Here Comes Sunday [Easter at Access] — Pastor Jason Burns

Look at this church. Because he's alive, some stuff's gonna change. Because he's alive, look at these, because he's alive, I have an un shakable hope. My hope is anchored to something that can't be broken. Number two, because he's alive, I'm fully forgiven. Once and for all my sins are fully paid for, fully forgiven. Grace has paid the bill and because he's alive, I am free. Free from what? Free from fear, free from judgment, free from condemnation, free from guilt, free from shame. I'm once and for all free. [00:22:24] (34 seconds)  #AliveAndFree

You see the Jesus had told them, literally on Thursday, Jesus was with his disciples at a meal that we call the last supper. And at this meal, he told them, I'm going to die and then I'll be buried. And on the third day, I will rise again from the dead. He told them this would happen, but certainly, they didn't believe him. Why? But because if they believed him, they would have been sitting out in those chairs that soccer mom sitting on the sidelines. They would have been waiting at the tomb, counting down everybody. Ten, nine, eight. But nobody showed up. Why? Because when people die, they tend to stay dead. [00:08:28] (36 seconds)  #MissedThePromise

Even if you could go backward in time and warn yourself that some difficult moments were coming, that, hey, listen, prepare your heart. Tomorrow, you're going to lose that loved one. Hey, prepare your heart. Tomorrow, she's going to break up with you. Hey, prepare your heart. It's gonna get challenging tomorrow. No matter how much warning you have, pain is still painful. Like, no matter how much heads up you have, pain just has this way of just weighing so heavy on us. And if you can understand that, hold on to that tension for just a moment because I think that's how Jesus' followers had to feel on that first Easter resurrection Sunday morning. [00:07:50] (38 seconds)  #PainStillHurts

And then they go into the speech, they say, but we had hoped. All of our hope, all of our faith, all of our trust was squarely on Jesus' shoulders. We had hoped that he was who he says he was. We had hoped that he was the son of God. We had hoped that he was going to save us. We had hoped that he would rescue us from the oppression our family lives under under the oppressive thumb of the Roman empire. We had hoped that he was the one who was gonna redeem Israel. [00:13:32] (28 seconds)  #WeHadHoped

Because they had hung their hope on Jesus. They had believed that he was the son of God who was there to save them, not just from their sins, but to save them from the oppression that they were under from the Roman government. They had seen all the miracles. They had heard all the wonderful teachings. And certainly, when they saw his head fall in death, this had to be the sentiment that flashed through their minds and crossed their hearts. It's too good to be true. Certainly, it's too good to be true. How could any of this be true? [00:10:03] (32 seconds)  #TooGoodToBeTrue

Jesus could have chosen to come and give his life at any moment in the course of human history. If Jesus had come and given his life in the year 2026, he probably would have died of lethal injection. It would have been quick and painless. But Jesus chose to come into humanity at the time that humanity had chosen the longest, most excruciating form to carry out a capital punishment, crucifixion. See, the Romans were masters at killing people. They they figured out how to take the death process and to stretch it out as long and painful as possible. [00:14:33] (32 seconds)  #HeChoseTheCross

Crucifixion. A lot of people think that a person would die from bleeding out. That's not how a person would die from crucifixion. Crucifixion would kill a person because they were hanging by their hands and by their feet that were nailed to a cross. And over time, they would be in such a unique position that they weren't able to take a breath. And so to take a breath, they would have to pull themselves up, which would shoot unimaginable amounts of pain through the body to take their breath, and then they would fall back down again. [00:15:05] (26 seconds)  #PainOfCrucifixion

Over time, a person would die of asphyxiation, the inability to catch your breath. If anyone understands physical pain, it's Jesus. Jesus also understands emotional pain. Jesus was born to a single mother in a time when this was unimaginable. Jesus was born to a single mom who I can't imagine all the names he was called in middle school. Jesus walked through the streets of the city with a cross on his back as people who just days before who had said, we love you, we worship you, we adore you. We're now spitting on him and ripping hair out of his face. [00:15:32] (33 seconds)  #JesusUnderstandsPain