Through Closed Doors

Sermon given at Beecher Island Sunday School

by Pastor Hunter Irvine

5/6/18

Luke 24: 36-43

= Luke 24:36-43 read by Garrett

+ Open in prayer.

+ Following the sudden disappearance of Jesus in Emmaus, He suddenly appears to the apostles and other disciples in Jerusalem.

John 20:19 records this same event, showing the doors were locked!

That is why the disciples thought Jesus was a ghost!

The apostles were “frightened!”

Jesus was not a ghost.

Jesus then invites them to touch Him!

And Jesus even eats some broiled fish!

Yet the nature of Jesus was different.  He went through closed doors.

~ The main point of this passage is Jesus was resurrected both spiritually and physically!

+ The message for us is Jesus was resurrected both spiritually and physically!

When Lazarus was raised from the dead, he came out of the tomb looking a little like a mummy.

Jesus was not a mummy.

The grave clothes of Jesus were left in the tomb.  Peter and John saw those linen clothes.

   * Either Jesus took His grave clothes off, or He went through His grave clothes.

Basic Christianity by John Stott is a classic book.  John Stott explains the original Greek text indicates the linen clothes fell off of Jesus as if the body disappeared.  (Keep in mind 75 pounds of spices were in the strips of linen.)  One key was the head cloth being separate from the other linens.

= John Stott states:

“A glance at these grave clothes proved the reality, and indicated the nature, of the resurrection.  They had been neither touched nor folded nor manipulated by any human being.  They were like a discarded chrysalis from which the butterfly has emerged” (Stott 53-54).

= John Stott continues:

“What then should we have seen, had we been there [in the tomb]?  We should suddenly have noticed that the body had disappeared.  It would have ‘vaporized,’ being transmuted into something new and different and wonderful.  It would have passed through the grave clothes, as it was later to pass through closed doors…” (Stott 53).

After the resurrection of Jesus, He was even able to go through closed doors.  His resurrection has a supernatural element to it.

All of this talk of ghosts and mummies leads to the question: Why does God allow death in the first place?

Romans 6:23   For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Jesus Christ died on a cross for the forgiveness of sins of anyone. He was the substitute for the consequence of sins, which is spiritual death.  Yet then He was resurrected!  If you believe in Jesus, you will have everlasting life with Him in heaven!

+   Invitation!   You can believe in Jesus this very day!

Scripture Love Blog

Night Hike

Sermon offered at Beecher Island Sunday School

by Hunter Irvine
4/29/18
Luke 24: 13-35

= Luke 24:13-35 reading by Dax

+ Open in prayer.

+   Distraught - these two disciples walked from Jerusalem to Emmaus, and they were distraught because of the death of Jesus, which is shown when they start talking with Jesus.  They both quit walking as if energy was taken from them, and their faces were “downcast.”

   Neither seemed to know Jesus is the Christ.  Instead they called Him a prophet.  However, they had hoped He was the one who would “redeem” Israel.  What they needed to learn is only the Christ can truly redeem Israel, and only the Christ can truly redeem the souls of people.  Jesus does explain this to them, as we talked about in Sunday school.  And I think their misunderstanding is the reason Jesus waited to reveal Himself to them.

Excited!!  When they finally recognize Jesus, they became excited.
   How do we know?  They walked seven more miles in the dark!

First, they had just walked seven miles.  Yet they turned around and walked seven more.

Second, apparently they did not eat dinner.  Jesus revealed Himself to them at the start of the meal.  They must have been hungry after hiking seven miles, even if they were snacking on fig cakes, yet they did not eat dinner.

Third, and most important, it was dark!
When they reached Emmaus earlier, it was “nearly evening.”  Thus their return was at night.  They could not wait for morning; they started walking “at once.”
  Night was never a safe time to travel back then.  Roads in the Roman Empire were under more protection, yet there was still always a risk.  The two disciples were so excited, they returned immediately.

~   The main point of these verses is the two disciples were determined to tell disciples in Jerusalem that Jesus was alive!

+   The personal message for us is we should be determined to tell people: Jesus is alive!

   The two disciples took a risk.  Honestly, that is what I would expect from two people who truly saw Him risen from the dead.
   And since we know Jesus is alive, and since Jesus is our Redeemer, we should be willing to take a risk to tell people of the love of Christ.

   For one school year in 2014 to 2015, I did college ministry work for Awaken Fellowship, a special interdenominational Christian ministry at Ithaca College, in Ithaca, N.Y.  It was hard for me since it was a raise your own support position, yet I do not like asking people for money, so I almost starved.  Plus I was homesick, even though I am an old guy.  Yet I loved those students with all my heart!
And a blessing, and the reason I was able to do that ministry work for one year, was that I was living in the home of my good friend Walt, who has been a friend ever since we studied together at Virginia Tech.  And I became friends with his wife and his cool daughter.
However, I had another challenge only five days after arriving in Ithaca: my car was pronounced dead by a mechanic.  So there I was without a car.
   Our group had our big worship and fellowship time every Friday evening.  When the weather was cold, the kind wife of my friend would drive me to the college.  And someone would always drive me home.
   Yet when the weather was fine, I would walk from my friend’s home where I was staying.  It was at least a forty minute walk through remote woods between his house and the college.  I like walking, so often the walk was truly enjoyable for me.
   The scenic walk was always in the afternoon, until one spring day.  I attended a special ministry event, of which none of the students who usually gave me a ride home were attending.  I had to walk home at night.  Frankly, it was a bit spooky walking through those isolated woods in the dark.  And there had been flooding because of melting snow.  Several times my feet sunk into cold water.  I was so glad to get home that night.  As spooky as that night was, even if I had to do that night over again, I would, because I love those students.
   It was worth the risk!

   Hopefully none of us will have to take any future risky night hikes.  Yet Jesus wants us to be willing to tell people He is alive!
   Risks may be more subtle in this day and age, but the risks are mounting here in the U.S. as the culture is more hostile to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

   We should not be careless; that is not smart.  And the truth always needs to be told in love.  Yet being obedient to Jesus involves risks, even to the point of risking losing a job or a friend.  May we rely on Jesus to take the risk to tell people He is alive!

   Jesus was dead.  Jesus Christ died on a cross for the forgiveness of sins of anyone. He was the substitute for the consequence of sins, which is spiritual death.  Then he was resurrected!  These two guys who had walked to Emmaus saw Him!
If you believe in Jesus, you will have everlasting life with Him in heaven!

+   Invitation!

Ossuaries in Denver

   As I stood Monday looking intently at a parchment or possibly papyrus fragment containing writing from the book of Isaiah, which is part of the Dead Sea Scrolls Exhibition in Denver, a young lady around twelve years old made a keen observation to me: “The writing is so small.”
   I had just met the intelligent young lady a few minutes earlier since we were next to each other in the line circling the structure where ten Dead Sea Scrolls fragments can be viewed from only a few inches away.  Her astute observation caused us to discuss a possible reason why they wrote in such small letters.  We considered that since writing material was so rare there in Judea thousands of years ago that tiny writing may have been a way of conserving parchment or papyri.  (According to the exhibition guide: "Most are on parchment, with some on papyrus.")  We both liked this hypothesis.  I was impressed with the interest and thought given by the girl.
   This all took place at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science here in Colorado, where there is the visiting display of the Dead Sea Scrolls Exhibition, an extraordinary museum exhibit.  Though I think a few facts presented were wrong, overall the exhibit is extremely professional, it contains artifacts which have never been seen before, and it contains other artifacts which I have never viewed in my life, several of which I was honored to see.  The total is over 600.
   To see fragments over 2,000 years old with the writings of Old Testament Scripture from the books of Isaiah and Palms is something I will always cherish.  Yet there was a surprise highlight for me.  Among the many ancient artifacts included, they have about six ossuaries from two thousand years ago!  Incredible.
   Ossuaries, which have the slang term “bone boxes,” are containers in which Jewish people put the bones of people who were deceased, the final stage of a process called “secondary burial.”  First learning of this subject from an article by Steven Fine from the September/October 2001 issue of Biblical Archaeology Review, I learned the practice took place in Judea from around 20 B.C. to 70 A.D.
   The body of a deceased person was placed in a cave or a tomb cut into a limestone cliff, and stones were put in front of the openings so wild animals would not get in.  Bodies in those tombs would decompose.  Around a year later someone would return to get the bones.  Many bones were piled up with a bunch of other bones in a cavern or tomb.  But for wealthy families, the bones were put in an ossuary.  An ossuary was made out of limestone, and sometimes that limestone box was plain, sometimes it had a design on it, and sometimes it had a name carved into it.  Then the ossuaries were often put in a cavern or a hole.  Over one thousand ossuaries have been discovered.
   In a sermon I gave years ago, I proposed secondary burial resulted from the view by Jewish people that bones were crucial for resurrection based on the vision of resurrected bones in Ezekiel 37.  This vision is a metaphor from God that the people of Israel would be “resurrected” from their doom of being conquered by Babylon.  Yet I think people started advocating bones were key in resurrection, thus the practice of secondary burial developed.
   I have wanted to see an ossuary in person for seventeen years!  In the Dead Sea Scrolls Exhibit, in the same room as the ten fragments, the ossuaries are quite hidden from view from most places in the large room unless you are near the spot, with the exception of one petite ossuary which is in clear view.  Thrilled even to see that, I still did not know of the treasure sitting to my right.  Upon finally seeing the collection of ossuaries, I was in awe.  I wanted to tell everyone in the room ossuaries were there.  I had seen pictures, and I had told others about them in two sermons, yet now I was seeing them with my own eyes in person.  Incredible.
   Secondary burial history gives great insight into context surrounding the burial and resurrection of Jesus.  The practice of secondary burial is the reason Jesus was put in a tomb in which there normally would have been access.  But when Christ was dead, there was not easy access to His tomb since it was “sealed” and Roman guards were posted as stated in Matthew 27:65-66.  Yet Roman fortification did not stop Jesus from leaving, and it did not stop the angel from rolling away the stone as revealed in Matthew 28:2-4, thus there was once again easy access to the tomb.
   And secondary burial is why the women were going to the tomb to put spices on the body early in the morning of the first day of the week.  Yet they did not find the deceased body of Jesus.  In fact, shortly thereafter they saw Jesus alive!  I think Mary Magdalene separated from the other women who saw Jesus as recorded in Matthew 28:8-10, yet of course Mary Magdalene saw Jesus as recorded in John 20:10-18.  He is risen!
Hunter Irvine

Where is Home?

Sermon given at Beecher Island Sunday School

by Hunter Irvine

3/25/18

Luke 23:35-43

+ Open in prayer.

= Luke 23:35-43 reading by Rachel

Being insulted!    As Jesus is suffering on the cross, He is getting insulted by many people.  They are being sarcastic about Him being the Christ.  They do not think He is, or they refuse to consider that He is the Christ.

   The “rulers” are insulting Him, which included priests and teachers of the law.  Roman soldiers are mocking Him.  And a “criminal” is insulting Him.  Other “gospels” show the crime committed by the two criminals was robbery, and at one point, both men were insulting Jesus.  Yet then one of them had a change of heart, which I will get to in a bit.

Christ is the Anointed One!    Christ is from the Greek language, the same word as Messiah which is from the Hebrew, and both mean Anointed One.  So what does being the Anointed One entail?

Christ is the High Priest and King of Kings!!

Who were anointed under the Mosaic Law?  Priests and kings!

As we discussed in Sunday School, priests were anointed with the special “sacred” oil mandated in Exodus 30:22-33, which had an olive oil base with perfumes and such.  And kings were anointed with olive oil.

Being the Anointed One, Jesus is the High Priest of Heaven, and He is the King of Kings.  He is anointed with the Holy Spirit!

As High Priest, Jesus sacrificed Himself.  He was the Lamb of God, dying in our place.  The book of Hebrews explains how Jesus as the High Priest was the One offering the sacrifice, and the Sacrifice, being the Lamb of God.

   Many missed this fact about the Christ.  They expected the Messiah to establish His kingdom at that time in Israel by overthrowing the Roman Empire.  They did not understand the role of the Messiah as High Priest there on the cross, physically and spiritually dying in the place of people.

As King - The sign in four languages!  Above Jesus was a sign.  Luke states it said, “THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS”

   But Matthew, Mark, and John all state what was put on the sign a little differently, though all have "King of the Jews" as part of the phrase.

   If the Bible is accurate, how can all four of the “gospel” writers record something different?  This was a question which bothered me when I studied the issue when living in Grand Junction, Colorado, and it was an issue I handed over to the Lord in trust.  Several years later He answered my question from a chapter in a book I read in a Christian bookstore here in Lakewood, Colorado.

   John 19 gives the answer, since it states the sign was written in Aramaic, Latin, and Greek.  Thus the person who wrote the phrases on the sign surely wrote each phrase a bit differently when writing in the three different languages.  And Mark just wrote an abbreviated part of one of the phrases.  So there is no contradiction!

Change of heart:  The other gospels show both criminals were robbers, and they show that at one point, both criminals were hurling insults at Jesus.  Yet then the one criminal has a change of heart and indirectly asks Jesus for mercy.

~ The main point of this passage is that Jesus offers paradise to the one criminal.

+ The message for us is Jesus offers paradise to us.

None of us are criminals.  But we all have sinned, and we all need forgiveness.  And Jesus offers forgiveness!

+   Here I am today in the great eastern plains of Colorado.  My grandma was born on a homestead outside of Prospect Valley, and she attended Keenesburg High School.

Jumping ahead, after my grandpa died, Grandma soon moved into Windsor Gardens Retirement Community.  She never had a driver’s license, and she became a “shut-in.”  I would take her out on drives, and I would take her out to eat.  This was always her best day of the week.

And Grandma liked football.  We watched much college football, and we watched the Super Bowl together for a number of years.

I rarely watch pro-football, but I consider Super Bowl Sunday to be like an American holiday.  I have only missed a few Super Bowls ever since Super Bowl 11.

One of the few I missed was in 2003.  I was not into the game that year.

When I proposed going out to dinner that night instead, Grandma reluctantly agreed to skip it, but I think she would have rather watched the game.

We drove around the beautiful country that afternoon.  Then that late afternoon we ate a nice dinner in Bennett.

Driving back to Denver, there were few cars on I 70, and it was a reminder we were missing the Super Bowl.  Unusual for me, I felt loneliness, right there driving down the highway.  Yet I considered how the fulfillment found in this world is temporary.  I considered what seems so glamorous and exciting in this world will one day end.

As I continued driving, there was a magnificent orange sunset in the west.  It was a reminder to me that God offers heaven.  It is everlasting!  Heaven is fulfilling and is better than I can even start to imagine.

I know this from Biblical revelations, including this promise recorded in Luke by Jesus on the cross of true paradise.

Jesus Christ died on a cross for the forgiveness of sins of anyone.  He was the atoning sacrifice for the wages of sins.  As High Priest, He sacrificed Himself.  Then He was resurrected.  If you believe in Jesus as your Savior and Lord, you will have everlasting life in paradise with Jesus!  Jesus truly loves you.

Scripture Love Blog

Billy Graham

   Standing in a thrift store in my hometown of Annandale, Virginia, looking at books on a shelf, I saw a paperback written in 1961 entitled Billy Graham: The Man Who Walks With God, by Glenn Daniels.  I had only been a Christian a few years yet I had become a student of the Bible.  Yet I had only read three Christian books to that date, and I decided that since I was now a Christian I had better learn something about the man who was the most well known Christian in my country.  I then read that influential book on subway rides to work.

   Soon after I attended the memorial service for a woman in our church named Dula.  She had a physical challenge which had inhibited her physically in many ways and which was the cause of her physical death at a rather young age.  Yet her focus was not on her physical challenges, and she was a kind and caring woman.  I really liked her.

   I learned at the memorial service that Dula had come to believe in Jesus after hearing Billy Graham preach at a stadium.  I was grateful for his ministry which had resulted in her life being changed!

   Then in Virginia a few years before my call into ministry work, there was a blessed evening when I sat with my dad in his living room watching Billy Graham preach with such conviction.  It was beautiful father and son time.

   Years later I would learn that my friend, Dr. David Beckman, was a freshman at Wheaton College the same time Billy Graham was a senior there, and they were friends.  During a challenging time in my life, I read the autobiography by Billy Graham, Just As I Am, which was a tremendous encouragement to me and an influence on me.  His honesty in that book was fantastic, and he showed times of struggling in his life, during which he turned to God with a sincere desire to trust Him.  Blessings resulted.

   Billy Graham had guts for God.  Willing to rely on the Holy Spirit, he preached with conviction, never neglecting the topic of sin.  Yet the aim of his sermons was the love of God and the opportunity to turn to Jesus for salvation.

   Billy Graham loves Jesus, and the result was the saving of many.  Billy Graham was an evangelist, an evangelist who desired to preach Christ in whatever country he could.  What an incredible journey with Jesus he traversed in this world.  He is now home.  And I say, “Thank you Billy.”

   This past Sunday, I was honored to preach at my church.  On the pulpit at my church are the words, “We preach Christ crucified, and risen.”  At the core, this is what Billy Graham preached.  And he preached that all people have a decision to make of whether to receive Christ or not.

   If you are not in a personal relationship with Jesus, you can know Him as your Savior and Lord even today.  Jesus Christ died on a cross for the forgiveness of sins of anyone.  Jesus was the atonement for the consequence of sins, which is spiritual death.  If you believe in Jesus, you will have eternal life in heaven with the Holy God.

Hunter Irvine

A student of Scripture

   When I studied at Virginia Tech, I took several law classes with a distinguished professor in the Political Science department, Dr. J.W. Tubbs.  He had been a successful lawyer, yet then moved into teaching due to a muscle disease.  That move was into a profession which was also a calling.  The muscle disease once caused him to be bed ridden for an entire year.  His saintly wife cared for him.  During that year he read every Supreme Court decision ever decided.  Incredible.

   In the second constitutional law class I studied under him, during the fall of 1987, we started the semester with his instruction on how to do a detailed examination of a Supreme Court case.  This is what he taught:  First, get the facts.  Second, get the decision.  Third, get the reasoning supporting the decision, and even the reasoning of the Justices who dissented with the decision.  Fourth, get the precedent.  For that quarter, I enthusiastically applied that methodology to successfully studying Supreme Court decisions.

   Several years later, less than a year after graduating from Virginia Tech, I turned to Jesus.  Then I started reading the Bible.  As a young adult, I knew less about the Bible than most of the people in my church.  Yet as a Virginia Tech grad, I employed, and still employ, lessons I learned in Dr. Tubbs’ class.

First, I get the facts.

Second, I get the message.

Third, I get supporting Scripture and reasoning supporting the message.

Fourth, I get an application.

   I steadily started learning more and more about the Bible.  And that continues here twenty-seven years later, and with further principles for gaining messages.

   Studying the Bible involves a rich dynamic, yet the bottom line is I want to gain messages God has in His revelations for us.  The point of that large book is to learn from God so we can gain messages for our lives, starting with salvation, and the lives of others.  So what we need first and foremost is content!

   The Bible is an ancient text containing sixty-six books which were written over a period of over 1500 years, which had numerous authors, and which were written in different literary styles.  The entrenched disagreement concerning certain Biblical messages between various Christian communities shows that Biblical interpretation is challenging.  Yet for me, learning from God’s revelations are of upmost importance.  After reading a number of Christian books in my early Christian days, I developed further principles, praise be to God.

   Four critical principles for Biblical interpretation are:

First, be willing to be guided by the Holy Spirit.  He is the One who inspired the Biblical writing.

Second, to get the message, take a verse in the context of the passage, a passage in the context of the chapter, a chapter in the context of the book, and a book in the context of the entire Bible.  More simply put by many, interpret Scripture with Scripture.

Third, gaining context may include learning some historical information.

Fourth, gain the message, not getting derailed by semantics.

   Regarding the fourth point, messages can be missed if you are caught up in some practice such as diagramming sentences like I had to do in the 8th grade.  And in my opinion, sometimes there is a passage in Scripture which is not clear, and trying to force a doctrine out of such a passage is a mistake.

   Details are still important!  For example, in most cultures there is a difference between a town and a city.  This was the case in Biblical times. (1)  But if there is not a difference between a town and a city in a culture, then that student of the Bible would need to learn a Biblical history fact, which leads back to my third principle for Biblical interpretation.  Once understood, the reader will recognize the distinction between the “City of David,” a term used in 1 Kings 8:1 along with a number of other passages, and the “town of David,” a key term used in Luke 2:11.  City of David refers to Jerusalem, whereas the town of David is Bethlehem.

   Taking the class "Interpreting the Bible" at Colorado Christian University, I learned that context is an important element of content, but becoming preoccupied with context can lead to missing the messages of God.  God’s purpose of Scripture for us goes back to the content, so we may gain messages from Him and apply them in our lives.  For a person who follows Jesus, we are to be carrying on with the Biblical story.

Hunter Irvine

Scripture Love Blog

(1) Patricia Dutcher-Walls, Reading the Historical Books: A Student’s Guide to Engaging the Biblical Text (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2014), 31.

Rebecca St. James has long been one of my favorite musical artists, and this is one of my favorite songs of all time, Lest I Forget:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYNeO7y5rBk

Christmas faith

   It has been a tough year for me.  And in my opinion, it has been a tough year in various manners for my home country, the U.S.A.  I prepare for and anticipate an enjoyable Christmas for one reason: a believer in Jesus can have joy and peace as he or she relies on the love of Jesus.  Thus it does not even mean my Christmas will be filled with fun or romance.  Yet come what may, my Christmas can be filled with the love of Jesus.
   Talking about the joy and peace of Jesus is easy to express but hard to live, yet I take this moment to recall there have been many occasions when I have had joy and peace in the past twenty-seven years of following Jesus in the midst of crummy circumstances, which I believe was solely due to the love of Jesus I knew in my heart.
   My ministry calling has been a unique one, and though I like kids, I was never blessed with my own children.  Yet I have been tremendously blessed to be true friends and like an uncle to the two children of my dear friends who are like family.  When the boy was very young, I frequently took him and his sister on walks.  My little buddy was quick to let go of my hand to examine things I would point out such as bugs or mushrooms.  Yet whenever I would start walking again, he was quick to say, “Hand!”  I would always stretch my hand out to him and he would clasp it.  In following Jesus for over twenty-seven years, I have learned I am never too old to exclaim to Jesus, “Hand!”
   There is a Father in heaven who loves everybody.  God the Father sent his one and only Son, the babe born to a virgin in a manger in Bethlehem over two thousand years ago.  Jesus was Immanuel, which means God with us.  Though a helpless little baby, He was the Christ, and though about thirty-three years later He submitted to being helpless on a cross as He was crucified by Roman soldiers, He was the Christ.  In fact, Jesus died on a cross for the forgiveness of sins of anyone.  He was the atoning sacrifice for sins.  Then He was resurrected.  If you believe in Jesus, you will have eternal life in heaven with Him.
Merry Christmas, love, Hunter

(Three friends, a picture taken just under a decade ago.)