Resurrection Day
The Hope of Glory
Happy Resurrection Day! Yeshua is risen from the dead – Halleluyah! We celebrated today the resurrection of Jesus our Messiah, the wonder and power of His rising from the dead as the FirstFruits of resurrection. The audio of today’s message is below. Before that are two worship videos – Because He Lives from Celtic Worship, and Christ is Risen by Matt Maher.
April 2019 Newsletter and Calendar
The newsletter and calendar for April is available here: Newsletter April 2019 PDF
Jesus is alive!
Jesus is alive!
Then He (Jesus) said to them, “With fervent desire I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer; for I say to you, I will no longer eat of it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.” Luke 22:15-20.
Jesus knew who He was, the Son of God, and why He had come as a man born of a woman, the Son of Man. He took on human flesh so that He could make the way to the Father open and so that He could show us that Way. He is the Way, the Truth and the Life. John 14:6 & Philippians 2:5-11.
Luke records the words above. Jesus knew He was about to suffer and die in fulfilment of all the symbolism of the Passover Lamb. He knew He would be offered up to God His Father as the sinless sacrifice, represented by the Unleavened Bread, without sin. He knew He would be crucified with the wicked, the two criminals crucified alongside Him. He knew He would be buried in a rich man’s grave. All according the prophecies given in what we call the Old Testament, what Jesus called ‘the Law and the Prophets’. Yet He eagerly looked forward to the Passover. Why was that, do you think?
Surely it was because He also knew He would not stay in the grave, that He would be raised to life, resurrection life, after three days and three nights! What an amazing fact! Jesus is alive today!!
Some people say, ‘Oh, if only someone would come back from the dead and tell us all about it.’ Well, He is the One who has come back and told us what it’s all about! Some would say it’s just a fairy story, but Jesus was seen and witnessed to by hundreds of people after His resurrection. This is all faithfully documented and recorded for us in the Gospels and letters of the New Testament. (The film Risen conveys this very well.)
He is alive, and alive forevermore! That is a truly life-changing fact. Because He lives, we shall live also. Because He lives, we have a hope and solid expectation that we too will be resurrected, just as He was. Not after three days, of course, but we shall be raised to resurrection life, just as Jesus was, all in God’s time. Jesus rose again on the Feast of First-fruits, the first day of the week after the Passover. He is the first begotten from the dead:
But now Christ is risen from the dead and has become the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep. 1Cor.15:20
The presence of first-fruits signifies there will be a harvest to follow. Jesus is the resurrection first-fruits, all those who believe in Him will be the resurrection harvest!
This life is for us to experience in the here and now. Is He risen in your heart? Have you experienced the new birth the Holy Spirit brings when we put our hope and trust in the LORD Jesus. He died for us in our place, the sinless for the sinful, so that we don’t have to die an eternal death. When we repent, turn to Him for forgiveness and cleansing and enthrone Him in our lives, we are raised to newness of life in our spirits here and now, born of His Spirit into His family. This is what Jesus’ death and resurrection is all about – new life in Him! God bless you!
Where we meet is changing!
For the last eight years Celebration Church has been meeting at St John Fisher church hall on Waltham Rd. This building has been a blessing to us and we have really appreciated the hospitality and assistance the local Catholic church have given to us during this time. However, when it was put up for sale at the end of 2016, and our offer to buy the building was not successful, we began to seek the LORD as to the way forward.
It’s quite fitting that our last Sunday in St John Fisher hall will be Resurrection Day. We can reflect on God’s goodness in all that has gone before and look excitedly to all He is going to do for us in the future. He has good plans for us, as individuals and as a collective fellowship together, and as we move we believe we enter a new and exciting phase of the church’s life!
We knew the LORD would lead us in all this, and He has done that! He has opened the way for us to move to the newly extended and refurbished Scartho Community Library on St Giles Ave. Our first Sunday there will be the 8th April, at the usual time of 10.30am!
The library is still in the final throes of the rebuilding and renovation process, so as you can see above in the photo taken on 29th March, it is still pretty much a building site on the outside.
Inside however, most of the work is complete, and so we will be able to move our all our various items and equipment next week prior to our first Sunday service there on the 8th April. Just to confirm, we will have front door access so we don’t need to negotiate whatever building works are still underway to the right of the entrance way. (For more information on the Library click here.)
So, as we approach the Passover, and remember Jesus’ death and resurrection in fulfilment of it, let’s contemplate the following verses:
Thus says the LORD, who makes a way in the sea
And a path through the mighty waters, Who brings forth the chariot and horse,
The army and the power (They shall lie down together, they shall not rise;
They are extinguished, they are quenched like a wick):
“Do not remember the former things, Nor consider the things of old.
Behold, I will do a new thing, Now it shall spring forth; Shall you not know it?
I will even make a road in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.
Isaiah 43:16-19
March 2018 newsletter and calendar
The newsletter for March is available here: March 2018 newsletter online version
“Why do you seek the living among the dead?”
Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection, three separate events all fore-shadowed in their Biblical roots, but together forming one composite event, the greatest single event in history.
The Timing of Jesus’ Death and Resurrection
This is an article by David Soakell of Christian Friends of Israel.
When was Jesus Christ (Yeshua the Messiah) crucified and resurrected? Did He really die on Good Friday and come back to life on Easter Sunday?
These are questions I’ve pondered on for many years. Now before we go any further, I need to stress that for the majority of Christians, Easter Sunday (or Resurrection Sunday) is the day Christians celebrate, for genuine reasons, the resurrection of Jesus the Christ (Yeshua the Messiah) from the dead. The majority of Christians also spend time on the Good Friday time to ponder on and contemplate, often in silence, what the sacrifice of Jesus means to them. This, along with Easter Sunday, is a Holy Day for most Christians, and therefore it is not my desire or purpose to dishonour any Believer in the Lord Jesus who use Good Friday to reflect on the death of Jesus, and Easter Sunday to celebrate the resurrection. Read the rest of this entry »
Scartho Celebration Church 