Is this the way it's supposed to be?
Is this all there is?
Why do we all feel like there has to be something more, something better? And is there any hope for something better?
Because if you look around, if you just live a little bit, you see something very different. You see a very broken world. There's evidence of it absolutely over overwhelming. It's absolutely everywhere that you look. It's not even hard to find evidence of it.
But here's a small list.
Too many children grow up without knowing their biological parents. That's not the way it's supposed to be. Husbands and wives are constantly quitting one another. We're more familiar with hurts and selfishness than we are with love. Little boys and girls are living in fear because of the consistent mockery from their peers.
Skin color continues to be something that divides and creates hate.
Pleasure and substances continue to be the stuff that cause addictions.
People use people. That's a broad statement because there's so many different ways that that happens. So many different ways that looks. But people use other people. Violence and war are the normal news.
Anytime you turn it on, you can expect to see it. And in those brief, rare moments when it isn't violence and war, well, then it's hunger and disaster and disease. And it doesn't matter how much we grow, how much we learn, how much we advance scientifically. Every problem we seem to solve reveals that there's more problems that we didn't even know existed. There's constantly something else there.
Every week I read of another scam that's preying on the innocent.
It seems like everywhere you look, hope has been kidnapped. It's been left unsatisfied by false hopes. We keep finding new things to put hope in, but it never satisfies. And it keeps causing us to look for more.
Daughters despise their mothers. Sons hate their fathers. Siblings live in tension and anger in their most important developmental years.
Even the earth itself is problematic.
It seems like the soil is better at growing weeds than it is food and flowers.
And for too many of us, every night we go to sleep with tears. And then we wake up with anxiety and dread. Is this the way it's supposed to be?
It's painfully obvious. The present and this world that we live in now, it needs fixing.
But how?
Seems like there's something hardwired into each of us that expects something better. Hardwired into each of us is a desire for life to mean something. For us to feel as if the world is actually going somewhere, that this life is actually Going somewhere. I think deep within most of us, if not all of us, is this cry for something. But for what?
What do we want? What are we looking for? What are we hoping for? What is the fix to the burdens and the pains of this world that we live in right now?
You see, I think that the old man who's got the bum leg and he's struggling to get around like he used to, and he's frustrated and he's angry. And I think deep within that man, there's a cr. Within him for something else. But what is it? I think the hurt that exists inside of a mocked teen is more than just the normal adolescent angst.
It's a cry for something else. There's something else deep within that's wanted. I think that the whimper of a toddler who just lost their toy sounds a lot like the tears of a mother who just got off the phone with a wayward child.
There's a yearning, there's a pain. There's a cry for something else. But what is it? I think there's anger from the man who's been laid off. I think there's silence that exists among friends as they stand around a casket.
I think even the gardener outside is frustrated with the weeds instead of the evidence of flowers. And I think they're all wrestling with the hope of something else. Something different.
Something different from the disappointments of this world.
Why? Why does it seem like there's something within every single one of us that expects something different than this? Why does it seem that within all of us, something is groaning within us, and yet at the same time, we struggle to identify what is creating those expectations and what exactly are those groans?
So, quote from A guy named C.S. lewis, probably about 100 years ago, he wrote this. He said, if I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, then the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world?
What if.
What if this longing that is deep within each of us is actually a longing for forever?
What if something within us is tied to creation? What if there's this longing within us for the way that things were when they were first made, the way that they were supposed to be, the way they were before man? What if the longing within us is for eternity? For a hope that there is a day in the future that will resolve all of this mess?
I think most of us probably believe in eternity.
But it probably also looks a little bit like it does when we say that we believe in God. We say that we believe, but you Wouldn't know it just from sitting back and observing the way that we live. For those outside the church, when they see Christians who claim to believe in God, they see a disconnect between the belief and reality, the way that they live. I think that when we speak of eternity, we say we believe in it, but I don't think we live like it because we live for now. And the evidence for that is overwhelming, just the same as we can look and we can see that this is a very broken world and there's evidence everywhere.
You can't hardly open your eyes without seeing evidence of it. I think it's the same within most of us. We don't live for eternity. We live for now.
And that's why most of us are overweight and we're disappointed. Even if we're driven, we're still in debt and we're addicted because we treat this here and now moment as if it's all that we have.
We live as if this life is all that there is. We live like this life is actually the destination, that this is all that there is. But the promise of forever is that you don't have to live that way.
You could actually live in the belief, not just believe something, but you could actually live in the belief that everything that is broken will be restored and renewed and that you will live forever and that God will renew this world.
But how could you know? How could you know that that's not just a belief, but it's actually something real? Where's the confidence from an idea or a dream like that come from? Want to take you to interesting passages. First Corinthians, chapter 15.
If you've got your Bibles or your phones, if you want to turn there, I encourage you to kind of look at it. We're going to skip around through a couple different verses, but I'll tell you on the front end that when Paul writes this letter to a church in Corinth, they're wrestling with this understanding of what the future may hold. They look backwards and they see Jesus and they believe in what Jesus has done. They specifically even believe in his resurrection. However, they don't necessarily believe that there's anything for them.
And in the future, they. They believe that this life is really all that there is. And so Paul begins to speak that. Speak to that. We're going to start in verse 13.
He says, if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is our faith. Paul says Paul says that if you don't believe in life after death, then that doesn't really work with the idea that Jesus rose from the dead. They're in conflict with one another. They don't fit.
You can't pick both sides of this, right? And the implications for this are huge. It isn't just like this idea of resurrection. The implications of this are huge. If there is no resurrection of Jesus and there's no need for us to be here right now, and I don't mean like us to be alive on earth, I mean for us to be in this room doing what we're doing right now, there's no value to this.
If Jesus didn't raise from the dead, that's what he says. Our preaching is useless and our faith becomes useless because it's rooted in something that must not have happened. If Jesus didn't raise from the dead, then it's all just a waste. He goes on, a couple verses down, he says, in Christ, if Christ has not been raised in your faith is futile. You're still in your sins.
And so, like he, he repeats himself, your faith is a waste. It doesn't really matter. You're making a mess. You're, you're, you're wasting your time. Doesn't really matter.
But then he adds that second layer of problems. If there is no resurrection, that means that Jesus is as the Christ. Jesus as the Messiah, means that he didn't really fulfill those roles. He isn't the Christ, he isn't Messiah, which means that you still have a sin problem with God, which is a really, really big problem. He goes on, a couple verses down, he says, if only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people to be most pitied.
If only for this life we have hope. If there is no eternity, well then what are we doing? What are we doing? And Paul's argument is clear. Without resurrection, Christianity makes no sense.
And if all that sin has broken, won't be forever fixed someday, then there is no hope, there's no resurrection, then there is no eternity. And if there is no eternity, then there is no hope. And Paul's laying the case here that our faith is built on the idea of a resurrection and of this idea of forever being a real thing. It's actually what gives meaning and power and hope to our lives. And right now, very next verse, Paul says this so important, says, but Christ has indeed been raised from the dead.
The first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. Our hope, our hope for a future eternity isn't some Sort of a fragile facade. It's built on the actual point in time, historicity of a past event, specifically the resurrection of Jesus. And if Jesus did not raise from the dead, then we are stuck in our sins and the hope of forever melts away. And he gives this picture of first fruits.
I think that's important. I don't know if you're the kind of person who goes into a garden or messes with soil, but do you know that if you go and you. You work the soil, you prepare, you go through the process and you plant the seeds. If you sit there for about 15 minutes, you won't see any evidence of your work. Takes a while, right?
And you can check up on it every once in a while. You can go back to it and look at it, but you're going to recognize that no little plants are popping out of the ground. It takes a while and usually about a week, maybe 10 days in, you go out and you look at your mess of dark soil that you prepared, and you finally see evidence of something, something green is pushing up out of this dark soil. When you see that, you don't see whatever it is that you planted, you just see evidence of it. You see the first fruits of it, the first piece of it, and it's what makes you believe that what you put in the ground, what you planted there, that one day it will actually spring forth and be what you wanted it to be.
Paul says, that's Jesus.
Jesus's earthly resurrection was never intended to be the only resurrection. It's supposed to be the first in a line of future resurrections. And so we look back and we see Jesus. Resurrection guarantees a final resurrection for all who believe. And the one thing between you and me and forever, that horrible thing called death that gets in the way, the one thing that prevents us from living forever right now, it has been defeated, and it gives us back the hope of forever.
Jesus defeated death, and so will you if you're his child.
But this isn't a simple message about the resurrection of Jesus. It's not about the hope in the future of a promised resurrection. If there is any resurrection in our future, then it should probably shape how we live today. That's the point of this. It's not just about what will one day happen, but it's.
If we believe that these things will actually one day happen, well, then they infiltrate this day that I'm living in right now. They infiltrate this broken world that I'm wandering through right now. If I believe and have a hope in eternity, then it ought to shape how I live right now. You see, there's this old saying. We kind of played with it a little bit in our host time.
There's this old saying, live today as if you'll die tomorrow. And we like that. We like the idea of that. We like the idea of living without consequences, the idea of carpe diem or seize the day. I imagine that if Dan had interviewed people not at church on a Wednesday night, he would have got very different answers.
Because we like that. Like the idea of just being able to go with no consequences, just live life to the fullest right now. Sounds really good. I think there's a better saying, live today like you may die tomorrow and then wake up in God's eternity.
That's a little bit different thing, isn't it? You see, if death is all there is, then I'm gonna live one way. There's no consequences to how I live. I can just do whatever I want. But if resurrection is imminent, then it's probably going to cause me to live a different way.
I'll probably live with eternity in mind. You see, eternity has massive implications. It impacts every part of our life. Stuff like this. The resurrection of Jesus and the hope of eternity.
Reveal what truly matters. Reveals what truly matters. Because it doesn't matter that your kids spilled their cereal again for the third day in a row, right? Doesn't really matter if you live with eternity in mind. It doesn't matter that traffic got you to work a little bit slower or got you back home two minutes later than you would have otherwise.
Doesn't matter if you live with eternity in mind. It's okay if you aren't in your friend's wedding if you're living with eternity in mind.
When circumstances rise to levels of importance well beyond their actual importance, then they exercise that they have more control over us than they should. And those stupid little examples are stupid. They're dumb. And yet we let them ruin our moment, our drive, our morning, sometimes our day, or our week. Sometimes we allow simple little things like that to ruin relationships.
There's bigger stuff that we stress over that is just as dumb.
Success is not the most important thing in life.
A lot of people live like it is. Pleasure isn't the most important thing in life. Being appreciated or accepted isn't most important. Being able to control your circumstances. A lot of people just try to grab tighter at life, to control it and make it.
To shove it into exactly what it's supposed to be for their convenience. That's not most important in life. Even getting more stuff that's not most important. You see, if Jesus really rose from the dead, and if there's a promise of eternity, then it gives us a sense of priority and proportion. It reveals to us what truly matters.
It's not just that the resurrection of Jesus and the hope of eternity bring perseverance. It causes us to reconsider how we view our responsibilities and our difficulties and our opportunities. If you say in First Corinthians 15, go to the end of the chapter. Paul's laid out this whole big case about the power of the resurrection of Jesus, not just for the reality and the historical moment and what we put our faith in, but how it impacts how we view our future and how it impacts our days in between. At the very end of that chapter, he says, therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm.
Let nothing move you.
The resurrection of Jesus and the hope of eternity means we have a reason to continue to persevere, to keep pressing forward. And we don't continue because we can see that our efforts are bringing us success, or because we are being affirmed or encouraged by others. We don't continue because we can see how our problems are going to be solved. We don't even continue because continuing is placed pleasurable. Usually, if you have to be told to continue, it's not because you're having a good time.
We continue because we get God's plan. When we see what's going to happen in the future, we continue in the now because we get that grace has given us a life beyond this life, and that forever that is before us makes the things that we do in the here and now meaningful and consequential. And so in the here and now, we have the opportunity for this grand motivation. We aren't hoping that our day is going to be predictable or easy or free of hassles, although how nice would that be?
Instead, we're living in a reality that today is the harvest of what I've planted before. And today is an opportunity for me to plant something that will one day harvested. Every day is an opportunity to live towards forever, to persevere. There's another big implication. The resurrection of Jesus and the hope of eternity reshape how we treat people.
And that's actually what this sermon series is going to be about. It's kind of sneaky because it's about eternity, but it's not. It's actually about the relationships that we have, the ways we treat one another. Because if you believe that Jesus rose from the dead, and if you believe that there's a promise of eternity out in front of you, then it had better influence the way that you treat the people around you. It should change how you value people.
It should cause us to see all people as souls who will one day experience resurrection. And it should cause us to care about what happens to them on that day, which means that we treat those people as having a higher value. We could simplify it for you. Who would you treat differently if you lived with eternity in mind? That's a convicting question, isn't it?
Who would you treat differently? Meaning you know you're not treating them correctly. Who are you lacking patience with? Who are you limiting love towards?
And we do this, we all do this because we don't see people as having eternal value. We see them as temporary obstacles.
Would your marriage be any different if you lived with eternity in mind? Is there any chance that you would be more understanding or more encouraging if you lived with eternity in mind? Do you think there's a chance that maybe you wouldn't obsess over the wrong things, but you'd care about the right things? You'd obsess over what matters? Maybe you would take some things less seriously.
Maybe there's some things in your marriage that you would take more seriously. Is it possible?
What about your kids?
Is there a chance that if you lived with eternity in mind, you would be a little bit more patient towards your kids? Maybe have a little bit more compassion? Do you think that maybe you'd become obsessed over what actually matters? That you would take some things less seriously and you would take some things more seriously?
What about the people around you? What about the people you work with? Is there a chance that if you lived with eternity in mind, if you lived like God really died and rose not for you, for them, and that one day they're going to stand before that God and they're going to experience the same resurrection that you have your hope in? If you really believe that, do you think you might treat them a little bit differently?
I'm going to tell you that all this even changes our relationship with God. When you see what he's done for you and what he's promised to you, then it should force you to your knees in reverence and in submission.
Who would you treat differently if you lived with eternity in mind?
At the back of the Bible, there's a book called Revelation. It's kind of a strange book, doesn't really fit with the rest of the New Testament. But it's this picture that John gets. John was a disciple of Jesus became an apostle of the church and led the church, wrote a lot, was a big time leader. And then late in life, he receives this vision from God.
And it's strange, it's difficult and it's hard to understand, but there's some powerful stuff in it. Towards the end of Revelation, chapter 21, John records this. He says, then I saw a new heaven and a new earth for the first heaven. And the first earth had passed away and there was no longer any sea. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven for from God, prepared as a bride, beautifully dressed for her husband.
And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, look, God's dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people. And God, God himself will be with them, and he will be their God. And then he's going to wipe away every tear from their eyes. There'll be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.
What if it's true?
What if it's true?
What if Jesus really did walk out of his tomb?
And what if that was really the first fruits of resurrection? What if one day each of us will live again?
And what if you can live with God?
And what if God's greatest desires that he could live with with you?
And what if. What if what God says in John's vision is true? What if a day is coming without tears or crying or pain or death or mourning? What if, because here too many children grow up without knowing their biological parents. And here husbands and wives are more familiar with hurts and selfishness than love.
And here little boys and girls live in fear, mockery from their peers. And here, skin color continues to divide and create hate. And here people use other people. Here we go to sleep with tears and we wake up with anxiety and dread. But a day is coming.
Where God promises no more tears and no more crying. And hope for that day doesn't fix the present, but it makes the intolerable more tolerable.
Eternity profoundly reshapes the present, specifically in that it reshapes you. It changes me. It changes us. It changes the way that we live. And eternity begins to change the world that we live in.
And it will spread specifically change the way we treat one another.
And here pleasure and substances continue to addict us, and violence and war are the normal news. Here, hunger, disaster, disease keeps showing up no matter how much we fight back. Here, scams continue to prey on the innocent. Here, hope has been kidnapped and left Unsatisfied by false hopes. Here, daughters despise their mothers and sons hate their fathers and siblings live in tension and anger with one another.
Here, the soil of earth grows weeds better than food and flowers. But a day is coming, a day where God promises no more pain and hope for that day doesn't fix the present, but it makes the intolerable more tolerable. Because eternity profoundly reshapes the present, specifically in that it changes the way that we live eternity. The belief in eternity changes us and it changes how we live. And it changes specifically the way we treat one another.
And here there's silence when we stand next to a casket.
Here, no matter how much we understand that death is a part of life here, death continues to catch us off guard. Here, death never loses its sting. Here, mourning sometimes outweighs joy.
But a day is coming where God promises no more death and no more mourning. And hope for that day doesn't fix the present, but it makes the intolerable more tolerable. Eternity profoundly reshapes the present, and it specifically changes the way that we live. And I'm telling you, as we look forward, it changes the way we treat one another.
As we step into this series, I'm telling you there is no place that eternity does not touch. There's no place. The truth of the resurrection of Jesus and what he's already accomplished will impact every single ounce of your life.
And if you believe, then it's really just a matter of whether or not you're going to respond.
I want to pray that over you. Why don't you stand? Let's pray together. God, I thank you so much for how good you are to us. God, I thank you for how much you have loved us.
And God, I thank you that we have something to hold on to in the future. Something that is better than this day. Something that is better than this world and all the problems that we see around us.
God, I pray that we would believe it.
And God, I pray that we believe it enough to live it.
God, if we're all just one moment away from eternity with you, God, I pray that we would live.
That we would live lives that honor you.
God, May eternity truly shape us. It's in Jesus name we pray. Amen.