Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:06 Good morning and welcome to thinking it through. My name is Craig Jarvis. I'll be your host for this podcast, but a 10 to 15 minute discussion. Each time we meet about thinking through some of the changes in our culture with some extra information background that we need to kind of make good decisions. Today is a post Easter theme. Uh, we just spent, E's celebrating Easter yesterday at our church. And a few years ago, I was reminded of a family at our church when they did a very special thing for us. Actually, it was a little more than a few years.
Speaker 1 00:00:39 So they actually got together and surprised my wife and me with tickets to a Broadway show called Les Miserables. Lou, I don't know if you've ever seen this, uh, Broadway production, but it is a life-changing experience. And this family completed the night for us with babysitting and dinner and gave us a night that we would obviously never forget, which is why I'm still talking about it today. I, I fell in love with Les Miz this evening because it was the first time I saw it. I've seen it a couple of times since, but mainly because of its unmistakable picture of grace, the setting is deigned France, and it is 1815. The hero is <inaudible> and he has been released on parole from 19 years on the chain gang in prison, uh, for stealing a loaf of bread, he finds that the yellow ticket to that he has to carry this ticket of leave by law must be displayed and always will condemn him as an outcast.
Speaker 1 00:01:35 All for stealing this loaf of bread to keep his family alive. Only the saintly Bishop of Dane treats him kindly by giving them food and cold, uh, lodging from the coldness of the street. Now, John Belzoni has been embittered by years of hardship and repays the Bishop with an interesting action. He rises in the middle of the night, steals all the silver in the place, puts it all in his bag. And when he's discovered as he's robbing the place he beat the Bishop, that was all Belzoni is condemned. Uh, he's he's caught, and he's brought back to the Bishop by the police and amazing Lee enough. He is astonished when the Bishop lies to the police in order to save him, uh, the police say, did this man Rob from you? And he said, no, he didn't Rob from me. And they say, well, what's all this stuff in his bag.
Speaker 1 00:02:28 And he simply says, those are the things that I gave to him and then offers him two more valuable candle stakes to put in with the other stolen items in his bag while <inaudible> is shown an incredible kind of grace this day, as the little Bishop decides to give him an opportunity to start his life a new and that little Bishop did an amazing thing for our hero. He replaced and repaid Val's zone's hate and anger with forgiveness and well Easter. It was a celebration of that kind of grace in our world. Sin has entered into our world a long time ago and it has entered for one reason. It wants to enslave us. The irony of sin is that when it whispers promises of freedom into our ear, it slips, it's heavy chains of guilt over our wrists. Now we are all condemned as victims, as soon as we're born all slaves to sin and we all live in denial, convincing ourselves that we are indeed free and we are indeed unhindered in our self-sufficiency yet.
Speaker 1 00:03:34 The Bible makes it clear to us plain and simple in Romans three 23, it says for all, have sinned and come short of the glory of God. In every way we were <inaudible>. We were bound. We were condemned by our own sin. It doesn't matter how small or great it was, whether it's stealing a loaf of bread or doing anything worse than that, we are simply condemned by our desire to sin and, and please ourselves, and do the things that would make ourselves higher than our brothers and sisters around us, whatever it takes. We knew only self satisfying methods to run our lives. We raised our shackled wrist in defiance against God, and incredulously declared our right to be free and our ability to succeed at our own chosen destiny, w we were indeed desperate, imprisoned and hopeless to find a way out all the while thinking we are, we are free.
Speaker 1 00:04:31 But then in the middle of our desperate plight, Jesus told us the truth about life and the sin that shackles us. And he gave us the means to be free. It says in the Bible in Romans five, it says, you see just at the right time while we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely would one die for a righteous man though, for a good man. Somebody might possibly dare to die, but God demonstrates his own love for us in this while we were still sick, Christ died for us. That's an incredible picture of grace while we're in the middle of our sin. Jesus paid the price for our actions. Like the little Bishop of France Christ gave us an unbelievable gift. We didn't deserve it. And we certainly never expected it. Even when we were still sending Jesus offers us what we don't deserve a way out.
Speaker 1 00:05:25 Only someone untainted by sin could ever enter our prison and unshackle our chains. Everybody else's inside the prison. Only one person was born without sin. Only one person lived a life of sinlessness and only one person died as a martyr, as a sinless martyr, Jesus is the only candidate. So Jesus stepped in. He gave his life so that we could be free. And when he did that, he satisfied the demands of God. And now we are all able to freedom through his sacrifice. Jesus was dropped behind enemy lines for the purpose of freeing us from our sin. The weight of our sin had to be immense. We could never found our way to freedom and certainly never found our way to God on our own. In fact, it's foolish to F and futile to even try to pay a debt beyond our comprehension with resources beyond our means what God forgave through the sacrifice of Christ redefined love forever.
Speaker 1 00:06:28 This was grace for if we, it says in Romans five, it goes on to say when we were God's enemies, we don't like to talk about that a lot, but the Bible makes it clear that in our sin, we were enemies of God. And Romans five seven says when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his son. How much more being reconciled shall we be saved through his life? You see, we are not saved through the death of Jesus alone, but we are saved through his life. The final chapter is not that Jesus died for us. It's that he Rose from the dead for us. He conquered sin and he conquered the grave. He rescued us from the sin that makes our lives unbearable at times and the death that each one of us deserves. And then it says in Romans 14, nine to this end, Christ both died and Rose and revived so that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living.
Speaker 1 00:07:26 Easter is a celebration of this occasion. Easter is when Jesus nailed his greatest conquest. He defeated sin and he defeated death. And when he Rose on this day, this Easter morning, so many thousands of years ago, he settled it, defied our victory through him. In fact, the victory of all who were caught and shackled in the prisons of sin past, present, and future Jesus is our only hope for victory in this life, from the sin that so easily tears away at our lives. He is the only hope for victory over the death that has been promised to each of us. You see, because of sin that has entered into our world. This world is decaying. And so are we. And every one of us will succumb someday. In fact, in first Corinthians 15, it talks a lot about this and starting in verse 13, it says, if Christ wasn't raised to life, our message is worthless.
Speaker 1 00:08:25 And so is your faith. If the dead won't be raised to life, we have told lies about God by saying that he raised Christ to life, which he really did not. So if the dead won't be raised to live Christ, wasn't raised to life. And unless Christ was raised to life, the Bible says in first Corinthians 15, your faith is useless and you are still caught in your sins. And those people who died after putting their faith in him are completely lost. If our hope in Christ is only for this life, we are worse off than anyone else. But Christ the Bible says has been raised to life and makes us certain than others, that others will also be raised to life. Adam brought death to all of us and Christ will bring life to all who believe in him. See Christ's sacrifice for us reaches far deeper than the stain of sin.
Speaker 1 00:09:20 It reaches far deeper than this. The covering of our sins, what he offers is full salvation recreation, a new beginning like Joan vowel. Joan was given this amazing gift of grace by this little Bishop in France, we are given the chance we are given the opportunity through Christ through this offering of grace to start a new life, a new beginning, to find new purpose and to be freed from the shackles that so often remind us, we are not our own. It is a promise that he will rid our lives of the baggage that sin loves to bring with it. We are removed from the tainted line of Adam, the tainted line of sin that he has left us with. And we are reborn into the family of Jesus Christ. Listen, there is no sin, too great, no crime to large and new thought to corrupt that it cannot be cleansed by the power of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. And there's no time limit that blood always has and always will free shackled people who believe in his liberating power. The bottom line is God will always give grace to all who requested. So if you will be saved, it says in Romans 10, you will be saved with you. Honestly say Jesus is Lord. And if you believe in your heart, that God has raised him from the dead, God will accept you and save you. <inaudible>
Speaker 1 00:10:47 was forever changed, man. Once he came face-to-face with a grace shown to him by this little old French Bishop. And for those of us who come face to face with the grace of Jesus Christ in giving us freedom, when we deserve imprisonment and then the death that that brings and in giving us life and replacing our spiritual death and our physical death with an eternity promised in heaven with him. While when you come face to face with that kind of grace,
Speaker 0 00:11:18 Frankly, you can never be the same. It's been a privilege this morning to talk through these Easter thoughts with you, as we are thinking it through. I know lots of people say to me, what difference does it make that a man Rose from the grave 2000 years ago? Well, hopefully now, you know, with that resurrection comes a victory. Then everybody who believes in him can know that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord, hoping this life and promise of life to come. How better does it get? It's been a privilege thinking this with you. And I hope that you'll join us next time. As we think things through on a totally different subject, I hope you had a great Easter and we will see you joining us next time.
