Princeton Presbyterian Church

Princeton Presbyterian Church (EPC) Sermon # 1708

November 16, 2025

Mark 16.1-8                   Click here for audio worship.

Dr. Ed Pettus

(This is an extended outline, not a verbatim transcript.)

 

“The Resurrection”

 

When the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him. And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. And they were saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance of the tomb?” And looking up, they saw that the stone had been rolled back—it was very large.  And entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe, and they were alarmed. And he said to them, “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.” And they went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had seized them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.

 

• Sunday Morning

 

Today we conclude our series in the gospel of Mark. As with the other gospels, the final story is the glorious story of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is the central story of our faith and testimony. It is the greatest story ever told. It is the climactic event in human history. As you know, Mark is the shortest gospel and perhaps the least detailed account of Easter morning. The other gospels add more details here and there and Luke adds much more to the entire day. It was Sunday morning, the first day of the week and not at all a typical Sunday morning. It had not been a typical Sabbath day for the followers of Jesus.

Sometimes I am asked which holiday is my favorite. Many people name Christmas as their favorite, others might claim Thanksgiving, though not an official Christian holiday, and still others might claim some other day. Mine is Easter. For me, Christmas is great but so commercialized it draws something from the celebration. Easter, while somewhat commercialized with Easter bunnies and other knickknacks, is not as distorted by the world. We don’t see any Easter items on sale two months before the date.

Easter is pretty much ignored by the culture, but none of these things are why I prefer Easter. It is because it is the central story of our faith. I understand some will say, “well, you can’t have Easter without a Christmas birth!” True, but you can’t have Easter without the crucifixion either but few are celebrating Good Friday like Christmas.

American culture pretty much gives little attention to the resurrection of Jesus. For some people, the resurrection is not much more than our fantasy about a respected teacher who lived a long time ago. Many do not give Jesus Christ a second thought, just another religious figure along with all the other religious figures that mean nothing to them. Some are only interested in Jesus and the resurrection in so much as they can laugh when the so-called expert scholars say the resurrection never happened.

But then there are those who believe. Christians trust the story is true, not just the truth of the Scriptures, but the truth of our very existence as a people. It is our exodus from bondage to sin and death. Just as the Exodus is central for the Jews, so too, and even more so, our exodus in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This is the formative story of our lives. Jesus Christ was nailed to a cross, died, was buried and on Sunday, He rose from the dead. Every Sunday, we profess with confidence, “He is risen!” It is the reason we are worshiping on Sunday. It is the reason we live and move and have our being (Acts 17.28)!

 

• Godly Inversions

 

One of the great things about the resurrection is the godly inversion from death to life. God is at work all the time turning things upside down or right side up depending on the circumstance and His purposes. Sometimes God will reverse the order of things, other times it is a reversal of disorder. Jesus turning over the tables in the temple, repentance is a reversal of life turning things right side up. Miracles invert the natural laws of healing and creation: the blind see, the lame walk, the tumult of the sea is calmed with a word. Resurrection from the dead is the ultimate godly inversion.

Imagine what it must have been like on that Sunday morning to expect death and receive life. Imagine what it must have been like to expect a body and receive a message. The women had come to care for the body of Jesus because, to them, it still mattered. It was important that Jesus receive the burial preparation that could not be given before his placement in the tomb. The Sabbath was over and they felt it was important that proper respect and proper care be given to the dead. So they came to the tomb on that Sunday morning. But He was not there!

“See the place where they laid Him.” It was a bare place, no body, only a young man dressed in white telling the women: “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; He is not here.” Hopefully the empty tomb leaves us so amazed that, in one respect, we become like those women who left the tomb speechless. That is one of the wonders of this story – the resurrection at first leaves us speechless, because words, mere words cannot do it justice. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is too big for words and we stand amazed at these words, “He is not here.”

There is no record of the actual event of resurrection. No shining light, no appearance of God the Father, not even a burning bush. All we have is the death on the cross, a quick placement of the body in a borrowed tomb, and the early morning discovery that “He is not here.” When words are not enough we use symbols. The symbol of the empty tomb says more than words ever could. The symbol of the empty cross says more than we can. But the words matter because the testimony matters. It is what we have to give. Words, symbols, truth.

Our story is, at its core, the words of the angel in the tomb: “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; He is not here. See the place where they laid Him” (Mark 16:6). The Good Friday crucifixion yields to the wondrous Easter resurrection. The bad news of death has been inverted by the good news of life. It is truly amazing and in many respects terrifying. Imagine the disciples and the women seeing the lifeless body of Christ taken to a tomb and the stone rolled against the entrance. Now the women find that He is no longer in the tomb. They are alarmed and amazed at the same time.

He is risen; He is not in the tomb and because He has been raised, we are alive to God. Jesus lives and because He lives we live also!

 

• The Resurrection

 

So, what does the resurrection of Jesus Christ mean for those who believe? The God who created humanity has sought to bring us back into relationship with Himself since the Garden of Eden where Adam and Eve disobeyed God and brought a separation between God and His people. In the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the barrier between God and humanity is finally broken down. The “curtain” that once separated us from God is torn in two. In the condition of sin, a sacrifice must be made to cleanse the sin from the offender. Jesus took it upon Himself to offer the ultimate sacrifice for sin, His very life. Believer and non-believer alike know John 3.16, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” There is no greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for another. God loves you and me so much that God is willing to give up His only Son for us. Jesus is so much in love with us that Jesus was willing to give Himself up for our sake. Resurrection reveals God’s love.

What does the resurrection mean? It means God is powerful. God has the power to bring life from death. God has the power to defeat death. God has the power to bring each of us out of the forces that would rob us of life, of true life in Jesus Christ, a true life back with the Creator of humanity. That is the power and meaning of the resurrection, to bring us back to God. Deep in all of us is the desire to be with God. We distort that desire, thinking that it is a desire to have wealth, possessions, beauty, physical pleasures, or power. We run a race to get ahead and be productive, to fit in with the social expectations placed upon us and we miss what God has for us. Resurrection reveals the power of God.

 

What does the resurrection mean? It means that God is faithful. The apostle Paul says it this way, “God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord” (1 Corinthians 1.9). And that faithfulness is shown in God’s love: “but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5.8). Even when we did not remain faithful to God, God remained faithful to us to the point of death on a cross. Sometimes I hear people say that they are undeserving of God’s love and forgiveness, and in one sense we are, we all are. But when they say that they are usually thinking that they cannot be saved because of what they have done. The truth is that there is no sin so deep that we cannot be forgiven. Resurrection reveals the faithfulness of our God and Savior.

 

Why does the resurrection matter? It matters because our sins can be forgiven! This is what we call the GOOD NEWS. Sometimes we have so much guilt, we get stuck in the past, or we have intense regrets, yet none of that prevents God from forgiving us. Colossians 2.13-15, “And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This He set aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him.” Jesus took care of it: guilt, regrets, sins, shame, all gone in Christ. Even if we feel unforgivable, Jesus forgives us anyway! Jesus wants to forgive our sins, our debts, all of them: emotional, relational, spiritual.

If you are like me, you love to get your debts paid. When I put that check in the mail to pay the bill, I forget it! And what if someone else paid your debts for you? Wouldn’t you be so thankful to that person? That is what God has done, and in God’s forgiveness we can forget about sins, guilt, regrets. Put them in the mail and forget ‘em.

“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8.1). Remember the old Etch-A-Sketch? You could draw a picture and if you messed it up you just flipped it over and shook it up to get a clean slate and start over. God’s clean slate is given in the good news of the resurrection that shakes us up and gives us a clean slate, clearing away our mess-ups. Resurrection matters because sin no longer has dominion over us.

 

Why does the resurrection matter? A second enemy we face is death. We are all going to die but we do not like to talk about death. It frightens us or we simply ignore the subject altogether. I remember reading some quotes from young children about death and one in particular was from a boy named Raymond, aged 10, “A good doctor can help you so you won’t die. A bad doctor sends you to heaven.” Deep down we are all curious about death. What will happen? What is it like? In the resurrection, Jesus defeated death. While we will die a physical death, we will live forever in heaven with Christ. Resurrection matters because, through it, we have life eternal. Death has lost its sting.

 

The resurrection of Jesus Christ makes possible the good news that we can come back home, that is, we are reconciled to God. We can know God and God can know us, we can be in relationship with one another. This entire message can be summed up in 2 Corinthians 5.17-21, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to Himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.

 

Jesus is not here, not in the tomb, not dead. He has risen. And because He has risen we are in a right relationship with God our Creator. And we have been given a ministry to share this good news so that others may become reconciled to God. Such good news, amazing news, life giving news: For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. Amen and amen!