All Things Are Possible

Dr. Bernie Miller: You know you watch the bottom line. You know you don't write a check if you don't have the money in the bank. Well, if you watch the bottom line in your bank, why don't you watch the bottom line in your spiritual life? You ought to be ready for Christ's coming. That ought to be just as important to you as the bottom line in your bank.

Guest (Male): New Covenant Fellowship Church. In-person worship Sunday mornings at 10:30, 1326 North Moore Road in Chattanooga. New Covenant Fellowship Church: a place for every race.

Now from New Covenant Fellowship Church, All Things Are Possible. At New Covenant, we show and grow people in Christ and glorify God. It's what we believe. To say it another way, if you're looking to worship in a place without having to worry about what to wear or a plate being passed for money, come to New Covenant.

Every Sunday morning at 10:30, you'll enjoy great music and solid teaching from the Bible. You'll find us on North Moore Road in Chattanooga, with directions right to our door at ncf.church. New Covenant Fellowship Church: we are a place for every race. And here's Pastor Bernie Miller.

Dr. Bernie Miller: Have you ever noticed that people will try any and everything to avoid death? They take these drinks and stir it up and put it in a blender with all kinds of concoctions added to it. They even eat kale a lot. They take vitamins with names that sound like Wi-Fi passwords. They have fitness watches telling them "Stand up," "Breathe," "Move." A brother said his watch told him, "You've been sitting too long." He told his watch, "Mind your business, I was meditating."

And now we have apps that track sleep, calories, and steps. Do you really want to know how many calories you've eaten after eating that big old slice of cake? I don't want to know. But no one has an app that says, "Congratulations, you have defeated death." We can delay it, we can dress it up, and we can deny it, but we cannot defeat it because death has a 100% success rate, except for Jesus, who took the sting out of death when He died for our sins on that old rugged cross.

And there's something about the whole cross thing that a lot of folks don't even know, I don't think, if you've really researched it as some of us have. You realize that the moment that He hung on the cross and slumped down, His shoulders were out of socket. And He was barely able to breathe. And He was slumped down like that, and it was excruciating. In fact, that's where we get the word "excruciating" from, from Him being on the cross and having His shoulders out of joint.

And every time He had to speak, He would have to push Himself up. Now, you know that He had been whipped with the bone and on a whip and thirty-nine times, and so the back of His back was just an open wound. And every time He had to raise up to speak, He was rubbing His back against the wood with splinters in it. But He spoke seven words on the cross that were very important. I'm not going to go into those seven, but I just want to give you the setting because some of us think, "The cross, that's a nice thing." No, no, it was painful.

And when Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane, He knew exactly what was going to happen to Him because He was God. And He knew the beginning and He knew the end. And He also knew that when He was whipped and put on the cross, He knew how excruciating it would be just to speak the words that He had to speak. And every word that He spoke came straight out of scripture. If you look in Psalm 22, you'll find a lot of it right there, leading up to Psalm 23 and 24.

If you just read those three, you'll get a good idea of Jesus knew exactly what He was going through. That's why in the Garden of Gethsemane, He said, "Father, if it be Your will, let this cup pass from Me." Now, what He was meaning was, "I'm going to have to suffer. I know I'm going to suffer. I'm going to suffer excruciating pain. They're going to beat Me." But "not My will, but Your will be done."

I mean, when you get to the point in your life when God matters more than you do, you will say to Him, "Not my will, but Thy will be done." That's what Jesus understood about His mission on earth. He came here to give up His life so that He could pick it up again so that we could have it in us. And so I think about the cross in a different way. And because He got up, we don't just have a funeral; we have a future because He gave it to us. He took the sting out of death, and He got up out of that grave on His own.

And so my message today is "Grave to Glory." And we're going to look at the resurrection story—the power, the proof, the promise of it. And we're going to look at it and show you some things that you've probably seen, you've known some of these things, but I just want to give it to you personally again because repetition is a good thing; it's your friend. In the King James Version, "resurrection" appears about 42 times. The Greek word means "raising" and "standing up again."

That's what it means, and it's a beautiful picture when you look at it because we have that same resurrection power in us. How do you think we get out of this womb of life into eternal life? It's because we have that resurrection power that's in us. Let's start with the power of the resurrection. Matthew 28, verse 1, it says, "Now after the Sabbath"—and I have that highlighted for a reason because I'm going to say something about that one—"and as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week"—the word "dawn," I'm going to explain that one as well—"Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to look at the grave."

"And behold, a severe earthquake had occurred, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled away the stone and sat upon it." I thought that was a curious kind of statement. But can you imagine that? I mean, this angel—how many did it take? It just says "an angel" rolled away the stone. One. How did he do it? He had the power to do it. It was like he was flipping pages: "Get out of the way."

"And his appearance was like lightning, his clothes as white as snow. The guards shook for fear of him and became like dead men." I imagine so. The angel said to the women, "Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus who has been crucified. He is not here, for He has risen just as He said," confirming everything that Jesus had said to them about His resurrection. "Come see the place where He was lying. Go quickly and tell His disciples that He has risen from the dead; and behold, He is going ahead of you into Galilee, there you will see Him; behold, I have told you."

"Now go." And they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy and ran to report it to His disciples. And behold, Jesus met them—met whom? The women—and greeted them, and they came up and took hold of His feet and worshiped Him. Then Jesus said to them, "Do not be afraid. Go and take word to My brethren to leave for Galilee, and there they will see Me."

And so the women got a first glimpse of Jesus. And by falling on His feet and worshiping Him, it was a position of honor. They were worshiping Him and acknowledging that He is indeed recognizable after the resurrection because they beat Him up pretty badly, but He was recognizable. So that tells me that when we are in our resurrected body, we will be recognizable. You think, "Well, I don't know if my mom will know me." You'll know her.

But the Bible says very plainly in John, "When we see Him, we will be just like Him." Well, how is that? Just like they recognized Jesus in His resurrected body, when you get to heaven, everybody's going to recognize you—that new you. And those that did not give their life to Christ, you won't have a memory of that because, remember now, heaven is a place where there is no more tears and no more sadness.

So if you are in heaven and you're thinking, "Wait a minute, Mama? Mama? Is my mama here?" No, you won't know that your mama's not there. You won't know that your daddy's not there. You won't know that any relative that didn't give their life to Christ is not there because that wouldn't be heaven if you had a memory that your relative is still down here on earth catching hell or thrown into the lake of fire. Now, how could you live the rest of your eternity with that memory? That's not heaven. And I kind of wanted to explain some of that to you.

The phrase "after the Sabbath and began the dawn" marks a chronological and theological shift. In Exodus, the Sabbath was a special sign between God and Israel. Spiritually, it's not a day off but a state of peace, faith, and trust in God's finished work for salvation. Now, you know what Jesus was doing on the Sabbath? Jesus was redeeming us. He was the High Priest. Remember now, the priests in the Old Testament, they worked on the Sabbath.

Jesus, being our High Priest, He's working on the Sabbath. What is He doing? He's proving to everybody that He is who He says He was, but He's doing His high-priestly duties because He is the great High Priest. And so just as a High Priest in the Old Testament worked on the Sabbath, Jesus was doing the redemptive work on the Sabbath. And that's why we celebrate Easter because after the work was done, Jesus came up out of there and spiritually, look, we have a Sabbath spiritually.

And spiritually, it's not a day off necessarily for me, but a state of peace and faith and trust in the finished work of God for my personal salvation. Now, Jesus' resurrection satisfied the law. According to Hebrews 4, it says He became our Sabbath rest. So the rest is a spiritual present tense rest. What does that mean? It means it's a rest in God's grace and God's mercy to keep us from trying to earn our salvation through doing some good works because you can't do enough good works to satisfy God's law because it's already been paid.

When Jesus said it was finished on the cross, He meant that. He meant there's nothing that you can do. There's no work that you can do. I've already done it. That's why He said, "It is finished." And it's a judicial term meaning that you cannot be locked up in hell. You're free. You are free to be with God in heaven, and you have no more debts against you because your debts of sin have been paid for. That's why He said it is finished. Everything that was required was done by Jesus Christ, and now we have a Sabbath rest, meaning a rest from our works having to get to heaven.

And it kind of puts a dent in the myth with these people who think they can send up some timber up to heaven. I don't know where you're going to get it that's going to make it out of this atmosphere. It's going to burn up when you get so far up there. I don't know what kind of timber you're sending up, but I think they're just using it to make a little small point. But don't say crazy stuff that don't mean nothing. Because people will think, "I need to send up some timber," so they're going to go down to Lowe's trying to find the timber that goes up to heaven. Get out of here! What are you talking about?

"Began to dawn" means hope was rising. "Severe earthquake" means a violent shaking. When Jesus got up, He shook loose all the things that would hold us down. We were set free because of the violent shaking. The stone was rolled back. The miracle wasn't the stone moving; it was Jesus moving. "He is risen" is a passive verb that means something being done to someone else. In this case, the passive voice means that God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit was doing something to the body that was in the tomb.

And all three of them were working together. So you say, "Well, wait a minute, how can..." Well, God is spirit, but Jesus was given a body so that He could come and be like us and redeem us. But you've got to know something: the Godhead, three in one, were all working together on that body, that human body that came out of Mary. And so the passive voice means that the Godhead, three in one, were working together to raise that body that Jesus housed while He was here.

It was a complete action with ongoing results. Jesus said in Revelation, "I am the living one. I died, and I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of death and Hades." So if you feel locked up in some situation, He's got the keys. He was raised, and He's still alive right now. So how do you know? Because I know He's living in me. You know, I was a knucklehead. Still am, sometimes. I go back to my old ways, and then the Holy Spirit kind of smacks me back in line.

He says, "What are you doing? Don't be thinking that. You know what to do with that thought. Get rid of it. You know what to do with the devil. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." Earthquakes in the Bible, you know what they signaled? God's divine power breaking into history to get our attention. Have you ever tried to move something that was pretty heavy and you say, "I got it!"? Somebody asks you, "You want help?" "No, I got it, I got it, I got it."

And then you don't got it. And that sofa you're trying to take up to the second floor starts tumbling back down to the first floor. You don't got it. You're grunting and calling for help. The stone in front of the tomb was sealed, and it wasn't supposed to be opened or moved because the seal could not be broken by anybody but the one who told it to be sealed. But when resurrection power shows up, what was immovable becomes irrelevant.

The stone wasn't moved to let Jesus out; it was moved to let the witnesses in so they could see. And the guards who became like dead men remind me of goats. You ever see goats when they are startled? They fall over on their side. Their skeletal muscles stiffen, and they fall over. We laugh every time we see those goats get afraid. The resurrection transforms terror into a testimony.

Someone said, "Pastor, you know what I've noticed?" I said, "Well, no, what have you noticed?" He said, "I've noticed something about people at the graveside." I said, "Well, what have you noticed?" He said, "I've noticed that we're good at saying goodbye but terrible at believing it's permanent. We say things like: they're looking down on us from heaven." Let me tell you something, nobody's looking down on us from heaven. None of your relatives want to see what's going on down here. They went up there, they don't want to think that.

Please don't think that. They would be embarrassed by some of the things that we're doing. So, they're not looking down at us from heaven. But nobody at a graveside says this: on Friday, they're at the graveside, and then they say, "Don't worry, I'll be back on Sunday." No. Has anyone been buried on a Friday and told you they're going to come back on a Sunday? No. I haven't heard nobody. No one can tell me that.

I mean, it is miraculous in itself that anybody comes up out of the tomb, but Jesus did. But that's what we believe as believers. That's what I preach. I preach that this is not my end when I close my eyes and take my last breath. You talk about a miraculous thing that happens with the resurrection. But what we believe is that it did happen. On a Friday He went down, and on a Sunday He came back. Talk about a comeback! My wife and I, we were watching UConn's comeback to beat Duke 73 to 72.

It was miraculous. I was rooting for Duke, you know, I'm from North Carolina. And I said, "Man, just hold the ball! Why are you... you already got the lead! Just hold the ball! It's only ten seconds left, you're not going to get penalized, just hold the ball!" What did they do? Want to take it across the line. I said, "Why are you doing that?" And I don't even know much about basketball, but I knew that was dumb. I know they've got so many seconds, but it was just dumb.

But the resurrection is the most miraculous comeback story in history. No sequel, no reboot, no based on a true story. This is the original. A dead man folded His grave clothes, walked out on His own, and death left—left death defeated right there in the tomb. The resurrection was confirmed in John 2 where Jesus said, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I'll raise it up again."

A defibrillator, y'all know what it does: it restarts a stopped heart, but only temporarily. Jesus didn't need a defibrillator. He didn't need one of those things. He was the power. He was the life. He didn't need anything to give Him life; He was life. He didn't need a defib, He didn't need that at all. But there was a cover-up of the resurrection. Matthew 28:11. Now while they were on their way, some of the guard came into the city and reported to the chief priests all that had happened.

And when they had assembled with the elders and consulted together, they gave a large sum of money to the soldiers and said, "You are to say"—watch this—"you are to say his disciples came by night and stole him away while we were sleeping." Huh? Go back to that verse. If you were sleeping, how do you know that somebody stole the body? You're asleep! Really? Next verse. "And if this should come to the governor's ears, we will win him over and keep you out of trouble."

You've got to explain to him that lie because that's just... you can't be asleep and then be able to see something. And they took the money and did as they had been instructed, and this story was widely spread among the Jews and is to this day. That ought to tell you something. Truth was replaced with money, manipulation, and messaging. The lie spread, but the truth stood still. The proof of the resurrection was prophesied and explained and planned.

In 1 Corinthians 15:3, it says, "For I delivered to you as first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the scriptures, and that He appeared to Cephas"—meaning Peter—"then to the twelve. After that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep"—in other words, they've died. "Then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles; and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also."

God planned our redemption before we ever needed it. He was seen by more than five hundred brethren at once. It was a mass eyewitness account. How are you going to not believe the resurrection story? If a group of people all claim to see the same thing at the same time in the same way, it's not a rumor, it's evidence. But if your heart is set against the truth, no evidence will ever convince you. The resurrection can stand cross-examination. These faithful followers became fearless followers overnight.

1 Corinthians 15 shows the gospel in three movements: one, death (the payment); burial (the proof that He died); resurrection is the victory, showing us that death could not hold Him down. The grave is not our address; it's just our doorway. If He only died, it would be a tragedy. If He only lived, He would be an inspiration. But because He rose, we have salvation and we have victory over sin. And I love what the Bible says. It doesn't make these statements and say, "I believe." It says, "according to scriptures."

Scriptures do not lie because it's the word of God, and God wrote the word of God. He inspired men to write the word of God. In the King James Version, "resurrection," as I said, appears 42 times. Isaiah says, "Your dead will live; their corpse will rise." In Ezekiel 37:1, it says the vision of the dry bones coming back to life is really the resurrection story. And some guys will preach it and they'll assume that the people in the congregation are those dry bones, they don't seem to have any life when they're preaching and nobody says amen, nobody laughs, nobody does anything.

Maybe you need to change your message and those dry bones will start saying something. In Daniel, it says, "Many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake." We had a storm overnight, we've had storms in the past. My wife says I sleep so hard that the alarms, the calls, any text messages I get on my phone can't awake me. She's right. I woke up the other day asking her what day it was. I forgot I had an appointment on that Monday. Not the Monday, I just kind of forgot all about it.

But can you imagine somebody seeing Jesus overslept? From Friday to Sunday, He overslept the resurrection? No, no way. He didn't oversleep, He overcame. Next, the promise of the resurrection. John 11:21. Martha said to Jesus, "Lord, if You had been here, my brother Lazarus would not have died. Even now I know that whatever You ask of God, God will give You." Jesus said to her, "Your brother will rise again."

Martha said, "I know that he will rise again in the resurrection of the last day. I know that, I'm smart." Jesus said, "I am the resurrection." Did you know that? "And the life. He who believes in Me will live"—spiritually—"even if he dies"—physically. And I put that in parentheses because it's not really in the scripture, but I didn't want to have to put it in my notes because I ran out of paper. So I wanted to put it on the screen so that you could see it yourself.

"And everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die"—eternal separation from God, in other words. And then He says, "Do you believe this?" And so the question is, do you believe this? I mean, we've got in the Bible that can't lie that there were five hundred brethren who saw Jesus at the same time. Do you believe this? Because if you don't believe the resurrection of Christ, then what do you believe? Do you believe that maybe you're going to get a second chance when you die?

Who's going to give you a second chance? First of all, who gave you life? Who started this whole life business? "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word became life." And Christ is the Word that lives in me. Jesus, I'm glad He didn't oversleep. He didn't oversleep, He overcame. The resurrection is not just about Him; it includes us. It includes you and me because Jesus is the resurrection and the life. We have hope that we will too have eternal life one day in our new body.

Now think of Jesus as the first fruits of a harvest. When the first crop comes in, you know what it's a guarantee of? It's a guarantee that there's more crops coming. And we are the crops that have come out of His—He says, "Unless this grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it abides alone, but if it dies, it will produce much fruit." You and I, if you are born again, you are the much fruit that Jesus was talking about. You're the ones that believed in His resurrection. His resurrection is proof that ours is on the way.

The resurrection is more than an event to celebrate; it's a reality that Jesus, who died, lives in us. Well, I know He lives in me because the Bible says so. It means my past has been forgiven. It means there is nothing presently against me because Jesus died on the cross to forgive me of my sins: past, present, and future. And some people have a hard time with that because they have a hard time with grace.

But I don't have a hard time with grace. I don't have a hard time with mercy. It was because of God's great love with which He loved us, even though we were dead in our sins and trespasses. By grace we've been saved through faith, and that not of ourselves; it is a gift of God. God has never, ever taken back a gift that He's given. He is not like that. That's not the kind of God I serve. When He gives you eternal life, He doesn't take it back.

When He had the manna come down from heaven, He didn't take the manna back from the Jews. When Jesus prayed and people saw getting the five thousand, they ate. He didn't tell them, "All right, stop, stop, y'all eating too much. I'm going to take it and I'm going to give it to some other people." No, God does not take back His gifts. Now, we may, you know—guy got married, got a divorce, told his wife, "I want that ring I bought you."

She said, "What ring is that?" "With your wedding ring." "This was a gift." "Yeah, I know, but I want it back." He's still waiting. You know, there's some people you may meet that you can't get over like that, but there's some people you're not going to get over like that. God is not a—He doesn't take back gifts that He gives us. We have the gift of the Holy Spirit. He doesn't take the Spirit from us. He said the Spirit will be with you always.

And so I believe that everything that comes along with His gift is going to be with me always. So because Jesus lives in me, that means that my past is under the blood, my present forgiven, my future has a promise, and my future is sealed and secure because of what I believe about Jesus Christ. The grave held us locked in, but Jesus had the keys. Because of the resurrection, there is power; the grave couldn't hold Him.

Because of the resurrection, there is proof; the world couldn't deny Him. Because of the resurrection, there is promise; death couldn't keep Him. He's not dead, He's alive! I mean, everybody else's god is dead, but ours is alive! And see, we have proof that He's alive because there's some things that you know you used to do, but because you are now a believer in Christ Jesus, you don't even have... you don't want to do it.

And then when you do do something, you get convicted by—you know why? Because you have the Holy Spirit. If you don't have the Holy Spirit and don't get convicted, then you need to be born again. Death—get this—death is not a period; death is a comma. When I leave this life, I know where I'm going. I'm not in a hurry to get there, but I know where I'm going. I want to live long enough, hopefully, to see old Zack get married.

I don't know how that's going to happen, but anyway... Zack, look, he's fed up. He decided, "I don't want to think about that." One day he was helping his mom when we had something here at the church and when she was in charge of the children's ministry. He was supposed to—he and his friends, Landis and the rest of them—they were supposed to watch the kids, the little kids, younger kids. Zack got so frustrated with his mom, went over to his mom and says, "I ain't never having no babies!"

You know Zack, one day you may meet that right one. But anyway, back to my message. Grave gets your body, but it cannot touch your soul. The resurrection is more than an event to celebrate; it's a reality to live in. It means your past can be forgiven, your present can have a purpose, and your future is secure. The guards who were asleep and said they saw the disciples steal the body... I tell you, that's like one of your kids saying, "I didn't eat the cookies!" and you say, "Come here, let me smell your breath," and you see a little crumb on the side on the corner.

"You didn't eat the cookie?" "No, I didn't eat the cookies, I was asleep!" Okay, who ate the cookie? "My brother did." "Well, how do you know he ate the cookie if you were asleep?" It goes right back... you know, kids can come up with a good one sometimes and they try to fool us, but we know better than that. The truth was rejected by all those religious people. Have you rejected the truth of the Lord Jesus Christ?

You can't stop the power of the truth. You can lie, lie, lie, but pretty soon, the lie goes out quick. The truth is kind of like—as this guy told me—kind of like a turtle crawling around; pretty soon it's going to get across that finish line. But that rabbit? Gone! That's what a lie does. And right down to this day, there are some people that think they are okay with God because they believe a lie that Jesus wasn't the resurrection.

Any story you have to pay people to believe probably isn't true. No one paid me to believe; it was by God's love, His great love with which He loved me, that I gave my life to Him. And through His grace and His mercy and my faith that He gave me to believe. God's love and God's grace can save you today if you're willing to believe by faith Jesus is alive.

On the cross, one thief asked Jesus, "Will You remember me when You get into Your paradise, into Your kingdom?" and Jesus said, "Today you'll be with Me in paradise." But there was another thief on the cross. The other thief rejected Jesus. The thief didn't get entrance into Jesus' paradise because he didn't have the faith to believe in Jesus. But I have the faith to believe. And I don't know where you all are with your faith, but I ask you today: examine yourselves to see if you are really in the faith.

Guest (Male): All things are possible from New Covenant Fellowship Church. Connect with us anytime at ncf.church/connect or on social media at NCF Chattanooga. Worship with us every Sunday morning at 10:30 in-person at 1326 North Moore Road in Chattanooga or online at ncf.church/messages. New Covenant Fellowship Church: a place for every race.

Dr. Bernie Miller: Hate the sin, but don't let the hatred for the sin carry over to the sinner. They can be forgiven of that sin because that's why Jesus came. And you just need to, look, take care of your own house.

Guest (Male): New Covenant Fellowship Church. In-person worship Sunday mornings at 10:30, 1326 North Moore Road in Chattanooga. New Covenant Fellowship Church: a place for every race.