Easter Sunrise

1 ...sow in tears, come up in joy. Amen. Oh, because I live ye shall live also. Oh my, if the Old Testament saints could think that, what ought we to think this morning, after nineteen hundred years of seeing suffering and toils and so forth; knowing that we're right into the front door of the resurrection. Amen. The church has moved right up to the hour now where the resurrection can come at any time. And I'm thinking what would it mean to us at that day, the believers, what will it mean on the day.

I can see on that early morning when Martha and Mary went out to the grave. They were coming along the side of the hill after a night... Think of that poor mother's heart. Her Baby all the way, when she was--when It was born, they said It was an illegitimate Child, that It absolutely didn't belong to Joseph, and the--and It was--or It was Joseph's, and they were... The Baby was born out of holy wedlock. She'd had all that to go through, and the--on--think about your baby, and how It'd been rejected, and despised, and spit on, yet he claimed it. And she somehow with a quivering heart, said, "God brought me that Baby, how could it be?" Seeing Him yonder in that great crucial hour.

She thought surely, when they went to put a crown of thorns on His head, and beat Him till the Blood showed through His back, striped Him up and down and all these things; she thought surely that any moment He will throw that cross down and turn around, hit His foot on the ground, and the earth will quake from one side to the other, and proclaim Who He was. But He had died yonder, like a poor, defeated malefactor hanging on the cross.

He had died in disgrace. You see the picture of course with the clout around Him, that was wrong. They stripped every bit of clothes off of Him, just...?... and disgraced Him to the world and everything they could, and they nailed Him to the cross. And there He seemed to be standing helpless. Standing, the earth didn't want Him, heavens couldn't have Him, He was a sinner. Oh my! if you could only realize, just think, the earth didn't know its Creator. Heaven couldn't receive Him because He had the sin of the earth on Him. They didn't even have a place... talk about a place to be born, didn't have a place to die. That's right. The earth didn't want Him. They rejected, said, "Away with such a Fellow." Heavens couldn't receive Him because...?... He was a sinner.

Oh, what a Saviour! Coming from glory and becoming that for me. So rejected by His own, that "He came to His own, His own received Him not." No place to be born, no place to die. What did the world want? What could they do but cast Him into hell. But there was Somebody who loved Him. "I'll not leave His soul in hell, neither will I suffer Him to see corruption." But He raised Him up from the grave, and He come forth on Easter morning, triumph. Hallelujah! Broke every...?... and every fear and everything, rose again and stands alive today, forevermore.

His presence is here, He's at this place this morning of worship. He meets wherever two or three are gathered together...?... all I have. He know that the very promises He made in the Bible, "The things that I do, shall you also. I'll be with you to the end of the world." The poor, rejected, despised people of this world can still have His presence with us. "I'm a...?... I'm a...?..." always, all present, all powerful, everywhere at all times. How He made a way of escape, in every hour of--of trouble. "I'm a very present Help in the time of trouble," He said.

Now, this morning He lives. He's with us today, we may be just a little church today. We may be just a little, old boarded up tabernacle here, not very much to look at; but there's never a place too humble, but what He will come to. He's alive today among the living. He's not dead, but He's alive. And He lives among the living.

Sinner friend today, if you're dead in sin and trepasses, why not live? Why do you stay in death? Why--what have you gained by staying in death? Why not come to life? Why not live today with Him? Live, great blessed hope, that even death itself separates you from your loved ones, can never stain or mar or take away anything from. What a blessed hope. What a wonderful thing that we have today, because of His resurrection. And He lives, and we live with Him, and someday He will come, and we'll go with Him. For, said, "Go tell my disciples and Peter that I go before them into Galilee."

He always goes before us to make a way. Where there is no way, He said, "I am the Way. I'm the resurrection, I'm the Life." And may today, as we gather here today... You love Him?

He lives, He lives, Christ Jesus lives today!

He walks with me and talks me along life's narrow way.

He lives, He lives, salvation to impart!

You ask me how I know He lives?

He lives within my heart.

Isn't...