The Living Savior

Why is experience with the living Savior important to those around you?

*If they have not experienced His forgiveness and power, what are they missing?  How might Jesus make their lives more peaceful, joyful, and meaningful?

*How can you share what Jesus has done in your life with family and friends?

John 20:1-9

1.  Someone took His body.

2.  She did what is often a person’s favorite exercise, SHE JUMBED TO A CONCLUSION.

3.  Mary RAN to Peter and the other disciple, known in some of the gospels as John the beloved.

4.  First disciple would not enter the tomb.  Impulsive Peter rushed in where angels would later tread and could hardly believe his eyes.

5.  Grave wrappings not tossed aside as if a hurried grave robber had stolen the body, Linen Strips lying neatly folded on the place where earlier the body had rested.  No evidence of theft or vandalism.

6.  Taken time to remove and fold the wrappings.  They would have risked being caught.

7.  He may have believed Mary’s statement that Jesus’ body was gone.

John 20:10-16

1.  She stayed and wept-this was the only natural reaction to what she was thinking and feeling at the time.

2.  Two angels setting where once the Lord’s body had rested.

3.  Why are you crying?

4.  They have taken my Lord away and I don’t know where they have put him.

5.  She was not expecting Him to be alive.  She may have been blinded by grief.

6.  Who is it you are looking for?

7.  She was looking for Jesus’ body.

8.  He called her by name and she recognized his name.

9.  Rabboni-beloved Teacher-she sought to embrace Him.

John 20: 17-20

3.  Go to my brothers and tell them, I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God v. 17a.

4.  His choice of words imply that Jesus sustained a special relationship to the Father⁓

v. 17a.

4.  His choice of words imply that Jesus sustained a special relationship to the Father

*How can you share what Jesus has done?

GROWING IN GRACE  APRIL 4, 2010

Word to Live By:

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life.  He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.  Do you believe this?”  (John 11:25-26).

Session Truth:

The resurrection of Christ means that the Risen Lord wants His triumph to become ours.

Session Goals:

*To understand that Christ’s resurrection is the assurance of new life to those who believe.

*To be thankful for the Resurrection and place our hope completely in Christ.

*To celebrate the reality that His resurrection makes ours possible.

Exposition:

The resurrection of Jesus has been denied outright or explained away by detractors of Christianity within and without the churches.  Some skeptics have scoffed at the Resurrection story because, they argue, the so-called risen Jesus appeared only to believers.  The scriptures we survey in this lesson make it clear that His death had shattered the faith and hope of His disciples.  THEIR BELIEF DID NOT CREATE THE RESURRECTION; THE RESURRECTION RESTORED THEIR BELIEF.

*A Missing Body  (John 20:1-9)

*A Weeping Woman (John 20:10-16)

*A Thrilling Mission (John 20:17-20)

EVERYDAY DEMONSTRATIONS OF RESURRECTION POWER

The great Easter truth is not only that we are to live newly after death, but also that we are to live here and now by the power of the Resurrection.  The Resurrection means not only that we may live forever, but that we may live holy lives now.

One of the most powerful evidences of the truth of the Resurrection is the difference that God makes every day in the lives of countless Christians.  They are living demonstrations of resurrection power.

*How is your experience with Jesus evidence that He is alive?

*Why is your witness to your , one that they did not and could not share, nor can we.  They came into the Father’s family as we do, as forgiven sinners and adopted sons and daughters.  Jesus however, had been from all eternity the Father’s perfectly obedient Son.  As Paul would later teach, the Resurrection powerfully declared the unique son-ship of Jesus to God.  He is what no other can be;  HE DOES WHAT NO OTHER CAN DO.

5.  Are you coming back?  How long will You be gone?  Why can’t you stay?

6.  They gathered behind locked doors for fear of the Jews.

7.  Peace be with you.

8.  Jesus displayed His cross-scarred hands and side, a nonverbal reminder that His death had atoned for their sins and had purchased their peace.

9.  When they saw Jesus with their own eyes.