Good morning.
Fok Wai Ji Phi Lok.
Is that sort of right?
Okay, great.
Happy Easter for those of you who like me,
aren't very good at Cantonese.
And welcome, welcome to our Easter service.
If you are a guest of ours this morning,
please make yourself right at home.
It's so wonderful to have you with us
as we celebrate what is the most wonderful
and significant day in the Christian calendar.
This morning, across the globe,
from Tokyo to Texas, from Canberra to Canada,
from the southernmost tip of Africa
all the way to the northernmost tip of Asia,
followers of Jesus from every culture,
every background, every language,
every socioeconomic group are celebrating
not just that Jesus died
and he took our sin upon himself,
not just the fact that God came to earth for us,
but the fact that Jesus rose again
physically in bodily form.
This morning, we celebrate
that the grave couldn't hold him.
This morning, we celebrate
that the tomb couldn't contain him.
This morning, we join with the angels who say,
why look for the living amongst the dead?
He is not here.
He has risen.
And so this morning, we celebrate
the risen Lord Jesus Christ.
But the question is, what does that mean for us?
How does this historic and most important day
affect our lives tomorrow
or on Tuesdays, you go to work?
How does this day affect us
when you're sitting in the doctor's room
and you have got a medical report in front of you?
How does the resurrection of Jesus affect
not just your eternity, but your career,
your approach to money, your marriage?
How does it affect you
when you get paid a nice bonus?
How does the resurrection of Jesus
affect your successes and your failures,
your ambitions and your disappointments?
This morning, we're gonna just,
for 15 minutes,
we're gonna look at this passage of scripture
that was read to us.
And the scripture tells us
two profound implications
of the resurrection of Jesus.
Two implications that speak
to our deepest existential need,
but two implications that also speak
to the nitty-gritty days of life,
the days when we're in the trenches,
the realities of life.
And so if you've got the bulletin,
look at the bulletin scripture with me.
In verse 15, Paul is writing,
and the apostle Paul writes to these Christians
in this very superstitious city of Ephesus.
And he writes that he's praying for them.
And he's praying this prayer,
and this is the prayer that he prays.
He says,
I pray that the eyes of your heart
may be enlightened,
may be opened,
that you may know,
so not just theoretically know,
not just know in your head.
I pray that deep down in your heart,
you will know something.
And what does he want them to know?
He wants them to know two things.
He wants them to know the hope
to which God has called them,
and he wants them to know the great power
that is promised to those
that are followers of Jesus.
Okay?
So look at what he says, verse 18.
I pray that the eyes of your heart
may be enlightened,
in order that you may know
what is the hope to which God has called you.
Friends, the resurrection of Jesus
gives hope to the hopeless.
All of us know
that hope has the ability
to both stir you up
and to crush you, right?
You know, the Proverbs writes
that the hope deferred
or hope unrealized
makes the heart sick.
Can anyone recognize that feeling?
You hope for something
only for it not to happen,
and your heart feels sick, right?
But why is that?
Why does hope have this ability
to both encourage us
and to crush us?
Well, the reason is
because when we talk about hope,
we talk about hope
as something like a desired outcome
that we hope is going to happen,
but the outcome is very uncertain, right?
You hope to have good grades
to get into university.
You hope that your mother's cancer
will go into remission, right?
You hope that you will be made MD this year.
You hope that your child
will get into med school
and become a doctor.
It's these things that are,
it's the desired outcome,
but the outcome
is not necessarily certain.
Every year,
I hope that my football team
will win the league,
and in my case,
it's very uncertain, right,
that that's going to happen.
But we're all familiar
with the uncertainty of hope.
Hope has the ability
to disappoint us.
But you know,
when the Bible speaks about hope,
it actually uses it
in a very different way.
The Bible talks about hope
as something which is,
the outcome is guaranteed.
It's absolutely rock solid certain,
but the path towards that outcome
is very uncertain.
Or the route,
or if you're American,
the route towards that outcome
is very uncertain, right?
So think about it in this way.
In our culture,
we think about hope
as like driving a car
without a GPS system.
You hope that you're going to get
to the destination,
but whether you get there or not
is not very certain.
Okay?
But when the Bible talks about hope,
it talks about hope
as being like somebody
that's blind,
but taking the hand
of somebody trustworthy.
The path in front of you
is unknown.
It's going to require faith.
It's going to require trust.
It's going to require courage.
But you can be guaranteed
that the person
is going to get you
to your destination.
Okay?
Does that make sense?
Now,
look at what Paul says here.
He says,
I pray
that the eyes of your heart
will be opened,
that you may know,
not just intellectually,
that you may know
in your heart
what is the rock-solid hope
to which God has called you
because Jesus has risen
from the dead.
Now,
why does Christ's resurrection
give us this hope?
Why can we bank our lives
this rock-solid hope
because Christ has risen from the dead?
How does Jesus rising from the dead
give us this hope?
In the book of 1 Corinthians,
the apostle Paul writes,
and he says this.
He says,
if Jesus didn't rise from the dead,
well,
our faith
is actually in vain.
Our hope
is worthless.
We've got nothing to hope for
because all we've got to live on
is that which is around us,
the circumstances,
the situations.
We hope that things will go well
or maybe things won't go well.
Our faith is worthless
and hopeless.
It's all in vain.
But then he says,
but,
says Paul,
in fact,
Christ did rise from the dead
and is the first fruits
of those who have died.
In other words,
he's saying,
Jesus died
and he's gone to heaven,
but he hasn't just gone to heaven.
He's opened the way.
He's paved the way
for all those who trust in him
and to hope in him
that we will follow him
to glory one day.
In other words,
Jesus didn't just die
to save us from judgment
from God one day.
Jesus rose from the dead
and his resurrection life
is now available
for you and I
right here today,
right now.
As you go to work this week,
as you work on your marriage,
as you worry about your children,
something of Jesus' resurrection life
and power
is available to us today.
It's no secret that in Hong Kong
there's a real sense of hopelessness.
That right?
People feel like the system
is against them.
The housing market,
rental is so expensive,
education,
the pressures of work,
these long hours
that you have to work,
the expectation of your bosses,
the pressure to provide
for your children
everything that they need
to succeed.
For many people in Hong Kong,
the system,
the sense that the system
is against you
renders so many people
with a sense of hopelessness.
Friends,
I want to tell you this morning
that the gospel gives us a hope.
It guarantees that there's an outcome.
It guarantees that if you take the hand
of the living God,
you may have to trust Him.
It doesn't guarantee that your life
will be comfortable or easy.
As you take His hand
and He says,
walk with me,
there will be times
where the route between here
and glory
is not comfortable or convenient.
But there is a hope
that the resurrected Jesus gives us
that you can take His hand
and He will not let you go.
There is a hope that
in your heart of hearts,
you can face the obstacles.
You can face the storms in life.
You may have storms around you.
You can get up in the morning
with hope in your heart
because Jesus is alive
and has risen from the grave.
And I want to ask us
to think about
the implications of this.
Think about the implications
in two ways.
Firstly,
think about the implications
for hardship and trials,
difficulty and suffering.
This week,
I was listening to a podcast
of a man called
Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones.
The podcast was about
this man's life.
And Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones
was a,
he grew up in the United Kingdom
and at 10 years old,
his father had a shop front, right?
So you know how in Hong Kong,
the old shop front,
there's a shop on the bottom
and a house up on top.
And so his father
was a shopkeeper
and they lived above the shop.
And at 10 years old,
one night,
the family's all fast asleep
in the house
and something in the shop
catches a light
and the shop
bursts into flame.
The flames engulf the shop
and soon they engulf
the whole house.
And so the family
realized what's going on
and they escape.
And they get out alive,
but they've lost everything.
Absolutely everything.
This was in the early 1900s.
They didn't have insurance,
good policies in those days.
And so the family
loses completely everything.
And they try and trade
their way out,
but things just get worse.
And so after a few years,
the family is declared bankrupt.
And the shame,
they've got to sell everything
and they've got nothing.
But listen to what
the podcaster wrote about this.
He said,
these financial troubles,
this frowning providence
was actually hiding behind it all
a smiling face
because the financial losses
would become the impetus
to push Martin Lloyd-Jones
into becoming the man
that he had later become.
You see what he's saying?
Even in the midst
of great hopelessness,
in the midst of great despair,
as this family lost everything,
behind all that hardship
was the smiling face
of the sovereign God
that knew what he was doing
and was using that moment
to forge this person
to becoming
one of the greatest leaders
in the last century.
I'll tell you more about him
in a second.
Well, consider the apostle Paul.
Paul is in prison
and things aren't going well.
He's getting beaten in jail.
And what does he do?
He rejoices.
He rejoices at the trials
that he's facing
because in the midst
of the trials,
he sees the fingerprints
of God.
He knows that God
is in the trials
and God is there with him
even in the prison.
He says that the prison
has allowed him
to know God deeper,
to find out something
about the nature
and the character of God.
Even as he's being beaten
and mocked,
Paul finds reason
to rejoice.
And he writes this.
He says,
even though my body
is wasting away,
my body is becoming frail,
even in my old age,
I'm not as strong
as I used to be.
He says,
my inner self
is being renewed,
made new every day.
These light
and momentary troubles
that I face
are preparing for me
an eternal weight of glory
beyond all comparison.
You see,
others might have looked
at Paul
as this defeated preacher,
this man who's
in the misery
of a Roman dungeon jail,
being beaten,
left for dead.
They could have thought,
what a waste of a life.
But Paul knew
that because Jesus
is alive
and is on the throne,
that even his dying
in the dungeon
is not the end
of the story.
That Christ is preparing
for him
an eternal glorious home.
And Paul knows
that the route
between here and there
may not be easy.
It may be challenging.
There may be obstacles,
but he knows
that the dungeon
is not the final word
on his life.
He knows that there is
a word that speaks
a better word
than even what
the Roman prisoners
and authorities
can throw at him.
There is a word
that says,
Jesus was dead
and now he is alive
and I'm preparing
a home for you.
Friends,
I'm not sure
what challenges
you face.
There might be
some really tough situations.
I'm not minimizing
the pain of that.
Friends,
I want to tell you
this morning
that in spite
of the challenges
you face,
in spite of the hardships,
in spite of the trials,
the final word
in your life
is not what is happening now.
If you are a Christ follower,
if you are in Jesus
and Jesus is in you,
the final word
of your life
is that Christ
has died
and has risen again
and he's pouring
his resurrection life
into you
and therefore
there is hope.
The resurrection
promises us
hope
in the midst
of trials
and hardships.
But think about
how the resurrection
also not only defines
our trials
and our hardships,
the resurrection hope
also redefines
our successes
and what's important
in life.
In our city,
success
is measured
or defined
by accolades,
by applause,
by affirmation,
and by financial reward.
But for the Christian,
our hope
is not found
in the applause
or the affirmation
of people around us.
For the Christian,
our hope is found
in the affirmation
of the one true God
for whom we were made
and with whom
we will live
for all eternity.
You know,
Martin Lloyd-Jones,
this man I was telling you
about who at 10 years old,
his family home
was burnt down.
When the family
lost everything,
he realized
his parents
couldn't afford
to send him to school
and so he studied
extra hard
and he won a scholarship
to a very good school
and at the school
he did very well.
And so at 16 years old,
he got admitted,
which was a very young age,
he got admitted
to the top medical school
in London,
St. Bartholomew's Hospital.
So at 16 years old,
he goes to medical school
and there he just excels.
He does exceptionally well
and in fact,
in his final years
of study,
the doctor by the name
of Sir Thomas Horder,
who was the king's physician,
noticed Martin Lloyd-Jones
and actually in his final exam,
Martin Lloyd-Jones
diagnosed a patient
with something
that this Dr. Horder
had missed.
And so Dr. Horder,
before the results
of his exams are out,
Dr. Horder approaches him
and says,
I want you to be
my clinical assistant.
And so here at the age
of 22,
Martin Lloyd-Jones,
is the clinical assistant
to the king's physician.
And over the next few years,
he wins some more
research scholarships.
And eventually at 25,
Martin Lloyd-Jones opens
his own practice
on Harley Street.
And Harley Street
is in London
where all the top physicians are,
the cream of the crop.
And so 25 years old,
he is tipped
to become the next physician
to the king of England.
He's got a private practice
on Harley Street.
Dr. Horder has introduced him
to the wealthiest
and the most upper class
of London society.
He is being a doctor
to members
of the royal family,
parliamentarians,
the upper class of society.
He's made it,
he's absolutely had it made.
25 years old,
he's got everything
that he wants
in front of him.
And 18 months later,
the age of 26,
he walks away
from it all
and he decides
to become a minister
in a small farming community
in the south of Wales.
Here was a man
who had it all.
In the eyes of society,
his hope and therefore,
his life was completely set.
He had the money,
he had the career,
he had the reputation,
he had everything going for him.
But because of the hope
of the gospel,
because of the hope
of the resurrection,
he knew that his hope
wasn't defined
in the things
that society said
gave him hope.
He knew that his success
wasn't in the eyes
of society.
He knew that his hope
was in something
far deeper,
something far more profound.
And so he gave up
this high-flying career
with parliamentarians
and royal family
to go and minister
to a bunch of farming folk
in the south of Wales.
Friends,
the good news
of the gospel
is that because Jesus
is alive
and he's real,
he's making himself known
to those who love
and trust him,
this redefines our success
and what's important
in life.
You know,
in one of Paul's
prison letters,
Paul wrote lots
of letters in prison.
In one of his prison letters,
he writes this.
He says,
as a young man,
I had it all going for me.
I had the career,
I had the money,
I had society's approval,
I had the wife
and three kids,
I had the car,
I had everything going for me.
And then he writes this.
He says,
but what I had,
I've now written off
as rubbish.
All these things
are now considered rubbish
compared to the surpassing
worth of knowing
the resurrected Jesus Christ
in order that I may gain him
and know him
and know the power
of his resurrection.
Friends,
what the resurrection
of Jesus declares to us
is that this life
is not your final
resting place
and therefore
the most important things
in life
are not gained
or found
by hard work.
They're not secured
by being the brightest
or the smartest.
They're not given to you
by opportunities
or money
or connections.
What the resurrection
tells us
is that the most important
things in life
are found
by following
the path of Jesus,
of dying to ourselves,
of picking up our cross,
following Christ
to Calgary
and there we find
resurrection life.
Friends,
this is the hope
of the gospel
that Jesus has risen
and if you trust him,
Christ is in you
and you are in him.
Christ,
your hope of glory.
Second thing is this.
So two things
the resurrection gives us.
The resurrection gives us
a hope.
Friends,
as you go to work this week,
the resurrection gives you hope.
Maybe your boss
is moaning at you.
Maybe you make a mistake.
Maybe you think
you're about to get fired.
Maybe your marriage
is difficult.
Maybe parenting
is difficult.
Maybe you've hit
a roadblock
in your career
and you don't know
which way to turn.
Friends,
this world does not have
the final word
in your life.
The resurrected
Lord Jesus Christ
has the final word
in your life
and you can hope in him.
You can bank your life
in him.
Second thing is this.
The resurrection
gives us a power.
Look at what
Paul writes here.
He says,
I pray that the eyes
of your heart
will be opened
that you may know
what is the hope
to which he's called you.
Okay,
we spoke about that.
Verse 19,
and what is the
immeasurable greatness
of his power
towards those
who believe.
The same power
that God worked
in Christ Jesus
when he raised him
from the dead
and seated him
in the right hand
in the heavenly places.
One of the reasons
why in Hong Kong
people feel so hopeless
is because we feel powerless,
right?
We feel like the system
is against us.
We feel like the rent
is just so high.
We feel like things
are so expensive
and you just can't
beat the system.
But some of us
also feel powerless
because we can't
change our own lives.
The patterns of behavior,
the addictions
that we feel,
it's like we try
everything to become
the people
we so desperately
want to become
and we just can't
change our lives.
But here in this passage,
Paul tells us
that the Christian,
the life that God
calls us to
is not by summoning up
or working extra hard
or trying extra hard.
That actually,
there's a power
in the resurrection
of Jesus
that changes your life
beyond what you are able
to do
through the power
of the Holy Spirit.
I don't know
if you're hearing anything
but I'm trying my best,
right?
We're almost done,
okay?
We're almost done.
You know,
Martin Lloyd-Jones,
that medical doctor,
right?
He becomes a medical doctor.
He's tipped to become
the next king's physician.
At 26 years old,
he packs it all up
to become a minister
to a farming community
in the south of Wales.
Do you know why
he did that?
The reason he did it
was because
as a medical student,
he had to often work
with the poorest
and the most uneducated
in London society.
And he found out
that there was
this powerlessness
to overcome
the patterns of behavior
in their life.
These people
that as a med student
he had to work with,
they just couldn't break
the patterns of behavior
in their life.
And he assumed
that the reason was
because they were uneducated,
they didn't have access
to opportunities,
their poverty
had trapped them
in a lifestyle
and they were powerless
to overcome it.
But then a few years later,
he becomes doctor
to members
of the royal family,
to parliamentarians,
to the most powerful,
wealthy,
and the elites
of London society.
And he finds out
that the elites
of London society
struggle with
the exact same thing
that the very uneducated
and the poor did.
He realized
that if you have nothing
or if you have everything,
both people
are powerless
to change
the patterns of behavior
in their life.
And so one day
he wakes up
with a sense
of hopelessness.
He says,
God, what is the point?
If you've got everything
in the world,
you still are powerless
to change your life.
If you've got nothing,
you are powerless
to change your life.
Where is the hope
for these people?
And he realized
that there was a power.
There is a power
that's not found in them.
There's a power
that's found outside of them.
And so he decides
to become a doctor,
not of medicine,
but a doctor of souls.
And he leaves it all
and he packs it up
to go to the south of Wales.
And on the south of Wales,
there are people there
that thought
they could never change.
There was one man
that was so angry,
it's such an anger problem,
that one day
his dog irritates him.
He brings out a knife
and he hacks his dog
to pieces out of anger.
He walks into
Martin Lloyd-Jones
preaching one day
and he's a changed man.
The power of the gospel
changed him.
One day a lady
comes into his services,
she's a median,
a spiritist,
she helps people
speak to spirits,
and she comes
into his meetings
and she says,
I know power,
I work with power.
There's a power
in that meeting
that I've never
encountered before,
but it's a different
kind of power.
It's a clean power.
I want that power.
And her life
changes around.
After 12 years,
Martin Lloyd-Jones
leaves Wales
and he goes back
to London
to work with the high
elites of society.
And there,
men and women
that were trapped
in the power of sin
that they couldn't
break free,
their lives
are turned around
as they encounter
the power
of the gospel.
Friends,
as I look
at the holiness
and the beauty
and the majesty
of Jesus,
and I look
at my own life,
I'm tempted
to become
overawed
with a sense
of hopelessness.
How is it
that someone
like me,
someone as rotten
as me,
could ever please
my God,
my maker,
how is it
that I can ever
live up to
what he did
on the cross
for me?
Friends,
apart from
the power
of Christ
and the power
of the Holy Spirit,
what hope is there?
But I have hope
when I look
at the power
of the gospel
because if Jesus
can change people
like me,
if Jesus can change
people like Saul
of Tarsus,
if Jesus can change
millions of people
around the world,
friends,
there is a hope
in the midst
of the most hopelessness
because Christ
is powerful.
Friends,
when I get
overwhelmed
by the expectations
and the pressures
of life
and what people
expect,
it can be exhausting
until I recognize
that my identity
and my hope
and my security
is not what people
think of me.
It's not what I can do
or what I can achieve.
My hope
and my identity
is in the power
of the living God
who was once contained
in the grave
but is no longer there.
Who was once nailed
to the cross
but he's no longer there.
My hope
is in the power
of the risen,
resurrected Christ
who is seated
in the heavens.
Friends,
this Easter,
I pray,
I pray that we will
lift our eyes
off of ourselves.
I pray that this Easter
we will lift our eyes
to the heavens
where Christ is seated.
We'll find our hope there.
I pray that this Easter
we will know
that if you're in Christ,
Christ is in you
by the power
of the Spirit
and the power
of God
that raised Jesus
from the dead
is alive
and is in you.
Friends,
if you've come
to place your hope
and your faith
in Christ,
Christ's death
and resurrection
is not just
a fact of history.
It's not just
a story from the Bible.
It's a power
that gives you hope
in the midst
of the most hopeless
of situations
because Christ's word
speaks a better word
than everything else
around you.
Romans 15, 13
says this,
May the God
of all hope
fill you with joy
and peace
in believing
so that by the power
of the Holy Spirit
you may abound
in hope.
Let's pray together.
Jesus Christ,
this morning
we celebrate
the most glorious
good news
that has come
to mankind.
Not only did you die
in the cross for us,
not only did you take
our shame
and our guilt,
not only did you
take our sin
that separates us
from you,
but Jesus,
you rose again.
Jesus,
today you are
seated in the heavens
above all rule
and all authority.
Jesus,
today your power
is at work
in those that have
come to know you
by the power
of the Holy Spirit.
Oh God,
I pray,
won't you infuse
our hearts
with a hope
in the midst
of great hopelessness?
God,
I pray,
today may the power
of the Holy Spirit
come upon us,
God.
may you change us,
may you give us
fresh hope,
God.
God,
I pray for those
of us that
feel hopeless.
Jesus,
won't you open
the eyes of our hearts
to see you
and to know the hope
to which you've called us.
God,
may you give us
a new identity
this morning.
And God,
I pray that your Holy Spirit
will be at work in us.
God,
I pray this morning,
may we take your hand
knowing that for certain
you'll get us
to our destiny.
knowing that we can
bank our lives
on you.
God,
we know it'll require
trust,
it'll require great faith,
may require some courage.
Jesus,
this morning
we take your hand
and we walk with you
banking our lives
on you,
our resurrected
and living King.
We pray these things
in your wonderful
and powerful name.
Amen.