8 Day Week
Removing Doubt and Fear
The power of the resurrected Christ
Removes doubt and fear
To turn your negative into a positive
The week end has passed,
fear and sadness filled the hearts of the followers of
Jesus.
The disciples were afraid they too might be arrested
and in their mind they must have wondered
what type of delusions they might have been under.
It’s Sunday Morning,
the first day of the week,
a new day - the 8th day!
The day starts with a violent earthquake
and the stone covering the tomb is removed. Matthew
28:2
Mary Magdalene, Joanna and Mary the mother of James
go the tomb to anoint the body of Jesus
and discover He is gone.
Angels appear and Jesus Himself
and they are told to tell the other disciples,
which Jesus called brothers.
The disciples don’t believe the women. Luke
24:11
In the afternoon,
Jesus takes a walk with two men,
they talk about the events of Christ’s death.
When they reach their destination,
they invite Jesus to stay with them.
When Jesus blesses and broke the bread,
He gave it to them and they realized who He was.
Do you recognize Him,
does His Word burn in your heart when you eat the
bread
and drink from the cup in communion with Him?
These two men find the other disciples locked in a
room
for fear of the Jews. John
20:19
Then Jesus appears in the room,
and says, “Peace
be with you.”
Jesus asks, “Why
are you troubled,
and why do doubts rise in your minds?”
A week later the disciples are still locking the doors,
this time Thomas is there and doubted that Jesus had risen.
Jesus again appears and says to Thomas,
“Stop doubting and believe.” John
20:26
Jesus says in John 20:29 NIV,
Then Jesus told him,
"Because you have seen me, you have
believed;
blessed are those who have not seen and
yet have believed."
I have been in hopeless situations
and I have to confess I have had doubts.
Like the disciples, I have been with others
where we talked about how negative and hopeless things
were.
But I thank God that He did not let the locked doors
stop Him from coming to me
and removing my doubt and giving me peace.
It is when we recognize Jesus
in our locked room of fear, disillusion, and doubt
that He will open our minds to understand the
scriptures
and how they apply to our need. John
20:45
No matter how bad you think things are:
DON’T DOUBT - HE HAS RISEN!!!!!
PS… Peter is restored. John
21:15-ff
Scripture Reading
John 20:1-21:1
20:1 Early on the
first day of the week, while it was still dark,
Mary Magdalene went
to the tomb
and saw that the
stone had been removed from the entrance.
2 So she came running
to Simon Peter and the other disciple,
the one Jesus loved,
and said,
"They have taken
the Lord out of the tomb,
and we don't know
where they have put him!"
3 So Peter and the
other disciple started for the tomb.
4 Both were running,
but the other disciple outran Peter
and reached the tomb first.
5 He bent over and
looked in at the strips of linen lying there
but did not go in.
6 Then Simon Peter,
who was behind him,
arrived and went into
the tomb.
He saw the strips of
linen lying there,
7 as well as the
burial cloth that had been around Jesus' head.
The cloth was folded
up by itself, separate from the linen.
8 Finally the other
disciple,
who had reached the
tomb first,
also went inside.
He saw and believed.
9(They still did not
understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.)
10 Then the disciples
went back to their homes,
11 but Mary stood
outside the tomb crying.
As she wept, she bent
over to look into the tomb
12 and saw two angels
in white, seated where Jesus' body had been,
one at the head and
the other at the foot.
13 They asked her,
"Woman, why are you crying?"
"They have taken
my Lord away," she said,
"and I don't
know where they have put him."
14 At this, she
turned around and saw Jesus standing there,
but she did not
realize that it was Jesus.
15 "Woman,"
he said, "why are you crying?
Who is it you are
looking for?"
Thinking he was the
gardener, she said,
"Sir, if you
have carried him away,
tell me where you
have put him, and I will get him."
16 Jesus said to her,
"Mary."
She turned toward him
and cried out in Aramaic,
"Rabboni!"
(which means Teacher).
17 Jesus said,
"Do not hold on to me,
for I have not yet
returned to the Father.
Go instead to my
brothers and tell them,
'I am returning to my
Father and your Father,
to my God and your
God.'"
18 Mary Magdalene
went to the disciples with the news:
"I have seen the
Lord!"
And she told them
that he had said these things to her.
19 On the evening of
that first day of the week,
when the disciples
were together,
with the doors locked
for fear of the Jews,
Jesus came and stood
among them and said,
"Peace be with
you!"
20 After he said
this, he showed them his hands and side.
The disciples were
overjoyed when they saw the Lord.
21 Again Jesus said,
"Peace be with
you!
As the Father has
sent me, I am sending you."
22 And with that he
breathed on them and said,
"Receive the
Holy Spirit.
23 If you forgive
anyone his sins, they are forgiven;
if you do not forgive
them, they are not forgiven."
24 Now Thomas (called
Didymus), one of the Twelve,
was not with the
disciples when Jesus came.
25 So the other
disciples told him, "We have seen the Lord!"
But he said to them,
"Unless I see the nail marks in his hands
and put my finger
where the nails were,
and put my hand into
his side, I will not believe it."
26 A week later his
disciples were in the house again,
and Thomas was with
them.
Though the doors were
locked,
Jesus came and stood
among them and said, "Peace be with you!"
27 Then he said to
Thomas,
"Put your finger
here; see my hands.
Reach out your hand
and put it into my side.
Stop doubting and believe."
28 Thomas said to
him, "My Lord and my God!"
29 Then Jesus told
him,
"Because you have seen me, you have believed;
blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed."
30 Jesus did many
other miraculous signs in the presence of his disciples,
which are not
recorded in this book.
31 But these are
written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ,
the Son of God, and
that by believing you may have life in his name.
No comments:
Post a Comment