Download Notes - Bonnyville Baptist Church

TITLE: The Story: Love, Death, and Resurrection
TEXT: I Peter 1:2-5
THEME: At the heart of the gospel is a story of love death and resurrection
OPENING
SENTENCE: A book I read years ago that lays out the process for writing a story for a
Hollywood TV show or movie.
INTRODUCTION: The approach is actually pretty simple.
ACT ONE: Get the hero up a tree.
ACT TWO: Throw rocks at him.
ACT THREE: Get him out of the tree.
In other words: put the main character in a difficult situation and let's watch him fight his way
out.
Storytellers call the main character's hard fight to solve his problem the conflict. Conflict
is the essential ingredient to any story. If you don't have conflict, you don't have a story. If
you don't have conflict, you won't have an audience either. We're only interested in seeing
your main character solve his problem, reach his decision, or realize some vital truth if he
has to fight against strong opposition to do it. For instance, here's a favorite format of
magazine storywriters:
1. Make the readers like a person.
2. Make that person want something.
3. Put an obstacle in his way.
4. Show how he overcomes the obstacle.
Maximum desire set against maximum opposition gives you maximum drama. A writer
was upset because every time he sent a story to an editor it came back with the note,
'More conflict! More conflict!'
Finally the writer asked the editor, 'Okay, you give me a good example of conflict.' 'Well,'
said the editor, 'There are two guys, see? Two guys. One wants to be a jet pilot and the
other wants to be a deep-sea diver. And they're Siamese twins. Now, there's conflict!'
Conflict is the heart-beat of a story. Stories just can't do without it. Conflict comes in
many forms. Let's look at the three most common.
The first basic conflict is man against man. Many old Hollywood movies used it in this
format.
1. Boy meets girl and falls in love.
2. Villain pushes aside boy and takes over girl.
3. Boy takes courage and defeats villain.
4. Boy and girl walk off into setting sun.
Does that all sound familiar? By the way, it's the format for most of the Popeye the Sailor
cartoons. Next time you see a Popeye cartoon on TV you'll find…
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1. Popeye meets Olive Oil and falls in love with her.
2. Big tough villain steps in. He beats up Popeye and takes away Olive Oil.
3. Popeye eats his spinach. Then with super strength he flattens the villain.
4. Popeye and Olive Oil sail off into the sunset.
The second basic conflict is between man and his conscience. This is man's mental
struggle with himself. A man learns and believes certain principles which guide the way
he behaves. When he's forced to act in a way contrary to those principles, there's the
conflict of man against his conscience.
The third basic conflict is man's struggle against the forces of nature. You find it in
stories where man fights to survive in the scorching heat of the desert or the freezing
cold of icy wastelands. Sailors fighting stormy seas, farmers struggling against drought
tell of man's continuing battle with the elements.
TRANSITION
SENTENCE: Today I want to address one other form of conflict: man against God
TRANSITION: This is the story of the Bible. More specifically this is the story of Easter.
Easter is a celebration of the resurrection of Jesus which is the resolution of an ongoing conflict
between a good and holy God and fallen rebellious man. The story of Easter and the resolution
of this conflict is a real life story and is the most important one ever told for in it we find our
greatest tragedy and our greatest hope.
SAY WHAT YOU ARE GOING TO SAY: This morning I want to look at this story’s three
main components. First, we find a hero who is good and merciful and wants to have a
relationship with those He created. Second, we find the conflict. The conflict is that those He
loved and created have rebelled against Him and because alienated from Him. In fact their
rebellion is so severe it requires a severe punishment- so severe that it makes that alienation from
Him eternal. The third element of our story is the resolution. We find that His love is so great
He chooses to take upon Himself the penalty for sin and grants to them a new relationship and
hope.
THEME: At the heart of the gospel is a story of love death and resurrection
What are the three elements of the gospel that make the story meaningful?
I.
The Hero: A Loving Merciful God.
A. It is part of His character. The first element of our story is the main character, or the Hero,
of the Bible- which is God. The Bible portrays Gods unfailing love and mercy in both the
Old and New Testaments. For instance, one cannot read the Psalms without acknowledging
and appreciating God’s great love. Let me list just a few.
Psalm 17:7 Show me the wonders of your great love, you who save by your right hand those who
take refuge in you from their foes.
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Psalm 25:6 Remember, Lord, your great mercy and love, for they are from of old.
Psalm 36:7 How priceless is your unfailing love, O God! People take refuge in the shadow of
your wings.
Psalm 40:11 Do not withhold your mercy from me, Lord; may your love and faithfulness always
protect me.
Psalm 42:8 By day the Lord directs his love, at night his song is with me- a prayer to the God of
my life.
Psalm 51:1 Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great
compassion blot out my transgressions.
Psalm 92:2 proclaiming your love in the morning and your faithfulness at night,
Psalm 138:2 I will bow down toward your holy temple and will praise your name for your
unfailing love and your faithfulness, for you have so exalted your solemn decree that it surpasses
your fame.
Psalm 143:8 Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in
you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I entrust my life.
B. It is what motivates Him to act on our behalf. It is this love for us that drives what God does
for us. It portrays Him as the loveable Hero always reaching out, always taking the initiative.
It is what allows Him to be incredibly patient with us.
ILLUSTRATE: God is the Hero of our story and He wants nothing more than to have a
relationship with you and will go to any measure to show His love and act on it.
You cannot grasp the full nature of the conflict in our story until you understand the magnitude
of God’s love. No greater pain has ever been experienced on any level than the hell of Christ
suffering while He was on the cross. Why? Because he carried all of our pain, sin, guilt, and
shame in that moment. Yet on a far deeper level he was forsaken and punished for us to reconcile
us to God. Why did He go through all that? Because He is our Hero who loves us passionately.
Tim Keller illustrates it this way: “If after a service some Sunday morning one of the members of
my church comes to me and says, "I never want to see you or talk to you again," I will feel pretty
bad. But if today my wife comes up to me and says, "I never want to see you or talk to you
again," that's a lot worse. The longer the love, the deeper the love, the greater the torment of its
loss.” (Stu Epperson, Last Words of Jesus (Worthy Inspired, 2015)
APPLY: The cross of Jesus reveals to us the length and depth of God’s love for us.
What are the three elements of the gospel that make the story meaningful?
II.
The Conflict: The Force and Power of Sin and Death
A. Man has rebelled and turned from the God who loves and created him. We cannot fully
grasp the magnitude of our rebellion until we grasp the magnitude of God’s love. There is
not story without it. This is the conflict. God created us and loves us deeply but we have
either denied His very existence or act as though He does not matter. He provides for us the
conditions that give us our health, our food, our homes, our family, our pleasure, or joy- yet
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we live as though He doesn’t matter. We don’t acknowledge He is the source of all that is
good.
B. Man’s sin and rebellion has created a rift between him and God.
What relationship can exist when only one party in the relationship does all the giving? We have
all seen what one sided relationships look like- they are unhealthy and dysfunctional. In fact
they are not really relationships at all. God is a gentleman and will not coerce His way into your
life. He will not make Himself so unapproachable or controlling that you would not desire to be
with Him. In fact that would not be love at all. Love cannot be coerced- it must be chosen. So
God gives us the freedom to love or not love Him.
The rift that results from our choosing not to love Him and to rebel against Him becomes
permanent at death. That is what hell is- is the permanent alienation from God due to our free
choice to reject Him. If someone you love deeply chose to ignore you, avoid you or even
demean then you really have no relationship. For the relationship to be restored the cause for the
rift must be acknowledged, recompense must be provided and forgiveness must be granted. The
same is true for God. It is just at death the option for restoration is removed.
C. God’s Holy nature requires that sin be punished by death. Another characteristic or attribute
of God that is just as real and significant as His love is His Holiness. This is an attribute our
modern culture fails to acknowledge or appreciate. We seem to be willing to readily accept
His love but not His Holiness. Holiness means that God He is set apart and is the standard
and measure for morality. The standards of righteousness (or right vs wrong) are based on the
nature of God. Because He is Holy he cannot tolerate sin in His presence and He must
punish it just as a just judge must punish a murder, rape, or robbery. The ultimate penalty for
sin, as cited in the Bible, is death. Is it any wonder people don’t accept it?
ILLUSTRATE: The magazine Vanity Fair recently (December 2015) published an article on the
actress Jessica Alba, which had the following paragraph on Alba's faith and views on God:
Alba's childhood was marked by two things: illnesses … that landed her in the hospital often,
and a burning desire to leave a mark on the world, which at the age of 12 meant becoming a
devout born-again Christian. "I was seeking a purpose," Alba says of her years as a member of a
conservative Christian youth group. "I wanted to exist for a reason." This lasted until she was 17,
when, she says, she was turned off by the boundaries and labels set by fellow churchgoers. That
year, she attended an acting workshop in Vermont and "fell crazy in love with a cross-dressing
ballet dancer who had a baby and was bisexual. I was like, 'There's just no way he's going to
hell!'" Acting opened her to a new world of creative people and a community where she
belonged. "I felt like, at the end of the day, God is love and everyone is human." (Derek
Blasberg, "How Jessica Alba Built a Billion-Dollar Business Empire," Vanity Fair (12-1-15)
APPLY: Alba expresses what many in our culture feel and think—that God does not and will not
judge sin. But if she is right then there is no story because there is not conflict and there is no
need for the cross. God is simply a God of love and accepts any and all behavior without any
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judgement allowing us to act with impunity. It says, “Live and do what you want- God doesn’t
care.” But what kind of love is that? The guidelines He gives are for our good.
What are the three elements of the gospel that make the story meaningful?
III.
The Resolution: The Resurrection of Jesus from the Dead.
The story of Easter finds is culmination in the resurrection. To raise from the dead He had to
die. Jesus death had meaning and purpose.
A. As God Jesus loves us so much He took our penalty of death upon Himself.
Romans 5: “You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the
ungodly. 7 Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone
might possibly dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were
still sinners, Christ died for us.”
The cross of Jesus is where the Holiness of God and the Love of God converge. His Holiness is
satisfied because the penalty of sin has been paid and the love of God is satisfied because it
allows his rebellious fallen creation to be reconciled to Him. He can be fully loving and fully
holy at the same time and the tension, the conflict, is resolved through His death.
B. Jesus resurrection defeats the power of sin and death.
But the resolution of the conflict means so much more. Paul shows this in I Corinthians 15:5457, “When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with
immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in
victory.” 55 “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” 56 The sting of
death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory
through our Lord Jesus Christ”
C. The resurrection gives us hope and a promised inheritance.
I Peter 1:3-5, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he
has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
4 and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven
for you, 5 who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is
ready to be revealed in the last time.”
ILLUSTRATE: The satirical site The Onion ran a humorous (note: fictional) article with a biting
truth. The article was titled "World Death Rate Holding Steady at 100 Percent." The article
reported:
World Health Organization officials expressed disappointment Monday at the group's finding
that, despite the enormous efforts of doctors, rescue workers and other medical professionals
worldwide, the global death rate remains constant at 100 percent.
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Death, a metabolic affliction causing total shutdown of all life functions, has long been
considered humanity's number one health concern. Responsible for 100 percent of all recorded
fatalities worldwide, the condition has no cure.
"I was really hoping, what with all those new radiology treatments, rescue helicopters, aerobics
TV shows and what have you, that we might at least make a dent in it this year," WHO Director
General Dr. Gernst Bladt said. "Unfortunately, it would appear that the death rate remains
constant and total, as it has inviolably since the dawn of time." (The Onion, "World Death Rate
Still Holding Steady at 100 Percent" (1-22-97)
APPLY: Death is one thing we can be certain of. But what the article did not cite is that while
we all die we do not all cease to exist. Even in death we have hope.
SAY WHAT YOU HAVE SAID: The morning we looked at the three elements of what
comprises the story of Easter.
TIE INTO OPENING SENTENCE: Every story must have three elements to be meaningful and
we find all three in the Easter story. We find the good and caring hero in God. We find the
conflict in His great love for his creation- yet they have rejected and rebelled against Him.
Finally, we find the resolution. The death, burial and resurrection.
APPLY TO SPECIFIC AUDIENCE:
1. Realize the magnitude of God’s love for you. He yearns for you to love Him in response.
2. Because of His love God has gone to great lengths to draw you to Himself- even to the point
that He will remove all the obstacles that could keep you from Him.
3. He asks that you love Him in response and show you love in how you believe and live.
HAYMAKER: According to an article in The New York Times, "The Walt Disney Company's
Star Wars: The Force Awakens earned roughly $517 million in worldwide ticket sales [in the
first weekend], smashing multiple box office records. … It was the largest opening weekend in
North America."
Why the huge success? Jeanine Basinger, a film studies professor at Wesleyan University, has
one good theory. Basinger said, "The studios finally seem to be remembering, after years of
over-reliance on visual effects, that moviegoers like a story. It can be a story we are familiar
with. It can be a serialized story. But give us, please, we're begging you, a story of some kind."
(Brooks Barnes, "'Star Wars: The Force Awakens,' Breaks Box Office Records," The New York
Times (12-20-15))
Professor Basinger has a good point, and as Christians we have the best story in the universe to
share with others. It has all the crucial elements of a good story. And the greatest thing of all.
You can be a part of it by accepting that Jesus, as God, loves you so much so deeply that He
would go to great lengths to restore you to Himself.
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