3rd April 2026

3rd April 2026


Pray (ACts)


Read (Luke 24:36-53)


Message (Alan Burke)


If we did a straw poll and asked people what was the first thing that came to their minds about Jesus, there would I’m sure be many different responses. Most people have some concept of who Jesus was and is, no matter how fanciful it may be, and would be able to give some kind of answer. There would be some outlandish nonsense, but then there would be those who the thing that would come to mind is the incarnation. After all, think of how many years of school nativity plays we were involved in or have watched. Yes, the incarnation is an important concept, and it’s one that is foundational to our understanding of Christ, but at best an introductory image; it fails to consider the purpose of his coming. 


For others, it might be the Jesus of the Cross, and that’s good because that explains the necessity of the incarnation and his life here on Earth. Everything between the incarnation and his death on the cross we call the humiliation of Christ, for the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many (Mt 20:28). From his birth to death, Jesus suffered all things as we suffer. In the end, he suffered and died on the cross. 


These things still leave us short, for they are not good enough; they only paint a picture that is partly complete, because the death of this Saviour on the cross is not where the story ends. But in his Resurrection, it moves from humiliation to his exaltation, for Jesus rose from the dead, he ascended into heaven, and he will come again to judge the living and the dead. In His humiliation, we find our exaltation. Our shame is replaced by His glory.


As Jesus appears to his disciples, we learn of how the body which rose from the grave was the same body that had been crucified and buried, yet it has a different quality as he stood among them. The reaction of the disciples to the appearance of Jesus that day is recorded for us in such a descriptive way. These were men who did not expect it; they could hardly believe it; they had seen Jesus humiliated, beaten, whipped, nailed to a cross, crying out in his forsakenness, before dying, and there for all to see a spear thrust into his side just to be sure that he was dead. They had then seen how he was buried in a stone tomb with Roman soldiers to guard it. But Jesus had risen from the dead, defeating death, fulfilling the scriptures, and as the account ends in Luke’s gospel, he ascends before their very eyes. 


Through the miracle of the incarnation, Jesus had come, he took on flesh, he lived and died in our place, and when returned to heaven, he did so with a physical body, in a resurrected, glorified body, he returned to where he had been from eternity past. But there, he is now in his incarnate state, the distinct natures, the Godhead, and the manhood, were inseparably joined together in one person, without conversion, composition, or confusion in the incarnation. That means he is now crowned with human glory and honour and dwells in God’s presence, true God and true man, there at the right hand of the Father, crowned with glory and honour (Heb 2:6-9).


When Christ returns, we who are his shall be vindicated, we shall publicly be justified before the whole world (Luke 22:29-30). We shall receive our full adoption and inheritance in glorified bodies (Rom. 8:23). We shall be fully complete and perfect in Him, and we shall live eternally in glory all because of what he has done. Our citizenship is in heaven, and we await for our Saviour who is to transform our lowly body to a glorious, incorruptible one (Phil. 3:20-21; 1 Cor. 15:42).


Pray (acTS)


Sing


WSC
Q32 What benefits do they that are effectually called partake of in this life?
A. They that are effectually called do in this life partake of justification, adoption, sanctification, and the several benefits which, in this life, do either accompany or flow from them.
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