Sunrise Presbyterian Church
From the very beginning God wanted to establish a personal relationship with His created humanity. The Lord our God chose His people to serve this purpose, yet they were unable to carry out His will. God chose men and women who would bring the message of salvation and hope for humankind. God was motivated by love (John 3:16).
“You love what is right” says Hebrews. God’s love is so powerful, because it can take the dark and transform it into light; the sour into sweetness, the dead come to life, the impossible is made possible. Jesus’ mission was driven by this core reality known as love.
Because Jesus’ life is purpose-driven and driven by God’s love, He graciously offered up Himself as our substitute on the cross made for sinners. Jesus volunteers Himself freely to die on our behalf. There are no fees attached for His life, death and resurrection. The grace of Jesus is more than sufficient.
The word grace comes from the Latin meaning, freely or free. What God offers us through Jesus is free salvation as long as we acknowledge our sinful nature, repent and accept Jesus as our only way to salvation, and we proclaim Him as our Lord.
Jesus demonstrated His grace by offering us a relationship with God the Father, which we have broken, as well as life eternal with our triune God: the Father, Son and Holy Spirit onto eternity.
What Jesus has done for all of us was demonstrated by His dependence on God and how we can also do the same. This is the God Jesus turned to all the time in His personal life. This is the God that worked all the miracles; such as the feeding of over 5,000 men, (plus women and children), healing the sick, giving life to the dead and breaking down the barriers that separate each one of us. Jesus came to show us the way to God, because ‘He is the way.’ (John 14:6)
It is Jesus who accomplishes His given mission of demonstrating how to live before God in obedience and how to connect always with the Lord through prayer and scriptures.
God needed a sinless, lamb-like person and it could only be Himself. God chose to send the One who was without blemish, Jesus. Jesus had the will, determination and the power to accept such a challenging mission. The mission required Him to die on behalf of humanity.
You show power when you obey God. You demonstrate power when you trust and have faith on the one that goes before you as a Shepherd. Being a disciple of Jesus requires us to be obedient to God to the very last breath. There is a place for all of us when we do obey the Lord, named Eternal Life and Heaven. Living eternally where God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit dwell is called paradise.
Jesus showed us ‘the way’ through His mission, teaching, example and His own earthly life. God through Him worked marvelous miracles with those around Him, but it was also demonstrated by His own resurrection. The promise for us lies in the fact that as Jesus was brought to life following His physical death, we are assured of our own resurrection through Him.
Jesus is the incarnation of love, grace and power that is proclaimed this Easter and all the Christian Sundays we gather to worship our risen Lord. Hallelujah!