Our passage of scripture this morning as we continue through the gospel of John is John chapter 20, and I'll be reading verses one through 10. John 20, verses one through 10. Now on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb early. while it was still dark and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb. Then she ran and came to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved and said to them, they have taken away the Lord out of the tomb and we do not know where they have laid him. Peter therefore went out of the other disciple and were going to the tomb. So they both ran together. The other disciple outran Peter and came to the tomb first. And he, stooping down and looking in, saw the linen cloths lying there. Yet he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came following him and went into the tomb. And he saw the linen cloths lying there. And the handkerchief that had been around his head not lined with the linen clothes, but folded together in a place by itself. Then the other disciple who came to the tomb first went in also, and he saw and believed. For as yet they did not know the scripture, that he must rise again from the dead. Then the disciples went away again to their own homes. The title of my message to you this morning is Running for a Risen Lord. And as I looked at this sermon, as I studied it, I think it's a sermon that the preacher needs to preach to himself. So I am preaching this to me as much as I'm preaching it to all of you. I became a Christian, a real Christian, when I was in college, and before I was a Christian, I was a runner. And I was so devoted to running that when I first became a Christian, I wondered if too much of my time was spent running and not studying the Bible, Scripture, and all of this. And I remember I started memorizing verses, Scripture verses while I ran, and I remember I was 20 years old when I read this passage before Easter, before Resurrection Sunday. And reading this, I was inspired to try to kind of act it out on Easter morning. And my girlfriend at the time, who actually lived 10 miles from me was Well, she lived about 10 miles from where I was and I actually looked up on a map, on Google Maps to make sure this was correct. It's about 10 miles from my house where I was and where my girlfriend was. And there were several people in the church on the way between her and me. And so Easter morning, I don't remember when it was I got up, but I ran. all the way from my house to her house and stopping at several other houses on the way of different church members. And every time I knocked on the door, I would say to the church member, he has risen. and basically give them an Easter greeting, and then get back on my way running all the way until I got to my girlfriend's house, which was around 10 miles away, and basically gave her a greeting. She wanted to give me a ride back, and I said, no, I have to run it back. And so it was 10 miles there and about 10 miles back, and I was definitely in better shape than I am now. So one of my applications from this message is, you know, you need to start exercising again, no matter what. And I remember being super excited about doing this. I still made it back in time for our Easter morning service at the church. I wasn't a pastor at the time, but very shortly I'd be preaching at a church, but that was earliest in my Christian life. And that was a thing I'll never forget doing. And maybe someday, by the grace of God, well, I'll run again. But I have to lose a lot of weight to do that. But whether I do that or not, we are all called to run spiritually. We're all called to be wholehearted for Christ. And that's what this message is about. But my first point is about Mary Magdalene. Mary Magdalene was faithful even when her faith was weak. She ran from the empty tomb. We read this in verses one and two in this chapter. It says, now on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb early while it was still dark and saw the stone that had been taken away from the tomb Then she ran and came to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved and said to them, they have taken away the Lord out of the tomb and we do not know where they have laid him. The first thing to notice about Mary Magdalene, it says that she went to the tomb early. She went to the tomb while it was still dark. It was early in the morning. The sun hadn't come up. This is to her credit. We read in the other gospels, if you read the other gospels, there are other ladies with her, but they go early. And she is the leader of them, I would guess, from what we see in John. And she was maybe the first there or even among those women. And the point here is there are faithful people. who, one, they very rarely ever miss church, and they are there Sunday morning, Sunday evening, Wednesday evening, and they aim to be at everything, and often they are, like Mary Magdalene, early to things. We've had people like this in our church. When I first started here, Sidney Gale was always the first person here, and I'm not counting myself. Sometimes I might be here before him, but even me, as early as I would come, he was often there before I was because he'd be sweeping out in front to make sure that the entryway was clean. And Erica O'Connor was an early one after Sidney died. She became the first one along with my mother and several other people that came early. And today we have a lot of people that come early in the morning, they help set up. There was a time there when I had to pull everything out myself, but now there's so many people setting things up, it's a lot easier on me. And I remember my first church, that I was a full-time pastor. Actually, I wasn't a full-time, I was an interim pastor in Anson, Missouri. And sometimes I would get there 40 minutes early before the service. And there were two older ladies. And one of them, I'm pretty sure her name was Mabel, as far as I remember. I'm not remembering the other one's name, but I remember seeing a cartoon And I think I still have the cartoon cut out and taped in one of my books upstairs, but I couldn't find it. But the cartoon shows two older ladies and it's snowing. And in the cartoon, the snow is up to the steeple of the church. So the whole church is buried under snow. And the two ladies approach the steeple and they say, it looks like there might not be church today, Mabel. There are people that are that committed, and they are always there, and we're thankful for that. And Mary was that kind of person. Here she is, the first person that is at the tomb of Christ. Notice, she's not expecting that he's gonna be risen. She's probably there to put more perfume on his body. Her devotion to Christ was likely based on how she saw herself in relation to him. He had done her great good, and we all have that in our case. In Luke 8-2, it says, in certain women who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities, Mary called Magdalene, out of whom had come seven demons. And so God had cast seven demons out of her. And if she had seven demons in her, probably before she was saved, she was not your typical godly churchgoer. She was probably a very, very wicked person. And yet God had saved her from that. And we read in Luke 7, 47 about a similar lady. It says, Jesus is saying, but to whom much is forgiven, much, there is much love. It actually says, therefore I say to you, her sins which are many are forgiven, for she loved much. Those who are forgiven much and know they are forgiven much, love much. But to whom little is forgiven, the same loves little. And if we understand how much Christ has forgiven us, then we love him more typically, because we see he's done great things for us. This love is shown. In John 20 verse 1 and Mary's getting to the tomb first and early. I think this is probably a habit of hers and this love is shown in 20 verse 2 when she sees that Jesus's body is not there. She just doesn't casually, oh, he's not there. She runs to the disciples. It says, then she ran and came to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved and said to them, and she tells them about the empty tomb. And notice this is another characteristic of somebody who loves Jesus. She goes to other people who love Jesus. She didn't say, oh, he's been pulled out of the tomb. I better go to Pilate because he's the official. She went immediately to the people she knew who loved Jesus. John loves Jesus like Mary did because Jesus loved him first as we read 1 John 4 19 says we love him because he first loved us and Peter loved too though he realized the weakness of his own love when we get to chapter 21 verses 15 through 17 Jesus asked Peter three times, do you love me? Do you love me? Do you love me? If you remember three times, Peter had denied him. And we'll talk about that more when we get to that chapter. But Peter did say, I love you, Lord. But not in the way that Jesus asked. Not in the way that he thought he loved him before. Anyway, point number two, Peter and John who are leaders among the apostles, when they heard what Mary said, they raced towards the empty tomb. John is this other disciple. John never mentions himself in his own book. And he being younger of the two, outruns Peter to the tomb. Peter might've been the oldest of the disciples. I'm not sure about that, but I'm almost certain that John was the youngest of all the disciples. And it says here in verses 3 and 4, Peter therefore went out and the other disciple and they were going to the tomb. So they ran together and the other disciple outran Peter and came to the tomb first. And yet while he arrived at the tomb first, He waited for his elder, Peter, to lead the way in. It says, and he stooping down and looking in saw the linen cloths lying there, yet he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came following him and went into the tomb, and he saw the linen twos lying there, and the handkerchief that had been around his head, not lying with the linen cloths, but folded together in a place by itself. And so here's the picture. It's pretty. Every little detail is described here, I believe, because John was there. That's why he knew all these details. The other disciple, John, arrives first. He peeks into the tomb. He sees that the linen clothes are empty. Jesus isn't in them, but he doesn't go into the tomb. It is Peter that goes in and gives a closer examination. Peter may have been first to go in, and yet we read here, John is the first to believe. Verse eight, it says, then the other disciple who came to the tomb first went in also, and he saw and believed. For as yet they did not know the scripture that he must rise again from the dead. Here, what this means is John, as soon as he saw that the grave clothes were empty, he believed that Jesus had risen from the dead. And here it says, they had not heard the scripture and did not know the scripture that Jesus must rise. Now, if we go back into the gospels, you'll see places where Jesus told them that he was gonna rise, but maybe they weren't remembering that They hadn't thought about it enough to impact them when they saw his dead body. When they watched him die on the cross, they weren't ready for him to resurrect. But John, even though he hasn't seen the risen Christ, as soon as he sees the empty grave claws, he believes. He knows Jesus has risen from the dead, and he's excited about that. John believes before he fully understood the scripture about the resurrection. And many of us may be like that. Obviously, we haven't seen Jesus risen, and yet we believe. And maybe when we're first believers, we don't understand everything in scripture, but we still love him. We still want to follow him. We still want to grow in that grace. And I see that was the case with John. It's appropriate that John also writes this gospel, which probably as much as any other book in the Bible, encourages true saving faith. One of the reasons that Sermon Audio sends out Gospel of Johns, one of the reasons that we as a church decided to send out Gospels of John into our community, if you don't know it, we send out 10,000 of them, 10,000 one year, 10,000 another year. And the reason is that book more than any other in the scripture is one that is about how to become a real, true, believing Christian. And so we see this in verses 30 and 31. We haven't got there yet, but chapter 20, the same chapter we're on, it says, and truly Jesus did many other signs, meaning miracles, in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book, but these are written, that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you might have life in his name. This is the whole purpose of preaching on the Gospel of John is that people would have true saving faith. It's the whole purpose that we should read this Gospel, that we would have true saving faith. And it's very interesting, the first person that seems to believe that Jesus had risen from the dead is the Apostle John who wrote this Gospel. There doesn't mean other people didn't believe before him. Obviously, Abraham even was a believer before this time. But this is the one who believes that Jesus has risen. Point number three, running like they did. Back when I was a runner, The first sermon I ever preached in any church was based on 1 Corinthians 9, 24, and 27, which says, do you not know that those who run in a race run all, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it. And everyone who competes for the prize is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a perishable crown, but we for an imperishable crown. Therefore I run thus. not with uncertainty. Thus I fight not as one who beats the air, but I discipline my body and bring it into subjection, lest when I preached others, I myself should become disqualified. At the time when I first preached that, I was a runner, not only just a runner, but in high school I'd run so much and was known in the community, so the little church I preached to knew who I was. And that was my first sermon. But Paul was writing to an Olympic world. And so when he writes in 1 Corinthians 9, he's talking about the Olympics, the real Olympics that they had in those days. And those athletes, just like today's athletes, used extreme measures in order to prepare. And they, obviously worked hard to win the Olympics, and at that time they had a perishable crown. It says the crown they won was actually a crown, and it was a crown of laurel leaves, and they were literal leaves, so they're very perishable. If you've ever collected a leaf, you know that it's not gonna last forever. It's gonna dry and it's gonna get hard very quickly. And so it wasn't even as solid as gold as what they get now, but it was a temporary prize. And he says, what they ran for was a temporary prize, but what we run for is an eternal prize. And I believe when, Paul is speaking here. He's speaking, not talking about running physically. I believe if I never run again in this life, physically I can still run spiritually. Running is when you're doing something faster. Running is when you're doing something with a lot of effort. It's less effort to walk than it is to run and spiritually we're putting more running in. Obviously Mary and Peter and John were literally running. Paul is speaking about metaphorically running in a race. Some of us maybe can run, literally. I mean, the youngest people here can. And all of us, if enabled by God and his spirit, can run spiritually. I believe this is what is spoken of in Isaiah 40, verse 31, when it says, but those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings like eagles. They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint. In that chapter it says, even the young men get tired. Even they can't do everything they want. But when God's spirit is working in us, when that power is working for us, we can do beyond what we would normally be able to do. And most of us, if we're just, On our own, just naturally, we can't do a whole lot. It's hard to pray, it's hard to read the word, it's hard even to listen to a sermon. John Bunyan, who wrote Pilgrim's Progress, writes, run, John, run. The law demands, but gives us neither feet nor hands. For better news, the gospel brings. It bids us fly and gives us wings. And when I think about what he's saying about flying, it says, they shall mount up with wings as eagles in Isaiah 40, 31. And I think this is spiritually talking about us rising up with God. us being so devoted to God that we are drawn toward heavenly things, that we see them as well as we see earthly things. And that is hard for us because even Paul says now we see in like in a mirror darkly or dimly or as like a glass dimly, we don't see God perfectly. We have to struggle with being heavy or being older or these things slow us down physically and sometimes they can slow us down spiritually. But God enables us in spite of that to go for Him, to be strong for Him. What are some ways that we might run spiritually? Well, more Bible reading, more Bible study, verse memory. You know, every Sunday morning I read a new Bible verse. And I'm not going to ask you all, how many of you have memorized all of those verses that we've given? Or how many of you have memorized some of those? But if we, you know, I wasn't the one who had the idea. of putting the Bible verse in there to memorize. It was Joyce Gross. She said, well, you should have a Bible verse to memorize every week. And we should do that. We should memorize that. I'm aiming at memorizing it every week. I do do that. And I read the Bible and I study, but I know I can do more. I can be more fervent, not just in verse memory, but also meditation on the word. In the first psalm, it talks about meditating on God's word day and night. Blessed is the man, it says, who walks not on the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is in the law. Meaning he loves it. And he meditates in it day and night. So if he wakes up, and I wake up at night a lot of times, in the middle of the night, he goes to scripture. Or it comes to mind. More prayer, a prayer meeting, a prayer list. I'm very happy we have a great prayer meeting on Wednesday nights. And you can join us there. We're thinking of doing other things with prayer, but praying on our own too. Even if nobody else is with you, you can pray to God. And how are we doing that with that? Can we improve our prayer life? More church or more Bible study, more prayer meeting, more Sunday evening. How can we do with these? Sharing the gospel with unsafe friends and loved ones, and being creative about it maybe. This time of year, as we enter the holidays, I think it's a good time to share the gospel with friends and relatives maybe that don't know the Lord because all you have to do is send a greeting card and write some Bible verses or share the gospel even more than just the verses in it. We have that opportunity at this time of year because Christmas should be about Christ and Thanksgiving is about God. And it's these are times where opportunity to share the gospel come. Heartwork, confession of sin. this passage should do this for all of us, because all of us probably fall short in one area or another. And so heart work means when you're looking in your heart, and I remember the first Christmas about that same time that I started running before that, the Christmas before I had really become a Christian, And I remember that Christmas was a serious time for me of looking in scripture and recommitting my life to Christ. And when we read about how Peter and John and Mary loved the Lord, even before he's resurrected, they're running here, running there, running, because why were they running? Because he was important to them. They didn't know he had risen. It even says here, Mary is saying, they took our Lord. They took his body. And so she was probably more upset than she was excited. But still she ran to the other disciples. She didn't try to find out on her own who stole the body. And you could say, well, Mary, she had a lack of faith. Even when she was the first one who sees there is in Christ. And at first it says, and we'll get to this in the coming weeks. It says she thought he was the gardener. She didn't realize it was him. And you probably can understand how that is. She really knew who he was. but she wasn't expecting him to be risen. But he had risen. And when they found out he had risen from the dead, and later he talked to his disciples and he met with others, we see the early Christian church, they were wholehearted. You could say, whether they were physically running or not, look at Acts 2. Look at Acts 2.42 through the end of that chapter. They were meeting every day. They were constantly devoted to the apostles' teaching. They were fervently praying, and God blessed their early church with a great deal of growth. Why? Because they were wholehearted in their faith and God was answering their prayers. And so that running, that's what that is. It's a spiritual running more than a physical running and we can all do that. Well, let's pray. Father, we thank you for this passage. We thank you for the things that it shows us about Mary and about Peter and John. And they were all running that day when you had resurrected from the dead, when Jesus had resurrected. And they were running, why? Because they loved him. They were running, not knowing that he had risen yet, but they were, I believe they were empowered by that. and they were empowered by loving and caring for your son, our Lord Jesus. Father, help us to be empowered by your Holy Spirit. Help us to be more wholehearted in our service of you. We pray these things in Jesus' name, amen.