salvation

The New Tomb and the Folded Grave Clothes

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, salvation Leave a comment

Now in the place where He was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid. -John 19:41

Christopher Ness says, when Christ was born, He lay in a virgin’s womb, and when He died, He was placed in a virgin tomb; He slept where never man had slept before. The reason was that none might say that another person rose, for there never had been any other body there, thus a mistake of persons was impossible. Nor could it be said that some old prophet was interred in the place, and that Christ rose because He had touched his bones. You remember where Elisha was buried; and as they were burying a man, behold he touched the prophet’s bones and arose. Christ touched no prophet’s bones, for none had ever slept there; it was a new chamber where the monarch of the earth did take His rest for three days and three nights.

(L)et us stoop down once more before we leave the grave, and notice something else. We see the grave, but do you notice the grave-clothes, all wrapped and laid in their places, the napkin being folded up by itself? Wherefore are the grave-clothes wrapped up? The Jews said robbers had abstracted the body; but if so, surely they would have stolen the clothes; they would never have thought of wrapping them up and laying them down so carefully; they would be too much in haste to think of it. Why was it then? To manifest to us that Christ did not come out in a hurried manner. He slept till the last moment; then He awoke; He came not in haste. They shall not come out in haste, neither by flight, but at the appointed moment shall His people come to Him.  ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0018.cfm

The Borrowed Tomb

Sherry Character of Jesus, salvation Leave a comment

And Joseph took the body and wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, and laid it in his own new tomb, which he had hewn out in the rock -Matthew 27:59-60

Yes, He was buried in another’s sepulchre. He who had no house of His own, and rested in the habitation of other men; who had no table, but lived upon the hospitality of His disciples; who borrowed boats in which to preach, and had not anything in the wide world, was obliged to have a tomb from charity. Oh! should not the poor take courage? They dread to be buried at the expense of their neighbors, but if their poverty be unavoidable, wherefore should they blush, since Jesus Christ Himself was interred in another’s grave? Ah! I wish I might have had Joseph’s grave to let Jesus be buried in it. Good Joseph thought he had cut it out for himself, and that he should lay his bones there. He had it excavated as a family vault, and lo, the Son of David makes it one of the tombs of the kings. But he did not lose it by lending it to the Lord; rather, he had it back with precious interest. He only lent it three days; then Christ resigned it; He had not injured, but perfumed and sanctified it, and made it far more holy, so that it would be an honor in future to be buried there.

It was a borrowed tomb; and why? I take it, not to dishonor Christ, but in order to show that, as His sins were borrowed sins, so His burial was in a borrowed grave. Christ had no transgressions of His own; He took ours upon His head; He never committed a wrong, but He took all my sin, and all yours, if ye are believers; concerning all His people, it is true, He bore their griefs and carried their sorrows in His own body on the tree; therefore, as they were others’ sins, so He rested in another’s grave; as they were sins imputed, so that grave was only imputedly His. It was not His sepulchre; it was the tomb of Joseph.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0018.cfm

Come, for Angels Bid You

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation Leave a comment

“Come, see the place where our Lord lay.” -Matthew 28:6

Angels said, “Come, see the place where the Lord lay.” The Syriac version reads, “Come, see the place where our Lord lay.” Yes, angels put themselves with those poor women, and used one common pronoun-our. Jesus is the Lord of angels as well as of men. Ye feeble women-ye have called Him Lord, ye have washed His feet, ye have provided for His wants, ye have hung upon His lips to catch His honeyed sentences, ye have sat entranced beneath His mighty eloquence; ye call Him Master and Lord, and ye do well; “But,” said the seraph, “He is my Lord too;” bowing his head, he sweetly said, “Come, see the place where our Lord lay.”

Come, for it is a pure and healthy place. Fear not to enter that tomb. I will admit that catacombs are not the places where we, who are full of joy, would love to go. There is something gloomy and noisome about a vault. there are noxious smells of corruption; oft-times pestilence is born where a dead body hath lain; but fear it not, Christian, for Christ was not left in hell-in Hades-neither did His body see corruption. Come, there is no scent, yea, rather a perfume. Step in here, and, if thou didst ever breathe the gales of Ceylon, or winds from the groves of Araby, thou shalt find them far excelled by that sweet, holy fragrance left by the blessed body of Jesus; that alabaster vase which once held divinity, and was rendered sweet and precious thereby…Come then, Christian, summon up thy thoughts, gather all thy powers; here is a sweet invitation, let me press it again. Let me lead thee by the hand of meditation, my brother; let me take thee by the arm of thy fancy, and let me again say to thee, “Come, see the place where the Lord lay.”~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0018.cfm

Come to the Tomb of Jesus

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation Leave a comment

“Come, see the place where the Lord lay.”- Matthew 28:6

Every circumstance connected with the life of Christ is deeply interesting to the Christian mind. Wherever we behold our Saviour, He is well worthy of our notice.

“His cross, His manger, and His crown,
Are big with glories yet unknown.”

All His weary pilgrimage, from Bethlehem’s manger to Calvary’s cross, is, in our eyes, paved with glory. Each spot upon which He trod is, to our souls, consecrated at once, simply because there the foot of earth’s Saviour and our own Redeemer once was placed. When He comes to Calvary, the interest thickens; then our best thoughts are centered on Him in the agonies of crucifixion, nor does our deep affection permit us to leave Him, even when, the struggle being over, He yields up the ghost… By faith we discern Joseph of Arimathea, and the timid Nicodemus, assisted by those holy women, drawing out the nails and taking down the mangled body; we behold them wrapping Him in clean, white linen, hastily girding Him round with belts of spices; then putting Him in His tomb, and departing for the Sabbath rest…Ask me the greatest man who ever lived-I tell you the Man Christ Jesus was “anointed with the oil of gladness above His fellow.” If ye seek a chamber honored as the resting-place of genius, turn in hither; if ye would worship at the grave of holiness, come ye here; if ye would see the hallowed spot where the choicest bones that e’er were fashioned lay for awhile, come with me, Christian, to that quiet garden, hard by the walls of Jerusalem.

Oh! in pensive sorrow come with me to this dark garden of our Saviour’s burial; come to the grave of your best friend-your brother, yea, one who “sticketh closer than a brother.” Come thou to the grave of thy dearest relative, O Christian, for Jesus is thy husband, “Thy Maker is thy husband, the Lord of Hosts is His name.” Doth not affection draw you? Do not the sweet lips of love woo you? Is not the place sanctified where one so well-beloved slept, although but for a moment ? Surely ye need no eloquence; if it were needed I have none. I have but the power, in simple, but earnest accents, to repeat the words, “Come, see the place where the Lord lay.”~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0018.cfm

This Promise is Ours

Sherry Attributes of God, Christian Life, prayer, promises, salvation Leave a comment

…And I will cause showers to come down in their season; they will be showers of blessing. -Ezekiel 34:26

“I will give thee showers of blessing.” The word is in the plural. All kinds of blessings God will send. The rain is all of one kind when it comes; but grace is not all of one kind, or it does not produce the same effect. When God sends rain upon the church, He “sends showers of blessing.” There are some ministers who think, that if there is a shower on their church, God will send a shower of work. Yes, but if He does, He will send a shower of comfort. Others think that God will send a shower of gospel truth. Yes, but if He sends that, He will send a shower of gospel holiness. For all God’s blessings go together. They are like the sweet sister graces that danced hand in hand. God sends showers of blessings. If He gives comforting grace, He will also give converting grace; if He makes the trumpet blow for the bankrupt sinner, He will also make it sound a shout of joy for the sinner that is pardoned and forgiven. He will send “showers of blessing.”

Well, then, if the promise is ours, the precept is ours, as much as the promise. Ought we not to ask God to continue to make us a blessing?… Only let us together strive, without variance. Let us labor for Jesus. Never did men have so fair an opportunity, for the last hundred years. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0028.cfm

Plenteous Grace

Sherry Attributes of God, Christian Life, promises, salvation Leave a comment

And yet He has not left Himself without witness, doing good, giving to you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling your hearts with food and gladness.” -Acts 14:17

“I will give them showers.” What would the ground do without showers? You may break the clods, you may sow your seeds; but what can you do without the rain? Ah! you may prepare your barn, and sharpen your sickles; but your sickles will be rusted before you have any wheat, unless there are showers. They are needed. So is the divine blessing.

If God gives a blessing, He usually gives it in such a measure that there is not room enough to receive it. Where are we going to hold God’s blessing that we have obtained already? …Plenteous grace! Ah! we shall want plenteous grace, my friends; plenteous grace to keep us humble, plenteous grace to make us prayerful, plenteous grace to make us holy, plenteous grace to make us zealous, plenteous grace to make us truthful, plenteous grace to preserve us through this life, and at last to land us in heaven. We cannot do without showers of grace. How many are there here that have been dry in a shower of grace? ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0028.cfm

Our Influence

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation Leave a comment

That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. -Galatians 3:14

None of us can bless others unless God has first blessed us. We need divine workmanship. “I will make them a blessing by helping them, and by constraining them.” God makes His people a blessing by helping them. What can we do without God’s help? I stand and preach to thousands, or it may be hundreds; what have I done, unless a greater than man has been in the pulpit with me? I work in the Sabbath Schools; what can I do, unless the Master is there, teaching the children with me? We want God’s aid in every position; and once give us that assistance, and there is no telling with how little labor we may become a blessing. Ah! a few words sometimes will be more of a blessing than a whole sermon. You take some little prattler on your knee; and some few words that you say to him he remembers, and makes use of in after years. I knew a gray-headed old man, who was in the habit of doing this. He once took a boy to a certain tree, and said, “Now, John, you kneel down at that tree, and I will kneel down with you.” He knelt down and prayed, and asked God to convert him and save his soul. “Now,” said he, “perhaps you will come to this tree again; and if you are not converted, you will remember that I asked under this tree that God would save your soul.” That young man went away, and forgot the old man’s prayer; but it chanced as God would have it that he walked down that field again, and saw a tree. It seemed as if the old man’s name was cut in the bark. He recollected what he prayed for, and that the prayer was not fulfilled; but he dare not pass the tree without kneeling down to pray himself; and there was his spiritual birthplace. The simplest observation of the Christian shall be made a blessing, if God help him. “His leaf also shall not wither”-the simplest word he speaks shall be treasured up; “and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.”~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0028.cfm