Transcription downloaded from https://yetanothersermon.host/_/stornowayfc/sermons/71351/easter-family-service/.

Disclaimer: this is an automatically generated machine transcription - there may be small errors or mistranscriptions.
Please refer to the original audio if you are in any doubt.


[0:00] Well, we're going to begin our worship by singing to God's praise. We're going to sing in Psalm 84, the Scottish Psalter version, Psalm 84.

[0:16] ! We're going to sing from verse 1 to verse 6.! We'll sing from verse 1 to 6, and we stand to sing to God's praise.

[0:41] O Lord, I'll host to thee, The tabernacles of thy grace, How pleasant are they me?

[1:11] My thirsty soul on bitterly, It pains thy course to see.

[1:22] My heavy heart and flesh by air, O living God for thee.

[1:37] If all the sorrow findeth thine, And I'm sent to rest.

[1:49] The swallow also for herself, Hath purchased head and head.

[2:01] In thine old altar's prayer, she say, Her young was born, they bring.

[2:14] O thou almighty Lord of hosts, Who art my God and King.

[2:27] Let power be in my house that dwell, They ever give thee grace.

[2:40] Blessed is the one whose strength thine art, In whose heart are thy wings.

[2:53] Who passing thorough make us clear, Then into Jacob wells.

[3:06] The soul of the rain that falleth down, That puteth water fill.

[3:18] Amen. We'll bow our heads now in a word of prayer. Let us pray.

[3:31] Lord, our gracious God, We do thank you for this, your day, The day that you have made, And help us to rejoice and to be glad in it. We thank you that it's a day that reminds us Of the wonder of our risen Saviour, The one who came into this world, The one whose name was Jesus, Because he came to save his people from their sins.

[3:54] And we thank you that in order to save, He came not just to live in this world, But to give his life, To lay it down, To die for our sins.

[4:05] But we thank you that death had no hold on him, That the grave could not keep him, And that we come today reminded again of the great news That Jesus is risen, That he is alive.

[4:19] We know we have that message every day, Every Lord's Day, On the first day of the week, We are reminded of it. But we are thankful for the significance of this weekend, An Easter weekend, Where there is our particular focus on Good Friday, Which may seem a strange name when we think of Jesus dying, And yet it was because it is good news for us.

[4:41] And we think of the Saturday and the silence of that day As he lay in the tomb. But then we know that on the first day of the week, The grave was open. He was not there, For he was risen.

[4:53] And so today we thank you That we come to worship our living, risen Saviour, Who is Jesus Christ, our Lord. And so we pray, Lord, That you will bless our time, And the word that we look at together today, We thank you for it, And for the blessing that it is to all our hearts, To hear the good news of Jesus.

[5:14] And we pray that together as families, Friends, and visitors here today, That together your spirit will be with us, To guide us and help us in all that we do. We thank you for that desire you put in our hearts, To come and draw near to you.

[5:29] We thank you for our young people, We thank you for all present here today, And all maybe who are away on holiday just now as well. We pray for them, For you to bless them and to keep them, In school, in the homes, In the communities around us, Lord, That they would know your protection and your help.

[5:45] And together as families, Even here today, We would know your peace upon us. Bless the young ones as they go through To the holiday tweenies, And also those in the creche as well. We thank you for all who care for them there, And help them to understand your word.

[6:01] And we just pray that together, We will know that help, That even Jesus speaks of, In the passages that we read today, That the spirit would help us to understand, All that is written in the prophets, The psalms, In the word of God, As we have it before us.

[6:17] Lord, we need your help. So remember us, Remember those unable to be with us, Remember those belonging to us, As a people who are mourning at this time, Those who are unwell, Those who are confined to their homes.

[6:29] Lord, we continue to pray for each one, In all their different needs, And ask that you will bless them, Surround them as well. And so may you be with us now, And all your people today, As so many gather to worship, To all ends of the earth.

[6:44] We thank you that from the rising of the sun, To its setting, Your name is praised. Be with us throughout the day, Into the evening service. Remember Callum, As he preaches here in this evening, Remember us in the praise night as well, Lord, And for all who have prepared for that as well, That we would see, And hear of your goodness in all of these things.

[7:04] So bless us, Watch over us, Go before us, Pardon all our sins, That's all we ask, We ask in Jesus' name, And for his sake. Amen. Well, it's Easter Sunday, So it's an important day for us, As we remember that Jesus, Although he came into this world, And died on a cross, We remember today, That he rose from the grave, That he is risen.

[7:33] So Easter Sunday, What's maybe the first thing that comes to mind, When you think of Easter Sunday? What kind of things come into your thinking, As you think, What is Easter Sunday?

[7:44] What does it mean? There may be certain things that come to you, You think Easter eggs, Anybody had an Easter egg today? Hands up, Oh, there's a few hands going up already, Yeah, I'm sure many of you had Easter eggs, Does anybody like hot cross buns?

[8:00] Hands up, Or you like hot cross buns? I'm sure there's a few, Who like hot cross buns, Yeah, One elder at the front there, Or nameless, I won't say who it is, So the hot cross buns, You probably had some of them, During this week, You think of holidays, When you think of Easter, We think of holiday time as well, So there's all these things, That come to mind, But what about Jesus?

[8:22] Where does he fit into Easter, As you think of Easter, And all that it means? Does he fit into everything, That you're thinking about, When you think of Easter? It's a little like Christmas as well, When we think of Christmas, What comes to mind then?

[8:40] We maybe think of presents, We think of the Christmas tree, We think of turkey, We think of the holidays, We've got all these things, That we think of, When we think of Christmas as well, But we ask the same question, Where does Jesus fit into that?

[8:54] Where does he fit into Christmas? Where does he fit into Easter? Where does he fit in our lives, As we think about all of these things? Is he just part of it, That we put to the side, And just take out when we want?

[9:07] Or is he the most important thing, In it all? Well if you go back to, Christmas time, We had a Christmas family service, And we were together, Thinking about Jesus being born, Into this world, That amazing story, That Jesus was born, Into this world, And they gave him the name, Jesus, Because Jesus is such an important name, It means, He will save his people, From their sins, So Jesus is important, And then, That leaves us with a question, Well if he's going to save his people, From their sins, How?

[9:45] How is he going to save his people, From their sins? Well that's when we see, The importance of Easter, Because Jesus came, As we remember at Christmas time, Each year we remember his birth, He came to live, But in order to save his people, He had to die, He died on the cross, He gave his life, And that sounds so strange, To us, It can sound a little strange, To think, Why did Jesus have to die?

[10:17] Was there no other way? It might sound like, Things were a little out of control, That things had got beyond God, That he had no control, Over what was happening, And that Jesus dying, Was a mistake, And even to the people, Who were around Jesus at that time, Even his closest people, His followers, They were called the disciples, They were confused by it all, And so many people had questions, Why is this happening?

[10:46] Well that's what we see today, As we think of Easter, Because we remember, God had a plan, And this was all part, Of God's plan, That people would need, Saving from their sins, And in order to be saved, He had to send Jesus, Into the world, It was all part, Of his plan, A plan that we see, Right through the Bible, Even when we think of going back, Into the Old Testament, We see, God had a plan, All the time, In the book of Jeremiah, In the Old Testament, There's a verse, In chapter 29, And verse 11, It says, I know the plans, I have for you, Declares the Lord, Plans for your welfare, And not for evil, To give you a future, And a hope, God had a plan, All the time, Who likes playing with Lego, Anybody like playing with Lego, Hands up, Yeah, There's a few hands going up, That like playing with Lego, You can make all kinds of things, With Lego,

[11:46] It's amazing, And it's been around, For years it seems, It can be quite annoying, If you stand on a bit of Lego, When you're walking barefoot, Through the living room, But it's great fun, To play and make different things, With Lego, What kind of things can you make, You can build racing cars, Out of Lego, You can build boats, Out of Lego, You can build houses, And castles, Even football stadiums, You can make them out of Lego, You can do all sorts, With Lego, But what's important, When you're playing with Lego, What's the key, That's in the box, Not just the Lego pieces, But there's a bit of paper, With the plans, The instructions for you, And how to build these things, If you don't follow the plan, You go wrong, It can be good fun, Sometimes just to try, And do things yourself, But if you want to have, The finished product, You need to follow, The instructions, That's just the way, We are sometimes in our life, We don't always listen,

[12:46] To what the plans, The instructions say, And instead we make our own plans, We try and do things ourselves, And so often our plans, Can just go wrong, Think about the kind of plans, That we've made, Maybe even in the last few weeks, Over holiday times, You've made plans, To go away on the ferry, And you get a text, Technical fault, It's not sailing, Plans change, Plans go wrong, Maybe you make plans, To have a plan for the week ahead, What you're going to do each day, And you think, I'll do this, I'll do this, I'll do this, And you wake up on Monday morning, And you're full of the cold, Or you've got the flu, And all of a sudden, Plans have gone wrong, There's so many ways, That our plans go wrong, Even when we think of, Maybe building things, Building a house, Or building a shed, Whatever it might be, We think, I'm going to do it like this, And you realize, I can't afford it, I can't do it like that, There's much more to it, Than I thought, Our plans, Can so often go wrong, God's plan,

[13:48] Never went wrong, Even though things, Might seem strange to us, And to so many people, That Jesus came to die, Wasn't that his plan went wrong, His plan was in place, All of the time, Nothing takes God, By surprise, And that's the wonder, Of all that we have today, To look at in the word, Of God, That we come, With God saying, Trust my plan, I've got everything in hand, What you have to do, Is believe, And trust in me, Believe, In the son, Who I have given, Jesus, Who came to save, His people from their sins, By dying on the cross, But today, We remember too, He is risen, He is risen, He is alive, And that is our hope, So we are going to look, At God's plan, In a few different ways, But before we do, We are going to sing again, To God's praise, In Psalm 16, And the sing, Psalms version, Psalm 16,

[14:50] The sing, Psalms version, We are going to sing, From verse 7, Down to the end of the psalm, To verse 11, And during this singing, The children who are going out, To the holiday, Twinnies can go out, Through the door, To my left here, And go through, To the halls, We are going to sing, Psalm 16, At verse 7, The tune is, Golden Hill, I'll praise the Lord, My God, Whose counsel, Guides my choice, And even in the night, My heart, Recalls, Instruction's voice, We stand to sing, These verses, To God's praise, The Lord, My God, Whose counsel, Guides my choice, And even in the night,

[15:51] My heart, We lost its passion's voice Before we constantly I said, the Lord my Lord Because the earth's at my right hand And all the overthrows Therefore my heart is mine My child with joy will stay

[17:00] My Lord eternal and secure In hope and will I live For you will not allow My soul in debt to stay Nor will you hear your holy one To see the tombs decay You have made good to me

[18:07] The power of my divine This shall I know At your right hand Joy from new faith will shine We're going to read our first passage of Scripture together Just now we're turning to the book of Acts chapter 2 I'm reading from verse 21 to verse 28 Acts chapter 2 at verse 21 Using the church Bible you find it around page 1097 We've got three different readings today

[19:13] But they're all really focused on the fact That Jesus is risen And that being God's plan In the midst of all things So Acts chapter 2 at verse 21 We take up our reading Roughly halfway through Peter's sermon At this time on what they call the day of Pentecost And Peter was preaching to a large crowd And he had these words to say to them So at verse 21 we read It shall come to pass that everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord Shall be saved Men of Israel hear these words Jesus of Nazareth A man attested to you by God With mighty works and wonders and signs That God did through him in your midst As you yourselves know This Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan And foreknowledge of God You crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men God raised him up Loosing the pangs of death Because it was not possible for him to be held by it

[20:15] 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 And may God bless that reading You notice as we read in these verses The middle of verse 25 there The psalm that we just sung Psalm 16 is being quoted So you think of God's plans And you see how God's plans Are really there for us in the Old Testament as well We see all so clearly So a plan was made God had a plan Do you like the thought of having to stand in front of a large crowd of people to speak

[21:22] Hands up here If that would fill you with a sense of excitement Standing in front of a large crowd and speaking I don't know if any hands would really go up It doesn't thrill you does it What about the thought of coming up here to the pulpit And coming to preach in this pulpit to the congregation here Any volunteers Anybody want to come up and give it a go I've got a couple of ministers in the congregation today They might want to just come up and show me how it's done Anybody want to come up here and preach It's a scary thought It is Every Sunday coming here is a scary thought Standing in front of everybody to speak But it's a wonder being able to speak about the word of God And what God has done for us Well what if you had done this before And it had been a disaster It had all gone wrong And you were made to feel so stupid You had said all the wrong things Nothing had gone right The thought of coming to do it again would be terrifying Again if you ask the ministers here myself included

[22:27] We'll see every Sunday you think Why did I say that? Do I have to go back and do it again? We always feel like we can't do it right We often make mistakes But still we can come and tell of the wonder of God And when you look at this passage And you think of Peter And Peter who was preaching this sermon And you think well he must have been so confident He must have been so assured With what he was doing So courageous there to stand up and speak And yet when you look at the life of Peter What had he done previously?

[23:03] He had made mistakes himself He had been made to look quite stupid in many ways And the thought of maybe coming to speak in front of people Because when Jesus was going to go to the cross What did Peter do?

[23:21] What did Peter do? People started turning to him and saying Are you not friends with Jesus? Are you not one of his followers? What did Peter do? Did he say yes, I'm one of his followers? No He denied him He says I don't know this man No, not once But three times He did that And he felt a failure Failure He felt he had let down his Lord But his Lord Jesus When he rose Restored Peter And he said to him Feed my sheep Go and tell the people And that's what we see now Peter doing And what makes the difference Even though he had failed in the past Even though he had denied The Lord Jesus It's because now he knows He knows He knows fully He knows fully That what God had said in his word What Jesus had told him It is all true Even when he thought Things were going wrong That they were taking Jesus away To put him to death

[24:23] That he would never see him again What's the difference? Well he knows now He is risen He has seen him And so now he's able to come And speak to them about this Jesus Who is risen Have you ever heard someone say I knew that would happen Or they would say I knew that person would say that When do you hear people saying that?

[24:48] So often it's after the event And they're making themselves to look As if they know everything Oh I knew that would happen Like yesterday I was able to say for sure Before it happened Aberdeen will beat hearts And get to the cup final Definitely it's going to happen Not that confident actually But it did happen There are so many things We can be uncertain about But do we really believe it?

[25:17] Until it actually happens We're maybe not entirely sure Well here is Peter now preaching This sermon And what does make the difference for him Is these words that we find in verse 23 23 And 24 Where it says This Jesus Delivered up according to the definite plan And foreknowledge of God You see Peter says here This was the plan The definite plan This was going There was no other way It was all part of God's plan And in order to show that He quotes from that psalm That this is what was going to take place The grave could not hold on to our Saviour You will not let your Holy One see corruption Basically means that Jesus was going to rise From the grave again And so Peter realizes this is all part of God's plan

[26:21] And now he's preaching about God's plan This plan is made This plan is certain It's secure in Jesus And as he stands to preach He shows them the depth of this plan How great this plan is Even though it seems strange The definite plan and foreknowledge of God This Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan You crucified and killed In the hands of lawless men You did it he says But he says God raised him up God raised him from the dead This was part of God's definite plan And the wonder of that too It's such a deep plan But in many ways there's a simplicity to this plan as well Because what it says now to the people is In verse 21 It shall come to pass That everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord Shall be saved Because of the depth and the wonder of God's plan

[27:26] The definite plan This is what people can do In order to be saved They call on the name of the Lord Many things in life are exclusive That means we can't get them Unless you've got maybe the right amount of money Or the right ticket You can't get it Think of just walking through an airport You ever walk through an airport And you see a place with a sign Executive lounge But they won't let you in Because you're not important enough You don't have the right credentials So you're not allowed to go in All you can do is just walk past And have a wee look in To see what it looks like Or maybe then you go onto the plane You're going onto a big plane Hundreds of people on it And you have to go to the right To standard class But to the left is first class But you don't have the ticket You can't get in And all you can do is just have a wee peep

[28:28] And see what it looks like All these big seats that they have That they can put in to recline And sleep on And you have to go down And be crushed in the midst With everybody else We don't have the right access to get in But the wonder of the gospel As we see here is Everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord Nobody's excluded It's for all of us here today If you've called, great If you know that salvation How wonderful it is But if you haven't Well here's the instructions God has a definite plan He has done everything According to his foreknowledge And he says Call upon the name of the Lord To be saved The plan is made God had a definite plan And the next thing we want to see Is how this plan Is actioned

[29:30] And for that we're going to read In another part of scripture We're going to read In the Gospel of John Chapter 19 And just a few verses In that Gospel Verse 28 to 30 Just a few pages back John 19 John 19 And we read at verse 28 So here is We come to the cross here And the death of Jesus After this After this Jesus knowing that all was now finished To fulfill the scripture A jar full of sour wine So they put a sponge full of sour wine On a hyssop branch When Jesus had received the sour wine It is finished And he bowed his head

[30:31] And gave up his spirit Just these few verses But they say So much to us And what we want to see here Put into action What's your plans?

[30:50] That's a common question That we're asked, isn't it? What's your plans for the weekend? What's your plans for the holiday? What's your plans tonight? We're so often asked that question What about this question?

[31:03] What's your plans for being saved? Can we do it ourselves? Are you going to save yourself? We can't So what's your plans for being saved?

[31:19] Who is able to save us from our sins? Well, we've already said, haven't we? Who is it? Who is able to save us from our sins? What's the name that we think of When we think of Who is able to save us from our sins?

[31:31] Who wants to shout out that name? Isn't it? Jesus saves us from our sins But not just the Jesus we think of Thinking back to Christmas The one who was born into the world But the Jesus that we read of here As he goes to the cross saying It is finished It is finished So someone referencing A football manager this week Some of you may be too young to remember He was manager of Arsenal A number of years ago Very successful manager And he said at one point As he was managing the team He said when looking at the games to be played Christmas is important But Easter is decisive What did he mean by that?

[32:20] What did he mean by that? Well at Christmas time You find that the teams You have to play a lot of games In the same period of time Maybe four or five games Maybe in two weeks And it is important It is important that they do well But the way he looked at it was Christmas is important But then you look at Easter Which can be a busy time And it is coming to the end of the season And he is saying Easter is decisive That is when things are really decided And what the person was saying And what the person was saying Is he was talking about this In a football way But we can think of it From the scripture as well Christmas is important Jesus came into the world That is so important But Easter is decisive Because without the death And the resurrection of Jesus Our faith would mean nothing The resurrection is so important Easter is decisive He was born into this world

[33:24] But he came to die And rise from the grave That was the definite plan But Jesus' dying on the cross Can seem like a plan that had gone wrong That God had failed And maybe this was kind of plan B How are we going to make things right?

[33:42] We've got to find another way Like we, when we're doing things We can go wrong And we think, right, what's plan B? How are we going to fix this? How are we going to change this? But all along This was God's plan A And that's what we see As you go right through the Old Testament It's always pointing towards Jesus on the cross Because he had to die for our sins But how do we know This is plan A?

[34:17] Well, there's a word used in these few verses that we've read These three verses that we've read It's the word finished You see it there in verse 28 After this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished Said to fulfill the scripture, I thirst And then when Jesus had received the sour wine He said, it is finished And he bowed his head and gave up his spirit So the word finished Is so important for us There's a number of words or phrases that maybe stick with us when we hear them Words that we can associate with something For example, the Titanic You think of the ship, the Titanic That sank back in April 1912 It was the anniversary just earlier this week Of the sinking of the Titanic Many people when that ship was built They looked at it and thought

[35:21] They used that word Some people used that word Unsinkable But on its first proper voyage It sank A tragedy occurred There was another time when a spaceship went up to space There was a mission, Apollo 13 There's a film made about it And the words that were used at one point was Houston, we have a problem And these kind of words, they stick with us Because we think that we associate them with something Unsinkable Or Houston, we have a problem And we think of Plans that had not worked out Plans that had gone wrong And for many people Jesus' words here in these verses People think that He'd lost control It was done It was finished He'd failed That's the way many people see it That's why many people saw it at the time

[36:22] As they looked on Jesus dying on the cross They thought, we're done The one we had hoped had come to save us Many people look on it in the same way Jesus means nothing But what we have to see is This word finished And it's a word I want you all to remember Because it's such an important word It's one of the most important words It's one of the most important words That Jesus said It is finished It's one word in Greek Tetelestai And I want you to remember that word Young and old alike It means And behind that word is Everything is paid in full Everything is paid in full And it's only used in the New Testament here These two times It's the only place it's used

[37:24] One of Jesus' last words on the cross Tetelestai It is finished Other people have used it in a different way But it always points towards something that is complete A servant who was maybe doing work in a house for someone They would use that word when their task was finished Tetelestai It's finished An artist would use it When they put the last touch to a masterpiece Tetelestai It's finished It's done Or people in trade would use it when they've come to an agreement When a deal has been struck The deal is done Tetelestai It is finished It is finished But here Jesus uses this word In a sense of everything that he had come to do Everything about God's plan Everything was finished with him All

[38:26] Is done The price is paid Have you ever been to the castle Here in Stornoway Have you ever gone inside Even just looking outside is amazing now But when you go inside The transformation since it lay derelict for so many years Just falling apart But then people got together and said We're going to renovate it We're going to redo it And a lot of money was put into it Maybe about 20 million pounds was spent on bringing it back Into what it had been previously And you go in now And you see it It's amazing to see Weddings are held in there You can stay a night in the castle It's an amazing place So imagine someone coming up to you and saying It's yours There's the keys What would your first reaction be You say I can't afford it 20 million just to do it up

[39:27] What's it worth now Hundreds of millions I can't afford it But someone comes and says What would you do If you got those keys Keep it to yourself Come and see my new house 70 bedrooms Anybody want a job cleaning it You can't imagine that happening Everything being paid for you in that way And yet here As you look at the word of God You got something even better Where Jesus says It is finished He is saying Here is the keys to life for you I have done it all Paid in full This is the plan of God for salvation For salvation He died So that we might live

[40:29] And he says It's for you The plan Was actioned It was done by Jesus But is that it Well we want to thirdly think of What does this mean for us today And we want to do this By just reading a few more verses In the Gospel of Luke We are going to read in chapter 24 Luke chapter 24 verse 44 to 53 And as we read these words What we see now is Here is Jesus Having been on the cross Where is he now?

[41:24] He has risen from the grave They went to the tomb On the Sunday morning And the stone had been rolled back The grave was empty The woman met the gardener Who said He is not here He is risen And then Jesus met With his people In different ways And here is one occasion When he met with them As we are reading in Luke 24 Then he said to them These are my words That I spoke to you While I was still with you That everything written about me In the law of Moses And the prophets Must be fulfilled Then he opened their minds To understand the scriptures And said to them Thus it is written That the Christ should suffer And on the third day Rise from the dead And that repentance For the forgiveness of sins Should be proclaimed in his name Beginning from Jerusalem You are witnesses of these things And behold I am sending the promise

[42:25] Of my Father upon you But stay in the city Until you are clothed With power on high And he led them out As far as Bethany And lifting up his hands He blessed them While he blessed them He parted from them And was carried up into heaven And they worshipped him And returned to Jerusalem With great joy And were continually In the temple Blessing God Jesus is risen And what does that mean For us today Well go back to the castle And the offer of the keys To it being yours For that to be complete What needs to happen?

[43:10] You have to move in You have to accept it Until you do that Until you do that It's not yours It's not yours You're not living there You're not part of it And that's like it is With the kingdom of God As well The offer is there for us Everything is done It is finished It's Jesus said But in order to live Life to the full We need to believe And understand the scriptures All that is written And that's what we see In these words here That Jesus is speaking To the crowds Who are there with him He says These are my words That I spoke to you While I was still with you That everything Written about me In the law of Moses The prophets And the Psalms That's the Old Testament As we have it Must be fulfilled And then he opened Their minds To understand the scriptures That's what we long for today That the Lord would open our minds

[44:13] To understand the scriptures To understand the importance Of this message It is finished It is done It is paid in full But do you understand that today?

[44:30] Do you understand the importance Of that today for yourself? That in order to live with God You need to believe in Jesus The resurrection Affects our whole life And our eternal life as well What we believe today Is what will matter In the future Even as we think of ourselves Living in this world We know we are just passing through And the day will come When we are called away ourselves But are we ready?

[45:07] That's always the question Are we ready for that day? Well, it is the word of God It is trusting in Jesus And the finished work Of all that he has done There was a lot of confusion At the time of Jesus' death Peter, as we said Was confused by what was happening He denied knowing Jesus And the disciples left Even before They could see what had happened And when they were told That he has risen They didn't believe it We will be hearing more of that But just before this part of Luke 24 You have two who were on the road to Emmaus And they tell us that Everything just seemed to have got out of control God's plan had failed in many ways They didn't understand what was happening They were saying This Jesus has been crucified He has been put to death

[46:09] And we had hoped that he was going to be our savior They couldn't understand And while they were discussing all of these things Jesus came alongside And it says in verse 16 Their eyes were kept from recognizing him They didn't see him They didn't understand who he was They were kept from recognizing him But what they do then is Later on Their hearts are opened As he preaches the word Did not our hearts burn within us?

[46:40] As he opened up the scriptures to us And when you see that in light of what he says here Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures You see it's all about Jesus He is the one who helps us to understand Their eyes were kept from seeing him Until their hearts burned within them And for yourself today as well It's what are you trusting in?

[47:12] Are you trusting and seeking to understand from these words That here is the way to eternal life Here is the way to be saved from our sin It is to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ There was a man Who used to go out in the streets of the cities Different cities around America And he was always preaching about Jesus Telling people about Jesus But he said I would often be interrupted by the crowd asking a question And so often he was saying the same question kept coming up They would say there are hundreds of religions in this country How can we know that the truth that you are telling the truth?

[47:59] And the man would answer the question something like this Did I hear you say there are hundreds of religions? I'll say this to you There's only two And he said yes there may be different shades of religions But there's ultimately only two And one he said covers all who expect salvation By doing it themselves That's one religion You are saved by what you do yourself The other he says covers all who say They are saved by something that was done by another Jesus Are you saved by what you do yourself?

[48:50] That's one religion And it's a religion that's so common in this world We don't need Jesus It's about what we do, how we live That we're good people We live that we're good people All of these things But that's not what counts Through religion Is found through faith in Jesus Christ Believing in something that was done by another But we couldn't do ourselves We couldn't save ourselves from our sins But that's why Jesus said It is finished It is done It is done And that's why we need help from Jesus To open our minds to understand these scriptures To understand all that is written Jesus paid it all All to him I owe Sin had left a crimson stain He washed it white as snow That's what the hymn writer says

[49:53] Jesus paid it all We all like a good bargain We all look for the best deal Is that how you're living your life?

[50:06] Looking for cheap grace Somebody wants to put it like this There are no victories at discount prices Jesus paid it all It is finished Do you believe this?

[50:26] God had a plan He put his plan into action This plan is completed Do you believe it?

[50:39] What has Jesus done? He said he would come We can say Tetelestai Finished He said I will die We can say Tetelestai It is finished He said I will resurrect We can say Tetelestai It is finished There's one part yet He said I will come again It is time To get ready And to believe That God's plan The instructions Now help us Lord To understand These scriptures And to believe That all is done All is paid He is risen And he will come Let us pray Our Father in heaven

[51:41] We do rejoice In all that is done for us That it is finished That the price is paid in full And we ask O Lord today That you will help us To understand these scriptures So that our hearts May burn within us And rejoice In the hope that is found In Jesus Christ The one who defeated death Who rose from the grave Who was ascended on high And the one who will come again Hear our prayers And continue with us We ask in his precious name We're going to conclude By singing to God's praise In Psalm 33 In the Scottish Psalter We'll sing from verse 8 To verse 11 Page 245 Of the Psalm books At verse 8 This Psalm reminds us That the word of God Is true It stands forever

[52:43] Let earth and all That live therein With reverence fear the Lord Let all the world's Thread him with one accord For he did speak the word And done It was without delay Establish it It firmly stood Whatever he did see We'll sing from verse 8 To 11 We stand to sing To God's praise Let voyance Let voyance Let voyance Let voyance Let voyance Let voyance Let voyance Let voyance Let voyance Let Him with one accord.

[53:35] For He did speak the word undone, it was without delay.

[53:50] Establish it, it firmly stood whatever he did say.

[54:02] What love the council bring to naught which He then hoped to take?

[54:17] And what the people do delight of the defective day?

[54:30] Oh, that the council of the Lord does stand forever sure and all His heart the purposes from age to age and true.

[54:56] Amen. After the benediction, I'll go to the main door. We'll close the benediction. Now may grace, mercy, and peace from God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit rest upon and abide with you all now and forevermore.

[55:12] Amen. Amen. Amen.

[55:22] Amen. Amen.

[55:40]