“And behold, Jesus met them and greeted them. And they came up and took hold of His feet and worshiped Him.” (Matthew 28:9 NASB)
What would it be like to encounter the resurrected Jesus? If you are a Christian, it is not a theoretical question; you will do it one day! What WILL it be like? How will you respond to Him? We get a clue to that here in :9 of Matthew 28, when His followers met Him after His resurrection. Continue reading
“And behold, Jesus met them and greeted them. And they came up and took hold of His feet and worshiped Him.” (Matthew 28:9 NASB)
They were not even expecting it. Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were on their way to report Jesus’ resurrection to His disciples. They weren’t anticipating that they would have this encounter — but “Jesus met them.” It led to worship (“they came up and took hold of His feet and worshiped Him”) and His subsequent direction for their lives (“take word to My brethren to leave for Galilee”). But the key was: He met them.
This is what we need as well. Continue reading
“Go quickly and tell His disciples that He has risen from the dead; and behold He is going ahead of you into Galilee, there you will see Him; behold, I have told you.” (Matthew 28:7 NASB)
When the angel had given the women who were looking for Jesus the message of His resurrection, he then added: “Behold, I have told you.” It was as though he was saying, “OK; now I have done my part. I have told you. I have done what I have been instructed. The rest is up to you.” That is something like OUR job too! Continue reading
We all want to go to heaven — but what do you have to do to go there? I once read a survey of multi-millionaires, in which they were asked, “How much would you be willing to pay for a reserved ticket to heaven?” The average answer was $640,000. Folks that’s cheap, compared to the price of what it really took: as we saw last week, it cost the blood of the “only begotten”, perfect Son of God Himself, which was the only thing that could have paid for our sins. $640,000 is NOTHING compared to that!
But now that Jesus has paid that incomprehensible price for our salvation, HOW do we get what He did on the cross, applied to our lives so that we are saved? This is an important question. How do you get what Jesus died for you to have?
— some would say “Get baptized”
— some would say “Take the the Lord’s supper, or the mass”
— some would say “walk down an aisle and make a decision”
— some would say “pray the words of a certain prayer”
Some of these things are good, but NONE of them is really the right answer in itself. We find the answer to that question in the words of this great verse that we are looking at this morning: “that whoever BELIEVES IN HIM shall not perish but have everlasting life.” These words hold the key that unlocks salvation for us. Let’s look at them one by one: “Whoever … believes … in Him”. Continue reading
When Jesus cried “Eli, Eli, lama sabachtani” in Matthew 27:46, it was a heart-rending moment. The scriptures were being fulfilled as He quoted Psalm 22:1 and died on the cross. It is also challenging to note the two kinds of responses that characterized those who were present in His time of agony: Continue reading
“If You are the Son of God come down from the cross.” (Matthew 27:40)
Jesus had heard this very same phrase three years earlier, in His temptation in the wilderness at the beginning of His ministry. Now He hears it again at the end: “If You are the Son of God …”. The first time, these words came from Satan himself; this time from one of the adversary’ favorite instruments: a crowd of ungodly people. Continue reading
“A little later the bystanders came up and said to Peter, ‘Surely you too are one of them; for even the way you talk gives you away.'” (Matthew 26:73)
This verse describes what happened as Simon Peter denied Jesus for the 3rd time after His arrest. But it also leads to an ironic twist, with a piercing truth: Continue reading
In Matthew 26, the Bible describes how just before He went to the cross, in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus prayed “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will.” Facing the inconceivable agony of the wrath of God that was deserved for all the sins of world, Jesus asked that if there were any other way to bring about salvation, that God would let this torture pass by Him. He prayed this same thing three times, and it should be instructive to us that after He finished this prayer, He went ahead to the cross. What’s so important about this episode is that it demonstrates to us that there was indeed NO OTHER WAY of salvation than that God had to give His Son. Had there been any other alternative, in the face of the fervent pleading of Jesus, God the Father would have given it. But there was no other way, and Jesus went to the cross to die, bearing our sins in His body.
Last Sunday we saw how God loved the world so much “that He GAVE” — He didn’t merely “say” He loved us; He demonstrated it by giving the gift that would make us right with Him. All the sacrifices that mankind tries to make to put us right with God are not sufficient. There was only ONE sacrifice that would suffice, and that is what we are going to look at today, the one gift that would save: “His Only Begotten Son.” Just Who was this gift, and why did it have to be Him and Him only who could save us? Continue reading
“When he had gone out to the gateway, another servant girl saw him, and said to those who were there, ‘This man was with Jesus of Nazareth.’ And again he denied it with an oath, ‘I do not know the man.”” (Matthew 26:71-72)
Peter had been sitting outside in the courtyard of the high priest, when he was identified by a servant-girl as being a follower of Jesus. He denied it. Evidently he became uncomfortable sitting where he was (if you can imagine that!) so he decided to move out to the gateway instead. But there was no escaping it; in just a few moments he was asked basically the same question by another servant-girl, and he responded with yet another denial: “I do not know the man.” Changing his location didn’t help Peter any — because his problem was not in his geography! Continue reading
I'm a retired Southern Baptist pastor of almost 40 years. My wife Cheryl & I moved to Norman, OK in March of 2025. I share a weekly overview for Sunday School teachers of the weekly Lifeway "Explore the Bible" lesson, as well as texts of my sermons and other articles.
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