This sermon was preached at University Park Baptist Church in Houston, Texas. For more information about UPBC, visit upbchouston.org. So if you have a Bible, we're in Luke chapter 7, beginning in verse 11. And if you don't have a copy of God's Word, there are some on the sides. We'd love for you to grab a copy, follow along, you'll be helped as we look at the scripture closely today. And if you don't have a copy of God's Word, please take one with you as a gift from us. Let's look at God's word together. Luke chapter 7, beginning in verse 11. Soon afterward, he went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a great crowd went with him. As he drew near to the gate of the town, behold, a man who had died was being carried out. The only son of his mother, and she was a widow, and a considerable crowd from the town was with her. And when the Lord saw her, He had compassion on her and said to her, do not weep. Then he came up and touched the beer and the bearer stood still. And he said, young man, I say to you, arise. And the dead man sat up and began to speak. And Jesus gave him to his mother. Fear seized them all and they glorified God saying, a great prophet has arisen among us and God has visited his people. And this report about him spread through the whole of Judea and all the surrounding country. Let's pray. Lord Jesus, we pray that you would now be on display. That our eyes would fall on you and no other. You carry our burdens and our sorrows. There's no other place to go but you. And oh Lord, you are enough. You are sufficient. Your promises carry us through. So I pray that you would breathe life, Lord, into any suffering, struggling saint. Oh, Lord, bring life, bring encouragement, wipe away tears, focus our hearts and minds on what's coming. Show yourself to us, Lord. We need you. We ask it in your name. Amen. Someone described the death of a child as a period before the end of a sentence. The sentence isn't complete and yet there's that period. It had hardly begun. A thousand years before the widow in our story walked her dead son to the tombs, another mother was in distress. I want to tell you about two mothers actually. But her son came to her with a terrible headache, and the headache didn't get better. She did all that she could. She held him in her lap, helplessly watching him fade away and die. He was her only son. In fact, he was a miracle. He was a promise from the prophet Elisha. She was not able to have children, and she had been hospitable to this prophet, begged the Lord, and on behalf of the Lord, she became pregnant. But now all she could think of was that her gift had been taken away. So she went immediately to find the man of the Lord. I'm summarizing here 2 Kings 4. And he came. He laid his body out on the child's body, his mouth on the child's mouth, his eyes on his eyes, his hands on his hands, his flesh on his flesh, and the child's flesh became warm. So Elisha got up. He prayed, walked around, and then he laid back on the child. And then interestingly, the child sneezed seven times. He was alive. He was awake. And so he summoned his servant to call the mother and told her when she came into the room, pick up your son. He's alive. Can you imagine? This wasn't the first time Elijah had seen a miracle like this. He had seen, likely, or heard about his mentor Elijah in a similar position. In 1 Kings 17, Elijah was commanded by God to go to Zarephath. And there he found a poor widow who was to feed him. And so when he came to the gate of the city, he meets this widow. Interestingly, Jesus also meets a widow at the gates of a city in Nain. He meets her gathering sticks to prepare the last meal she's going to have for herself and her son. They're so destitute they're going to eat this last meal and then die. Elijah tells her, do not fear. It probably seems presumptuous to her. Do not fear. We're about to die. And make some bread for me. And so she had enough for one last meal and she gave it to the prophet. And the Lord provided, as you know the story. Her jar of flour did not run out. The oil never ran dry. But her joy would be short-lived. Her son also got sick. And she too watched him suffer and die. How could this happen under the watch of such a great prophet? How could God allow this? Was God punishing me for my sins? These are the questions she's asking in the passage. First Kings 17. Give me your son, the prophet said. He took him in his own bed. He laid them there, laid him there and prayed. He stretched himself out on the child three times and cried out to the Lord, Oh, Lord, my God, let this child's life come into him again. And the text says that the Lord listened to the voice of Elijah and the child revived. And Elijah brought the child down and delivered him to his mother, saying, See, your son lives. And she said, now I know that you are a man of God and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth. The Lord listened to Elijah and Elisha. But that was a thousand years before this story that we find here in Luke 7. This account is only in Luke's gospel. It's one of three accounts of Jesus raising the dead. Jairus' daughter and Lazarus. The others? Each of those cases is public. Everyone sees it, and it's widely reported. News tends to spread when dead people come alive. In chapter 7, Luke is making a case for the identity of Jesus, and we mentioned that last time. I tend to think in terms of food, and so if you think about this chapter as a sandwich, The middle of the sandwich, the meat in the middle, is this account of Jesus raising the dead and people saying things like he's a great prophet and God has come to visit us. And it's kind of a double meat sandwich. The questions from John the Baptist. Who are you? Are you one who is to come or should we look for another? So identifying who he is. These are in the middle of this passage. And then the bread of the passage of the sandwich, the top and the bottom are these illustrations of great faith. We saw the illustration last week of the centurion who had such great faith. He said, you don't even need to come to my house to heal my servant. Just say the word. Jesus marveled. That's the top layer, the top piece of bread. And then under that in chapter seven, the bottom piece of bread is this sinful woman who is so amazed at who Jesus is and how much she's been forgiven. She weeps and washes his feet with her tears. So you've got this picture in chapter seven of the true identity of Jesus with these wonderful examples of faith on either side. Luke is telling us something greater than Elijah and Elisha is here. Something much greater. In fact, he hints at it there in verse 13. I don't know if you've noticed that. You notice this as we've gone through, but look there at verse 13. He says, and when the Lord saw her, the Lord. It's the first time that Luke has referred to Jesus as the Lord. This is his own commentary, his own reflective. This is the authorial commentary of what Luke is saying. This is who he is. This is the Lord. He saw her. He's coming to his own conclusion, and this is the right conclusion. Not everybody in the story knows this yet. Luke knows it, and he inserts it here. And it's the main point of the sermon. Jesus is Lord. Jesus is Lord. And if you're taking notes, I want to make three observations about his Lordship. Jesus being Lord. Three observations from our passage. Number one, the Lord is compassionate. The Lord is compassionate. You see that in verses 11 to 13. Jesus is Lord. He is compassionate. Number two, the Lord has authority over death. Verses 14 to 15, the Lord has authority over death. And then finally, number three, the Lord is worthy of worship and witness. Worship and witness, verses 16 and 17. We're looking at a confrontation of the Lord of life and sin's death. They collide. Who would say to a mourning widow who has lost her only son, stop crying? Only the Lord would say that. And we see that interaction here in our first observation. So number one, the Lord is compassionate. Jesus and his disciples have gone, if you track their progress, from this level place where he preached the Sermon on the Plain to Capernaum, which is basically his ministry headquarters. That's where the elders from the Jews came from the centurion and said, the centurion's servant is sick. You need to come heal him. He's worthy. You remember the story from last week. After healing that servant, we read verse 11. Soon afterward, he went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a great crowd went with him. Nain is only mentioned here in the Bible, so not a super significant town. Jesus goes there on purpose, but there's not a whole lot there. It's about 25 miles south of Capernaum. So it's about a marathon away from Capernaum that could be done in a day, in a day's journey. If you're not running, if you're walking like normal people, it's about a day's journey. And so likely Jesus set off in the morning and by evening they get there. And notice he's gathered a crowd, a traveling crowd. So he's got his 12 chosen disciples and then other committed followers that are with him. And then this great crowd. And we would assume some of these people are going to be in on this 25 mile journey. So they're just kind of putting their life on pause to follow Jesus. See what's going to happen. What's he going to do next? So it's maybe twilight and they enter into the town and verse 12 tells us what they observe when they come. And he drew near to the gate of the town. Behold, a man who had died was being carried out. The only son of his mother. And she was a widow. and a considerable crowd from the town was with her. There's a detailed picture here from Luke, isn't it, about the scene. It's really helpful. So you have Jesus and his crowd entering the town, and then they're met at the gates by a funeral, by a procession. And it would be customary for the dead to be buried outside of the city, usually at twilight on the same day of the death. So there's some time for preparations. But then because of the the laws, the Jewish, they're going to be they're going to be burying this body outside of town and on that same day. Sometimes we see funeral processions, don't we, as we're driving and we see the line of cars with lights on and flashers on and maybe we pull over, if we can pull over for a sign of respect here. Jesus probably heard the procession before he saw it. There would have been musicians who played a mournful dirge, kind of as they proceeded, made their way to the burial site. There would have likely been, even for a poor family, hired professional mourners. So these are these women that would be basically wailing and weeping as an expression of the community's grief over the loss. The body itself is placed on a bier. And so you should think of that as basically like a stretcher, kind of an open ended casket. likely covered and then carried on the shoulders of the bearers. You know, like we have pallbearers, be on their shoulders and be carrying this man kind of on a plank, probably with a cover over his body. And it was customary for the family to walk ahead of the body. And I think that's why this scene is probably doubly tragic, because there is likely one woman out front. She's by herself. Luke tells us that she was a widow. And this young man was her only son. Just a parenthetical note, this will not be the first time that Luke mentions when children die that it's the only son or daughter that die. I don't think that's accidental. I think he's writing a biography about God's only son who will die for sinners. And as he comes against these situations, he points that out just subtly, but often. She's lost her husband and now her only son. So that means all earthly security and hope for her family has died. Her son's cold face reflects likely her husband's likeness. So when she sees him, she's reminded of her husband and both are gone. She is totally alone. No one to provide for her, no one to carry on her name. And that probably explains the large crowd from the community that's gathered to pay their respects. So it's kind of an irony that they're there, they're all around her, and yet she's still alone. She's alone in a crowd. And some of you know exactly what that feels like. It's not the crowd of people that support at the ceremony, at the service, but it's when everyone goes home, you're alone. Maybe it's the most sad funeral you can imagine. Many of you can relate to this kind of pain. Listen to one theologian, Robert Dabney. He writes about the sudden loss of his son. He says this, I have learned rapidly in the school of anguish this week and am many years older than I was just a few days ago. I saw him suffer such pangs and then fall under the grasp of the cruel destroyer while I was impotent for his help. When the mighty wings of the angel of death nestle over your heart's treasures and his black shadow broods over your home, it shakes the heart with shuddering terror and a horror of great darkness. to see my little one ravaged, crushed, and destroyed, turning his beautiful liquid eyes to me and weeping with his mother for help after his gentle voice could no longer be heard, and to feel myself as helpless as to give aid. This tears my heart with anguish. It's a period before the end of the sentence. It doesn't belong there. Death doesn't belong. And so for this woman, she's burying part of her heart and her life with her son. And so when we come up against this kind of pain, when we come up against this kind of hurt naturally without Prodding with instinct, we ask why. Why are we faced with such anguish in this life? I wonder if you've honestly asked that to the Lord, maybe recently. Martin Luther, I think, is helpful here. He says, when you hear of death, you must think not only of the grave and the coffin and of the horrible manner in which life is separated from the body and how the body is destroyed and brought to naught. But you must think of the cause by which man is brought to death, namely sin and the wrath of God on account of sin. So every life ends in a funeral because of sin. The wages of sin is death. And all die because all have sinned. Sin is the source of all of our sorrow. Paul says, therefore, in Romans 5.12, just as sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned. If you're here this morning and you're not used to coming to church, worshiping with God's people, I'm really glad you're here. I know this is probably a heavy way to kind of start the sermon and you're visiting us maybe your first time. Really glad you're here. It is hard to think and talk about death, but it is so important and crucial that you think about it well, that you understand what the Bible says. The Bible has answers for our why questions. It tells us that death is, in fact, a result of our sin. Sin came into the world through our first parents. You can read about that story really clearly in Genesis 1 to 3. Adam and Eve listened to another counselor apart from God, their father, and they rebelled against him. and fell away from him and came under his judgment. They were separated from him. And because they are our first parents, they have passed that sin on to us. We are all infected with that same sin. And we know that. You can test to see whether or not you're infected, whether or not you sin like they do. And we all do. We all ignore God and we blame others for our faults. We blame God for our faults. We naturally gravitate to centering our life around ourselves. And most clearly, we die. We die. And if you haven't thought clearly and carefully about death, today's a good day to start, especially if you're maybe 25 and under. And you're feeling really good. Apart from Jesus' return, this is happening. And after death comes the judgment. Standing before your creator, your holy creator, to give an account for your life. Every single thought, every single word, every single motivation. And you know, if you're honest, that if God is holy and his word is true, then we have fallen short of that glory and are, in fact, guilty before a holy God. So friend, my question for you is, are you ready for that day? The day of death and the day of judgment. This widow, I would guarantee you never thought she would be burying her son. You can't predict. You don't know when your death will come. You can't say, I'll put off thinking about this until I get older. Because you don't know what tomorrow will bring. You don't know what will happen in the parking lot after this service. Are you ready? That's what you need to answer today. Are you ready? The only hope that you have as a guilty sinner before a holy God is the compassion that we find here in Jesus Christ. It's the Lord Jesus, the Lord of glory, the Lord of life. Notice how he enters the scene and just interrupts, causes havoc, changes everything. Verse 13. And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, do not weep. I don't know about you, but I love places in the Bible that give us windows into the heart of God. This is one of those places. We see the Lord's heart. That's what Luke calls him, right? The Lord saw her. He took notice of her plight. I think there's probably a reminder there for some of us today. Listen, there is no evidence here that this woman knows who Jesus is at all. That she even sees him coming. Notice she doesn't ask him to do anything for her. Jesus takes the initiative completely. He saw her grief. and suffering, and it moved him to compassion. When he learned of Lazarus's death, Jesus wept. Isn't this our story if we're a Christian? Isn't this the gospel story that Jesus had compassion on us, that he came to save us, who didn't have anything to offer him? It wasn't because we had prayed a great prayer, lived a great life, he just poured out his compassion and grace. Beloved, Jesus has compassion for your pain. Jesus has compassion for your loneliness, for your suffering. He has the Father's heart. Listen to Psalm 68 5. It's describing the heart of God. Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation. Jesus is simply reflecting that same heart. He hears the cries of anguish that no one else hears. Listen to Isaiah 53, 4 again. Not just thinking about the cross, but thinking about your own pain. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows. Isn't that helpful to think about? That Jesus surely has carried our pain. So if you're grieving, you're not alone. And I know this is not theoretical. If you've lost a child, a parent, a spouse, a relationship, A way of life, a trajectory of life that you thought would go one way and it is not going that way and it will never go that way. Jesus bears those cares, those sorrows. He's full of compassion for you. He has taken on our burdens as his own. And he has brought great comfort to us through the gospel and through his promises. Great comfort. And we see a wonderful picture of that here in this passage. And those of us who have known that comfort, those of us who have known the grace of God in Christ, are then called to take the comfort that we've been given and comfort others. Johnny Erickson Tada notes that since Jesus was not caught up with his own concerns, he was able to fully and selflessly enter into someone else's suffering. What a great picture of that. Jesus, his selfless love, observed someone else in pain and enters into that suffering. So to be like Christ is to be drawn to those who are suffering around us, to have an instinctive compassion for their sorrows, to weep with those who weep, entering into their situation with sympathy and giving them freedom to grieve and heal in God's timing. It means showing them the Savior. Friends, what a difference it makes when someone is on the road of suffering, on the road of death, and they meet Jesus. What a difference Jesus makes. The one who says at the peak of this woman's tragedy and pain, do not weep. Do not weep. I don't recommend you say that to anybody at a funeral. You know how we're kind of prone to comforting words that have no real basis, that are really mere platitudes. Like it's going to be okay. Time will heal all wounds. It's part of life. There's no Jesus comfort. Jesus' call to wipe away your tears is based in the gospel. A rock solid promise. And he's about to act on that promise. He's going to give her comfort that's rooted in what he's about to do. And let's look at that now. Number two, the Lord has authority over death. The Lord has authority over death. So Jesus takes the initiative completely. I love in our statement of faith that we say salvation is holy of grace. We believe that here. All glory to God. Holy of grace. Here's a great picture of it. Great picture of it. He sees this woman's pain. and tells her not to weep. So that at least sets a tone of expectation. If you're gonna take that in the best possible way, tone of expectation. And then we read here in the first part of verse 14, then he came up and touched the beer and the bearer stood still. Again, you gotta get this in your mind. Jesus going this way with his posse, The procession is going this way at the city gates and he touches the beer. He touches the coffin as if to say this funeral isn't happening today. This procession isn't going any further today. He is effectually stopping death in its tracks. You can go no further. I have come to put a stop to all this. And I'm going to give you a preview of that right now. Powerful, powerful picture. And they stopped. They stopped, probably with a gasp. Not only because he's interrupting the funeral, but because to touch something that's been in contact with the dead, a coffin, would make a Jew like Jesus ceremonial unclean. But Jesus is the Lord of life. And when he has a collision with death, he always wins. So he's not polluted. Death loses. That's going to be a consistent pattern if you're keeping track. Jesus wins over death. He's not corrupted. He's not contaminated by it. He overcomes. He's victorious. He has divine authority to keep death in its place and ultimately to defeat it. And so, even though this man is dead, Jesus is gonna talk to him. He's gonna talk to a dead guy. Just finish reading verse 14. Everybody stopped all attention on Jesus. And he said, young man, I say to you, arise. I think the word you're looking for is crazy. If you see this happening in real life. disrespectful, crazy. If someone did this, someone talks to dead people and expects them to respond. Even the prophets didn't do this. The prophets would at least lay on top of them and do some other stuff and pray. Jesus commands a corpse to rise with a word. He speaks to a man that's died and that man, listen, that man heard him. That needs to say something to you about your theology of death. If you think that it's all over at death and just you cease to be, the Bible disagrees. This man was somewhere, his soul was somewhere and he heard the voice of Jesus. Verse 15, and the dead man, I love the way Luke puts this, the dead man sat up and began to speak. And Jesus gave him to his mother. So I think what's happening here is Jesus is summoning this man's soul and reuniting his soul with his body. So only one with power and authority over life and death, the body and soul, cosmic powers could do this. Could turn death backward. Death's got a pretty good track record at this point. But J.C. Ryle says it this way, that the prince of peace is stronger than the king of terrors. And that though death, the last enemy, is mighty, he is not so mighty as the sinner's friend, as Jesus Christ. So Jesus contradicts all that nature teaches about the finality of death. And Luke's language captures it so well. The dead man sat up and began to speak. Who spoke? The dead man. Who's talking? The dead man. Who's sitting up? The dead man. One author I read summarized this section as dead man talking. Dead people don't sit up. Dead people don't talk. And this is the opinion of a doctor. Luke's medical professional opinion. He was actually dead. He's careful to stick to the facts. Now he's sitting up and talking. They could lower the beer. All funeral services canceled for today. Morning turned to dancing at the word of Jesus. Again, there are three times this happens in the Gospels. All based on a command by Jesus, by his word, life comes. All public. The news spreads. In other words, these are verifiable cases of dead people being made alive. About a century after Jesus lived or Jesus did these things, an early church apologist named Quadratus said this, The persons who were healed and those who were raised from the dead by Jesus were not only seen when they were healed and raised, but were always present also afterwards. And not merely during the time that the Savior walked upon the earth, but after his departure also. They were still there for a considerable time. So that some of them lived even until our times. We kind of read this and we think this guy just kind of walked off into thin air, but no, he lived a life. People, could you go have coffee with him? Of course, he eventually died. That's why we tend to classify miracles like this as resuscitations and not resurrections, which would differ from Jesus' own resurrection. The Holy Spirit gives him a glorious new immortal body. The people Jesus raised from the dead did not receive a new resurrected body. But this points to that. that's coming. It's a commercial for what's coming and what's coming is the death of death, finally and forever. The death of death in Christ. Jesus came to defeat death by dying for sinners, by dying himself, by taking the punishment that we deserve on the cross which is the wrath of God For all that would put their faith and trust in him, Jesus takes it on himself, absorbs it, dies, and three days later rises from the grave himself over sin and death victoriously. And then says, I rose, and that is a promise and a preview for all those that trust in me, you too will rise. Friend, is that your hope? Is that your hope? Jesus means to give you more than his sympathy. He is absolutely a sympathetic high priest. He is absolutely carrying your burdens because in the sense that he's with you in your suffering, but he is doing more than that. He is rescuing you for eternity. He died on the cross to finally purchase you forever. He wants you to have not just life on earth, but eternal life. Life that will never end, that is indestructible. Would you call on him? Would you call on him and receive the gift that is his life, death and resurrection? Would you turn from your sins and put your faith and trust in Jesus? This life is not all there is. True life is found in Jesus. That's what this man is experiencing. Friends, this is our story. We were all in this funeral procession heading to the tomb before Jesus interrupted us and said, no, you're mine. Rise up out of the grave. And if you know Jesus Christ, it's because you heard his voice and you responded in faith. I love that phrase in verse 15. Jesus' compassion, you see where his heart is, where he's focused and he gave him back to his mother. He gave him to his mother. That's verbatim. It's a verbatim match of 1 Kings 17.23 in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament. Verbatim. That section in the story of Elijah giving back the widow her son. That was a preview of this day and Jesus saying this is a preview of the last day. A relationship or relationships that have been broken by death will one day be restored by Jesus Christ. So our parting with loved ones who are in Christ is not for long. It is not for long. It is only temporary. On that fateful day, Jesus will raise our bodies in glory and then we will be united, reunited with the ones that we have lost in Christ. Jesus gave him to his mother as a gift. Life after death is a gift and she receives it. I can't imagine how she received it. What a happy day. What a happy reunion that awaits us, beloved. Who are you waiting to greet in glory? Great motivation for evangelism. Friend, I just want to see you in glory. I want you to be with me in glory forever. Paul says that when the Lord comes, the dead in Christ will rise. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them, with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air so that we will always be with the Lord. Therefore, he says, encourage one another with these words. Beloved, be encouraged. Be encouraged. In that day, you will have joy and comfort unimaginable. That's a ground for comfort. It's not a platitude. It's something you can anchor your life in. Unimaginable joy and comfort. And Jesus will look at you then, just like he looked at the widow and said, do not cry. Wipe away your tears. Revelation 21 for it'll be our benediction today. All tears gone, all sorrow gone, death no more. So we have comfort to give those who are hurting. We can be grounded in this hope. Blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted. He could tell her to not cry because he was going to go conquer the death that caused her sorrow. That's our comfort. And one day we will hear that voice again. and we will be raised to eternal life. That should lead us to worship and it should lead us to witness. That's our last observation. Number three, the Lord is worthy of worship and witness. We completely understand the response that Luke records here in verse 16. I'd be right along with them. Fear sees them all. And they glorified God saying, a great prophet has arisen among us and God has visited his people. So they were in awe. I think that's what this fear communicates. It's not not exactly a fear of a grizzly bear. But it is coming into the presence of the holy. God showed up. And the response is awe, arrested attention and worship. reverential fear and worship of the one true God for what Jesus has done. Amen. And they praise Jesus. Notice what they say to Jesus. He's a great prophet who's arisen among us. They're not wrong. He echoes the pattern of ministry of Elijah and Elisha. There will be some later who say he is Elijah. We see how they got there. And yes, God had visited his people. This was the prophecy from Zechariah about Jesus before he was born in Luke 1, 68. Blessed be the Lord of Israel, for he has visited and redeemed his people. And he has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant, David. Amen. Hallelujah. But Jesus is more than a prophet. In fact, that's John's question. It leads into the next section. Are you the one or should we look for someone else? Not just a prophet, but the long-awaited prophet, the Messiah. And this visitation from God is more than just sending a messenger, but it is God himself in the flesh, in their very presence in Jesus Christ. So they're using the highest language that they can possibly have, that they have in their vocabulary to describe what's happening, and it still misses the mark. Actually, friends, we know that if you have folks in your life that you're ministering to and loving that say things like that we honor Jesus as a great prophet or we really respect Jesus as for his teaching that his high morality and those things and they leave it there. It's absolute blasphemy. He is Lord. He is God. He is the only way to the Father. He has conquered sin and death and risen from the grave, and he is worthy of our worship. We gather each week on the Lord's Day because Jesus was raised on Sunday. We gather here to celebrate. He is risen to come in reverence and awe and joy and anticipation, worshiping the person of God's Son. and glorifying him for the gift of resurrection life. What a privilege and a joy as we gather to worship and as we go and scatter to share the good news. He's glorious and wonderful, too glorious and wonderful to keep to ourselves. Notice what they do. Verse 17. And this report about him spread through the whole of Judea and all the surrounding country. Good news travels. When we believe the good news about the cross and the resurrection, it's natural that we should spread the report. A dead man is alive. When we evangelize, we are essentially doing this, spreading the report that Jesus is alive. The last enemy to be destroyed has been destroyed. Jesus has overcome it. Death is real. Because of sin, we know it's real and it's horrible, but it's not the end. Jesus offers real eternal life. When was the last time you spoke to someone else about the resurrection of Jesus? That you spread the report. You don't need to overcomplicate it. Tell the news. Explain what happened. With expectation that Jesus would do what he does here in this story, make a dead man alive, a dead woman alive by his grace. Wake them up to who he is. Give them eyes to see. Jesus is Lord. All this because of his great compassion. He did not leave us in our sin. Because of his authority over death and the grave, we worship him. We call others to him and we walk through this broken journey of life that sometimes feels like a funeral procession with great hope. Great hope. And here's the hope. First Corinthians 1554, when the perishable puts on the imperishable and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written, death is swallowed up in victory. Oh, death, where is your victory? Oh, death, where is your sting? The sting of death is sin. The power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. The day is coming when Jesus will say to the dead in Christ, arise. And he will say to the living, weep no more because he's Lord. So may we look to that day. May we look to Jesus. Amen. Amen. Let's pray. Lord, there is nothing better to be caught up in the praise of your name. The self-forgetting praise that looks to your glory, that looks to your love and your compassion for sinners who were dead in trespasses and sins and you have made alive in Christ Jesus. So Lord, we pray we would just live here. We pray that we would be reminded Lord, of the ironclad hope that we have, no matter how bad it may seem, no matter how deep the loss may be, we can hang all our hopes on your promises, all our hopes on you, that you are coming again. You'll wipe away every tear. You'll bring the dead to life. Lord, we pray that we would be faithful stewards of this message. May this church be a lighthouse for the gospel. that many, many, many would come to know Jesus. We pray in His holy, powerful name. Amen.