In the sermon titled 'The Road to Emmaus: Walking With the Risen Christ,' Paul Carrington discusses the biblical account of two disciples encountering the resurrected Jesus on their way to Emmaus. He highlights the importance of approaching familiar doctrines like the resurrection with fresh eyes, much like a first-time experience. Carrington draws a parallel between the disciples' initial inability to recognize Jesus and the modern tendency to overlook the profound truths of the Christian faith. He emphasizes the significance of the resurrection as a cornerstone of Christianity, as illustrated by Paul's teachings in 1 Corinthians 15. The sermon underscores the role of Scripture in revealing Christ and encourages believers to let the resurrection fuel their faith and witness. Carrington urges his audience not to let the resurrection become a mere common fact but to let it transform their lives with renewed wonder and amazement.

And so in verse 13 of Luke 24 we pick up, it says this, Now behold, two of them were traveling that same day to a village called Emmaus, which was seven miles from Jerusalem. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. So it was, while they conversed and reasoned, that Jesus himself drew near and went with them. But their eyes were restrained so that they did not know him. And he said to them, What kind of conversation is this that you have with one another as you walk and are sad?

Then the one whose name was Cleopas answered and said to him, Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem? And have you not known the things which happened there in these days?' And he said to them, What things?' So they said to him, The things concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered him to be condemned to death and crucified him. But we were hoping that it was he who was going to redeem Israel. Indeed, besides all this, today is the third day since these things have happened. Yes, and certain women of our company who arrived at the tomb early astonished us.

When they did not find his body they came saying that they had also seen a vision of angels who said he was alive. And certain of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but him they did not see. Then he said to them, oh foolish ones and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken. Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his glory? And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded to them in all the scriptures, the things concerning himself.

Then they drew near to the village where they were going, and he indicated that he would have gone further. But they constrained him saying, Abide with us for it is toward evening and the day is far spent and he went in to stay with them. Now it came to pass as he sat at the table with them that he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they knew him, and he vanished from their sight. And they said to one another, did not our heart burn within us while he talked with us on the road, and while he opened the scriptures to us.

So they rose up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem and found the eleven and those who were with them gathered together saying the Lord is risen indeed and has appeared to Simon. And they told about the things that had happened on the road and how he was known to them in the breaking of bread. Well, let's pray. Lord, we thank you for these words, and as we go through them, Lord, we pray that you would speak to us and help us and guide us. Oh Lord, not unto us, not unto us, but unto your own name, give glory, amen, amen.

Well, we have this opportunity here this afternoon to walk with the risen Christ on this road to Emmaus. And I wanted to talk to us about this because sometimes really the most beautiful things and the the most solid things are sometimes taken for granted by us. We talk about the cross and we all know about the cross, but we can sometimes take it for granted, much like the resurrection. And I recall some years ago I was sitting on a plane about to depart out of Raleigh Airport just going to another city within the US. And as I was sitting there, I made room, and an older lady came and sat beside me at the window seat.

And she sat there, and we just made small talk. And she said, you know, this is the first time I've ever flown. And she's asking all these questions. You could see the nervousness, you could see the anticipation, all the things. She couldn't stop talking, you know, just I think to try to quell some of that nervousness.

And you could just imagine the thrill of the takeoff for her being a first-time flyer. And as the plane departed from the earth and cars began to look like ants and houses and all of these different types of things, the wonder this woman had was just amazing. You could see it on her face. But nothing was quite like when we passed through the clouds. It was a cloudy, overcast day and all of a sudden you break through the clouds and the wonder of this woman's experience.

It was amazing and I started kind of looking at the whole situation through her eyes. Here I was just a frequent flyer. I just sit down. I get something to read. I might even close my eyes.

And it's just another flight. I'll land in two hours or whatever. But to look at something like that through fresh eyes, it is indeed an amazing thing to consider. And that's what I hope to do today is to really not say anything so much new, but hope that we can look at the power of the resurrection, maybe differently, maybe more freshly, and come away not with just things to talk about, but a solidity in us that keeps us and holds us. Really the goal of this afternoon is I want you to know what you know.

And what I mean by that, you know, you've heard, but do you know what you know in a way that it's a catalyst for living this godly life and living and worshiping the Lord. And so we're going to be spending our time looking at the resurrection of Christ. As I said, it's a Sunday like no other in history, either before or since. It's one of those doctrines that's a lodestone in the Christian faith. You've got the crucifixion, and you've also got the resurrection and all that took place there.

And I hope that we can put ourselves along the road with these disciples because again, one of the great dangers is that the most beautiful things over time just become common. This was the danger to the saints in Galatia. When Paul, the apostle, he laments, he says, who has bewitched you? You began well, but somewhere along the line you were bewitched from the beauty, the simplicity that is in Christ. You know, we see the same thing in the book of Revelation where the Ephesian church was somehow doing all the other things but their love, their first love had somehow grown cold.

They had perhaps gotten away from the beauty and simplicity of the resurrection. You can see the same thing in the book of Hebrews where the writer is warning them. He's saying, you need to give more earnest heed to the things that you've heard, lest at any time you let them slip. See, our tendency is to let some of these most important, solid teachings somehow just slip through our hands in the process of this Christian life. And so I want to just go back to that.

And on the positive side, what you see is the sustaining power of the cross and of the resurrection when you look at the different lives. I looked at the book of Acts. And when you look at Acts, the resurrection features in almost every single interaction that the apostles or the deacons have with different people as they begin to preach the gospel. And Paul himself, he recognizes just how important the power of the resurrection is when he writes in 1 Corinthians chapter 15. Look what he says, he says this.

And if Christ is not risen, then our preaching is empty and your faith is also empty. Yes, and we are found false witnesses of God because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ whom he did not raise up if in fact the dead do not rise. For if the dead do not rise, then Christ is not risen. And if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile. You are still in your sins.

Then also, those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable. Do you see what he's doing here? He's basically saying that if the resurrection never happened, Christianity is worse than paganism. You actually accuse God of doing something He never did.

And Paul is loading up every reason why if there is no resurrection, then we're the most foolish people, the most to be pitied, more than the pagan bowing down before the stones. Are we who worship a dead savior who's not there? But now, he goes on to say, Christ is risen indeed." See, he loads up every reason, but then he says, but now Christ is risen indeed. And so the question is, has history's greatest event become just a simple, common thing to you? Or does it hold any of the wonder and amazement?

Well, hopefully with fresh eyes, like the woman who was sitting beside me on the plane, we can take a look at the events that unfolded. See, it was a Sunday morning, just like any other, breaking up, or breaking upon the vast Roman Empire, but it was the dawning of a new world, the dawning of a new day. And with the resurrection of Christ, it was God saying in large capital letters, satisfied, that everything has been paid and fully accepted because of Christ and what he's come to do. And so we're gonna take a look at this in just three different areas. The road to Emmaus, what happened at Emmaus, and then the road from Emmaus as they make their way back to Jerusalem.

But the women that went to the tomb that morning, they went there to pay respect to a dead savior. That's what they had gone to do. He was a great man, of course, but he was a man nonetheless in their eyes, subject to frailty, he was powerless over his own life. And so they were going there with all of their spices and so on. And so the first declaration that we meet with that Jesus is alive is in verse five, where there's those two angels there on either side of the slab where they had laid his body.

And they asked the question, well, why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here but is risen. And of course, they go back and report that, but it's just idle tales to the rest of the disciples, at least at that time. But it goes on here in verse 13, and now, behold, two of them were traveling that same day to a village called Emmaus, which was seven miles from Jerusalem. And they talked together of all these things which had happened.

And of all the 11 appearances that we find of Christ appearing after the resurrection, this is perhaps the most captivating of them all. And what we find here are these two generally and historically unknown disciples. We don't know anything really about them. Cleopas is the name of one. We don't know who the other is.

And that's the only time that Cleopas is actually ever mentioned. And you can imagine, Here they are, walking back, perhaps with their heads hung low, their hearts sick, they're devastated, they're confused, they're disillusioned, discouraged. All of their joys had been totally dashed, and it was the third day. And here they are, this earthquake in their lives had just taken place and they're looking down and seeing all of the pieces and they're trying to, as they walk along, maybe trying to make sense of everything that's taken place. See the shepherd had been struck and the sheep had already begun to scatter and go all their different ways and so on.

And so they've got themselves on this two hour walk or seven mile walk from Jerusalem there to Emmaus. And their great hope, the great hope of the Jews, was that somehow the Messiah would come and free them from the Roman bondage that they were under. Something maybe like what their forefathers enjoyed with the Exodus from Pharaoh and from the land of Egypt and Like Mary somehow their eyes were beholden. They couldn't actually Recognize the Lord here. It says their eyes were restrained so that they did not know him And so we see that the Lord himself comes up alongside of them, and he asks them, well, what kind of conversation is that that you have with one another as you walk and are sad?

He could tell by their body language if their speech didn't give them away, their countenance and the way that they were carrying themselves, perhaps gave them away from a distance. Then one of them whose name was Cleopas answered and said to him, are you the only stranger in Jerusalem and have you not known the things which has happened there in these days. And what I like about this particular part here is that you've got these relatively unknown men. They're men that are visited by the Lord himself. Just like he visited, you know, Mary was the first one that saw him when he had resurrected from the grave.

It's not the eleven that are still left there, but it's these unknown. And he's totally dumbfounded that anyone anywhere near Jerusalem had no idea of what had happened in these days because if you go back just not even a full week before but you had that triumphal entry that didn't take place every day where everyone was shouting Hosanna and they were waving palm branches laying their clothes down as the Lord was transported into Jerusalem on a donkey. You had the mock trial that took place in the dead of night. You had then the crucifixion the following day. And how could someone not be aware of all these things that were taking place and you just see the simple question, what things is what the Lord Jesus, he asked them.

And so that opens the torrent on this ignorant, seemingly ignorant traveler. And it isn't amazing that Cleopas decides to bring Christ up to speed with all that's going on. The only one that actually knows what's happening. And so he brings him up to speed. But notice, I want you to notice something here as we go through verse 19 to 23.

And he said to them what things. So they said to him the things concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet, mighty in deed and word, before God and all the people, and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered him to be condemned to death and crucified him. But we were hoping that it was he who was going to redeem Israel. Indeed, besides all this, today is the third day since these things happened. And what you notice about their language is that it's all in the past tense.

You see that? He was going to. We were hoping that he was going to be the Redeemer of all Israel. And As I read this, and no doubt you can relate to this, if you're a Christian and you've been in the battle for any length of time, oftentimes we can lay our hopes on things and you can put all of your eggs, so-called, in a basket and all of a sudden that basket drops and everything can be so-called or seemingly dashed to pieces, our expectations can be thrown down. You could even say, I prayed about this.

And Look how it's turned out. You could look at your own life in much the same way and maybe even say the same thing. We were hoping, just like these two men were saying, we were hoping that he was going to be the one that would redeem Israel. That word, we were hoping, it means to wait for salvation with joy and full confidence. We put all of our weight and hope on this one and now it's shattered and everything's broken.

And you could say the same thing, I was hoping. I was hoping for this, I was hoping for that in this Christian life, only to find yourself perhaps devastated or even heartbroken, perhaps along the way. And it could be like what the apostle Paul described there in 1 Corinthians 15. If Christ is dead, it could be much the same way. These men were operating with this understanding, and as a result of that, their faith became futile and empty and hopeless and we are still in our sins and we are of all men most pitiable.

This is the dawning that's coming upon them as a result of their savior dying at the hands of the Jews. And so the Lord himself still hid and still masked from their sight, he says this, oh, foolish ones in slow of heart, to believe in all that the prophets have spoken, ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his glory. And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded to them all the scriptures concerning himself. You see this gentle rebuke that the Lord gives. And we could be in the same position, how often perhaps, even for yourself or myself, we could be in the same position, oh, foolish and slow of heart.

Spurgeon says it like this, we have a very leaky memory. And what that means is that when trials come that's when the leak is probably most prominent we forget the things that God has said the things that God has promised to us but if we can recognize that just like these two men the Living Christ he walks beside us in every single trial. This is the great hope and so that spirit of heaviness, sometimes we can have our heads so far down that we don't realize that he's wanting to clothe us with the garment of praise. And so they were slow of heart to believe what? Notice what he does.

He doesn't show them his wrists or his hands or his feet or his side, but what he does is he opens to them the Old Testament. Isn't that amazing? Here he is risen, but he's not, here, look at these right off the bat. He's going to say something by pointing back to the Old Testament. He points to that holy book.

And so you get a sense of what is the Lord's attitude towards the Scriptures. In a day and age where the Scriptures can somehow be kind of put to the side or not considered to be all that important, Christ has an entirely different opinion. And so what is the highest purpose of the Old Testament? It's to point the way, to point to the coming of Christ. You could find Christ, there's a book actually entitled Christ on every page.

Isn't that amazing? When you look at it and Christ himself said, these are they that testify of me. Speaking about the Scriptures when he was speaking to the Pharisees. Why don't you believe it? These same scriptures are the ones that testify of me.

And so it's as though he's saying to them, oh, you slow of heart, look at the summary of scripture and how it points in every book to the fact that the path of victory lay through Calvary's road. It's gonna be a road of suffering. And where these men had set their sights, they had set their sights on freedom from Rome. They had set their sights so low, and sometimes we do that as well We we want to be free out of a situation or out of a context that we're finding ourselves in But Christ comes to set us free from much much more But we kind of set our sights on if I could just get out of this problem if I could just get this if I could Just get that but the living Christ has come to conquer and vanquish sin. And so what happens, he expounds, it says, he expounded to them from the Old Testament, and you could imagine what must this have been like?

What must this have been like? Someone said it like this, you have the best teacher speaking from the best book on the best subject for two hours. Could you imagine Just walking side by side with these men along the road again He's not pointing to the prince in his nails But he's pointing to the the prince in his hands But he's pointing to the testimony of Scripture all the way from the beginning down through the line He's telling them that the fact that he had suffered and met with such a demise isn't proof that he isn't the Lord, it's actually proof that he is the Lord as he opens up the scripture that before the crown you would have the great suffering that he went through. And so what does he bring up? Moses and the prophets.

And you could just imagine, here it is, almost like these two men walking with the master, and the master unlocks the door of the house, and they get a sense of looking to gaze inside and see all that the prophets, all that Moses had said since the very beginning. You could look at it through those same eyes. See, he's not just talking about the times where Christ shows up in the Old Testament, but he's speaking about the suffering that was necessary to bring about the redemption. At the fall, everything seemed so final. You remember that?

He could have been saying and telling them. There was Adam and Eve as they maybe cast a longing glance back at the gates of the Garden of Eden. You saw the seraphim with their swords crossed forever. It seemed barring man's entrance back to the garden. How was the Lord, how was this gonna be put back together again?

Well, the Lord had promised that through the war, somehow that even though the Lord would be injured in the process, that he would over the course of his life crush the head of the serpent. And you could take a further glance and remember Abraham and there he was just at the brink of slaughtering his own son when the angel restrained him. Remember what he said about his son? Three times, the son, your only son, whom you love, Whom you love. The Lord was reminding him over and over.

And what happened? Isaac was spared in the process, but there was not just a sparing, there was a substitute that was put into place. And do you remember what Abraham called the place? Where that took place? The Lord will provide.

There on Mount Moriah, the Lord will provide a substitute. And he goes down the line. Do you remember Joseph? Remember Joseph after being rejected and sold by his brothers, he ends up delivering the entire nation. It all looks so hopeless at the time.

22 years he was separated from his brothers. And he suffered, but he says at the end of Genesis, but God meant it for good. In order to bring about as it is this day to save many people alive. Well, in the same way the Messiah would suffer to bring many sons to glory, you've got the lamb that is without blemish that is offered on Passover night, and you've got the Levitical sacrifices, all of them pointing towards the coming of the Lord. You remember Samson and his death, a type of Christ where through his death he destroyed the enemies of God?

Well, there on the cross you had Christ, not destroying just the enemies of God, but the enemies that had destroyed man from the very beginning, the works of the devil taken down in a moment. You could picture Christ there in Psalm 22, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And so Christ is the true scapegoat. He's the true brazen serpent. He's the true high priest.

And when you go to Isaiah and the prophets, it's loaded with references and talking about Christ. For unto us, a child is born, and unto us a son is given and the government will be upon his shoulders. And how could he not touch on Isaiah 53 where it talks about the idea of Christ bearing our griefs and our sorrows, and yet we turned every one of us to his own way, and the Lord laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and he was cut off from the land of the living. For the transgression of my people he was stricken, yet it pleased the Lord to crush him." And so all of this pointing back to the Old Testament, we see Christ as the sum and the substance of everything that is in the scriptures.

And these men were seeing it, they had seen it, but now they were seeing it in a different way. And he took the time to transfer, he was gonna be going to heaven. And so what is he doing? He's transferring their dependence on Him to their dependence on the Scriptures, on the Word of the living God. And so here we find Christ walking, the resurrected Christ, walking the dusty road with these disciples.

And when you take the risen Christ here in this picture, and then you fast forward to the book of Revelation, and you see that Christ is the theme of the worship of heaven, where the seraphim are bowing down, and the elders are casting their crowns before him. And you see the split screen of Christ walking on the road with these men, these bruised men, with their faith almost dried up. It gives you a sense of the spirit and the heart of Christ. There's not a bruised read among us today that the Lord isn't and cannot and is not willing to bind up and to heal and to help and to comfort if we turn to him. And so there they are, they walk along the road and they finally reach Emmaus in verse 28.

And Christ is finished. It says that he was going, he indicated that he would go further. But even though Christ is finished, these men aren't finished with Christ. Even though they don't know who he is, all that he was saying had lodged in his heart and there he is. They wanted more time with this man and so it says that they constrained him.

That word's very strong, almost like they forced him, maybe even maybe took a hold of his garment, they want him to stay with them and they heap up reasons. It's the night is far spent, it could be all these different things, could you just stay with us a little bit longer? And so of course the Lord, he complies with them and then of course the great revealing in verse 31 when he breaks the bread and then they look at one another, he vanishes from their sight, and they look at each other, and they say, did not our hearts burn within us while he talked with us on the road. And what did he do? While he opened to us the scriptures.

Maybe we can look at the scriptures in a different way and in a different light as food for our souls, not just food for conversation and interesting points, but how are they affecting and impacting the way that we live and our hopes? Because is there any better news for people that are sad or distressed or even in the battle like we heard this morning? Is there any better news for desponding and despairing men than that the Savior lives? And that He's able and willing to receive us? And not only that, but He's walking with us every step of the way?

And that question, did not our heart burn within us? It's a good question to ask yourself, when was the last time that's happened to you where you've heard something of the word of God and your heart was genuinely moved, Either to repent or to change or just to worship God and give him praise and thanks. It's a good question to ask ourselves because these men had been won by the Word of God as it was opened to them little by little as the Lord walked with him. It's almost like they were saying, now I know why my heart was so ravished while he was talking to me, while he was talking to us as he opened up the word of God for us. See, they had felt the warmth, but now they saw the sun.

And of course, he vanishes from their sight. And I think what often happens, it's happened to me, is that we can often hear too coolly about the things of God and what Christ has done, specifically the cross and the resurrection. Maybe in your life they've become sterile facts, interesting facts, but they're not the lodestones that they were intended to be. They're not the theme of everything that you're about and that I'm about. Well, oftentimes what happens is our hearts can grow cold because of neglect or because of sin, but the great antidote is laid out for us right here.

One of the things I love is reading the Apostle Paul, and sometimes I imagine him, like in the book of Philippians, where there he is, it's a prison epistle, and he's 25 years on writing in 62 AD, 25 years after he's been converted. He's had experiences, he's seen things, he's walked with the Lord, he's had unbelievable experiences. But what does he say when he's very personally kind of unveiling himself to these Philippians. He says, oh that I may know him in the power of the resurrection. He never got over it.

And I think sometimes we get over things so easily they just become somewhat common to us in our Christian life. And we're not talking about euphoria here. I'm not talking about just euphoria where we just get all crazy and all that type of thing, but I'm talking about a steady increasing hope, maybe a refixing of our gaze on who Christ is and actually what he has done. In other words, to know what you know but in a deeper way. Well, what happens?

We came from Emmaus, or from Jerusalem to Emmaus. We spent a little bit of time in Emmaus and of course Christ reveals himself there. Well, what is their response to this? See, that was awesome, wasn't it? Nothing like a good sermon.

Well, I'm tuckered out, let's get some sleep. It was good talking to you, brother. We'll talk in the morning more. No, no, these men who had just met with the risen Christ and had heard all that they had heard, the only right response is found in verse 33. It says, so they rose up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem.

And you can picture all that's happening in these three scenes, almost like a fireplace. They started off as a smoking flax, hardly anything coming out of them. They're walking with their heads slung on their chests, but as they walk, Christ breathes into them and that that smoking flax in the fireplace just really fans into flame. And now they've seen the risen Christ face to face and even though he's vanished from their sight it's as though the flames have leapt out of the fireplace and have caught all around the house and these men can't do anything but tell other people, tell others or as Paul says with the comfort that they themselves had been comforted to go and to comfort others. We just heard this morning, what is the state of the ungodly?

Yesterday we were at the abortion mill. There's a young lady who pulls in and she stopped and just talked for a moment. And she wasn't aggressive or anything like that. And I asked her a couple of questions, and she said, I've been here multiple times. And you get a look at this woman, and I just got a picture in my mind.

When this woman was six or seven or eight, did she ever think her life would turn out like this? And here she is making her, I don't know, third or fourth, I don't know how many visits she's come. But is not Christ mighty to save? And you look at this, I just ask you to consider that for a moment. We're surrounded by a sea of people who have, if they've heard, have rejected, Or maybe they've never quite heard, or maybe they've heard some distorted gospel, but whatever it is, do you see the beauty of what's happening here?

These men, it doesn't matter, they had heaped up all the reasons why Christ shouldn't go on. The night is far spent. It might be dangerous. Just come in for the night. All those reasons have now evaporated.

By the way, Jerusalem is up high. They have gone low. They've got to now go back seven miles uphill to Jerusalem. Is that too much for them? No.

It doesn't matter because of what has actually happened. The most significant news in history. What else matters? If this is true, and I just want to ask you that today, if this is true, what else matters? If a man was dead and now he's risen to life again and he lives forevermore and he's seated at the right hand of God and he's coming again?

Is there something more compelling? Is there something more captivating than that? I just wanna ask you that and let that ponder, because let you ponder that because he lives. Just those two words, what's all wrapped up in the fact that Christ lives? Every liability is taken up in the fact that Christ lives and will never die again.

He led death to death. He led captivity captive. And so the only right response is to tell it out and to share the same thing. And may it be said of us that we have the same heart attitude. I would just as much wanna run back with these men from Emmaus to Jerusalem as I would have loved to be there along the road as Christ opened up the scriptures Because what would have been going through their minds as they're going back to Jerusalem for seven miles, even if you're jogging, that's gonna take some time and they might have been jogging, who knows.

But what's going through their minds as they're Going through this trail all the way back see they didn't even need the Great Commission At this point, but simply God had done great things for them And this is the greatest thing that can ever happen to you is that you get a vision of the risen Christ Don't let it become common. I just plead with you today, don't let it become common. Don't become so heady, so far beyond. See why I mentioned the Apostle Paul? As far as he went, He could always just look out his window and he could see the cross and he could see the tomb, the empty tomb.

And that was the fuel of everything that ever mattered to him. And if you look down through history, and any man who's served God or woman who served God substantially, it's usually those two things they have in common. They've seen the cross and they've seen the empty tomb and they never get over it. Don't get over it. And so I just wanna leave you with a couple of things to think about.

See, I was talking to a young man maybe a couple of weeks, two weeks ago, and we were talking about these matters of Christ and growing up in a church and all that, but he denying the Lord, denying the Lord. Ah, you know, positioning himself, and we've all had that experience where he's neutral. He's just kind of an observer of here's the truth and here's things that may not be true, and I'm just, I need to be persuaded. No, you're not neutral. If you believe this, you're on one side, and if you deny this, you're on the other side.

And everyone who is sitting here today falls on either one of those sides. Either you believe the testimony of Scripture and the God who cannot lie, Or you say, I'll hear you again on another matter like the king before Paul, but don't do that. If this is true, there's nothing more important for you to know. There's nothing more important. And so here's the question for you, for those of us that do know him, do you know what you know?

And the other question I would just ask you as we close is this, who else do you know that needs to know what you know? May God move upon our hearts, May we never take for granted what Christ has done. May it be the fuel, may it be the thing that grabs hold of our hearts and takes us forward so we might live in this world. It may be crashing and crumbling all around us, but God has raised his son from the dead, and Christ is sitting there ready to come again. May these truths dawn on us anew and afresh.

Can you pray with me? Let's pray together. Oh Lord, we come to you here this afternoon and we thank you for the power of the resurrection. Lord, I need to be more taken up with these things. I pray, Lord, that you would work deeply in all of our hearts and move us.

Not so much with emotion, Lord, but with a fixed rootedness to know of the things that we have believed. Oh Lord, to be persuaded of them and then to live them out in a world that is against you and opposes you in so many different ways. We thank you