April 11-13, 2026 Pastor Timothy J. Spaude Text: John 20:19-31 (EHV) “JESUS LIVES!”

 

EASTER 2

April 11-13, 2026

Pastor Timothy J. Spaude

Text: John 20:19-31 (EHV)

 

“JESUS LIVES!”

1.     He gives you peace.

2.     He gives you proof.

 

          Apparently I’m not much fun to watch crime dramas with. I found that out recently. Just like when I’m watching football and a running commentary/critique on the play and the announcers just kind of spews out of my mouth, the same thing happens with TV shows when it’s just not realistic. “So, nobody ever turns on the light when they go into a darkened basement, really? Oh, she’s going to go into the abandoned warehouse by herself without calling for backup. Just like they are taught. I wonder what’s going to happen.” That’s when I heard it. “You know you kind of ruin the fun of watching these shows!” says Chris. Well, at least I’m consistent. I find myself doing it when reading the Bible. Easter gets me. “Guys, how many times in the past few months did Jesus tell you that He was going up to Jerusalem where He would be betrayed into the hands of the chief priests, put to death but after three days rise again?” It’s not like He used parables where you had to figure it out. He didn’t use apocalyptic language like Revelation. So as things kept happening just like Jesus said, why were they so slow to believe? Why are we so slow to believe? Friends, Jesus lives! Our full service living Lord did not just perfectly obey in our place so we are covered with His righteousness, perfect in the sight of God. He did not just pay in full the punishment price for all of our sins. He also rose from the dead and as our living Lord gives us what we need. Peace and proof. Just like with His disciples.

          It’s the evening of Easter Sunday. The disciples have heard from the women that Jesus rose from the dead. Peter and John have seen the empty tomb and folded grave clothes. The Emmaus disciples have rushed in and told them how Jesus walked with them and taught them. So of course they are rejoicing and celebrating and…No. They are behind locked doors afraid of the Jewish leaders who had opposed and killed Jesus. Fear will do that to you. It will make you act irrationally. It will paralyze your ability to stay calm. Then Jesus appeared. “Peace be with you!” ²⁰After he said this, he showed them his hands and side. So the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.” Jesus gave them peace. That’s calmness even in difficult circumstances. A sense of well being that even though things might be tough, the loving and all powerful God has a plan and will work it out. This was a blessing the disciples needed as they continued to serve their risen Lord. The chief priests and other enemies of Jesus did not go way. Conflict among the Jewish believers as they navigated the journey from being Old Testament believers to New Testament believers was coming. So was persecution. But Jesus lives! So they had peace!

          We do too! Fear comes into our lives. Fear that seeks to rob you, the people of God, of the peace that is yours because of Jesus. Shall I do my running commentary. How many times has God personally fulfilled to you His promise that in all things He works for the good? How many big and little financial crises have you lived through and here you are still living in affluent America with more food than you need and more clothes than you need? How many times has a problem come up and someone just happens to there at the right time and right place to give you information or help? For all of you who have had to deal with the death of a loved one, the kind that shocked you and took your feet right out from under you so that you did not know how you could carry on, yet you are, one day at a time. It’s not like God made those promises in a parable or using apocalyptic revelation we have to work to figure out. Our personal history proves the proverb “If God brings you to it He will bring you through it.” We know these things. But then the next cancer diagnosis or health scare comes. Then the job loss comes. Then the next international crisis. Then the next national turmoil. Then the next election. Then the___________________. We feel anxious. Fearful. Sad. Stressed. Peace! Jesus lives! Lift your eyes from your own lap, your own hands to the cross of your Lord. Remember how perfectly God plans things for you. Even things that look terrible. Jesus lives and He is with you always just as He said. And He will provide what you need. Peace be with you.

          And proof. Poor Thomas. Doubting Thomas. I don’t think we are going to call him that to his face in heaven! Yet in the church stuck in this world he is probably always going to carry that label. He didn’t always doubt. He was the one who urged the disciples to go die with Jesus when He went to Jerusalem knowing full well the opposition he would receive. He was the one who had the courage in the Upper Room to ask the question all the others probably had too but didn’t want to look stupid. Jesus had said, “You know the way to place where I am going.” “To which Thomas replied, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going so how can we know the way?” That’s when Jesus gave the simple answer we all need to know. “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” When you get to heaven thank Thomas for his next speaking up for all of us act!

As you heard in the Gospel lesson Thomas was not there on Easter evening when Jesus appeared. So of course they tell him the Good News. Jesus lives! The response? “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands, and put my finger into the mark of the nails, and put my hand into his side, I will never believe.” Now I know we wanted to rush in there and try to stop him but it’s good for us that Thomas went ahead with his bold skepticism. It’s good because while sometimes we are like Thomas and are bold in our trust in Jesus at other times we are like Thomas and we doubt even though all of the voices in the Bible are telling us the truth, even though we can look back at the fingerprints of God in our lives but when a time of testing or trial pops up we doubt. Look what Jesus gives to the doubting. “Peace be with you,” he said. ²⁷Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and look at my hands. Take your hand and put it into my side. Do not continue to doubt, but believe.” ²⁸Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus gave proof. Not just any proof. The exact proof Thomas had boldly demanded, proving that not only does Jesus live but He really is with us always and hears our every word. Do you think it made an impact on the rest of Thomas’ life to realize Jesus had been with him the whole time he was setting his conditions? Jesus lives so Thomas got proof.

          Good news for us. Because no matter how many times Jesus gets us through another rough patch, no matter how many times he provides in a way were not anticipating, the next time there is a tight spot we find it so easy to doubt Jesus’ wisdom and power in our lives. We spend our energy on anxiety over things out of our control. We fret. We worry. What we need is proof that God will take care of us. Jesus lives and gives us that proof.

          Did you notice what Jesus did for all of the disciples? At His first appearance on Easter Sunday evening Jesus pointed those disciples to his hands and his side. Then again with Thomas. Touch my hand and my side. Here is my body. Here is my blood. Do you want proof that Jesus lives for you, that He is really present? Communion. The Lord’s Supper is one of those ongoing proofs that Jesus gives. Your Baptism is another. Do you want to know you are a child of God and the Father will treat you like His Son. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. Jesus lives and gives you proof.

          It’s blessed faith, not blind faith, that God gives us. Jesus pointed that out when He said to Thomas, “Because you have seen me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”  And then He had John write these words, “Jesus, in the presence of his disciples, did many other miraculous signs that are not written in this book. ³¹But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.” Jesus lives! Take hold of the gifts that come with that fact. Inner calmness through all of life’s troubles. Confidence that God will prevail. Peace and Proof. Yours because He lives. Amen.

April 3, 2026 Pastor Timothy J. Spaude Text: Zechariah 3:8-9 (NIV84) “GONE IN A SINGLE DAY!”

 

GOOD FRIDAY

April 3, 2026

Pastor Timothy J. Spaude

Text: Zechariah 3:8-9 (NIV84)

 

“GONE IN A SINGLE DAY!”

 

          If you were at our Midweek Lenten services you know that we have been looking at prophecies from the Old Testament prophet Zechariah. He’s called the Holy Week prophet. Some 500 years before Jesus was born God had Zechariah point us to what Jesus would do as our Savior with many of the pointed prophecies finding fulfillment during Holy Week. Today’s is fittingly a Good Friday prophecy. Here is how it happened. God showed Zechariah a vision of the High Priest Joshua being accused by Satan. Joshua was covered in filthy clothes which symbolized his sin and the sins of the people. Then the Lord exchanged Joshua’s filthy clothes with clean pure richly ornament clothes which symbolized the righteousness of Christ. Then came this prophecy.

 

Zechariah 3:8-9 "Listen, O high priest Joshua and your associates seated before you, who are men symbolic of things to come: I am going to bring my servant, the Branch. ⁹See, the stone I have set in front of Joshua! There are seven eyes on that one stone, and I will engrave an inscription on it,' says the Lord Almighty, 'and I will remove the sin of this land in a single day.”

 

“GONE IN A SINGLE DAY!”

 

          This is prophecy. Filled with symbolism. But it is not new symbolism. It has been used elsewhere. Joshua and his associates, the priests. They were symbols of Jesus the great High priest. Joshua and the priests had made animal sacrifices for the sins of the people over and over and over again. Why? Those sacrifices did not take away any sins. They were symbolic of what was to come. Jesus. Then there is the servant called the Branch. Nothing new here either. The Root of Jesse. The Branch from David’s Stem. Same thing. The Messiah who was a descendant of David, the son of Jesse. From Him God’s church would branch out and grow. He is also called the stone with seven eyes. Jesus is the cornerstone, the stone that causes people to stumble if they reject Him and He sees all. And then the inscription that is engraved so it can not be changed. I will remove the sin of this land/world in a single day. Gone in a single day.

 

          The historians record for us some pretty impressive single day losses. You are familiar with Black Friday, a day when merchants gain a lot of money and consumers lose it. Some of you may have heard of Black Monday or Black Tuesday or Black Thursday. Those are days when the stock market had its biggest single day loss. On the worst, gone in a single day was 22% of wealth. Some people who invested in single stocks found their entire life savings gone in a single day. Or think of some of the wildfires that have plagued our west coast. In a single day thousands of acres of forest and thousands of homes and millions of dollars of property gone. Gone in a single day. To end World War 2 in the Pacific, President Truman ordered the use of atomic bombs. The first fell on Hiroshima. Gone in a single day, 70,000 people. Many more deaths occurred later.

 

          Gone in a single day. Did you notice something in common with all those single day losses? Lives were ruined and lost. That’s what sinful man can easily accomplish. Destruction. Greed ultimately drives stock market crashes. Many of the wildfires were caused by man’s foolish use of fire although, a squirrel chewing on a wire can do the same. War. Zechariah’s prophecy pointed to something different. This gone in a single day would not ruin lives. It would save them. What was gone in a single day? The sins of the world. When? The day we are celebrating. How? Jesus, the Righteous Branch. All those Old Testament priests with all their always repeated sin sacrifices were symbolic, pictures or what Jesus would do. Jesus is the Lamb of God. He offered Himself. He stayed on the cross in agony. For three hours darkness covered the land as God was forsaken by God. For one purpose. To take away the sins of the world. Every pastor’s sins. Every member’s sins. Every parent’s sins. Every child’s sins. Every everyone’s sins. Yours and mine. Every sin committed. Every one that would be. Gone in a single day. Just as was told in prophecy. It is finished. No more payment for sin is required. No condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. Our sins have been removed, gone in a single day. And the result is not destruction but salvation. Life. New life now. We don’t exist to serve self and sin, we get to serve Jesus. New and perfect life to come. Come back on Sunday to hear about that! Gone in a single day. Not our doing. Jesus did it. What’s left to say but thank you Jesus. Let’s do that now by singing a fitting Good Friday hymn, Thank You Jesus!