"A Physical Resurrection" Sermon: Acts 10:34-43 (manuscript)

“A Physical Resurrection”

[Acts 10:34-43]

April 12, 2020 YouTube

            Today is Easter.  It is the day on the Christian calendar that we celebrate Jesus’ rising from the dead.  What does that mean?  And why should we care?

            If you ask the average person on the street – or even in the church – if Jesus rose from the dead, you will get several different answers:

            “No. Jesus didn’t rise from the dead – dead people don’t rise from the dead, except in movies.”

            “Yes.  Jesus rose from the dead, and what that means is that His spirit lives on.”

            “Yes. Jesus rose from the dead, and that means that He lives on in the minds of those who think His message is valuable.”

            “Yes.  Jesus rose from the dead.  The same physical person Who was put to death on the cross came back to life and never died again.”

            Our text this morning takes place after Peter has met Cornelius, the Gentile centurion who came to believe in Jesus savingly.  At this point, Peter understands that the Gospel is not just for the Jews, but it is for the Gentiles as well.

            Peter has some important things to tell us in our text.

            First, the Gospel is for all peoples.

“So Peter opened his mouth and said: ‘Truly I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.’

Peter originally thought – as others did – that the Gospel – what the Savior – the Messiah does – is just for the Jews – the chosen of Israel.  But Peter – with others – misunderstood God’s choice of the Jewish people as the ones through whom the Law and the Prophets and the Savior was given to mean it was only for the Jews – that the Gentiles – the non-Jews – were cut off.

But God tells Abraham, the father of the Jewish people:

“I will surely bless you, and I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and as the sand that is on the seashore. And your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies, and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice” (Genesis 22:17-18, ESV).

And in the text preceding the one we read, God gives Peter a vision of a net full of all kinds of food that are not kosher and tells him to eat – shrimp and lobster and bats and so forth.  Peter objects, and God tells Peter that God sets the rules as to who is clean and unclean, and Peter better go preach the Gospel to Cornelius.

And Peter learns – and preaches from then on – that the Gospel is for every type of people that ever exist – Africans, Italians, Greenlanders, Spaniards, Chinese, and every other type of people throughout time and space.

And everyone who hears the Gospel and believes – fearing God and doing what is right – will be received into the Kingdom of God.

Second, this is the Gospel.

‘As for the word that he sent to Israel, preaching good news of peace through Jesus Christ (he is Lord of all), you yourselves know what happened throughout all Judea, beginning from Galilee after the baptism that John proclaimed: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. And we are witnesses of all that he did both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree, but God raised him on the third day and made him to appear, not to all the people but to us who had been chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.’

How would you answer the question, what is the Gospel?

I know someone who says that the Gospel is financial equality among all people. 

Peter and Paul – among others – disagree.

The Gospel is what Jesus did in history.  Period.  That’s what Peter says here.

Paul similarly says:

“For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me” (I Corinthians 15:3-8, ESV).

The Gospel is what Jesus did in history.  Period.

And what does Peter say Jesus did in history?

Jesus (Who is God – notice the use of the word “Lord”) was baptized by John the Baptist, and God baptized Jesus with the indwelling of God the Holy Spirit and with power.  He went all around doing good and healing those oppressed by the devil.  Then He was taken, crucified and died, but God raised Him from the dead on the third day.  Jesus was seen by lots of people after His resurrection, and Jesus ate and drank with them after He was raised from the dead.

And that last point is extremely important:  Jesus ate and drank with them.

And some might think, “Well, who cares if Jesus had lunch, isn’t the point that He was dead and now He is alive?”

Yes, but – why did Jesus eat and drink with them?

Jesus – God in the real human person of Jesus – ate and drank with many people after His resurrection to assure the people who saw Him and talked with Him that He physically rose from the dead.  He is not a ghost or a spirit.  He is not a hallucination or some projection of a memory. No, the real human being, Jesus, Who was crucified and died three days earlier is now physically alive again.  Jesus condescended to them and ate and drank to prove He was really the same physical human being Who had died three days before.

So, third, we proclaim a physical resurrection.

‘And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead. To him all the prophets bear witness that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.’”

All believers are to tell everyone that Jesus physically rose from the dead on Easter.  He is the judge of the living and the dead.  He is the fulfillment of the prophecies of the Old Testament.  And if you believe the Gospel – the historical facts about Jesus – including that He physically rose from the dead – the same body that they put dead into the tomb is the body that was alive three days later – if you believe in Him with your heart and mind and confess Him with your mouth – as God and Savior – your sins will be forgiven – and He has prepared a place for you in His Kingdom.

And some will wonder, “OK, but what if He didn’t physically rise from the dead, how would that change anything?  Jesus lived to make us righteous and died to pay the debt for our sin.  Does a physical resurrection really add anything?”

Paul says:

“And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied” (I Corinthians 14:15-19, ESV).

Paul says, if Jesus did not physically rise from the dead, then believing in Jesus is useless, because He did not fulfill the prophecies that said He would physically rise from the dead.

“God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it. For David says concerning him, ‘I saw the Lord always before me, for he is at my right hand that I may not be shaken; therefore my heart was glad, and my tongue rejoiced; my flesh also will dwell in hope. For you will not abandon my soul to Hades, or let your Holy One see corruption. You have made known to me the paths of life; you will make me full of gladness with your presence’” (Acts 2:24-28, ESV).

            If Jesus did not physically rise from the dead, then believers will not be physically raised from the dead.  God will fail to save our whole selves – our bodies that God declared “good” in the Garden.  God will fail to save us.  Rather, we will rot in the ground, or fly away as ash, or turn to dust in a wall – but we will not be saved – we will lose a very important and substantial part of who we are.

            “OK, but what exactly will we be like?  Jesus’ wounds didn’t bleed after the resurrection, but He could eat and drink.  Jesus was not immediately recognized by His closet followers, but with a word or a touch they knew it was Him in the flesh.”

            Paul writes:

“Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:

            “Death is swallowed up in victory.”

            “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?”

            “The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (I Corinthians 15:51-57, ESV).

            Jesus physically rose from the dead in the same human body that was put in the grave three days earlier.  Since He did, our salvation is secured – Jesus fulfilled all of the prophecies regarding our salvation and His work – and when Jesus returns to judge the living and the dead, every one of us will be raised in the physical body in which we lived.  Then we will be received into the fulness of the Kingdom and put on immortality.  We will eat and drink and be with Jesus and all those who ever believe in His Kingdom where sin and death and sorrow are past.

            “But what exactly happens to us?”

            Thanks be to God, Who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ, Who walked out of the tomb in the same body His mother, Mary, gave birth to some thirty-three years earlier.

            Let us pray:

            Almighty God, we thank You for raising Jesus in His physical body, so the prophecies would be fulfilled, our salvation would be secured, and we would see that to be like Jesus means to have a physical body.  Help us to tell others the history of Jesus – the Gospel – including His physical resurrection.  And be pleased to draw many to Yourself for salvation.  For it is in Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.