we are the objects of the love of God Almighty.

15
00:01:31,000 --> 00:01:34,000
And he has demonstrated that love to us.

16
00:01:34,000 --> 00:01:41,000
Peter points out four actions that demonstrate the love of God.

17
00:01:41,000 --> 00:01:46,000
The first is that Christ Jesus was foreknown.

18
00:01:46,000 --> 00:01:48,000
What does that mean?

19
00:01:48,000 --> 00:01:57,000
It means more than simply God knew ahead of time what was going to happen when Jesus came into the world.

20
00:01:57,000 --> 00:02:09,000
The idea behind this New Testament word means that Jesus Christ was selected, chosen, designated.

21
00:02:09,000 --> 00:02:14,000
He was purposed in his coming into the world.

22
00:02:14,000 --> 00:02:21,000
And when was it that God designated Jesus Christ to be the Savior?

23
00:02:21,000 --> 00:02:27,000
Well it tells us in the text that it was before the foundation of the world.

24
00:02:27,000 --> 00:02:31,000
You think about that for a moment.

25
00:02:31,000 --> 00:02:40,000
Before the events of Genesis chapter 1 ever transpired, before God ever spoke into being,

26
00:02:40,000 --> 00:02:44,000
space and matter and time,

27
00:02:44,000 --> 00:02:54,000
he had already designated his son Jesus Christ to come into the world that he was going yet to create

28
00:02:54,000 --> 00:02:58,000
and to be the Savior.

29
00:02:58,000 --> 00:03:04,000
We notice that then Jesus Christ appeared, action number 2.

30
00:03:04,000 --> 00:03:09,000
He came into the time and space that he created.

31
00:03:09,000 --> 00:03:15,000
He was made revealed, he was manifested.

32
00:03:15,000 --> 00:03:22,000
The invisible eternal God was made visible in the person of Jesus Christ.

33
00:03:22,000 --> 00:03:23,000
He appeared.

34
00:03:23,000 --> 00:03:25,000
And when?

35
00:03:25,000 --> 00:03:28,000
Well it says in these last times.

36
00:03:28,000 --> 00:03:42,000
That is in this final stage of human history, this period of time when God is going to bring to consummation his purpose for all of history.

37
00:03:42,000 --> 00:03:45,000
Jesus Christ appeared.

38
00:03:45,000 --> 00:03:56,000
When he appeared and came into the world, he came to fulfill that purpose that God gave him before the world was created.

39
00:03:56,000 --> 00:04:03,000
That he might go to the cross and there suffer and die for the sins of the human race.

40
00:04:03,000 --> 00:04:06,000
And be raised again from the dead.

41
00:04:06,000 --> 00:04:15,000
That he might forever save those who become believers in God through him.

42
00:04:15,000 --> 00:04:23,000
Not just any God, the God of the Bible, Yahweh, Jehovah.

43
00:04:23,000 --> 00:04:29,000
Those who become believers in the true God through him, through Jesus.

44
00:04:29,000 --> 00:04:32,000
Not through any religion.

45
00:04:32,000 --> 00:04:35,000
Not through any prophet.

46
00:04:35,000 --> 00:04:40,000
But through this one whom he designated as his beloved son.

47
00:04:40,000 --> 00:04:42,000
His only begotten son.

48
00:04:42,000 --> 00:04:47,000
Those who believe in God through him.

49
00:04:47,000 --> 00:04:52,000
There are those who say, I've always believed in God.

50
00:04:52,000 --> 00:04:59,000
You see we did not become believers in this sense by our birth.

51
00:04:59,000 --> 00:05:07,000
We did not become believers in the sense that Peter means it by our baptism.

52
00:05:07,000 --> 00:05:16,000
We do not become believers in the sense that Peter means this through our good deeds.

53
00:05:16,000 --> 00:05:20,000
What does it mean then to become a believer in God?

54
00:05:20,000 --> 00:05:24,000
Peter says, for your sake he appeared.

55
00:05:24,000 --> 00:05:28,000
Who have become believers in God. What does that mean?

56
00:05:28,000 --> 00:05:35,000
It means that we come to that point in our lives where we recognize our own spiritual bankruptcy.

57
00:05:35,000 --> 00:05:40,000
Our own brokenness before God. Our sinfulness.

58
00:05:40,000 --> 00:05:47,000
And we recognize what God has done in sending his son into the world.

59
00:05:47,000 --> 00:05:52,000
And we turn to him and we give ourselves to him in faith.

60
00:05:52,000 --> 00:06:02,000
And we receive him into our lives as an act of intelligent belief to be our Lord and Savior.

61
00:06:02,000 --> 00:06:13,000
At that moment, at that moment, we become believers in God in the sense that Peter means it.

62
00:06:13,000 --> 00:06:17,000
Jesus Christ was designated before the foundation of the world.

63
00:06:17,000 --> 00:06:22,000
But has appeared at God's chosen time and has been raised from the dead.

64
00:06:22,000 --> 00:06:26,000
Action number three.

65
00:06:26,000 --> 00:06:36,000
It's hard to know whether to chuckle or to weep when we read about those who have been a part of the religion of communism.

66
00:06:36,000 --> 00:06:40,000
Wondering what they should do with the body of linen.

67
00:06:40,000 --> 00:06:51,000
Should they keep sending the embalmer week after week to try to keep the body looking decent, lying there in the mausoleum in Moscow?

68
00:06:51,000 --> 00:06:55,000
Their religion has collapsed around the world.

69
00:06:55,000 --> 00:07:03,000
And the founder of that religion of communism lies dead and his body is in that mausoleum to prove he's dead.

70
00:07:03,000 --> 00:07:08,000
So they try to preserve his body as best they can.

71
00:07:08,000 --> 00:07:15,000
I want you to know there has been no effort to preserve the body of Jesus Christ from the part of man.

72
00:07:15,000 --> 00:07:21,000
Because three days after he literally died, he literally came forth from the grave.

73
00:07:21,000 --> 00:07:24,000
He rose up from the grave.

74
00:07:24,000 --> 00:07:27,000
Death could not keep its prey.

75
00:07:27,000 --> 00:07:29,000
Jesus our Savior.

76
00:07:29,000 --> 00:07:36,000
One can almost see death there in that tomb with him saying, now you lie still there, you stay there.

77
00:07:36,000 --> 00:07:40,000
But death could not keep its prey.

78
00:07:40,000 --> 00:07:46,000
Death bound him perhaps with chains of some sort to cause him to lie still on that cold slab.

79
00:07:46,000 --> 00:07:50,000
But death could not keep its prey.

80
00:07:50,000 --> 00:07:59,000
Up from the grave he arose with a mighty triumph for his foes.

81
00:07:59,000 --> 00:08:02,000
He rose from the dead.

82
00:08:02,000 --> 00:08:09,000
And Peter concludes by telling us that God gave him glory.

83
00:08:09,000 --> 00:08:13,000
When he ascended back into heaven, God gave him glory.

84
00:08:13,000 --> 00:08:17,000
You say, how do we know he actually got back into heaven when he left the Mount of Olives?

85
00:08:17,000 --> 00:08:27,000
Because Stephen, the first martyr, just before he died, looked up into heaven which opened up before his eyes.

86
00:08:27,000 --> 00:08:31,000
And before he died and left his body, he was able to speak these words.

87
00:08:31,000 --> 00:08:36,000
I see Jesus standing at the right hand of God.

88
00:08:36,000 --> 00:08:39,000
He has been seen there.

89
00:08:39,000 --> 00:08:51,000
We have witness of it, historical evidence, that Jesus Christ rose from the dead and is now standing at the right hand of God in heaven.

90
00:08:51,000 --> 00:09:02,000
And this same Jesus, who was taken up into heaven and exalted and given a name that is above every name, is one day going to come again.

91
00:09:02,000 --> 00:09:15,000
The angels said, this Jesus that has been taken up from you into heaven shall so come again in the same way as you have seen him go up into heaven.

92
00:09:15,000 --> 00:09:28,000
And John, writing in the last book of the New Testament, the book of the Revelation, has given a vision of that day, yet future from our own, when Jesus Christ will return.

93
00:09:28,000 --> 00:09:31,000
He sees this white horse coming down from heaven.

94
00:09:31,000 --> 00:09:37,000
The heavens are opened and the Son of God comes forth with his armies.

95
00:09:37,000 --> 00:09:51,000
Glorious in his array and across his robe are printed the words on a banner that he wears, King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

96
00:09:51,000 --> 00:09:59,000
And John says in heaven, I heard as it were the voices of a great multitude.

97
00:09:59,000 --> 00:10:02,000
He said it was like many waters.

98
00:10:02,000 --> 00:10:13,000
Take Niagara and amplify it a hundred times and add to it the pounding surfs on every beach in the world.

99
00:10:13,000 --> 00:10:20,000
John says it was also like the peal of thunder.

100
00:10:20,000 --> 00:10:29,000
And so you take every thunder peal that you have ever heard and amplify that a thousand times and add it to the sound of the waters.

101
00:10:29,000 --> 00:10:37,000
And you have the sound that begins to approach what that multitude was saying.

102
00:10:37,000 --> 00:10:40,000
They said hallelujah.

103
00:10:40,000 --> 00:10:47,000
The Lord God Almighty reigns.

104
00:10:47,000 --> 00:10:53,000
Jesus Christ was foreknown before the world was created, but in these last days has appeared.

105
00:10:53,000 --> 00:10:56,000
He's come. He's been made visible.

106
00:10:56,000 --> 00:11:01,000
He died for us. He rose again from the dead. Has been given glory.

107
00:11:01,000 --> 00:11:09,000
And one day is going to come and establish upon this earth the kingdom of his justice and righteousness.

108
00:11:09,000 --> 00:11:19,000
And we know that because the same word of God that has told us all of the rest assures us of what is yet to come.

109
00:11:19,000 --> 00:11:23,000
And we're going to sing about it right now.

110
00:11:23,000 --> 00:11:27,000
It is number 37 in your hymnal.

111
00:11:27,000 --> 00:11:31,000
And it says hallelujah.

112
00:11:31,000 --> 00:11:35,000
The Lord God Omnipotent reigns.

113
00:11:35,000 --> 00:11:41,000
He is King of Kings and He is Lord of Lords.

114
00:11:41,000 --> 00:11:45,000
Don't worry about getting lost in all of the notes.

115
00:11:45,000 --> 00:11:53,000
If you don't know the tune, all you have to do is keep singing or saying hallelujah and you'll be right in there with the rest of us.

116
00:11:53,000 --> 00:12:16,000
Paul, lead us in this glory.