What does Easter mean to you?

Sermon notes from Sunday evening 16 April 2017

Ephesians 3

Perhaps a strange passage to look at for Easter Sunday night.  You might expect us to turn to a portion on the cross or tomb but this particular portion has been on my mind after reading an article entitled "What does Easter mean to you?"  In that article they had asked different people what it meant to them.  Some said it was a time to meet up with families, others a time to go out for a meal and for children it was all about Easter eggs and being off school.  There was not one person who mentioned anything to do with the cross or the tomb or the words "he is not here he is risen."  We come to a day and age when people don`t care, have no time to read what the gospel means to them.  Maybe Easter is the only time when the cross is ever considered and we pay lip service to it at that particular time.  The cross might never be talked about or preached from the pulpit until next year.  The cross is not just something we consider at Easter, it is at the forefront of our minds each and every day.  It is the only reason why you are here.  If he hadn`t went to the middle cross for you, touched that life of yours, you might as well have stayed in the house tonight.  It is not something to pick and choose at.  That time of Easter is where people will begin to think about what Jesus did at the cross.  What happened at the tomb on Easter Sunday?  In this portion of scripture Paul understood what the cross meant to him.  He had it at the forefront of his mind every day of the week.  Verse 14 "for this cause I bow my knee unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ."  In each of his letters Paul understood the importance of prayer.  He understood the need that lay all around him.  That is why Jesus left heaven.  Calvary was not an afterthought.  God didn`t sit down and think this world has made an awful mess so we need to do something about it.  No right back in the Garden he had planned Calvary.  That is why Paul could set the cross at the forefront of his mind.  He understood the strength and power of the cross.  If we were to take time to go back to Acts 9 we would undertand the power of the cross.  He was "breathing out threatenings and slaughter" against those who followed Christ.  Then he saw a great light from heaven shining on him.  Paul dropped to his knees.  He had an encounter with the risen Christ that day.  He could picture back to the power that brought him to his knees.  Later on that day Saul`s men picked him up and took him to Ananias` house.  Think of what Ananias thought when he heard Paul was coming to see him.  "What is God doing bringing an evil man to my house?"  The Lord told Ananias "he is a chosen vessel unto me."  How can he go from verse 1 to a man now on his knees?  That is the power of the cross.  That is why Easter should not be something we pick up today and not give it much thought until next year again.  That is why this pulpit preaches the cross today.  He is the same God who can touch your soul tonight just like he did to Paul on the road to Damascus.  "For this cause" surely we have to ask ourselves one question - for what cause?  There is something he wants to tell us.  To bow the knee, remembering.  Why did he feel the need to bow?  When he considered the universal call of the gospel - verse 6.  "That the Gentiles should be fellow heirs and of the same body and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel."  It was the gift of salvation.  We could be outside the kingdom and God today, on our way to a lost eternity.  The cross of Calvary can still touch us at the point of our need.  Why?  Because the universal call of the gospel is still there.  Not talking here specifically to Jewish people.  He was saying it was for Gentiles but who are they?  We are the Gentiles.  God touched us because we are the Gentile people.  He has touched us, saved us.  How?  Because of the middle cross.  For this cross he could have bowed the knee.

He also bowed the knee because he considered the love of God to his soul.  Verse 8 "unto me who am less than the least of all saints is that grace given."  Many of us could put our names in there.  Paul did it.  Jesus went to Calvary just for me and you also.  Think of John 3 verse 16.  Now consider verse 8 - it is John 3 in action.  Grace was given to us freely without charge.  Grace is where God gives us the things we don`t deserve.  Do any of us deserve redemption?  There is a home in heaven reserved for us.  God loved us.  Not one of us deserved God`s mercy.  Not one of us deserved the mercy shown to us.  To take the punishment for your sin.  Even the great apostle Paul.  In Philippians 3 we read the credentials of this man.  A learned man, a scholar yet considered him to be the least of all the saints.  That is humbleness and humility.  What a loving God we come before.  The one who did not look at us and see all our flaws, all our sin..  The word "given" is the word to be thrown upon, to be bombarded upon.  So much grace flowing on top of us.  Paul bowed the knee when he considered the access he now had to God - "in whom we have boldness and access with confidence by faith in him."  God didn`t save us and leave us.  You have access to the throne room of God.  Why?  Because of Calvary.  We read in the scriptures that the temple veil was ripped from top to bottom when Jesus cried "it is finished".    No longer do we have to present that lamb before the priest.  We have direct access to God, all because of Calvary.  He could look at what Christ had done for him and think the only thing I can do is bow the knee.  Too many Christians forsake the source of power and strength available trying to make it their own way.  Can we afford not to be in prayer for our world today, for the church itself or families and loved ones.  Can we afford not to be in place where we have direct access to God because of Calvary?

He bowed the knee when he considered the one he came before.  Unless we get an insight of the one we come to this evening then we miss the point.  What is God like?  To many God sits on a throne and has a great white beard.  That is not what we should be saying.  In Isaiah 6 the throne room of God was like Revelation 4.  It tells us the cherubims and seraphims go through the throne room of heaven crying "holy, holy, holy" yet Jesus left the splendours of heaven to hear them shouting at him "crucify him".  Isaiah 53 "he was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities"  God is not someone sitting on a cloud.  Jesus left the environs of heaven.  When the angels shielded their faces because they couldn`t look at him.  To come into a sin cursed world to have his beard ripped from his face, have his face slapped as he walked past.  Is it any wonder Paul could say "for this cause I bow the knee"  For everything God has done for me.  Verse 17 "that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith."  We talk a lot at Easter of the cross.  He is not there.  He is at the right hand side of the father making intercession for us.  Verse 17 "that ye being rooted and grounded in love may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge."  How can we know all that if he is still dead today?  Calvary is much more than one day a year.  A place of sacrifice.  He laid down his life for you.  A place of victory.  A sealed tomb couldn`t keep him.  Calvary is a place of decision.  The thief cried out "Lord remember me when you come into your kingdom."  The other thief looked into his eyes and went into hell itself.  Why did Paul say "for this cause I bow my knees".  He looked at the access he now had, what the Lord had done for him.