Easter Sunday, The World's Greatest Comeback

Turn in your Bibles this morning with me, if you would please, to Romans, the 8th chapter. Romans chapter 8. And our text this morning is just one verse of Scripture. Romans chapter 8, please. I hope you've read this morning the wonderful Easter story in John chapter 20 or Luke chapter 24. But if you haven't, do it when you leave here today. Read 1st Corinthians 15. Tremendous, tremendous promise. If you've been facing death in some way, a loved one, whatever, read 1st Corinthians 15. I tell you, you can't read it and not shout. Unless you're made that way. And I was going to say something about some of our backgrounds, but you can shout even with those backgrounds sometimes. Okay. Romans chapter 8 and verse 11. And if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who lives in you. You know, this is an amazing time of all kinds of unusual things taking place. Yesterday many of us completed a 36-hour fast as an expression to the Lord of our dependence upon Him for our power and the need that we sense for His provision of property. And following that service, a number of us went out to a local restaurant, a new restaurant in the area. And I want to tell you, I've seen hungry people before, but these people get out of their way, all right? And I made the mistake of telling some of the people in our church that we were going to this restaurant, and they all came, brought their families. So there was a horde of them there by the time I arrived. And our waitress, who was a very friendly and capable person, was, you know, already deluged with need. And as I have a want to do from time to time, I was beginning to tease her a bit, and I was, her number was number 54. And how many of you remember a television show, Car 54, Where Are You? Well, I started saying things that I shouldn't have said, like, you know, Girl 54, where are you? And we were having quite a time talking about, are we going to get this breakfast together, and so on. Well, the food came, and it wasn't all that long. But by this point, you have to see, you know, our eyes were like pulsating, and we're really, I'm talking really hungry. And she brought the food out, and she started saying some things about Easter. We said, well, isn't it going to be great? She said, tomorrow, I'm going to go and buy my Easter baskets, and get my eggs, and my candy, and all that stuff. And, you know, I turned into my spiritual mode, and I said, well, are you going to be in church on Sunday? And she said, well, yeah, I'm at work. And I said, well, that's great. Where are you going to go? And she said, well, that church down behind David Weiss. Well, you know, I've heard some good things about that church. I'd like to visit there myself. I don't know if you're here today, Miss, but I'm sure you felt just as aghast as I was when you walked in here today. Folks, we're talking big tip here. Oh, Lord. Well, my first setback of the Easter season, and as it were, I have to say to you today, church, we come, every one of us, having experienced setbacks from time to time, if not from one little source, then another. A teenager fails his driving tests twice, and his third time he passes it, he comes home, and on the way home, he wrecks the car. A setback. A mom leaves strict orders for the Kool-Aid to stay in the kitchen as she goes out to visit the neighbor, comes back, big red spot on the white carpet where someone wasn't listening. You see, yesterday, one of the brothers that's here in this service right now looking at me was here helping, putting the lights up and getting everything ready, and I'm in my office, and suddenly there's this crashing sound. It's like disaster. And here he was skydiving through the ceiling tile, hanging literally by one ankle. I mean, my heart was up in my mouth. I just couldn't believe it. A setback. He's here today. Praise the Lord. Today in our service, there are some people, I think of one right now whose setback was far more serious. Three years ago, a report of cancer came through very powerfully from the physicians. Her brother went into a very critical time of chemotherapy and extended doctoral care, and I can say today that that was a tremendous trial faith for him. Another person I'm thinking of here this morning got the news just two years ago that her husband had enough, and he was leaving for greener pastures. Another person that's here this morning just heard a few weeks ago that a job that was very secure is now no longer in existence. He's out of work. Dear ones, and we could go on. I think of Bill Heil and his testimony this morning. There's something that those four people all have in common beside their tragedy. What they've all experienced is the possibilities that open up in their life when they turn to Jesus Christ and let his strength become their power. Just even though they experience disappointment and loss and even a sense of loneliness and hurt and even despair, they've managed to turn their tragedies into triumphs, as we heard today. They've managed to turn their setbacks into comebacks. And I want to talk to you today about the world's greatest comeback. You know, when we think of comebacks, what automatically comes to our mind? Sports. We think of sports. We think of the Pirates, 1971-1979. Three games to one down in the World Series. Remember that? Boy, I was cheering for him. I had a friend in Baltimore in 1979. He was laughing, calling me after every game, yeah, you're gonna lose. And the Pirates came back and won the World Series, 1979. Well, I sometimes associate comebacks with business. You know, you were here, America, for Chrysler. Now, Chrysler's here for you. Great comeback story in the business world. Or think of NASA after the Challenger disaster. I mean, the bottom fell out. Terrible things. The nation was in shock. And two years later, the comeback, as discovery took off and reignited NASA's efforts. But in my mind, the greatest comebacks are in the lives of people. Individuals who, through courage and perseverance and the ability to hang in there when it gets really tough, those individuals stand to me as the examples of true comebacks that we ought to all look. Think of, for example, Greg Louganis. How many remember when he hit his head on that diving board? That hurt me. Did that hurt you when it happened? I just feel that. And he came back and won two gold medals in that same Olympics. Or think of Joni Erikson, Tata, who at age 17, an athlete in a very popular girl in school, dove into a shallow lake bed and fractured her neck and is paralyzed from the neck down, no use of any limbs. And now today, paints beautifully with her mouth. Paintings and cards and all those kinds of things. You see, these are comebacks that inspire faith in me. But dear ones, they are all comebacks that have taken their inspiration from the world's greatest comeback. The one whom we are here to celebrate today, the one who in the grave bore on his body the very anger and wrath of the whole world. The sin of the world was upon him, beaten beyond recognition, whipped on his back, blood flowing from his brow. Sunk down in that tomb and left for dead, Jesus became the world's greatest comeback. He proved that hell's legions could not keep him there. He proved that there was life after death. He proved that forever death was not the final word. And I don't care how old you are today, you need to know with certainty that death is not the final word. Jesus is the comeback champion. And because the Bible says that same spirit that raised him from the dead lives in us, we too have the possibility for a comeback today. And I want to talk to you today about comebacks in your life. I want you to know something. If you've experienced a setback, if you're crushed in spirit this morning, I want you to know something. The Bible says that God is near to you. The Bible says that God draws near to the broken-hearted. Psalm 51 and verse 17. The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart, O God, thou will not despise. If God hated setbacks, he would have walked away from those twelve disciples who forsook him. But he draws near to them even as demonstrated by his appearance following his resurrection. I want to share with you very briefly three ways that God wants to bring you in a comeback today. The first way is a comeback from shattered self-worth. Now, you wouldn't think in a room with all these people looking so wonderful and and seeming so happy that there'd be any problem here with self-worth, but I want you to know the more I go on in ministry, 18 years now in ministry, the more I realize that many people are constantly battling with self-worth. We haven't discovered how to just be free to accept ourselves as God loves us. We haven't learned what little kids seem to know so well. I know of a person who during a violent thunderstorm, you know, lightning flashing and thunderclaps, went up to check on his little four-year-old daughter. Ran up the steps and there she was spread eagle on the windowsill with her hands and feet up against the window looking outside in the lightning. And she says, what are you doing there? He said, oh daddy, I think God's trying to take my picture. Now she understood something about how much God loved her. I'm getting my attention here. Yanked her off there and said, honey, don't use a camera. I don't need you to do that. So many of us fail to see how much we really are worth to God. And we carry along something that someone said a few years ago or a parent did to us and whatever it might be the case, even though they must have been sincerely trying many times. Church, I'm amazed at how deeply we fall into patterns of despair and negative worth. You say, well, it's very hard for me to believe that God really loves me the way you're saying, because you don't know my life, some of you are thinking right now. You don't know how full of crud, how rotten I really am. I want to know, you want to know something? All of us are like the rest of us. I mean, we all have stuff in there. We all have enough rottenness that if we had to come in here based on our goodness, folks, the place would be just about empty. A couple of you'd be here, I'm sure. But as I look around here, every single one of us knows our own rottenness. I keep looking down here at this brother. I don't know why. We're all like that, aren't we? We all have it in us. We all have this this inclination to do wrong. Dear ones, I have good news for you today. Here's God's comeback. The Bible tells us that on the cross of Calvary, Jesus Christ hung there and because he was God's son, he absorbed everything in his flesh. Everything that was evil, everything that was vile, everything that was rotten and rebellious, he absorbed it all into his body. The punishment that God had meted out for sin, Jesus bore on his body. And the reason we can come here today and worship with liberty and freedom is because we have been set free from our rottenness and our failure. Second Corinthians 521 says, he who knew no sin became sin that we might become the righteousness of God. More than that, now listen, it gets better. Not only does God forgive your sin, listen, God also forgets it. I'm kind of glad God forgets about it. How many of you'd like to go to heaven if you didn't forget? I mean, I don't know how you imagine it, but I see it's something, you know, this giant amphitheater full of people. Now, Pastor Scott likes to make videos of people. He sneaks around and gets you when you're not expecting it and shows it to you on your birthday. Well, I can just imagine God, you know, we've been waiting for you up here, you know, preparing for the entrance and in we walk and he said dim the lights, it's time for the life of Jay Passamon right now. Oh, how many would be just a tad bit embarrassed if that began, if the heavenly video began to unroll and there was your life. There was every time you yelled at your kids and out of control. There's, you know, every time that you went somewhere you shouldn't have or did something you shouldn't have done. Dear ones, the Bible says that doesn't happen. For when they put the videotape in the tape player of heaven, it's blank. The Bible says that God has removed our sin as far as the east is from the west. As deep into the sea as you can go, that's where he's buried all of our sin. He doesn't remember it anymore. I don't know. I can't understand that. And there's one more thing that the Bible says about those who trust Christ. It says not only are you forgiven, not only has he forgotten your sin, but number three, it says that he's given you a garment of righteousness. He's come in and listen to this, all the things that Jesus did, all the good things, his obedience, his faith, all the good things, the Bible says God gives you that. He attributes to you his righteousness. How many think God is fair? No, he's not. He's beyond fair. He's merciful. If he was fair and just, we just, we wouldn't make it. He's beyond fair and just. He's merciful. And so I stand here before you today saying that God is going to receive you and when the videotape rolls in heaven, the blank part about your sin and then the part about your righteousness is going to come on. And I want to have you there with me when my part comes on. I want to have my wife there and I want to have her mom there. And every one of us can have that same experience. The righteousness of Christ is our gift. You see, if you're down on yourself, if you, if you think that you're, you have nothing to give God, that you're not worth his love, listen to what the Bible says. Romans 8 and verse 1, there is now therefore say it, no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. That's the promise of his word to us. When Jesus encountered the woman caught in the act of adultery, caught in the act, as guilty, a sin, what did he say to her? He said, go and sin no more. I don't condemn you. Don't do it anymore. Go and sin no more. Dear ones, no matter how far down you slipped, I want you to know that God is saying to you, come to me. I'll forgive your sin. I'll forget your sin. I'll give you a garment of righteousness. Go and sin no more. God's calling us back from the setback of shattered self-worth today. He's also, you're saying, why is he doing that? So I can become successful and I, you know, I can be, feel good about myself and walk around the world. The reason God wants you to know your value and your love and your worth to him is so that you, number two, can help others recover from the setback of severed relationships. You know, there's so much hurt, isn't there? There's so much hurt out there. I look around, I think of, I see so many of you I know, children leaving, spouses unfaithful, co-workers putting you down, stepping on you to go another rung in the ladder, and no one escapes it anymore. In my estimation, the greatest pain of the human soul is the pain of betrayal. If you've never been betrayed, you don't really know. See, Jesus even experienced betrayal. And severed relationships are a part of our culture. Fifty percent of the marriages that take place in this decade will end in divorce. And covenants will be broken. God desires to help you make a comeback from a severed relationship, and he wants you to be able to help another one make a comeback. Dear ones, as I look around here today, I see the potential for a revolution of love in this city. I see a potential for it. I see hundreds and hundreds of people through whom the love of Christ can flow toward those who don't know that there is an answer to their emptiness and loneliness and hurt. And if you're here today as one that's going through that period, keep in mind that God draws near to you in this time of being severed. He wants to fill in the void. And he may use the person right next to you to supply that love which you need. That's the key I want to get through today. God wants you to know how much you're loved so that you can love somebody else. Three weeks ago as I was ministering, a gal came up after the service. I had told a story about a young lady that had a difficult time leaving a negative relationship, a live-in relationship, and she sent me a little slip of paper with her name on it. She said, She said, And church, there are people in this room today that know what everything is like. There are people in this room that have experienced the pits of the pit. And you have been given the power of God in your heart to help others out of the pit of severed relationship. And that spirit that raised Jesus from the dead will help you to help them make a comeback. Satan needn't have our children. He needn't have our marriages. He needn't have our elderly. He needn't have those that have lost their jobs if those of us around them will come alongside and help them make their come. You know, we need to reach beyond it. And I have to tell you something. These people won't come to you normally in some kind of bright cheery little countenance. Most of the time they come to you behind the skin of a hurting, unattractive, depressing person. Why do you think Mother Teresa goes out in the streets of Calcutta? Does she wake up and say, Oh, another terrible day out there in the streets of Calcutta, you know, trying to serve the lepers? What does she do? Why does she do that? Well, she recounts time and time again when she shares her testimony how when she goes out in the streets, this is the kind of thing that happens. She says here, she said, I took one man off the street and gave him shelter. And he said to me that he'd been forced to live like an animal. But in our place of shelter, he would be able to die like an angel. And she said, when I looked into his eyes, I saw the eyes of Jesus. You see, when we look into the eyes of that one who's hurting, that one that's lost a spouse, has lost any hope of seeing their child come back in their own mind, all of it's a down turn. They're heading down into despair. When you look into their eyes, you see the eyes of Jesus calling out to you. And that scripture comes down through time and says to us, I was lonely and you visited me. I was hungry and you fed me. I was sick and you cared for me. Lord, when were you hungry and sick and lonely? When you did it to the least of these, my brothers. Church, Jesus won't appear to us in a glorious, glamorous, exalted fashion because we couldn't bear it. Revelation chapter one tells us that when John saw him that way, he fell to his feet, no dead, but he appears to you in the skin of a person and you have them right around you where you work. You know those people, the ones in your classrooms and in your neighborhoods who you just don't even like to be around. That's Jesus saying, love me, help me make my comeback. Number three, God wants to help every one of us from the setback of stolen dreams. I know something about all of you because I know something about me. You're like me and deep in your heart, and I've confirmed this in countless individual conversations. I look out there, see you men and you ladies, every one of you like me has a dream in your heart, something you want to do for God. You've come to realize that money isn't going to make it or that having a nice family, nice and neat, that's all that we do, just the little four of us or whatever it is, that God has put something in you that's bigger than just your own little world. And you have a dream. Jeremiah 29 11 says it this way. I know the plans I have for you. I know them. God says he has, if you want to use the word spiritually, he has a vision for your life. He has a plan for you, a call, a purpose for you to fulfill. It could be anything from starting a worldwide ministry to the simple fulfillment of launching your children off into a fruitful life and then turning and helping someone else do the same thing. Unfortunately, though, most of us give up on our dreams. Most of us never complete that which God calls us to do. Some of us make the mistake of looking to a person, to our spouse to make it happen, to someone on a television ministry. And we all know what happened when people looked at the wrong people. And God says, I am the one that gave you the dream. I am the one that will fulfill the dream in you. Let me tell you this morning, I know you have dreams. If we could each one rise, what would happen in this city? What would happen in this part of the country if a couple of thousand people began to fulfill their dreams in God? It'd be a revolution. It'd be a miracle. Where did you hear about it? Did you hear a speaker come in and he challenged you? Did you go to a place and watch someone working with kids and you said, I could do that? And you have a dream and you want to do it, but somehow you've heard someone say these words. That's unrealistic. I've never heard it. That's unrealistic. Now, we need to count the cost. We need to know that what our dream is may require a great deal of us. But dear ones, I want you to know something. With God, there are no dreams that are impossible. With God, the Bible says that everything is possible through him. And I know with confidence that today some of you here, and I have friends here that I've known for so long, you've had a dream and it hasn't come to pass. You're saying, well, I've heard you say that before, Pastor Jay. And if it was just Pastor Jay saying it, then I wouldn't listen to it either. But I want you to know God says to you today, bring me your broken and your stolen dreams and let me resurrect what I want to do in you. That's a message for some people today. I want to resurrect the dream I put into you. And the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead will put you on the comeback trail to the fulfillment that God has for you. Let me say a word today to some of you, and there's a number of you here today that are young, got everything going for you, looking for a future. You know, be careful of yuppie-dom. Be careful of what's out there to kind of ensnare you into the world's kind of, you know, go for it, go for it, go for it mentality. There are people, by the time they're 21, they've already set, you know, a career path and they've chosen their retirement plan, you know. And they're not free to hear God. There's such a mentality of accumulation and getting hold. And dear ones, it's all over the North Hills. I want you to know that. Guys driving his BMW hits a hole and a car spins down this side of the hill and the doors fly off. The cop runs down to him and says, sir, sir. And the guy says, oh, my BMW. I wrecked my BMW. The officer says, your BMW? Your left arm's been severed. Oh, my Rolex, my Rolex. Well, you know, there's more to the world and to life than stuff. Is that true? And I sat in a room yesterday with 10 other men, many of whom have done very well and have great careers. God wants you, listen, He wants you to be blessed. I want to say that loud and clear. God wants you to be blessed and He wants you to know fullness and supply. But don't make that your goal. Make your goal serving Him and pleasing Him and He'll show you how to see all of your dreams fulfilled. Something that's happening right now are some people saying, I'm too old. I've already hit the end. Listen, you're never too old to live your dream out for God. Remember that Abraham was how old? 94. When God fulfilled his dream. Anyone 94 yet? All right. So everyone falls underneath the category, at least Abraham's ahead of you. The Bible says that Anna the prophetess was a widow for 84 years before she saw the Messiah come in to the temple. Widowed for 84 years. So dear ones, no matter how old you are, it's not too late to do something great for God. It really isn't. God wants to meet you where you are and take you on. Freda Lindsay never had done much administration. Her husband Gordon Lindsay died suddenly unexpectedly at the age of, I think it was 63, took over a Bible college and a worldwide ministry called Christ for the Nations. It can happen. Don't listen to the ones that say you can't. You mustn't try. It's too difficult. Listen to the ones that says you can. In Christ, you can do it. You can come back from a setback today. And I pray and I trust those of you that I know, especially those of you that I've known for years, you'd hear God today on this resurrection Sunday saying come back. Let your dream be fulfilled. Amen. So what is the message that I leave you with today? It's this. In the end church, every one of us will die. You say, well, you really got that right. It's true. And they're going to take every one of us one by one. They're going to open up this hole in the ground and put us down inside of it. Then they're going to put dirt in our face, fill up the hole, walk away from it. And they're going to go and eat until they're blue in the face. And you'll leave behind either a title or testimony. They'll either have a list of all the things that you did because you were part of this organization or you served on this board. Or they'll be people around you who will begin to tell all the marvelous things that happened because you lived your life following the dream of God. Coming back from your setbacks, challenging others on to be all that they could be. And as I thought about it, whatever your setback today, whether it's from falling away from God five years ago because he disappointed you. Or if you've messed up so many times, you don't know if God really loves you anymore. If your relationships are broken and bleeding, if your dreams have been stolen, I want you to know today as you trust the Lord Jesus Christ, in your world, it will be you that has the greatest comeback. Amen. Heavenly Father, as we conclude today, I thank you and praise you for the power of the resurrection, for the things that you have done to demonstrate that no circumstance need hold us in its clutches and in its jaws, but that we can make a comeback from whatever would hold us down in defeat and discouragement and despair. Lord, we've heard it. We've seen it. And now by your grace, we shall experience it. For Lord, you're here today to make beautiful things of our life. We give you praise and worship. Let's stand and sing it together.