Grounded: He Rose Again from the Dead - Luke 24:1-12 - Jordan Varghese

``See, what's so crazy about the resurrection is that it's not kind of plan b. It wasn't an accident, it was actually God working in the world through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. In the face of what was a state execution by an empire, in the face of what was a sham trial created by religious hypocrisy and corruption, the resurrection of Jesus is the promise that God is still at work, despite the brokenness and evil that surrounds this community. That God can still work despite and even somehow through the greatest evils we are confronted with. [00:16:32] (46 seconds)  #ResurrectionNotPlanB

But see, the promise of the resurrection, the promise of the gospel of Jesus, is that through the life, death and resurrection of Christ, we are promised that death will one day let go. And, that day can be today. But, even if we have to wait, we are given the promise of a future where death will let go. It will let go finally and forever. In Jesus, it's impossible for death to keep its hold on us. [00:29:22] (36 seconds)  #DeathWillLetGo

See, there's something about the resurrection of Jesus that can't stay just in a historical moment of a single person. The resurrection of Jesus is promised to every single one of us that would put our trust and faith in Jesus. See, the important hope that the resurrection of Jesus is this, that in the same way that it was impossible for death to hold on to Jesus, for those of us who put our faith in Jesus, in Jesus, it is impossible for death to keep its hold on us. [00:26:39] (40 seconds)  #ResurrectionForEveryone

See, in many ways, you know, when we think of faith and the idea of it, we often think that what we're supposed to do is believe something unbelievable, believe something that is impossible to believe. But that's not actually, I think, what the Christian faith is founded on. See, faith, I think what it is, it's the courage to build your life on something that's believable. And, the Christian faith and the Christian tradition has always been built on the historical fact of Jesus' resurrection. That Jesus actually raised from the dead, and was found alive after his execution. [00:10:06] (36 seconds)  #FaithBuiltOnFacts

And yet, across these differences, they all agree on this claim, that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah, that he was killed and he is raised from the dead. And, not only is that a historical fact that they can agree on, many of us, and I think there are people in this room that can probably speak to the way that they've experienced Jesus as alive. That Jesus is in their life, that they speak to him, that God is alive in the person of Jesus. See, this common experience, I think, speaks once again to both the evidence and the experience to which the claim of the historical resurrection of Jesus is built on. [00:14:40] (46 seconds)  #EvidenceAndExperience

You know, Christian communities have always been places where death is untangled from the world. Where the ill are healed, where the naked are clothed, where the foreigner is welcomed. That has always been the mission and nature of the church, to partner with God in the ungripping of death from our world. So, if you're here and you feel death has its grip on you, the promise of the gospel is that it will let go as we put our trust and faith in Jesus. [00:29:57] (40 seconds)  #ChurchUntanglesDeath

And, if you look at the world and wish and desire for death to release its hold, not only do you have the hope that death will let go through the work and ministry and life, death and resurrection of Jesus, but you'll also be invited to participate in the untangling of death from this world itself. Whether it's through the way you relate in your relationships, there's through your work, whether it's through art, God calls all of us who follow Jesus to be a part of the unwrangling of death from this world. [00:30:37] (36 seconds)  #JoinTheUntangling

See, when we actually begin to wrestle with what the resurrection means, when we actually accept its strangeness, the way that it defies all our expectations, and all the ways that we know how the world works. Dead people stay dead. But, when we are faced with the evidence that Jesus truly raised from the dead, the resurrection invites every single one of us to wonder. To wonder about what is possible, about what God is doing in the world, about what we think life is all about. [00:20:09] (39 seconds)  #ResurrectionInvitesWonder