Messages from an Empty Tomb

Some messages are more important than others. Who the message is from or what it is about most often determines its importance.

“Dad, I forgot to tell you, your boss called this morning and wants you to call back” is not something you want to hear at 5:00 p.m.

That unexpected text from your girlfriend who’s going to a different college, did you read it right away? Why?

Tragically, sometimes very important messages are never received or never listened to. We are almost all now familiar with the tragic sinking of the HMS Titanic.

Initially, the captain of the Titanic ignored a message warning him about icebergs in the region. “We’re unsinkable,” he thought, and, “We’ve got a speed record to set.”

Once the ship stuck an iceberg and had begun to sink, its distress calls weren’t heard because wireless operators on nearby ships had turned in for the night.

Even Titanic’s distress flares were either not seen or were ignored by a ship just a few miles away. The result was catastrophic and unnecessary loss of life.

We read yesterday about a cease fire for Russian troops in the Ukraine. Unfortunately, it appears that fighting continues. Either the message was not received, or it was ignored. The result is more people are dying.

Today we are going to hear from a most unlikely source: . Each message is directed to a different group. Each one is vitally important. The fact that these messages originate from an empty tomb ought to immediately grab our attention, and the attention of those to whom the message is intended. Like the iceberg warning the Titanic received, each is urgent. To ignore them is to invite ultimate .

The First Message from Jesus’ Empty Tomb

The first message of the empty tomb is addressed to , to the who guarded the tomb, and the government they both represent. The message is: you cannot keep Jesus in the tomb.

We just read the account: Matthew 27:62-28:4

We learned that the Jewish leaders were worried about Jesus’ body being stolen and a false claim of a resurrection following. They went to Pilate who ordered the tomb secured by soldiers.

Yet despite this extra security measure, the tomb was found empty on Sunday morning.

This empty tomb says to the most powerful government on earth at the time:

You can assign your

You can use you have at your disposal

You can resort to concrete, steel, and a of soldiers if you want

You can use all the force of , all the force of , and all the force of might, but it will do you !

You cannot keep Jesus in the tomb. Listen again to what happened:

Matthew 28:2-4

Post a thousand guards and it would have been no different! Man cannot stand in the way of what God has determined to do. God had accepted the sacrifice of Christ on the cross, and he raised Him from the dead just as he had promised to do generations before. Nothing any government could do would stop him.

You will fail too if you try. Jesus is alive and loose on this earth, and nothing you can do will put Him back in the tomb, destroy His people, or stop what he has started.

Governments and presidents, and kings, and potentates, pay attention to this message from the empty tomb of Jesus addressed to you.

The Second Message from Jesus’ Empty Tomb

The second message of the empty tomb is addressed to the who bribed one of Jesus’ followers to betray him, then put Jesus on trial, convinced Pilate to handle their case, and when Pilate found him innocent, convinced the crowds to turn against Jesus and demand his death. The message is this: you cannot get rid of Jesus .

You can nail Him to a cross, see to it that He is dead, lay Him in a tomb, roll the stone across the door, set a guard, and go your way thinking that is that. It seemed that way at least until Sunday morning, Then the report of an empty tomb disturbs your peace. What will you do now? Bribe the guards to tell a most unlikely story? Deny the evidence? Threaten anyone who departs from the party line?

You thought you had gotten rid of Jesus, but you have not gotten rid of Him at all. Things aren’t better for you, .

Listen to what transpired just weeks after the tomb was found empty: Acts 4:5-20

Religious leaders, persecutors of the righteous, keepers of the faith regardless of the evidence against it, the empty tomb cries out to you:

The very ones who fled at the capture of Jesus now point fingers in your face and refuse to bow to your decrees. You thought you could so easily get rid of Jesus! You have not.

Listen, all of you who would use religious and clerical power to rid yourself of Jesus: the empty tomb stands quietly and says: “”

You will not do away with Jesus so easily.

He is alive! He has risen, and by his name even now all who believe may be saved. Those who trust Him find Him more real than all your arguments and threats, and they cannot keep silent no matter what you do to try to silence them. The empty tomb will become your worst nightmare. You will not be rid of Jesus as easily you thought. You will not be rid of Him at all.

The Third Message from Jesus’ Empty Tomb

The third message of the empty tomb is addressed to , the devil, God’s archenemy, and the enemy of our souls. The message is this: your plans have backfired and you’re about to lose everything.

You couldn’t succeed in Jesus,

you couldn’t lure Him away from His mission.

You couldn’t discourage Him,

you couldn’t get Him to His powers.

You couldn’t fill Him with during the triumphant procession.

You couldn’t Him by betrayal,

You couldn’t get him to at his crucifiers,

You couldn’t get him to off the cross.

You plotted to have Him betrayed and executed against the very laws of Israel and against the very wishes of the Roman governor, and you thought at last you’d succeeded. Jesus was dead, stone cold dead and lying in a tomb. So much for God’s chosen messiah! Dead before he could gather more than a few hundred or perhaps a thousand followers. His threat to you and your warfare against God seemed eliminated.

Then , the angel appeared and rolled away the stone, and the soldiers became as dead men. The angel announced your : “He is not here, he has risen, just as he said.”

A few dozen years later one writer would express what happened on that day in this way:

Hebrews 2:14

Another writer would tell us that after the resurrection:

Colossians 2:15

And again,

Ephesians 4:8

Satan,

You could control the

You could buy out the soul of a

You could turn the

You could the justice system to get what you wanted

You could kill an man

But that innocent man is not in the tomb where they laid him! He has risen! All your plans have failed.

The one you thought you’d defeated has left you powerless,

has disarmed your army,

and led captive a host of your forces.

Satan, your plans have , and your nightmare is just beginning.

The empty tomb says so.

The Fourth Message from Jesus’ Empty Tomb

The fourth message of the empty tomb is addressed to . The message is this: your aren’t dead – something better than you imagined has happened.

After the betrayal in the Garden, the disciples had scattered. Later some gathered together in Jerusalem but only to draw comfort from one another and to sorrow together at what they had lost.

They had believed Jesus was the Messiah and that he would lead Israel to overthrow the Roman yoke they endured, that he would establish a triumphant and magnificent Jewish kingdom where they would play a prominent part.

Now their dreams were shattered. He was dead. How did that fit into their ideas about Him? It didn’t.

So listen to the message the empty tomb spoke to them:

Luke 24:1-9

John 20:19-21

The tomb is empty. And not because someone Jesus’ body. But because he has from the dead.

The empty tomb cries out to the disheartened disciples:

Jesus is not dead, he is alive

All you hasn’t been destroyed

Your outlook for the future isn’t terrible, it’s

The one you loved been taken from you

The time you had with Jesus , it’s just beginning

With that news a band of discouraged fishermen, tax-collectors, and zealots became the nucleus of a movement that has now spread to every corner of the globe and claims hundreds of millions of followers. Death became the avenue to real life. Jesus became something more than just a great man. He became the triumphant Savior of mankind, the Son of God with power. And he lives now to save those to the uttermost who come to God by Him.

Dear saint, the empty tomb of Jesus says to you:

He continues to live to make for you.

He will leave you nor forsake you.

He will not leave you .

His will guard your heart and mind.

His will teach you and guide you.

Something than you imagine is already on its way.

He is alive and that makes all the difference to his followers!

The Fifth Message from Jesus’ Empty Tomb

The fifth and final message from the empty tomb is addressed to people everywhere looking for . The message is this: God has left no doubt that He exists and that Jesus is the way to Him.

If we scan history to see if there are any clues to the existence of God we must stop and consider the empty tomb of Jesus Christ. Let’s face it my friend, empty tombs after burial are not the usual. In fact, with few exceptions, they simply don’t exist. Those that do exist show the evidence that grave robbers have come and stolen the remains or that someone has taken the body to bury elsewhere.

But that isn’t what happened at Jesus’ tomb. It was guarded day and night against just such a possibility. The life of the guards was at stake in this, so they were sure not to have fallen asleep and to have slept through a robbery of Jesus’ grave. Jesus’ body wasn’t stolen and it wasn’t taken and reburied by the Romans or the Jewish leaders.

The empty grave presents a problem. It is either truly mystery, scientifically and historically, or it is evidence that something happened on that first Easter morning.

(MULTILINE)

What the empty tomb declares is this: , and he has acted in Jesus Christ to bring men to Himself. The resurrection is the seal of His approval upon what Jesus did on the cross, dying for our sins.

Paul said in Romans 1:3-4

The result of this is that what Jesus had declared before His death is absolutely true:

John 14:6

The empty tomb says to you who are looking for the truth about God: God does exist, and he has acted in history to raise His Son from the dead, to declare to you and anyone else who will listen to the message of the empty tomb that Jesus is His way back to Him.

Conclusion

These, then are the five messages from the empty tomb:

There is a message to government: you can’t keep Jesus in the tomb

There is a message to religious leaders: you can’t get rid of Jesus

There is a message to Satan: your plans have blown up in your face

There is a message to disciples of Jesus: you hopes are more alive than ever before, and

There is a message to you who are looking for the truth: God exists and has made Jesus the way to Him.

Which of these five messages is addressed to you?