Easter Sermon

Yesterday was Easter Sunday, and our ward had a Sacrament meeting devoted to music and messages about the events leading up to and following the Saviour's death and resurrection. Gretch and I are in the ward choir, so we were a part of the music. And last week I was asked to be one of the speakers. I know that we use the word "talk" in the LDS church to describe sermons, but I like to think of my talk as my Easter sermon. The topic I was given was... actually, no; I'm not going to say what my topic was. It annoys me when people do it in their talks, so it would be silly to do it now. For those who continue reading, I'll let you decide what my message was.

I gave no formal title to my sermon. When I am given the opportunity to speak in Sacrament meeting, I spend all of the time between the invitation and the day of the meeting contemplating the topic. I read what the Scriptures have to say about the topic, I read relevant passages from books I have acquired, and I read articles on blogs and other sites. I also think about it. A lot. I talk to Gretch about the topic and bounce ideas off of her. And then, depending on when I am speaking, I write the talk the night before or the morning of.

Our Sunday meetings start at 11 am, so I had plenty of time to write in the morning. This gave me an extra night to mull things over as I slept. On Easter morning I got up, pulled out my books again, and started reading. I read the accounts given in the New Testament, as recorded by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. I started to go to the computer, but I decided I'd rather write by hand. Instead of writing things out word for word, which I have done in the past, I made an outline. Just as I finished, I checked on some sites and found some more information that I wanted to add. And then I was ready.

What follows is the message I would have delivered if I had been given an unlimited amount of time. It is long, so I'll understand if you don't wish to read it all, but I wanted to share it and to have a record that I could keep in a more permanent form than the two pages of outlined notes I had in my portfolio.

I love music. It has long been an incredibly important part of my life. And so it should be no surprise that when I was first asked to speak on Easter Sunday about Christ that my thoughts turned almost immediately to a song I first heard during Seminary when I was in high school. The song is called "More Than Just a Man" and it was written by Julie de Azevedo. The message of this song is that Jesus Christ was so much more than "just a man from Galilee"--I have searched for the lyrics online, but I was unsuccessful in finding them. Fortunately, I have this song on a CD I got on my mission, and I can write the lyrics out to the best of my ability:

Some say that He was just a man who walked in Galilee,
They say that He spoke words of truth, and did a few good deeds.
Others claim He was a prophet who lived a faithful life,
They say He worked many miracles yet He was not divine.

But He's more than just a man who walked in Galilee,
More than just a prophet to me.
He is my Brother, my Saviour, my Lord,
He is my King.

Still others don't believe He lived;
just a legend passed through time,
To give men something to believe
and calm their troubled lives.

But He's more than just a man in whom we can believe,
More than just a legend to me.
He is my Brother, my Saviour, my Lord,
He is my King.

He is counting on me to help others see.

More than just a man who walked in Galilee,
More than just a prophet to me.
He is my Brother, my Saviour, my Lord,
He is my King.

More than just a man in whom we can believe,
More than just a legend to me.
He is my Brother, my Saviour, my Lord,
He is my King.

More than just a man...

 As I contemplated the words of this song, I stumbled upon a quote from the Prophet Joseph Smith that my friend Ben Spackman shared on a blog to which he contributes:

The fundamental principles of our religion are the testimony of the Apostles and Prophets concerning Jesus Christ, that He died, was buried, and rose the third day, and ascended in heaven; and all other things which pertain to our religion are only appendages to it.

This got me thinking... who was Jesus Christ?

Jesus was a mighty teacher. He taught eternal truths about mankind and our relationship to God. He clarified teachings of past prophets and explained the meaning and purpose of the commandments. He taught in parables to show how the principles of the Gospel could be practiced. He demonstrated, time and again, and the single greatest commandment is to simply love: to love others, to love God, and to love ourselves. Yet being a great teacher does not distinguish Jesus from the multitude of great teachers who came before Him and who have come after.

Jesus was a mighty healer. The scriptures are full of accounts of Him healing the sick and the infirm, giving sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, causing the lame to walk. He restored life to those who had died, and He cast out demons. But, once again, we must acknowledge that Jesus was not the first to heal and He was not the last. Being a healer does not distinguish Him from others.

Jesus was a mighty prophet. He prophesied of the scattering of Israel, of the ministry of His disciples, of His own death and resurrection, and of the last days. But there have been many prophets throughout the history of mankind.

What does distinguish Jesus? Why do we worship Him and revere His name? It is because, more than anything else, Jesus was and is the Christ, the Annointed One of God. Before His mortal ministry, He was the great Jehovah, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. As such, He was not just the Son of God. He was God. In the Institute class that Gretch and I have been taking, we have been studying the Book of Mormon. In the course of our study, we have come to understand that the great underlying message of the Book of Mormon is the testimony that Jesus Christ was the God of Heaven and Earth who descended from His throne above to atone for the sins of mankind.

One of the great sermons in the Book of Mormon is that of King Benjamin, found in Mosiah 2, 3, 4, and 5. If I could, I would simply transcribe the entirety of his message. In the heart of it is this beautiful summary of the role of Christ:

And he shall be called Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Father of heaven and earth, the Creator of all things from the beginning; and his mother shall be called Mary.
And lo, he cometh unto his own, that salvation might come unto the children of men even through faith on his name; and even after all this they shall consider him a man, and say that he hath a devil, and shall scourge him, and shall crucify him.
And he shall rise the third day from the dead; and behold, he standeth to judge the world; and behold, all these things are done that a righteous judgment might come upon the children of men.

Later in the Book of Mormon, there is a period of time when the righteous were looking forward to the birth of Christ. The unbelievers in the land had taken control of much of the government and had set aside a day in which, if the signs of the birth of Christ had not been manifest, all of the believers would be executed. The prophet at the time was a man named Nephi. He prayed to the Lord for guidance and understanding of what they should do:

Now it came to pass that when Nephi, the son of Nephi, saw this wickedness of his people, his heart was exceedingly sorrowful.
And it came to pass that he went out and bowed himself down upon the earth, and cried mightily to his God in behalf of his people, yea, those who were about to be destroyed because of their faith in the tradition of their fathers.
And it came to pass that he cried mightily unto the Lord all that day; and behold, the voice of the Lord came unto him, saying:
Lift up your head and be of good cheer; for behold, the time is at hand, and on this night shall the sign be given, and on the morrow come I into the world, to show unto the world that I will fulfil all that which I have caused to be spoken by the mouth of my holy prophets.
Behold, I come unto my own, to fulfil all things which I have made known unto the children of men from the foundation of the world, and to do the will, both of the Father and of the Son—of the Father because of me, and of the Son because of my flesh. And behold, the time is at hand, and this night shall the sign be given.

 I absolutely love the simplicity of this truth: God Himself spoke to Nephi and promised that He would be born in the morning as the Babe of Bethlehem. The sign of His birth did come, and Jehovah did come to Earth as Jesus of Nazareth. Years later, this same Nephi was among those who witnessed the glorious visit of the Saviour to some of the people who lived in the Western Hemisphere. This was His introduction to His people:

Behold, I am Jesus Christ, whom the prophets testified shall come into the world.
And behold, I am the light and the life of the world; and I have drunk out of that bitter cup which the Father hath given me, and have glorified the Father in taking upon me the sins of the world, in the which I have suffered the will of the Father in all things from the beginning...
Arise and come forth unto me, that ye may thrust your hands into my side, and also that ye may feel the prints of the nails in my hands and in my feet, that ye may know that I am the God of Israel, and the God of the whole dearth, and have been slain for the sins of the world...
And when they had all gone forth and had witnessed for themselves, they did cry out with one accord, saying:
Hosanna! Blessed be the name of the Most High God! And they did fall down at the feet of Jesus, and did worship him.

 This, then, is the reason for my faith and my testimony. It is the reason that we are gathered today to celebrate the glorious Resurrection of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. It is not because He was a mighty teacher, healer, or prophet, although He was all of these things. It is because the God of Heaven and Earth, the great Jehovah, came among the children of men as Jesus, the Annointed Saviour of mankind. In His brief mortal ministry, He set the example for us and showed us the way. He taught the higher law, the only law, that will lead us back to live with our Father in Heaven.

In teaching of love, Christ said, "No greater love hath a man than this: that he lay down his life for his friends." Christ suffered for us all; not just for our sins, for our pains and sorrows, also. His death loosed the bands of death for all. But Jesus did more than just lay down His life; He took it up again. And, through means incomprehensible to me at this point in my existence, He made it possible for all to live again.

That is what distinguishes Him from all others: Jesus is the Christ, the Eternal God. By Him, of Him, and through Him, the worlds were and are created, and we are all the sons and daughters of God through His Atonement, the apex of which was not seen in His death, but in His resurrection. As John testified, so do I:

And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book:
But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.

May we all take time to contemplate the life, the ministry, the atonement, and the resurrection of our Lord and Saviour, even Jesus Christ, the Author of our salvation.