SPEAKER_00 0:31

Good morning. It is good to be here this morning. Again, want to recognize all of our visitors. We're so glad that you have chosen to worship with us here at at Central this morning. Uh and it is a beautiful, beautiful uh Easter morning. In fact, we got started early uh at 6 30 with sunrise service. And I gotta admit to you driving in, I was wondering, hmm, are we gonna be outside or are we gonna be indoors? And I just thought, don't worry about it. Just do what you're supposed to do, and everything else will be fine. And uh we had about uh uh Blake tells me 22. I'm just gonna say 25. I'm gonna preach or count that one. Uh and uh but had just a great, great fellowship of folks this morning, and and and the Lord took care of it. Uh the the the sun did come out a little bit, the the rain lightened up, and in fact it it stopped. The wind did not stop blowing, uh, I'll tell you that. Uh but it it even though it was it was cool, and the coolness reminds us of something. It reminded us of the coldness of this world and the coldness of the sin that we all had upon us until we as believers came uh to the warmth and the light of Jesus. And that's part of what we're celebrating this morning. We're celebrating the resurrected Christ. Uh Thomas talked about the cross, and and we're actually going to go in in a little bit more in depth with that uh a little bit later. But but Jesus is risen. He's alive, and that's what drives us in our life as believers today in a world that could use the message of the cross. And this morning we're gonna look at the new covenant of the cross uh and take a look at what that means to us uh as believers. I had someone ask on social media this week, uh, why are we celebrating the resurrection this week? Don't we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus every week in the church? Well, of course we do. But this is the day in the year that the world stops and takes notice, at least for a moment, of the resurrected Jesus. And so we're gonna focus on the new covenant of the cross together this morning. But before we do that, let's let's go to God together in prayer and ask the Spirit to bless our message this morning. Our Lord and our God, we thank you, Father, for bringing us together today. We thank you so much for the message of the cross. It is a hard message for us to hear in light of the sins that we've committed. And Father, we are so thankful for the new covenant of the cross, that Jesus suffered as we deserved, and that today we celebrate his resurrection, and we look forward to our resurrection, to your kingdom in heaven when this life is over. Spirit, I pray this morning that the message will be your message, that you will speak to us in a very real and powerful way to help us to understand the price that's been paid and the blessing that we enjoy that we do not deserve as believers. Help us to share the message of the cross and the new covenant of the cross with those around us. Give us the words to say and the times to know when to say those words to lead others to you. Lord, we we love you so much, and we thank you for all that you've done for us. And it's in the name of the powerful and risen Savior, your Son, Jesus Christ, that we pray together. And Lord, we thank you so much. And the church said together, Amen. You know, a lot of people in the world wear a cross around their neck. But a lot of those folks don't know what the cross really means. And for some people, wearing a cross at Easter is kind of like putting your flag out in front of your house on the 4th of July. It's just something that we do. And it's a symbol that has lost a lot of its meaning for so many. Church, the meaning of the cross of Jesus is something that we must never, ever forget and we should never take lightly. Because it's at the cross, church, where Jesus has made it possible for us to have a new covenant relationship with the Father. Listen again to part of our text that was read just a moment ago. Luke writes to Theophilus in chapter 22, verse 20 of his gospel: this cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood. Church, a covenant is in agreement. It's where two parties enter into a relationship, and the covenant spells out the responsibilities of each party and the consequences should these responsibilities not be carried out. In the Old Testament, several times God states his covenant with the children of Israel. And he stated his laws, and the people were asked if they would agree to obey them. God gave them that opportunity, and the people always responded, if you remember, that they would. These were the terms of the contract. Obey the law and God will bless you. If you choose not to, well then there will be consequences for that choice. Time after time, when we go back and we look at biblical history, time after time, Israel failed in the terms of the contract and of the covenant. And they would have ambitious goals. They would have good intentions, but they didn't keep them. And through all of this, God never abandoned his people. And he promised, never will I leave you. Never will I forsake you. When he made that promise, church, he meant it. He kept it. But the people weren't living up to their part of the covenant. So God in his wrath reacted several times to their unfaithfulness. But the people never changed. And so God endured with the people. And there came a point in time when he pointed them to another time, a coming time, a time of a new covenant. And we see this in Jeremiah chapter 31, verses 31 to 34, where it says, The time is coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their forefathers when I took them by the hand and led them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them, declares the Lord. This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I'll put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God and they will be my people. No longer will man teach his neighbor or a man his brother, saying, Know the Lord, because they will know, they will all know me. From the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord, for I will forgive their wickedness and remember their sins no more. So how does the cross fit into all of this? And what are the terms of the new covenant? Well, family, to begin with, it's on the cross of Jesus where the new covenant with God is established. Church, in our life, you and I have slowly allowed ourselves to become slaves to sin. And every time we sin, church, what we need to understand is that we add a link to the chain and a charge against us in the side of God. And that makes us a bond servant to slavery, the slavery of sin. And every time we sin, we move farther and farther away from the Father and the freedom he provides for us through his Son, Jesus. And with this understanding, church, it should come as no surprise that we would no longer be entitled to the blessings from God. It should come as no surprise that salvation would not be extended to us. Family, the severity of our sin is enormous. And on the cross, Jesus blotted out our sins. And we see this in Colossians chapter 2, verses 13 and 14, in the American Standard Version of 1901. He says, In you being dead through your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, you, I say, did he make alive together with him, having forgiven all our trespasses, having blotted out the bond written in ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us. And he hath taken it out of the way, nailing it to the cross. Family, take a good look at that. And what Paul says. Having blotted out the bond, church, that means that Jesus basically hit the delete button on our sins. What that means is that the bond was paid. The bond was satisfied for the sins that we've committed in our life against the Lord. He not only posted the bond to free us, he also erased the sin record. And this is a visual language. We have to remember that the Greek is very visual. It's a visual language, and the visual symbol that we should see here is that of someone blotting out or wiping away our sins, like on a chalkboard or on a dry erase board. And only Jesus, only Jesus, the perfect Son of God, who was sacrificed for you and for me, was worthy to hold the eraser. Perhaps this could be connected to what John records in Revelation chapter 21, verse 4, which says, He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and there will no longer be any death. There will no longer be any mourning or crying or pain. For the first things have passed away. So how is that possible? What had to happen in order for your sins and my sins to be erased? Well, someone who was innocent had to take our place. Think about it. If you and I were convicted of a crime and we were sentenced to death, it would be pointless for me to offer to take your place. And the reason why is because we've both been sentenced to death. I'm just as guilty as you are. I face the same death penalty that you do. We both have the same sin problem. And we can't solve one another's problems. Because we're both guilty. And so someone else had to step in. And only Jesus could do that. Church, this is why Hebrews chapter 4, verse 15 says, He was tempted in every way, as we are, but was without sin. Family, he was without sin so that he could be our substitute. However, there's also a second dimension to what Christ did. Family, he not only paid the bond for the sins that you and I have committed in full, he also made it possible to receive the Father's rich blessings of peace and prayer and the Holy Spirit. So how was Jesus able to do this? Unlike Jesus, or unlike us, Jesus lived a perfect life. And he was due the blessings and the fellowship of his Father. So basically what Jesus did, he traded places with us. He took our penalty, he took your penalty, he took my penalty, which he didn't deserve. And we took his blessing, which we cannot earn, and we certainly do not deserve. Jesus was treated as the sinner, and we are treated as the son. We must receive this offer from the Father that's made through Jesus. We must accept Jesus as our substitute. We must claim him as our savior and trust him as our Lord. In faith, in repentance, confession, and baptism. If we'll do this, God promises to consider our sin paid in full and treat us with the respect and the honor that belongs to his son. So what's the cost of the covenant? It doesn't come free, I can tell you that. What's the cost of the covenant? Church, it's important for us to understand the tremendous cost of the new covenant that has been paid for us. And so in under to understand it, we have to be informed of it. Regardless of how painful it is to hear. I said, no, no, no, no. We need to hear this. We don't need to gloss over the cross. We need to understand exactly what happened on the cross, what Jesus went through on the cross for us. Because it makes it real. And if the cross isn't real for you and isn't real for me, then how can our faith and our mission and our ministry and our walk with the Lord be real? In his book, The Case for Christ, Lee Strobel tells of an interview with a medical examiner. And from that interview, we learn several things about the suffering of Jesus on the cross. And first, there was the brutal scourging that he went through. The Roman soldier would use a whip called a flagellum. And this whip consisted of long leather strands that were embedded with iron balls, kind of like balls from a pinball machine, about that size, maybe a little smaller, woven into it. And when the whip would strike the flesh, these balls would come down and bruise the flesh deep. And after repeated strikes with the flagellum, that part of it would bruise the skin to the point that eventually it would just break the skin open from all of the trauma. But that's not all. It also contained pieces of sharp bone or metal. And when it was swung, it would not only bruise the body, it would wrap around the body, and the bone and the metal would dig into the skin deep. And then when the soldier would pull back on it, it would rip the flesh from the body. It's been said that the back of the victim was so shredded that the spine was sometimes exposed by the deep repetition of the cuts. The scourging would go from the shoulders down the back all the way to the back of the thighs. Eusebius, a third century historian in his work Ecclesiastical History, in chapter 4, book 15, described scourging in this way. He said the sufferer's veins were laid bare, and the very muscles, sinews, and bowels of a victim were open to exposure. Family, naturally, as a result of this beating, many would die. Others would experience tremendous pain and go into hypovolemic shock. And what that means is that the heart would race, the pulse would quicken and race to pump blood that isn't there. The blood pressure would drop, causing the loss of consciousness. The kidneys would stop producing urine in order to conserve what volume of fluid was left in the body. And if the person doesn't lose consciousness at this point, they become thirsty. Because they crave the fluids to replace the loss of blood volume. Family, this is what's happening. This is what's happening. When Jesus says, I'm thirsty. This was the scourging of the cross that he endured. Then there's the painful agony of the cross. Church, we know that when Jesus was nailed to the cross, the railroad spike-sized nails went through the place in the wrist where the median nerve runs through the middle of the wrist, and it's the largest nerve going out of the body into the hand, and it would be crushed by the dull nails as it was being pounded in. And what would that be like? Experts say the pain would be indescribable. In fact, the pain that's Someone would be feeling at this point would be so bad that they had to invent a new word for it. Thomas covered this earlier. The word they came up with was the word excruciating. And that word comes literally out of the cross. That's what it means. And so when Jesus hung on that cross for us, church, several things happened. First, Jesus' arms would have been stretched, probably, as Thomas indicated earlier, six inches longer than normal. His shoulders would have become dislocated. That's hard to imagine. But it actually fulfilled prophecy. Psalm 22, verse 14 points this out where it says, I'm poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. Even on the cross, in this act, Jesus is fulfilling prophecy. And here's the thing: He knew it was coming. He knew all of this was coming, and he still went to the cross for you and for me. To compound the pain, the only way to breathe on the cross was to push up with your feet and to pull up with your arms, pulling your body weight on those three nails that pierced you with dislocated shoulders. And as you were doing this, the open wounds of your back would scrape against the rough wood of the cross. You see, the autonomic reflex to breathe would compel you to do so. Eventually, complete exhaustion would set in. Breathing would slow down, and the Lamb of God would have gone into what is called respiratory acidosis. And that's when the carbon dioxide in the blood is dissolved. And what happens is that causes the acidity of the blood to increase and to become toxic, which would eventually lead to an erratic heartbeat, hypovolemic shock, and heart failure. This would also result in the collection of fluids in the membrane around the heart and the lungs. And so in John chapter 19, verse 34, when the soldier pierced Jesus with the spear, we read about water and blood coming out of his side. And this was the fluid that had built up around that membrane, the pericardium, that membrane around the heart and the lungs, and it was also the blood that was within the heart that came out at that point. Church, when you consider the biology and you consider the physiology of what Jesus endured on the cross for you and for me, it's a very graphic account. But it's true. And we need to hear it. The reason why we need to hear it is because we need to understand the violent effects of our sin in the sight of God and the price of the new covenant. But family, we still haven't talked about the worst part of the cross for Jesus. It was the forsaking of our Father that he experienced for all of us. You see, God's words, think about this for just a second. God's words, never will I leave you, never will I forsake you, church, applies to everyone but Jesus on the cross. Why do you think Jesus said, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Because that promise to everyone else, to you and to me, everyone but Jesus, never will I leave you, never will I forsake you. Jesus experienced that for each and every one of us. Church, this was the reality for Jesus that none of us can fathom. And hopefully, none of us will ever feel like we experience. Now, the question that so many people will ask, when they hear all of this, and they try to wrap their head and their heart around all of this that's been said, the question that they're going to ask is why would anyone do that for me? There's only one reason. And that reason is love beyond comprehension. And this is so difficult for so many people to grasp. And the reason why is because they've never, ever felt like they've been loved that way by anybody. Church, the new covenant between God and man, between God and you, and God and me was accomplished on the cross. John chapter 19, verse 30 says that when Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, It is finished. And bowing his head, he gave up his spirit. Now notice what Jesus said there. Don't miss that. Jesus said, I'm done. Jesus said, Mission accomplished. Jesus said, I'm taking control of the situation and I am ending it. Family, nobody took his life. He gave his life of his own free will. He bowed his head and he gave up his spirit so that you and I could access the Holy Spirit. Jesus said it's finished. The original word is to telesty. And it is a market term, it is a business term. It is a contractual term that means paid in full. Church, at that moment, there was no longer any sin that stood against you or me. There was no longer a bond that had to be posted for our sin. Our sins were blotted out. The delete button had been pushed, and the whiteboard of our sins had been erased. It was paid in full by Jesus. In the new covenant of the cross. In all honesty, family, it appears to be all one-sided, if you ask me. Family, God gains nothing except the pleasure of extending his mercy to you and to me, which tells us how much he truly loves us and truly values us. But on the other hand, we receive forgiveness. And we're allowed to be children of God. We're given the Holy Spirit, which is the guarantee of everlasting life. We're added to the Lord's church with specific roles and expectations to meet in the church as we use our gifts to glorify God. We're given unlimited access to God in prayer. There's no person that we have to go through. We can go straight to the throne of God through the Holy Spirit whenever we choose. We're made brand new. We're promised that all our needs will be provided for. And all that we're asked to do is to trust him. How could we not trust him? Church, we're asked to not only believe in Christ, we're also asked to believe Christ and His promises to us. And one of his greatest promises is found in Mark chapter 16, verse 16, when Jesus says, the one who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved. Do you believe what Jesus says there? Do you believe that he is who he claims to be, the Son of the living God? Family, that promise and your opportunity to accept it right now is only possible through the new covenant of his blood on the cross. Do you believe his promise? And will you enter into his covenant today? The repentance and baptism. You see, the world today recognizes the resurrection of Jesus. People are stopping, they're pausing, they're considering Jesus this morning. Are you considering Jesus this morning? Have you looked at other options? Have you considered other ways to solve the problems that you're suffering with? But you keep coming back to Jesus, but you just haven't committed yet. Again, the world celebrates and recognizes the resurrection of Jesus this morning. Will your resurrection in the blood of Christ through baptism be celebrated today? That's your choice. And it's a choice that only you can make. If you're here this morning and you're visiting with us, we hope you'll come back. We're not perfect, but we'd love to have you here with us. If you have something that's on your heart that you need your family, your brothers and sisters in Christ to pray with you and to pray for you, we want to pray with you. We want to pray for you. Because we're called to bear one another's burdens, are we not? If you're looking for a church home, I hope you found it, because we'd love to have you. If you need to confess Jesus as Lord and be resurrected with him through baptism this morning, I encourage you to do so. Whatever your need, together while we stand and sing.