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Let's open our Bibles to Matthew chapter 28 as we return to Matthew's narrative on the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. The world has heard many important messages. The world has learned many great truths. The world has experienced many dramatic and life-changing events. But not any one of them nor all of them combined can come close to the significance of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Nothing in the history of the world...in fact, not everything in the history of the world can match for significance the reality that Jesus was raised from the dead.
In the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the heart of the Christian faith. Christianity is a belief, is a series of truths and doctrines and principles that rise and fall on the resurrection of Christ. When Jesus rose from the dead, He proved Himself to be exactly who He claimed to be. When He rose from the dead by the power of the Father, He was affirmed to have accomplished what He came to accomplish. And in 2 Corinthians 4:14 it says that as God raised up Jesus from the dead, so also shall He raise us up. Ours is a belief in resurrection life and that is built on the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Because He lives, we shall live also.
Now the message of the Scripture has always been a message of resurrection hope, that death is not the end. Death is not a cul-de-sac, it's not a deadend street. For the believer it's a thoroughfare that enters into eternity. That's always been the belief of the people of God. In Psalm 49:15, for example, the Scripture says God will ransom my soul from the power of the grave. In Psalm 73 and verse 24 we read, "Afterward...that is after this life, speaking to God...Thou wilt receive me to glory." The prophet Hosea in chapter 6 verse 2 confidently asserts that God will raise us up that we may live before Him. The great prophet Isaiah in chapter 26 and verse 19 says, "Thy dead shall live, their bodies shall rise. O dwellers of the dust, awake and sing for joy." And in Daniel 12 verse 2 there is the great promise that those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake unto everlasting life.
In the fourteenth chapter of Job, one of the oldest books in Scripture, verse 14 says, "If a man die, shall he live again? All the days of my appointed time, will I wait...says the answer...till my change come." And in the nineteenth chapter of Job and verse 25 through 27 we read, "For I know that my redeemer lives and that He shall stand at the latter day on the earth and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God whom I shall see for myself and not another, though my heart be consumed within me." And so, the testimony of Job is that no matter what happens to his flesh, some day in a new flesh He will see God.
That has been the hope of God's people for all history. And it is a hope predicated on the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is His resurrection that guarantees ours. It is His resurrection, says Paul, that is the firstfruits of all that slept. He is the guarantor of our resurrection. Is it any wonder then that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is mentioned at least 104 times in the New Testament?
The resurrection may be denied, it may be despised, it may be mocked, men may make an effort to explain it away, to give some rational arguments to explain the phenomena, but frankly I think only a fool would want to explain away the resurrection of Christ because in so doing he explains himself right into eternal doom. For the only hope of life after death, the only hope of eternal salvation, the only hope of being with God in glory forever is the resurrection of Christ. To explain that away is to damn all of the human race. Only a fool would do that. But there have been many such fools.
I'm reminded of the account of a missionary by the name of Dr. Bull. He was a Methodist missionary to the Riucco(?) Islands of Japan. And he visited on one occasion the island of Amacusa(?). And on that island he found a grave, a mass grave. And he was told that the burial there was a burial of Christians. And as he deciphered the marker on the grave he found that there were 11,111 heads taken from the bodies of Christians and buried in that place. The date of the grave is 1637, the same year in which the Japanese government ordered all Christians exterminated. And in this case he was told that they put the heads in one place and the bodies in another place to frustrate the Christian's hope of resurrection, feeling that if there was ever a resurrection God wouldn't be able to figure out what head went with what body. Foolish people.
Listen, the resurrection of Jesus Christ guarantees the resurrection of every saint, no matter what happens to the body. That is the promise of Scripture. And this then is unarguably the single greatest event in the history of the world. You cannot just slide the resurrection out of Christianity. Anybody who denies the literal bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ cannot be a Christian. He can only falsely claim the title because the resurrection is the heart of everything in the Christian faith.
Look with me for a moment to the fifteenth chapter of 1 Corinthians and let me show you the centrality of the resurrection and the argument of the Apostle Paul. If there is no resurrection there is no Christian faith, there is no hope, there is no salvation, there is no eternal life. And he makes that argument very clear in 1 Corinthians 15 beginning in verse 13. He says, "If there is no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen?" So let's start with that assumption...Christ is not risen. Let's say that Christ did not rise. We'll try to explain the fact that His body wasn't there another way. We'll try to explain the fact that the grave clothes were lying in perfect order another way. We'll try another angle. Maybe somebody took His body, maybe He never was dead and He just kind of awakened in the coolness of the tomb and got up and walked out. Let's say He didn't rise.
Then verse 14 says, "If Christ is not risen then our preaching is useless because the gospel says men are sinners and sinners need a Savior and Christ is that Savior and Christ has paid the penalty for sin and conquered death if He did rise. If He did not rise then He is as dead as everybody else is and He didn't do a thing for us. His payment was not accepted. He was not powerful enough." So if Christ is not risen, then gospel preaching is useless. There is no good news. The news is all bad.
The next statement in his argument comes in the same verse, verse 14, "And your faith is also useless," and he repeats that in verse 17. "If Christ is not raised your faith is useless." If Christ is not risen then all gospel preaching is useless and anyone who believes it is exercising an absolutely useless faith because a dead Christ is not good news and believing in a dead Christ is pointless.
Furthermore, verse 15 Paul says, "Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God because we have testified of Christ that He raised up Christ whom He raised not up if so be that the dead rise not." In other words, he says all the Apostles are liars. And men whom the world has honored for centuries and whom the world has esteemed as men of truth and morality and conviction and ethics are nothing but a bunch of liars. If Christ is not risen, gospel preaching is useless, faith in it is useless and the Apostles are liars who repeatedly preach that Christ did rise.
Furthermore, verse 17 says "If Christ be not raised your faith is vain or useless and you are yet in your sins." And the next point in his argument is that the power of sin is unbroken. And every man therefore is under the total domination of sin to be doomed and damned forever by it. No, the resurrection of Jesus Christ is not just negotiable reality, it is the very cornerstone of the Christian faith. And if you remove it, the whole thing comes down.
Furthermore, verse 18 says, "Then they also who are fallen asleep, or who have already died in Christ, are damned." If Christ is not risen, gospel preaching is useless, faith in it is useless, the Apostles are liars, sin's power is unbroken and everybody who died hoping in Christ is damned.
Therefore he says in verse 19, "If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable." If Christ didn't rise from the dead, then Christians are putting their hope in a different Christ and they are the most pitiful people in the world.
But bless God, He did rise. And let's go back to Matthew 28 and see His resurrection. And this is the theme of Matthew's last chapter. This is the climax of 28 chapters of the life of Christ. It is the monumental event of history. The simplicity of which he presents it is thrilling. The lack of effort to try to prove it but to just let it speak for itself is convincing.
Now we set the time last time, verse 1, in the end of the Sabbath. Or literally, long after the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week...Sunday morning at dawn. John says when all of it began to happen it was still dark. By the time the ladies arrived at the tomb, the streaks of sunlight coming from the east had begun to come across the top of the Mount of Olives and it was beginning to be light. It is then the third day. It is Sunday, the third day since Jesus was put in the grave on Friday. This then is the promised day of resurrection. For at least five times already in Matthew's gospel, the fact that Jesus would be in the grave has been stated and that He would be there three days. Five times it has already been said or noted by some that Christ said He would be in the grave three days. And now it is that third day...resurrection day.
Now as we saw last time, Matthew approaches the resurrection scene differently than Mark and Luke and John. They all see the same scene. They all deal with the similar phenomena and yet their perspectives are unique to each writer. Matthew approaches it from the feelings and attitudes and emotions of the women who were there. And thus it has a very human quality. Though it is a supernatural event to exceed all events, it still has a very natural, a very human, a very real sense as we come to it through the emotions of these women who loved Christ.
Now remember the first attitude we saw was the attitude of sympathy. Early in the morning while it is still dark, John says, the women begin to move toward the tomb. The night before, after sun had gone down, that is the Sabbath was ended, they had purchased some spices and they were coming for a final anointing of the corpse. They didn't believe in a resurrection. They weren't anticipating a resurrection. They were coming out of devoted love and sympathy to Christ to anoint His body one more time before decay finally totally took over. In Mark 16 it says as they approached the grave they were concerned about who might roll the stone away because it was so large and they were weak and they would need some men to do that. That tells me that they weren't at all expecting a resurrection. They didn't even realize there would be a Roman guard there to keep them from doing what they intended to do. And so they came not aware of a resurrection, not aware of the guard at the grave...only aware of their own sympathy for the Savior, for the teacher that they had followed so long and they were now sad because He was dead. And frankly, they had little if any hope in their heart for a resurrection. They never seem to even expect it.
The women appear at the end of verse 1, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, Mary the wife of Cleophas or Alphaeus, the mother of James the Little and Joses. And Mark says also Salome was there. Salome was the wife of Zebedee and the mother of James and John. And Luke says that Joanna was there, the wife of Chuza who was one of the stewards of Herod. So it was a little group of women who came.
As they came the ground must have rumbled with the tremors because there was an earthquake, as verse 2 indicates. But their purpose in coming was to see the tomb, it says at the end of verse 1. They wanted to see it and then to go and anoint the body of the Lord. When they arrived, or even as they began to approach feeling the waves of the earthquake, their sympathy was turned to another emotion and that was the emotion of terror. And verse 2 tells us there was a great earthquake and the earthquake was not caused by the resurrection. Remember what I told you, Christ had already gone out of the grave. The angel came and he caused it. It says there was a great earthquake because an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone from the door and sat on it...that's what created the earthquake. And remember what I told you, the angel did not open the grave to let Christ out, the angel opened the grave to let people in. Christ had already left. He didn't need to wait for the stone to be removed, He went right through the stone...just as later on He went through the walls of the upper room to meet the disciples, the door being shut. Christ left. And then the angel rolled the stone away that the world may go in and see that Christ was risen. And that arrival created an earthquake.
I said last time, also, that as the women approached they could see the tomb was opened. The stone was laying flat and an angel was sitting on it. Now apparently one of those women, Mary Magdalene, who was very devoted and very impetuous and very impulsive. She was sort of the counterpart of Peter among the women. Apparently as she saw the opened tomb didn't really take stock of the angel and wait to see what was going to happen...but John chapter 20 records that Mary Magdalene having arrived and seen the tomb opened, turned immediately and ran. And if you read the twentieth chapter of John and the first four verses, you will see that she ran back into the city to find Peter and John to tell them that something terrible had happened and someone had taken the Lord. She didn't wait around to talk to the angel, perhaps didn't even see the angel. In fact, I'm almost sure she didn't or she would have been anxious to stay and find out from the angel what had happened. And so she goes to Peter and John.
So as the description of the angel comes in verse 3, by this time Mary Magdalene is gone. She's running back into the city to find Peter and to find John. Meanwhile the rest of the women remain and they face an angel whose face or countenance is like lightning. And that is to identify him with the glory of God, the Shekinah presence, the glowing incandescent light defusing the divine one Himself. This then is a messenger from holy God. Further that is confirmed because his garment is as white as snow, speaking of holiness and purity and sinlessness. This is a holy angel sent from the face of God. And we remember, don't we, that the angels do always behold the face of the Father. And the glory of the Father, it says in Matthew 18, they behold His face, the glory of the Father transmitted to them, borne by them in this occasion to those women demonstrates that this is a messenger from God and his white garment that he is a holy angel.
So fearful was he, verse 4 says, that the soldiers were knocked unconscious. And they're in a state of coma at this point, lying on the ground. The women are in sheer terror. And in verse 5, "The angel answered and said unto them, Stop being terrorized, stop being afraid, there's no need for this. For I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. I know why you're here." That must have been a comforting word for them.
And then in verse 6 he says, "He's not here, He was raised as He said." And the emphasis is on "as He said," this is what He predicted. This was the prophecy. "Come, see the place where He lay." And if you compare the other accounts, the women went into the tomb and as they went in the angel went in with them and the angel repeated the same message again. So hard to believe, he repeated it again. And then a second angel appeared, one at the head and one at the feet and the two angels together repeated the message similar and said He was raised.
And then in verse 7 you'll remember the angel said, "Go quickly." All of this is taking place in a very brief time. "Go quickly and tell His disciples that He is risen, or literally that He was raised by the power of the Father--implied--from the dead." Fascination has to give way to proclamation. You can't just hang around the tomb, you've got to get out with the message. Go to the Apostles immediately and tell them He is alive.
Now the evidence was all there. If they were taking note of it, the evidence was all there. The empty tomb...not only the empty tomb but the unconscious guard, something so powerful that it overpowered the Roman soldiers. And then there was the angelic testimony from a holy angel out of the presence of God. And then there was the orderly grave clothes. The other gospel writers point out how that if Jesus had been stolen by someone, they would have ripped those things off Him and they would have been scattered all over the inside of that tomb, or the outside. But they were lying perfectly as they had been lying when He was in them with the headpiece where the head would be and the rest where the body would be as if He had lifted out.
Further testimony was these women knew the disciples didn't believe in any resurrection, they hadn't really come to grips with the resurrection so they wouldn't have stolen the body to falsify a resurrection they didn't even believe was going to happen. Furthermore there was the explicit statement of Jesus fulfilled in this. Oh there was plenty of evidence that it really was a resurrection. But the angel goes even further. Look at verse 7. You're not going to have to take my word for it, he says in effect, "Behold, He goes before you into Galilee. There shall you see Him. Lo, I have told you." I've given my message, I've done my duty. You're going to become eye witnesses when you see Him in Galilee. And this, of course, would be the climax of Matthew's gospel. The promise of the resurrection would be fulfilled. And Jesus said it in chapter 26 verse 32, "After I am raised up, again I will go before you into Galilee. I'll meet you all in Galilee." Galilee of the Gentiles...Galilee of the nations where the Lord first ministered and first did His miracles and first redeemed souls and was first hated and rejected...Galilee, a microcosm of the world.
The fact that He would meet them and commission them to preach the gospel in Galilee was in a sense to say, "I want this to be a representation that you must go to the whole world." It was a positive statement. Even as when Jesus came in Matthew 4:15 it says He came to Galilee as a light to the darkness, as light to the shadow of death. Galilee represented the world and the message of resurrection was to go to the world so the commissioning was to be in Galilee. And indeed it was as Matthew points out in verses 16 to 20, that great statement, "Go ye and make disciples, baptizing..." and so forth and so on. That was said to them, verse 16 says, in a mountain in Galilee. And Matthew's gospel ends with that great commission, all those people gathered in Galilee and sent out with the message of the risen Christ.
Now that doesn't mean that He didn't appear to anybody in Jerusalem first, because He did. It simply means that the great commissioning would take place in Galilee. The Lord will lead you there and He will meet you there and there you will be sent to the world with the message.
There were some appearances of Christ in Jerusalem before the meeting in Galilee. There's no question about that. In fact I can give it to you very briefly. This is Sunday morning. In just a matter of moments He will appear to Mary Magdalene who will arrive at the grave. The women who have been there since she left are now on their way to the disciples. They're going to be leaving. And as they're leaving, Mary Magdalene and Peter and John are coming and He'll appear to Mary. And later on He will appear personally to Simon Peter as Luke 24 tells us and 1 Corinthians 15:5 also tells us He appeared first to Peter. So there will be a personal appearance to Mary because of her deep devotion and because she stayed by the grave. A personal appearance to Peter because he of all the disciples had seemingly defected the farthest and needed grace for restoration.
And after that there would be an appearance to two disciples. Two disciples are on their way to Emmaus. And as they walk on the road to Emmaus, the Lord joins them, walks along with them, opens the Scripture, teaches them about Himself. Then reveals Himself to them in the breaking of bread. So He appears to Mary in the area of Jerusalem. He appears to Peter in the area of Jerusalem. He appears to the two on the road to Emmaus outside Jerusalem. And then on this very Sunday night, all the disciples were gathered in the upper room and the Lord appeared to them. It says in Luke 24:36, "And as they spoke, Jesus Himself stood in the midst of them and said to them, Peace be unto you." And they were terrified and frightened and thought they'd seen a spirit.
So, He appeared to Mary. He appeared to Peter. He appeared to unnamed disciples on the road to Emmaus in the afternoon. And by evening He appears to the eleven disciples gathered together. In fact there were only ten at that time, who was missing? Thomas. And eight days later the Scriptures tell us, John chapter 20 verses 26 to 29, He appeared again in the upper room, this time Thomas was there and Thomas when he saw Him said, "My Lord and My God." So there were several appearings to the disciples in Jerusalem.
But the great appearing in which there was a great commissioning occurred in Galilee. And that is the one of which Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15 and verse 6 when he says, "And after that...after He had been seen by Peter and the disciples...He was seen of about 500 brethren at one time." And that would have been that great appearing in Galilee to all the gathered disciples on a mountain. And even after that, He appeared to Apostles prior to His ascension. And every time He appeared to them it says in Acts 1 He spoke of things pertaining to the kingdom of God. For 40 days, from resurrection to ascension, at varying intervals to varying groups of the disciples, He appeared. But the high point of all those appearances was the appearance on the mountain in Galilee, I believe it was to that 500 plus where He commissioned them to preach the gospel to the whole world. And every meeting in Jerusalem prior to that was just a preparation for the great commissioning that would occur in Galilee.
So the angel then says to the ladies, "He will go before you into Galilee, you'll see Him there. I've told you." And sent them off as if to say you have your orders. Mark 16:7 says, "The angel said, Go tell the apostles and Peter." Peter most needed restoration. He most needed grace and forgiveness.
And so the women had come to the tomb with an emotion of sympathy. That had been turned into an emotion of terror and now the emotion of terror began to give way to a third emotion and that's noted in verse 8 and that is the emotion of joy. Verse 8, "And they departed quickly from the sepulcher with fear and great joy. Now their fear is tempered by tremendous joy and they did run to bring His disciples the message. "Did run" is the main verb. The angel said go, they spun around on their heels and took off down the path. And they're running into the city to find the disciples to tell them that the message from the angel is that Jesus was raised from the dead. And their terror is mingled now with great joy...the thrill that it might be true that it might be true that it might be true and we're going to see Him in Galilee.
By the way, when they got to the apostles and delivered their message, according to Mark 16:13, the apostles did not believe them. That's important. And again it reaffirms the fact that they didn't steal the body because they didn't even believe in the resurrection so why would they falsify it. Luke 24 also indicates the same thing, verses 10 and 11, verses 22 to 25, they weren't even believing in the resurrection. So off the women go to find the disciples. When they find them they can't even convince them that it's true.
Now meanwhile, Mary Magdalene who has been finding Peter and John in another place is on her way with them to the grave. And they pass each other, apparently without seeing each other. The soldiers are still unconscious. The tomb is open. The angel is there. Peter and John and Mary Magdalene are returning to find out what is going on.
Now turn in your Bible to John 20 and let's see what happens when they arrive. Verse 4 says, "Peter and John ran together and the other disciple," John never uses his own name, always calls himself the other disciples, or the disciple whom Jesus loved, or the disciple who leaned on Jesus' chest, something like that. He ran faster than Peter. And He came first to the grave.
Now John was somewhat timid. He was faster than Peter but he was also a little more timid. And he just stooped down and looked in. He didn't go in. He just kind of stooped and looked. And he saw the linen clothes lying there but he didn't go in. See, he hasn't got any information except that Mary says somebody took the body. And he looks in and all he sees are the grave clothes and he can't figure out immediately what's happening. And he's a little bit tense about just bursting into a grave. And I can understand that.
And then comes Simon Peter. And Peter doesn't know any of that kind of sensitivity. He just blasts into the grave...right by John, may have almost knocked him down. And he saw the linen clothes lying there and the cloth that was about His head, not lying with the linen clothes but wrapped together in a place by itself. In other words, indicating that there had been no struggle at all but that Christ had just left in perfect peace and quiet.
Then after Peter went in and sort of broke the barrier a little, then went in the other disciple who came first to the sepulcher and he saw and what? And believed. He had such a heart of faith, didn't he? Peter's probably got a million questions and John goes from curiosity to faith that fast. He believed. For as yet, up to this point, they hadn't even known deep in their hearts the Scripture that He must rise again from the dead. They didn't even understand that. Oh, they heard him say it, it didn't compute, it didn't register. You see, they were unwilling to allow Jesus to even say He was going to die, therefore they blocked out of their minds that He might rise again.
But John believed. And Peter questioned. And verse 10 says they went away again to their own home. They went back to try to figure it out. They didn't seem to want to do any investigation. They didn't seem to want to chase around and find out what foul play might have occurred, they just left.
But typically verse 11 says Mary didn't leave. Ever and always the devoted follower, always seeming to linger past everyone else, at the cross, at the burial and here. And so she was weeping and she stooped down and it mentions stooping down all the time because the entrance would be very low and it would be necessary if you were to go to that place now where they believe the grave of the Lord has been discovered, you would find you have to stoop to get into that little entrance. She finally stooped down and looked into the sepulcher and she sees two angels in white...the one at the head, the other at the feet where the body of Jesus has lain. These two angels are still there.
And they said to her, "Woman, why are you weeping? She said to them, Because they have taken away my Lord and I know not where they have laid Him." Now we don't know who "they" is and she didn't know who "they" was, she just said somebody has taken Him. "And when she had thus said she turned herself back." Now I don't know what was going on in her mind other than that she was so sorrowful she didn't realize she was talking to two angels. That ought to sort of wake you up to something. She looks in and here are two angels and they talk to her and she acts like this is normal. "Well, somebody took Him away and I don't know where they put Him." Her spiritual perception and her ability to understand what's going on is overpowered by her sorrow. And now we might understand why the original time when she came to the grave a few moments before this and there was an open grave and an angel there, she didn't compute that either. She just took off. And here she's having a conversation with these two angels about where this body might be. Maybe assuming they were men, for angels do take the appearance of men.
And then she had spoken and turned herself around, verse 14 says, and saw Jesus standing and didn't know it was Jesus. And somebody says, "Well, she was crying and she couldn't see too well." Well, that's probably right and she was so upset and emotional that she just couldn't make sense out of much, that's right. But the reason she didn't know it was Jesus was because Jesus after His resurrection was not known by anyone who saw Him unless He opened their eyes that they might know who He was, for in His resurrection glory He was changed so that He had to reveal Himself. How else could the two disciples on the road to Emmaus this afternoon walk with Him and talk with Him and not know who He was until He disclosed it to them by some personal means?
And so, Jesus said to her, "Woman, why are you weeping? Who you looking for? And she supposed Him to be the gardener...the person who takes care of the garden...and she said, Sir, if you have taken Him from here, tell me where you laid Him and I'll take Him away." In other words, if this grave was only for rent and not for sale or if this could only be used a few days because someone else has to be placed here and you've put Him somewhere else, please tell me where He is, I'll take Him and find a proper place to put Him. "And Jesus said to her in Aramaic, her own language, Miriam..." very personal touch and said her name and instantly she knew. "She turned herself and said to Him, Rabboni," which is the most dignified you could ever use in Aramaic, Rabbi is a step below Rabboni which is only for a highly exalted teacher and it means master. And Jesus in that moment revealed Himself to her and she was the first, it says in Mark chapter 16, to see the resurrected Christ.
And then in verse 17 Jesus says unto her, "Don't cling to Me...don't cling to Me." She grabbed Him. I mean, she had lost Him once and she wasn't going to let go again. The pain of His dying and going away was more than she could stand and she's holding on and He says no, "Because I'm not yet ascended to My Father." I can't stay. "Go to My brethren and say to them, I ascend unto My Father and to your Father, to My God and your God." One of the great statements of all of Scripture. He says, first of all, from now on they are My brethren, not friends like He had called them so beautifully in John 15:15, but now brethren. Why? Because of His death and resurrection they have been brought fully into the family of God and as Paul put it, they are heirs and joint heirs with Jesus Christ who is...Hebrews 2:11 and 12 says...not ashamed to call them brother. Go tell My brothers though they are cowardly, though they have forsaken Me, though they have denied Me, though they have fled from Me, though they have demonstrated that they do not stand by, they are My brothers, they have been redeemed into the family of God and go tell them that I have to go to My Father and your Father, My God and your God. And in those two identifications, He draws them into Himself...we share the same Father, we share the same God...tell them.
And so she lets go and now she also takes off to tell the disciples. Verse 18 it says that when she came and told the disciples that she had seen the Lord and that He had spoken these things...it says she came and told the disciples she had seen the Lord and that He had spoken these things unto her.
So, you understand the scene? The women have gone. Mary Magdalene, Peter and John have come. Peter and John took off, went back home. Mary lingered, saw Christ. Now she leaves to tell the disciples. The other women are also on their way. She's a little behind them. After having revealed Himself to Mary, the Lord then supernaturally transports Himself out in front of the other women and comes along the road to meet them. And we pick that scene up again in Matthew chapter 28. And it is a marvelous scene...absolutely marvelous.
In verse 9, and this takes us to their fourth emotion...they're filled with joy and their joy will turn to worship. "And as they went to tell His disciples, behold Jesus met them, having already revealed Himself first to Mary" as it says in Mark 16 and now He goes ahead of them supernaturally transporting Himself and comes back approaching them and He meets them. And I just love this. "Jesus met them saying, Chairo te...is the Greek word...Chairo te." There He was in resurrection glory, in physical form right on the road, alive from the dead and He says to them, "Chairo te." You know what that is? "Hi...Good Morning...Hello." Well, you'd think maybe you'd get something more profound than that out of the resurrected Son of God. There's something so beautiful about that. That was the ordinary salutation of the marketplace. That was the ordinary greeting that everybody gave as they passed on the roads. That was what you said when you spoke to the people in your own house every day. Here is Christ in resurrection glory...here is the Son of God in His kingly majesty having conquered death and in a very simple and warm and human way He simply stops some women that He loves and with human tenderness and very natural human sympathy He says good morning, hi.
And even though Jesus Christ is glorified, beloved, He has not lost His human sensitivity. He has not lost His human tenderness. He is heavenly but He is also earthly. He can commune with the holy angels and the trinity but He can also commune with men who walk the dusty roads of life. Marvelous picture. And even though He said to them something as simple as hi, or hello, immediately they held Him by the feet and worshiped Him. They knew who He was. They knew He was the risen Christ. And this was their recognition of His deity. This was their recognition that He was to be adored and praised and glorified and worshiped and honored. They were doing what Paul says every one should do, that every knee should bow, every tongue should confess Jesus as Lord to the glory of God, Philippians 2:11. They worshiped one who was worthy of worship. They paid Him homage as to God. And so they come to the emotion of worship.
I sense that in my own heart here. When I look at the cross I'm like those women...I feel sympathy. When I come to the grave and I feel the earthquake and sense the movement of God in a mighty way delivering Christ from death and a descending angel rolling the stone away, I sense the terror and the fear of almighty power. As I become alert and awake and alive to the resurrection, my heart is filled with joy and in coming to see Jesus Christ, you fall at His feet in adoring worship.
The evidence is all there. I mean, it was coming together in their minds, now it was solidified. They were eye witnesses of His resurrection. The empty tomb, that said something. The grave clothes, they said something. The unconscious soldiers, that said something. The testimony of the angels, boy, that was strong evidence. But this was it...they touched Him. This is not a figment of their imagination. This is not an apparition. This is not a spiritual resurrection. They held Him by the feet. It was a real physical bodily literal resurrection.
A lawyer by the name of Sir Edward Clarke said, and I quote, "As a lawyer I have made a prolonged study of the evidences for the events of the first Easter day. To me the evidence is conclusive and over and over again in the high court I have secured the verdict on evidence not so compelling. Inference follows on evidence and a truthful witness is always artless and distains effect. The gospel evidence for the resurrection is of this class and as a lawyer I accept it unreservedly as the testimony of truthful men to facts they were able to substantiate," end quote.
Professor Thomas Arnold who was the author of the famous three volume History of Rome and an appointee to the chair of modern history at Oxford University in England writes this, quote: "The evidence for our Lord's life and death and resurrection may be and often has been shown to be satisfactory. It is good according to the common rules for distinguishing good evidence from bad. Thousands and tens of thousands of persons have gone through it piece by piece as carefully as every judge summing up a most important cause. I have myself done it many times over, not to persuade others but to satisfy myself. I have been used for many years to study the histories of other times and to examine and weigh the evidence of those who have written about them, and I know of no one fact in the history of mankind which is proved by better and fuller evidence than the great sign which God hath given us, that Christ died and rose again from the dead," end quote.
The evidence is there. And it was for the women. The final moment of grasping the living Christ. And in that moment, of course, their worship turned to a new emotion, a new feeling, a new attitude of hope, verse 10, "Then said Jesus unto them, Stop being afraid. Go tell My brethren that they go into Galilee and there shall they see Me." Their hope was so clear now. They would see Him in Galilee for they had seen Him already.
Jesus repeats the same message the angel gave, reminding us again of the source of the angelic message and says, "Go tell My brethren, those who are now My brethren, those who now belong to Me who are in the family...go tell them...tell them that I'll see them in Galilee. We'll have a great convocation and commissioning there."
And so, we come then to the end of Matthew's brief glimpse of the resurrection. It's so simple. It lacks pretension. It doesn't look like the kind of case that someone is working very hard to prove because it's so incredulous. He states it so simply and so artlessly and such common terms are used. It doesn't even try to beg the issue. It states the simple convincing truth. And the women run to tell the rest. And before the days of Christ's earthly journey are over, He will appear to them all, confirming His resurrection. And then select from among them who will write the New Testament which is the record of His resurrection and the meaning of it.
Let me close with that. What does the resurrection mean? Let me suggest several things for you to think about. First of all, it means that the Word of God is true. Jesus said it over and over again, I'll rise...I'll rise...I'll rise...I'll rise in three days. And He did. The record of the Word of God is true. It affirms the truthfulness of Scripture.
Secondly, the resurrection means that Jesus Christ is the Son of God as He claimed to be, that He as God has power over death.
Thirdly, it proves that salvation is complete...that on the cross He conquered sin and death and hell and rose victorious.
Fourthly, the resurrection proves that the church is established. You remember in Matthew 16 He said, "I'll build My church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it?" And the gates of hell is a colloquial expression for death in that culture. He says I'll build My church and death won't stop Me, and it didn't. His resurrection proved that death could not stop Him from building His church.
Fifthly, it also proves that judgment is coming. The judge is alive. And He said He would live in John 5 and He said that God would give Him judgment. And He would have the power to raise the dead and He would judge the dead. Some would enter eternal life and some would enter eternal judgment. The judge is alive, folks, and court will be in session to determine the eternal destiny of every man and woman.
And sixthly, the resurrection of Jesus Christ proves that heaven is waiting. In John 14 He said I'm going to go away, but if I go I will come again and when I go I go to prepare...what?...a place for you because in My Father's house are many rooms. Heaven is waiting and Christ is preparing it for His own.
You see, the resurrection proves all of that. The Word of God is true. Jesus is the Son of God, deity, salvation is complete, the church is established, judgment is coming and heaven is waiting. All of that because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. I trust that you not only believe in the resurrection, but that you have received as your Lord and Savior the one who was raised, the Lord Jesus Christ. Shall we bow in prayer?
God knows every heart here as we wait for just a final moment. He knows your heart. He knows whether you believe in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. In Romans 10 it says if you believe in your heart that God hath raised Him from the dead and confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, you shall be saved for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. Being a Christian is believing in the resurrection of Christ and receiving the resurrected Christ as Lord and Savior. My prayer is that that is your prayer. And if you know Him, thank God again for what He has done for you.
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subset: commoncrawl


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Summary: rnrnrnrnAs our society has advanced, so have offices and business, and we continue to move towards a paperless environment. Information is now stored on a series of networks and servers instead of file cabinets and desks. Paper is quickly becoming a thing of the past, as the go-green movement has ushered in the digital age. The clutter caused by loose paper is no longer an issue for movers, but office moving now involves disconnecting and transporting electronic equipment. This is a specialized service, which requires specialized skills. So how do you move a server?rnrnOffice Moving - Preparing to Move a ServerrnrnThe first thing you'll need to do is notify customers and employees about the move, and how it will affect your networks. When you move your servers, your networks will be down, unless you have temporary servers in place. For those businesses that cannot afford any downtime, have your new servers staged, tested, and ready for when you move in. Otherwise, work with your IT department to create a list of possible occurrences, and have everyone backup their data and hardware as a precautionary measure. You also need to arrange for the necessary utilities to be ready for your arrival at the new location. Make sure that the internet service is turned on, that it has the right cables and connections, and that it can support all of your needs. If you can, test the connections to ensure that your network will start right up once you've installed the servers.rnrnAbout My Keywords Visit Here:-rnhttp://www.buy5th.in/movers-and-packers-bangalore.htmlrnhttp://www.buy5th.in/movers-and-packers-ghaziabad.htmlrnhttp://www.buy5th.in/movers-and-packers-hyderabad.htmlrnrn
Categories: Other Movies
Characters: Beorn
Genres: Angst
Warnings: Character Death
Challenges: None
Open: Closed
Series - O
Other Results: 1 Challenges


text: California Denies Price-Change Request from Dairy Cooperatives December 7, 2012 10:44 AM Tweet California Dairies Inc., Dairy Farmers of America-Western Area Council and Land O'Lakes want the California Class 4b price amended "to give our members the milk price relief they desperately need." © Catherine Merlo TAGS: Marketing, Overseas December 18, 2014 By Catherine Merlo Farm Journal's Milk Western and Online Editor Email New hearing set for Dec. 21 will consider short-term price adjustments to all classes of milk. The California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) has denied a Dec. 3 request from three major California dairy cooperatives seeking a hearing on a controversial change to the state's Class 4b pricing formula. In a Dec. 6 response, Kevin Masuhara, director of CDFA's Division of Marketing Services, said, "The Department denies the petition because the proposed modification does not effectuate the purposes of the Stabilization and Marketing Plans." Californa Dairies Inc., (CDI), Dairy Farmers of America-Western Area Council (DFA) and Land O'Lakes (LOL) had petitioned CDFA for a public hearing to consider modifications to the sliding scale that translates market prices for dry whey into higher monetary contributions to the California Class 4b price. The group had requested that the change remain in place for six months "to give our members the milk price relief they desperately need." Masuhara noted that CDFA had determined that modifying one component of one class of milk – the dry whey factor – "is an inappropriate mechanism to address the financial challenges of California dairy producers for a couple of reasons. "First, it cannot be justified due to a lack of reliable economic data that can be used to calculate this value in relation to the market," he wrote. "Second, there is no inequity embedded within the factor because not all cheese plants transform dry whey into a marketable dry whey product." CDI said it "is very disappointed in the decision by CDFA to deny its petition to consider a temporary change to the Class 4b pricing formula." In a statement to Dairy Today, CDI said, "In the short-term, as petitioned, adjusting the whey factor makes the most sense for California dairy producers. CDI will continue to support efforts and discussions to find long-term solutions that address industry concerns." Combined, CDI, DFA and LOL represent an estimated 80-85% of California's milk production. Processors continue to oppose the 4b change. "When the 4b price increases, our producers who receive premiums see their pay prices decrease as their premiums are redistributed to producers around the state via the pool," says David Ahlem, vice president of procurement and policy for Hilmar Cheese. "Almost all of our producers made less money in 2012 as a result of the last two 4b increases. The co-ops who have not invested in cheese and whey technology are asking us to take the money we pay our dairymen today and send it to producers all around the state." California's dairy pricing issue won't end with CDFA's latest denial. CDFA Secretary Karen Ross has called a Dec. 21 hearing to consider whether market conditions support short-term price adjustments to all five classes of milk. Those are Classes 1, 2, 3, 4a and 4b. The hearing will take place at the CDFA Auditorium in Sacramento. It will begin at 7 a.m. and continue until all testimony has been received. For months, California dairy producer groups have been asking CDFA to amend the state's 4b pricing formula. They contend that California's dairy producers are losing hundreds of millions of dollars each year because the whey factor in the state's milk pricing system is under-valued compared to federal order levels. They want CDFA to replace the 4b formula with one that more closely tracks the market direction of federal orders' Class III whey value. California's 4b price is the minimum price that handlers must pay for cheese and whey production. Handlers are not prevented from paying more for 4b milk nor are co-ops precluded from asking for a higher price. The CDFA Secretary sets minimum prices for the state's five classes of milk. Whey, a byproduct of cheese-making, is included in the state's 4b pricing formula. Back to news


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UPDATE: Since writing this blog post, a newer version of Clooz, version 3.2, has been released that makes some significant improvements over the previous 2.0 version reviewed here. I have not had time to write a full review of the new software, though I have dabbled in it and very much like the improvements. There is a new composite view, which allows the user to see all instances of a person in each document from the People screen. There is also a new template for the 1940 census, and many small bugs have been fixed. Most impressive is the fact that a new owner, Ancestral Systems, LLC, has taken over the product and will now make regular updates to the software. I hope to do a new review soon. In the meantime, please visit the Clooz website for more details and perhaps take a test drive.In the world of genealogy, despite the studying for the CPA exam and this being my busy season at work, I've managed to get quite a bit organized in my RootsMagic database and Clooz program. In fact, I've gotten all my census records from my RootsMagic database into Clooz. Now that I have them all entered into Clooz, I've decided that I'm not really going to use Clooz anymore. Funny, I know.
For those of you who don't know, Clooz is a software program that is supposed to be like an electronic filing cabinet. I think it was invented back in the day when genealogy management programs, like Family Tree Maker, did not really allow for much sourcing. Clooz has official forms to enter data into, such as death records, marriage records, birth records, census records, city directories, etc.
I really like the forms for the census records, but other than that, I'm not as impressed with the forms for other records. For instance, the marriage record does not have a field for witnesses or date of birth. There is a notes field in each record , but jamming everything into the notes is not really ideal.
The beauty of Clooz is that you are supposed to be able to attach a record to all the individuals named in the record, but when trying to do so, it gets kind of awkward. When I attach a person as a witness, the fields for data entry are the same fields as for the bride and groom. Seems like different roles should have different fields. This causes reports on my mom to show her occupation as "fireman" on her birth certificate, but this was actually her father's occupation.
Clooz seems to work better with a paper system of genealogy, allowing you to quickly find where a paper record is located by assigning each record an ID number. Since I am trying to go paperless with my filing system, it makes even less sense for me to continue using Clooz. My paperless filing system involves folders on each surname and within those folders, folders for each couple with that surname. This makes it pretty easy to find any document I may need without having to assign an ID number. My old system of paper filing worked better with Clooz because I filed by record type instead of surnames, which made it harder to quickly locate a document.
The one benefit to Clooz that I may be giving up is the ability to create reports on an individual that show all records/sources on that individual. I think I will miss that option a little. I say "a little" because the reports are not very flexible. I can create my own reports in Excel that I can tailor to my specific needs. In fact, I believe there are already some Excel templates that can be found through Google for the purpose of creating your own reports summarizing sources and info contained in them for an individual. I will also miss the census forms mentioned earlier, but I know there are also Excel templates out there for the same purpose.
Overall, I feel that Clooz no longer meets my needs and lacks flexibility. I would be curious if anyone else currently uses or has ever used Clooz and what your thoughts are on the matter.


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NEW YORK CITY - US stocks moved higher for the second straight week as a solid US jobs report spurred confidence in the economic recovery. Markets closed out a holiday-shortened week on a high after the US Labor Department reported that June jobs growth came in at 195,000, well above the consensus estimate of 166,000 jobs. The jobs report revived talk that the US Federal Reserve would soon taper its $85b per month bond-buying program. The yield on US Treasuries spiked to levels not seen since August 2011.
In recent weeks, the specter of less Fed stimulus and higher bond yields has been a damper on stocks, prompting talk that "good news" like better economic data was in reality "bad news" because it meant less Fed support.
Yet Friday's performance suggested the market's view may be evolving. Analysts cautioned against reading too much into a single day's trade, particularly given that many investors took vacation the day after the Independence Day holiday.
But even as bond yields soared Friday, US stock indices also went higher, suggesting less fear about the Fed taper.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average put on a robust 226.24 (1.52 per cent) for the week, taking the index to 15,135.84.
The broad-based S&P 500 jumped 25.61 (1.59 per cent) to 1,631.89, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index surged 76.13 (2.24 per cent) to 3,479.38.
"What we're seeing here is the stock market separating itself from the risk associated with the bond market and with other investments around the world," said Bud Kasper, financial adviser at Barber Financial Group.
Yet David Levy, portfolio manager at Kenjol Capital Management, said the big question will be whether yields stay in their current range, or continue to rise and drag on both corporate investment and the housing recovery because of higher interest rates.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose Friday to 2.72 per cent, a gain of 9.7 per cent over the week, while the 30-year increased 5.1 per cent to 3.68 per cent.
"It's very hard for the stock market to make meaningful progress higher in a period where rates are moving higher at the pace and magnitude over which they have in the last several weeks," Levy said.
Higher bond yields are not the only cloud on the horizon. Investors are also skittish over the political crisis in Egypt, which has helped propel oil prices higher.
The eurozone's travails also returned to center stage after resignations of a pair of top Portuguese officials revived concerns about the viability of the ruling coalition.
European Central Bank President Mario Draghi Thursday pledged that the ECB would keep interest rates low for "as long as necessary."
Yet analysts noted that the eurozone's problems can also boost US markets, which are seen as comparatively well-positioned.
"Our thesis is that the US is going to lead the rest of the world out of the crisis and we're going to be a very strong player for the next five or six years," said Greg Peterson, director of investment research at Ballentine Partners.
Last week's gains were led by consumer discretionary and technology stocks, both of which are well-positioned for a US economic recovery that prompts more consumer spending.
The utilities sector, which is known for paying a steady dividend, was the only one of the 10 S&P 500 sectors to finish lower. Analysts attributed the decline to the rise in bond yields, which has dulled the appeal of dividend stocks.
Investors next week will study minutes from the Federal Reserve's June policy meeting for clues about the Fed's plans for tapering due Wednesday.
Analysts are also closely watching the unofficial kickoff of corporate earnings season on Monday with Alcoa reporting after the bell closes.
The hope is not only for improved profits, but also higher revenues that would suggest companies are switching from cost-cutting mode to growth mode.


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Rock and Roll Kidz with Wendy Morgan
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Wendy Morgan loves to get kids singing, wiggling, jumping, dancing and just having a great time! Her original songs encourage children to use their imaginations, teach musical basics like melody and rhythm, and show kids how to have fun with words.


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Zechariah, the prophet, next to the last book in the Old Testament, a marvelous, prophetic record: we began to study it last time, and the very fact of your attendance tonight in such large numbers, and those of you who are in the chapel, is evidence that you are anticipating an exciting time as we continue through this tremendous book. It's really an adventure for me, because I am not really that familiar with doing in- depth exposition in the Old Testament, as I am in the New. And so it's a tremendous challenge to me, and what I've noticed about it is that it's so very, very different than the New Testament. The New Testament, so much of it is a logical progression of thought, whereas the Old Testament is just hammering, hammering, hammering on the same truth over and over and over again. You hear it, and then you see it in a symbol, and then it's in a metaphor, and then it's echoed by an angel and then God says it Himself, and it just keeps banging away. And so we're going to bang away through Zechariah on some of the marvelous things that God had in mind.
Now I've entitled the message tonight, "The Divine Plan for Jerusalem." Needless to say, Jerusalem is a fantastic city and has been through the years. I've made a couple of visits to Jerusalem. There's something about it that gives you goose bumps. When you come over the hills from the west, and you finally drop down into the valley, and then you ascend the mountains again, and you see in the horizon the city of Jerusalem, it just is an amazing and thrilling sight. As you stand on the Mount of Olives and you look across the Kidron Valley, and you see the tomb of Absalom below you, and you know that just behind you is Bethany and all of the scenes that are a part of your memory from Scripture, and you look at that city and you can see a wall that is made up of bits and pieces from many walls, because it's been knocked down so many times. There's something exciting and something fantastically thrilling about that city. The fact that it exists, and the fact that it exists in the way it does, speaks to the reality of God and God's unchanging, unending faithfulness. And that's what Zechariah is about, at least in particular the part we're gonna look at.
Now as we began the book last time, we noted that it is written in a crucial time in Israel's history. A remnant of Jews has just been released and returned from the Babylonian captivity. In 586 B.C., Judah, the Southern Kingdom, was taken into captivity and they had been there 70 years when Cyrus made a decree, releasing them and sending them back. This is bout 18 years after that decree was made. They're back in the land. Within seven months we saw that they had built the altar. Just after the beginning of the second year, they had begun to rebuild the walls of the temple and the foundation was laid and the face of the wall was put up. But then because of opposition, they had stopped.
And so they're back in the land, at least a remnant of them, the ones that weren't so embedded in Babylonian society that they couldn't uproot. They're back in the land, they've got an altar which means they've got the sacrifices going, and they're on the way to build the temple, but opposition brings it to a grinding halt.
But God doesn't want it to stop. God wants that temple built, God wants that wall built, God wants that city built, and God wants that whole thing set up the way He prescribed it in the Old Testament, and so He raises a prophet up to stimulate them to finish the job. And the prophet's name is Haggai.
Two months after Haggai comes a man named Zechariah and between the two of them a revival breaks out in Israel and they begin to do what they started to do. They begin to move on rebuilding things. They get some action. They start putting the bricks again on those walls to build the temple. The message of the prophets is clear: there is to be a spiritual revival and there is to be a recommitment to do the work, to rebuild the city.
Now as we come to Zechariah, the revival has already begun, Haggai being the catalyst for it. And Zechariah just wants to encourage the people in the work. And so his is a book of comfort. It's tough for a people who are trying to repatriate a desolated country, especially when they're such a small group. And they realize that all around them are potential enemies who could undue everything they've done, just by deciding to do it. It's a fearful situation. There's a prosperity all over the world that's hard to understand, because why should everybody be prosperous and God's people be in such a state of poverty and desolation and degradation? And so along comes Zechariah and he just again, and again, and again, encourages the people that God is in their midst, that God is at work, that God has a plan, that wonderful things are going to happen, no matter what it looks like. So his message is a message of comfort. God is a God of comfort. The name Zechariah means "God remembers." God remembers His people. God doesn't forget.
Now this is to be a book of comfort but it begins with a very discomforting thought in the first six verses, we saw last week, and that is the fact that God is a God of vengeance, and wrath, and judgment. And the reason that is at the beginning is simply to make sure nobody goes asleep in the concept of comfort and thinks that it doesn't matter what you are or what you do, God's gonna make sure everything's alright. God's just in the business of comforting everybody. No, not at all.
The first six verses show that God comforts the people that turn away from sin. You remember verse 4 said that, verse 3 said it. "Turn to me. Turn from your evil ways and your evil deeds or doings." So that there is a basic prerequisite to receiving God's comforting blessing and that is turning away from evil. It's only the people who repent of sin. It's only the people who turn away from it that receive the wonderful blessing of God.
So having laid down that prerequisite, we begin in verse 7, to hear the catalog of all the marvelous comforting blessing that God has for His people. Now, the prophecy falls into four sections. These aren't important in total, but right now I want to make at least one distinction. The first section is the "Call to Repentance," in the first six verses, 1:1-1:6, a "Call to Repentance." The second section begins in 1:7 and I call it "Comfort through Visions." You have a call to repentance, and then you have comfort through visions. God begins to comfort His people and He does so through a series of visions. The third section begins in chapter 7, and it's called "Counsel Regarding Fasts." "Counsel Regarding Fasts." And the last section, beginning in chapter 9, "Coming Events." So "A Call to Repentance, Comfort though Vision, Counsel Regarding Fasts," and finally "Coming Events." And summing it up, it's this: God has comfort, God has counsel, and God has some fantastic coming events for the people who have heard the call to repentance. That's the gist of the whole book. God's got some marvelous things laid out for people who repent.
And from 1:7 through 6:15, through the 15thverse of the 6thchapter, comes this comfort. And interestingly enough, it is given in a series of eight visions. And this is a mode that was used very frequently with the prophets. Eight visions. Now each of them is distinct, and yet basically they all say the same thing. But they come at it from different angles. In fact, as I looked at them, it's very clear that the first one is almost a summarization of the other seven, and the other seven put out the details. But these eight visions were designed to comfort God's people.
Let's begin at verse 7: "Upon the four and twentieth day," - now that's an important day simply because there have been so many interesting things that have happened on the 24thday. Five months before on the 24thday, work on the temple had begun. Two months before on the 24thday, Haggai received a marvelous revelation, and so there's something about the 24thday that's getting to be pretty hot stuff and about the time the 24thday rolls around, everybody perks up. "So on the 24thday of the 11thmonth, that is Sebat, the Babylonian name for the 11thmonth, in the second year of Darius," the second year of the reign of Darius the Mede who was the ruler of the Medo-Persian empire, the empire that really had the political control of Palestine, and this was the times of the Gentiles, it had already begun. It's still going on today where Gentile power has sway in land originally given to Israel. Even though Israel today controls its own Palestine, and its own city, do you realize that they were given by God everything from the Mediterranean to the Euphrates? And all the way down to the Nile and everything else, and they don't have all of that yet. And so it's still the times of the Gentiles and so their association then as a prophet is in the reign of Darius who was a Gentile king.
And at this time, the 24thday of the 11thmonth, the month Sebat, which is the Babylonian title for the 11thJewish month, in the second year of Darius, came the word of the Lord. And again I remind you that they are not giving opinions, and they are not giving whims, they are declaring the word of the Lord which is spoken to them. "And the word of the Lord came to Zechariah the prophet." You'll see the term "the prophet" at the end of the verse. It really should come after "Zechariah." "Zechariah the prophet who is son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo." And it simply reminds us of what we've already noted about his heredity.
So "on the 24thday of the 2ndyear in the reign of Darius," this helps us pinpoint exactly when this was: they had just been back from captivity, and God speaks through this prophet and to this prophet in a series of marvelous visions. And verse 8 begins, "I saw by night, and behold," - stop right there. In one night he has all eight visions, apparently. We'll see that as we go. And I would remind you that a vision is not the same as s dream. A vision is given when somebody is awake; a dream is given when somebody is asleep.
Now there were many visions in the Old Testament. In fact, the word occurs 86 times in the Old Testament. It occurs 15 times in the New Testament, and I think occurs 22 of those 86 times in the book of Daniel. So Daniel had a lot of visions. But from back in Genesis 15:1, we have visions. And there it says, "After these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision." So God, for a long time, has been communicating His Word through these visions. In Numbers 12:16, back in the Pentateuch, it says "If there is a prophet among you, I, the Lord, make myself known to him in a vision." God, historically from Abram on, has made Himself known to the prophets in a vision.
You say, "Well, what is a vision?" Well, I don't know, specifically; I never had a vision. But basically a vision is an awareness of reality beyond the senses. You might want to call it a sixth sense, only it's more than just a premonition. It is the ability to see beyond the human senses. It is the ability to go beyond what the human senses can perceive. It is extra-physical sight. For example, the prophet will see something that cannot be seen by anyone else. To the naked eye it is totally invisible, but to this additional sense, God makes it revealed and clear.
So he has these eight visions. Now we're gonna look at vision No.1. Vision No.1 encompasses the divine plan for Jerusalem and the scary thing about this is that the subject is so broad that it's hopeless to try to cover it all at one time. So let's just get into the thing and see if we can't figure out the vision and see how far we get. But there's so much in the Bible for the future of Jerusalem, we'll never be able to cover it all; we won't attempt.
Now, Israel had gone into captivity and Jerusalem had been devastated. And the reason Israel had been taken in to captivity is simple: it's a one syllable word, starts with "s" and ends with "n." What is it? Sin. God said to Israel again and again and again, "If you keep sinning, if you keep sinning, if you keep sinning, I must have a holy reaction against it. You're going to pay a high price: captivity." And the major prophet, who constantly preached this message, just before the captivity, was a man name Jeremiah. Jeremiah was the one who proclaimed the coming captivity, over and over and over and over. He told them, "You're gonna have trouble, you're gonna have trouble, you're gonna have trouble. I'm gonna take you out of the land I brought you," in the second chapter He says, "into a fruitful land, into a prosperous land, and you have not turned to me, you have not worshipped me, and you're gonna get out, you're going to be taken out of this land." The whole book of Jeremiah is just loaded with the cataloging of Israel's sins that are leading to the Babylonian captivity. He was the key prophet before the exile.
But Jeremiah, among many of his prophecies, made one that is especially important. And it is in the 29thchapter of Jeremiah. And I want you to look at it with me, in the 10thverse. Jeremiah 29:10, because Jeremiah not only told them they were going to go to captivity, but he told them how long. And I think this is fascinating. Certainly indicates that Jeremiah was speaking divine revelation. He had no idea, humanly speaking, how long they'd be in captivity, but God knew exactly, because when the time was right, God raised up Cyrus, who wasn't even a believer, and God had Cyrus make a decree and the people had the freedom to leave, just at the time God prescribed.
Alright, Jeremiah 29:10, now all the time he's been telling they're going to captivity, but look what he said: "For thus saith the Lord, that after seventy years are accomplished at Babylon, I will visit you and perform my good word toward you in causing you to return even unto this place." Verse 14, "And I will be found by you, saith the Lord, and I will turn away your captivity, and I will gather you from all the nations and from all the places to which I have driven you, saith the Lord, and I will bring you again unto the place from which I caused you to be carried captive."
Now God says "I'm gonna bring you back at the end of 70 years. At the end of that period of time, there'll be a decree that'll send you back to the land. Now that is a prophecy that they heard. It was very, very explicit. Now keep it in mind, because it is the basis of the vision we're gonna see in Zechariah. Jeremiah said "You're going into captivity because God always, always, always, always, puts a price on sin, always. You can be sure your sin will," - what? "Find you out." So, when they were going into captivity, inevitable because of sin, but there is - and this is the beauty of it - there is a tolerance within God's judgment that turns to compassion. See? "God shall not always keep His anger," said Malachi. There is a turning, and God's compassion takes over after His chastening, and He says, "I'll bring you back." And that's the basis of this vision.
Now there are five elements to the vision, we'll notice them as we go. The first one is the picture scene, the picture scene in verse 8. And if there's anything that just comes out of this passage, loud and clear with neon signs, as tall as a ten story building, it is this: God is faithful. Boy when God makes a promise, He keeps it. God made them a promise: "You're going to captivity, but you're going to Babylon for 70 years and at the end of 70 years, you're coming back." And that is exactly when they came back. God kept His promise.
But by this time, they're back, but things aren't going like they thought. And in the midst of this situation, they're sort of sitting saying, "But the city is in desolation and we're in humiliation, and our enemies have stopped our building." And they need some comfort from God.
And so the first vision comes. And let's look at the picture scene in verse 8, "I saw by night, and behold, a man riding on a red horse, and he stood among the myrtle trees that were in the bottom," or better, that were in the hollow or the glen or the ravine even, "and behind him there were red horses, sorrel, and white." Now stop there.
Now, basically, that amazing picture is not really interpreted by the prophet. Apparently it was very obvious to the people what was being said, and as we look at it, we'll see how that becomes obvious as we put the pieces together. Now, Zechariah has what we would call an apocalyptic or prophetic vision. He is in an ecstatic condition. He is in a trance like situation, much like Peter would have been in on the roof of the house in Joppa when God showed him a sheet and all kinds of - a bunch of things like that. It isn't dreaming. It is an ability to see something beyond the human senses. It's a supernatural miracle. And he says, "I saw."
Now, remember when that term is used absolutely in reference to a prophet, it means "I received the revelation," because prophets were called "seers" and when he says "I saw" he means "I was given a revelation from God and the first thing I saw was a man." And that's all it says. His identity is not explained, but immediately we get the feeling that he's a super-human man. Something different about him. In fact, he is an angel in the appearance of a man. And the man that he sees is riding on a red horse. There is justification for translating that, in reference to a horse, as reddish brown, rather than a bright red horse. Such because the very same term is used to describe Esau, who was not bright red. He was just red head, like red heads are, not like a red dress. So it can be used in that sense.
So he sees this horse that is reddish brown, as a horse would be. And a rider on this horse. Now, we have to stop at this point and we get a little idea here of what we're seeing because we know what horses represented in visionary situations in the Old Testament. A horse normally represented war. A horse seemed to be a symbol of war. In Deuteronomy chapter 2 - now you can incidentally find that also in the book of Revelation where horses are representative of war. When Christ comes back at the battle of Armageddon, what is he riding? A horse. In Deuteronomy 32:13, this is also Old Testament, "He made him ride on the high places of the earth, that he might eat the increase of the fields. He made him to suck honey out of the rock and oil out of the flinty rock." And here again you have the idea of God, as it were, at war, and the horse riding across the hills, God carrying out His war-like purposes. And there's a couple of others. I'm just giving hints at them, we won't take too much time, but there are many of them. Another symbol of it you'd find in Psalm 66 and perhaps in Isaiah 58 and so forth. Horses appear as useful in war, and that's precisely what they were used for, and of course, they appear that way symbolically. But the best passage may be, and the closest one, is in Zechariah 9:10, "I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim, and the horse from Jerusalem and the battle bow shall be cut off." And there you have the chariot, the horse and the battle bow all in the same verse, indicating that horses were used in situations of war. The 10thchapter, the 3rdverse, says at the end of the verse, "majestic horse in the battle." Again, assigning the horse the role of war.
So we can see then that a horse basically, in the Old Testament, and you can follow this through right into the New Testament, was a symbol of war. We find it all throughout the Word of God.
And I would add to that that red is also a symbol in the Bible and it's a symbol of blood and judgment and vengeance. Where you have red, for example in Revelation chapter 6, a rider on a red horse, there is war, and there is bloodshed, and there is death, because red speaks of blood and judgment and vengeance. As I recall there is a word in Isaiah 63, I might be wrong, but I think it's Isaiah 63:1, "Who is this that comes from Edom with dyed garments from Bozrah?" This is the day of Messiah coming. "This that is glorious in his apparel, traveling in the greatness of his strength? I that speak in righteousness, mighty to save. Why art thou red in thine apparel, that thy garments like him who treads in the winefat? I have trodden the winepress alone and of the people there was none with me, I will tread them in mine anger and trample them in my fury and their blood shall be sprinkled on my garments. And I will stain all my raiment. For the day of vengeance is in mine heart and the year of my redeemed is come." When the Messiah comes, and that's almost a direct parallel to Revelation 19, when the Messiah comes, His garments are stained red with blood. That's the symbol of war and the symbol of death and vengeance and judgment.
So what we have here then is a war horse, prepared for battle, prepared for judgment, prepared for vengeance. And astride this is a ride. Now we can talk along time about who the rider is. Jewish commentators historically have said it was Michael, but I'm convinced it was other than Michael and we shall see in a moment who it was.
Now I want you to notice where this rider is in verse 8: "He stood among the myrtle trees," that were in the glen or the hollow. Now, if you've ever been to Israel, or if you've ever read or studied anything about Israel, you know that the myrtle is very common. It's not really a tree at all; it's a bush. And it grows everywhere. It's all over the place. It's just everywhere, very, very common. Not always beautiful but if it's growing along a stream or if it's growing in a hollow or a glen, which would be a low place where there would be much shade and perhaps much water, along a stream you find that these shrubs can grow to the height of eight feet, and they can have very glossy, shiny green leaves and be very lovely. In fact, the ones that really flourish develop a star shaped white flower and they're very beautiful. And when you bruise one of the leaves of a myrtle that is flourishing like that, it gives off its fragrance. But its fragrance is only given off when it is bruised.
And so all of the sudden we see here a whole lot of myrtles everywhere. They are common to the land of Israel; they are flourishing in this place. Incidentally, the word "myrtle" in Hebrew is "hedasa" and a synonym for it is Ester. The name Ester is actually hedasain the Hebrew, which means myrtle. So that's a name, a beautiful name, to a Jew who would see something very lovely in a myrtle bush. In fact, it's interesting in Isaiah 41 - I don't want to get all into horticulture here, but this is kind of interesting - but in Isaiah 41, Isaiah 41:19 and Isaiah 55:13, it says that when the millennium comes, there will be tremendous flourishing of the myrtle. So God even likes it. There's gonna be plenty of it. God liked it enough to put it in Israel once and he likes it enough to fill up the millennium with them.
Now myrtle branches also were gathered with palm branches and willow twigs at the Feast of Tabernacles, and myrtle branches were used to make the booths in which the children of Israel celebrated the wanderings in the wilderness.
Now, here he is, this rider, riding a war horse and in a bunch of myrtle bushes. Now you say, "Now what does it mean when it says they're in the bottom or in the glen or in the hollow or in the ravine?" Well, this is identified most frequently with a low place. That's obviously what it means. And the low place outside of the city of Jerusalem is the Kidron Valley. If you look directly east from say the - or let's say you're on the Mount of Olives to the east of the city. Between you and the Mosque of Omar and the Dome of the Rock, there is a valley, just goes down and up. There's no passage there, it's just a valley. That is the Kidron Valley, and as the Kidron Valley proceeds to the south, it makes a bend around Mount Zion, and connects up with another valley, known as the Valley of Henum. And where the Valley of Henum and the Valley of Kidron meet, there is the lowest place outside the city of Jerusalem. It was called "The Hollow" and the spot had always been a garden. In fact, in 2 Kings 24 it says "The King's garden was in the hollow, or the ravine where Kidron and Henum met." And most likely, that's what you have here. In a low place outside the city sits a red horse with a rider on top, amidst some flourishing myrtles, that would flourish in the shade and the water that would run in that area.
Now that isn't all. Further - the rate we're going we're just going to tell you what this is and you'll have to come back next week to find out what it means - verse 8: "And behind him there were red horses, sorrel and white." You have more riders. All of the sudden you don't just have one rider, you've got more. And notice there are red and white and sorrel. You know what a sorrel is? It's a mixture of what? Red and white. So you've got the red horse, the white horse, and the combination.
Now is there any significance to the colors? In visions, no question about it. Red means what? Blood, judgment and vengeance. What does white mean? What is a white horse a sign of? Victory, triumph. When a Roman conquer conquered a city, he rode back into his own city riding a white horse, the sign of victory. When Christ comes, He comes on a white horse.
So what you have there is war that is going to end up in victory, and the mixture on some of the horses. So the scene is a scene of preparedness for war. It's going to be bloody but it's going to be victorious.
Now you say "Who are all these riders?" Well, it's clear. Who historically have been the agents of God's judgment? Who have they been? Angels.....angels. This is the God Squad. The angelic squadron, folks, and they are led by a confident leader on a red horse. The horses speak of battle and speed and swiftness and readiness to hasten to God's command. There are messengers of vengeance and messengers of victory, and the commanding angel is the rider on the red horse.
You say "But who is he?" Look at verse 11. Zechariah 1:11, "And they answered the angel of the Lord that stood among the myrtle trees." Who's the angel of the Lord? Christ. Now do you know who the rider on the red horse is? It's the Lord Jesus Christ, the angel of the Lord. He's the commander in chief of the God Squad, about to embark upon the battle.
You say "But what are the myrtles?" Well, listen. Because of the lowliness, because of the commonness, because of the simplicity, because of the beauty, and because of the fragrance when bruised, the only possibility for the myrtle is that the myrtle represents Israel. The commons, they're everywhere in the land, the people of God.
And what is the hollow? What is the deep place, the glen? That speaks of the suffering and the lowliness and the degradation and the baseness of their present condition. All the little lovely myrtles are sitting in the valley. They're looking up at their city and wondering if they'll ever rebuild it. And all of the sudden, standing in the midst, is the angelic army, led by the commander in chief, ready for battle. It's gonna be bloody, but it's gonna be victorious. Now that's an exciting scene isn't it? And you can hear all the Jews who were listening to Zechariah's sermon going, "Did you hear that? See? It's coming."
Tremendous vision. They are the covenant people. They are the eternally elect nation. They are loved by the Lord and they are the object of His unchanging purpose and the gifts and callings of God, Romans 11:29, are without what? Repentance. And God says "You may have been in captivity for 70 years and you may be in humiliation and degradation now and you may have a broken down wall and a broken down temple and a devastated land and you may be in the hollow, and you may be down here in the valley, but listen. There is a group of armed super-human personalities gathering to fight your war. Be encouraged."
Boy that is encouraging. The angel of the Lord, none other than Jesus Christ, no other than God Himself, the second person of the Trinity, taking on an angelic form. You say, "How do you know that?" Well, let me show you something. Genesis 16, just quickly. We're not even going to get past this verse.
You know, that's of the Lord, the Lord is gracious. Because if I had finished this, I'd have to spend all week doing another message, and I have to speak so many times this week, so many places, I was praying most of today, "Lord how am I ever going to get my work done next week?" Now I just don't have any work to do. This is terrific.
Genesis chapter 16, verse 13, well, we gotta back up. Verse 7, "And the angel of the Lord found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness." Angel of the Lord. Verse 9, "And the angel of the Lord said to her." Verse 10, "And the angel of the Lord said to her." Verse 11, "And the angel of the Lord said to her." Now we know here the angel of the Lord is identified, but who is he? Finally she says something, verse 13, "And she called the name of the Lord who spoke unto her, thou..." What? "God. Thou God." Who is the angel of the Lord? God. God manifest, and who is God manifest? God the Son, second person of the Trinity.
Look at Exodus chapter 3, verse 2, "And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire in the midst of a bush." Now you know where you are, don't you? Moses and the burning bush. "The bush burned with fire but it wasn't consumed and Moses said 'I will now turn aside and see this great sight why the bush is not burnt.' And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see" - listen - "God called to him out of the midst of the bush." What is amazing is verse 2 says "The angel of the Lord appeared in the bush" and in verse 4 it says "And God called to him out of the bush." The angel of the Lord and God are the same.
God manifest, the angel of the Lord. And if you were to look at Zechariah chapter 3, verse 1, "He showed me Joshua, the high priest, standing before the angel of the Lord." Now watch, "And the Lord said to Satan 'The Lord rebuke you, Satan.'" Isn't that interesting? The angel of the Lord says, and the angel of the Lord is God, now watch this one, the angel of the Lord, who is God, says, "Lord rebuke you." Here is the Lord asking the Lord. See the angel of the Lord is one person of the Trinity, unique and yet the same. Marvelous. This is God, the second person of the Trinity, in the form of an angel, riding a horse.
Now I just want to take it a step further. Do you know who the angel of the Lord in terms of his responsibility to Israel? Psalm 34:7, don't look at it, just listen. Psalm 34:7 says this: "The angel of the Lord encamps round about them that fear Him." The angel of the Lord was No.1, the protector and deliverer of Israel. He was the commander in chief of the angelic force, and He is the protector of Israel.
Second, this is beautiful. He is the interceder for Israel, the interceder for Israel. You see that in chapter 1 as we'll see, and in chapter 3.
Thirdly, He is the comforter of Israel. Genesis chapter 16, you see three distinct ministries of the angel of the Lord, protector and deliverer, interceder or advocate, and comforter or counselor. That's who He is.
So here's the scene: a group of people in a state of humiliation, about to be delivered by their glorious protector, defender, interceder, comforter. He stands ready to fight for them. What a scene. The Lord is in the midst of His people, ready to defend, ready to protect, ready to advocate their cause, ready to comfort them in their time of need. He's outside the city, ready to judge the nations and put Israel back in the right place, the place that God intended all along. He's gonna fulfill God's promise. Jeremiah said, "God will bring you back in 70 years and God will give you back the land and God will rebuild the land." And this angel, this angel of the Lord, was there ready to guarantee the promise of God. Boy that's a beautiful scene.
And you know what's wonderful about it? We'll close with this. It's a beautiful parallel to the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ to His church, isn't it? Here we are, and for this time, we suffer, yea all that live Godly in this present age shall, what? Suffer persecution. Who's running the world? Satan. Satan is the prince of this world. We're not in control. We're subjected to a satanic system, and we're, as it were, in the hollow. We're in the glen, in the deep place, in the ravine. We're like Israel. We're all gathered around and huddled in the deep place and saying "How long oh Lord?" like the people in the book of Revelation crying out under the altar, "How long oh Lord?" until things are made right. And yet there in the midst of us is not only the angelic host, but a great leader, the Lord Jesus Christ, who is our defender, who is our protector, who is our advocate, who takes our case to the Father, who is our High Priest, and who is our comforter. And who comforts us in the fact that someday He will come and reign as King of Kings and what? And Lord of Lords.
Listen. God is a faithful God. If God says to His people Israel, "I'll keep my promise," then He sets the great defender in motion with the angelic host to keep Him. If God says to the church, "I will keep my promise," He sets the Lord Jesus Christ to the task of keeping that promise. I don't know how it would be to live in this world apart from God. But I know it would be terribly hopeless to feel that life was unfulfilling, that hope was really hopeless, and have no promise of anybody who is standing ready to take up your cause.
Do you know what happened in the story in Zechariah? Four years later, the temple was built. 80 years later, the walls were finished. Israel was back. God kept His promise beyond that? The fullness of that prophecy is still yet to be fulfilled. When God starts to gather His people from all over the globe and bring them back for the kingdom. But you know what's exciting to me? That four years later the temple was built. Those angels did the job, and the myrtle trees got out of the valley and up on the mount. And in the future, God is going to restore Israel, and you and I are alive in a day when we can begin to see it rumble, huh? Back in the land, 1948, and that's the first time in a long time. And they're holding onto that land, and God is beginning to work a work, a wondrous work, to prepare for the re-gathering in the Kingdom. God is a faithful God.
Beloved, that's the kind of God I want to put my life into His hands, don't you? That's the kind of God I can trust with my life. God saves sinners, _____ said. God takes them to be with Him, that's His promise. Paul says "Put on the helmet of the hope of salvation." God is faithful. He's faithful to Israel in the past. He'll be faithful to Israel in the future. He's faithful to the church now, and he'll be faithful to you as you commit your life to Him. We have a faithful God. He wants to fight your battles. He wants to fight your wars. He wants to win your victories. And He just wants you to tag along and praise Him for what He's doing. That's your high joy and great privilege.
Let's pray. Father we just barely got started, and there's so much, so much to say. And probably we didn't say it very well, even what we did say. But I'll tell you one thing, Father, the thing that makes me trust you for my life and the future is because I've seen how you've fulfilled the trust of everyone who trusted you in the past. It seems to me such a shocking thing to realize the angel of the Lord stood ready to defend your people Israel, so does the Lord Jesus Christ, that very angel, stand ready to defend me, even to the place where who shall lay any charge to God's elect? It is God that justifies, the interceding High Priest who doesn't let one charge be laid against me, who defends me against every accusation, who protects me against the onslaughts of Satan, who will ultimately win the victory and give to me the eternal reward. What a tremendous truth. God thank you for being faithful, thank you for being a covenant keeping God, thank you for giving me that rider on the red horse, the Lord Jesus Christ to be my defender.
Now I would pray tonight that if there is anyone in our congregation who has no such defender, no such advocate interceding, no such comforter, that before they pillow their head in sleep tonight, they might be brought to a place of conviction, a place of trust, receiving the Lord Jesus Christ. We will praise you in Christ's name, Amen.
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United Nations Reform: U.S. Policy and International Perspectives
Description: This report focuses on U.N. reform efforts and priorities from the perspective of several key actors, including the U.S. government, the U.N. Secretary-General, selected member states, and a cross-section of groups tasked with addressing U.N. reform. It also examines congressional actions related to U.N. reform, as well as future policy considerations.
Date: December 21, 2011
Creator: Blanchfield, Luisa
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Executing Scripts Before and After the Snapshot Is Applied
You can specify scripts to execute at the Subscriber before or after the snapshot is applied. Scripts can be used for a variety of reasons, such as creating logins and schemas (object owners) at each Subscriber.
You specify a file location for each script, and the Snapshot Agent copies the script files to the current snapshot folder each time snapshot processing occurs. The Distribution Agent or the Merge Agent runs the pre-snapshot script before any of the replicated object scripts when applying a snapshot. The Distribution Agent or the Merge Agent runs the post-snapshot script after all the other replicated object scripts and data have been applied. After the snapshot application is complete and script files run successfully, the script files are removed from the working directory on the Subscriber.
The script is run by launching the sqlcmd utility. Before deploying a script, run it with sqlcmd to ensure it executes as expected. The contents of scripts that are executed before and after the snapshot is applied must be repeatable. For example, if you create a table in the script, you should first check for its existence and take appropriate action if it exists. The script must be repeatable because if you need to reinitialize a subscription for which the script has already been applied, the script will be applied again when the new snapshot is applied during reinitialization.
If you are compressing the snapshot file (by putting it in Microsoft CAB file format), the scripts are also compressed and placed in the CAB file. After the compressed snapshot file is transferred to the Subscriber and decompressed to a working directory on the Subscriber, any script indicated as a pre-snapshot script is executed. Likewise, any post-snapshot script is decompressed and executed at the Subscriber as the last step in applying the snapshot.
You can execute scripts when applying the snapshot to Subscribers running Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 if you use push subscriptions and the Distributor is running SQL Server 2000 or later. You cannot execute scripts when applying the snapshot to Subscribers running SQL Server 7.0 if you use pull subscriptions.
To execute scripts before and after the snapshot is applied
SQL Server Management Studio: How to: Execute Scripts Before and After a Snapshot is Applied (SQL Server Management Studio)
Replication Transact-SQL programming: How to: Configure Snapshot Properties (Replication Transact-SQL Programming)
See Also