Throughout this year we have been studying the Gospel of Luke.  Our theme has been, Lord, I Want to See.  This morning I want to announce next year’s theme; You Will Be My Witnesses.  We have decided to continue with Luke, the writer, and study Luke II, better known as Acts.  I am excited about this for several reasons, but one is the continuity.  Lord I want to see, is naturally follow by, now I can be a witness to what I have seen.  Witnesses see things and then share things.  We have seen the Lord and next year we will share the Lord!  This time next year we will have studied ¼ of the New Testament.  Isn’t that exciting?  That is the end of this commercial. 

Luke, as far as we know, never saw Jesus while he walked upon this planet.  Luke, as far as we know, never laid eyes on the resurrected Jesus.
Luke, as far aw we know, was not one of the original eyewitnesses of Jesus. So, Luke’s faith rested, not upon what he saw, personally, but upon eyewitness stories about Jesus.  Remember way back when we began our study; the very first 4 verses?

Luke 1:1-4 Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us,  just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word.  Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.

Luke’s faith rests upon what had been handed down from the first eyewitnesses.  Luke lived pretty much in the same place we live.  You and I have never seen the human form of Jesus.  We have never touched the scars or seen him suddenly appear in a locked room.  Our faith begins where Luke’s faith began; in stories of Jesus as told by the witnesses.  That is why I love the Gospel of Luke.  Luke writes from my perspective.  Luke’s lays out the story so I may know the certainty of the things I have been taught!

This morning we come to the last chapter of Luke. Luke, writing from my perspective, is amazingly evident in the first section of Luke 24. It is as if Luke knows my heart.  It is as if Luke somehow saw into the future 1,974 years and could see across 7,137 miles across time and space and read my mind and wrote these 12 verses for me; today!  Luke 24:1-12 is where I live. It is my faith. It is my doubt. It is my head. And amazingly, it is my heart. Let me explain what I mean.

Luke 24:1-6  On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.  While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them.  In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, "Why do you look for the living among the dead?  He is not here; he has risen!

Luke begins to capture me by explaining the foundation of my faith.  My faith is built upon the empty tomb.  In the final analysis being a Christian is all about believing in the resurrection of Jesus.  Here is the crux of my faith. There were other would be Messiahs in the 1st century.  There were others who stood up in Judea, around the time of Jesus, and said they were going to deliver the Jews. Before and after Jesus, leaders arose who claimed to be the Christ, the one who would redeem Israel from the Rome and establish God’s Kingdom. 

But what happened to all of them is what happened to Jesus.  They all ended up on Roman crosses.  And that was the end of their Messianic hopes.   But it wasn’t the end of Jesus!  The difference between Jesus and the other Messiahs was the empty tomb.  The movement ,we know as Christianity, only continued past the death of its founder because that leader did not stay dead!  "Why do you look for the living among the dead?  He is not here; he has risen!”  Is the only explanation of why you have heard of Jesus of Nazareth and not Judas the Galilean or Simon bar-Gi ora or any of the other dead, would-be Messiahs.  You never heard of them because when they were crucified they stayed dead. 

So, this is where my faith lives.  It lives because he lives.  And this is where I live.  My head lives in the empty tomb; if that makes sense?

But that is not all Luke knew about me. He is just warming up.  He next connects to my heart.

Luke 24:6-8   “He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee:  'The Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.'" Then they remembered his words.

Isn’t that where you live too?  I live remembering his words.  When God does the unexpected in my life, I remember his words.  The women didn’t come to the tomb expecting to find it empty.  They came to anoint the dead body of Jesus.  They came to honor the one they loved.  But when God did the unexpected in their lives… then his words came back to them. 

That is where we must live! We must learn to live in his words.  When the unexpected storms crash into your life, you must run into his words.  When the storm continues to rage longer than you had expected, you must find refuge in his words. And then, when the storm surprisingly ends… we find peace in his words. We remember such words as:

Don’t be afraid, from now on you will catch men
I am willing, be clean
Love your enemies, do good to those who curse you
Be merciful as your Father is merciful
Your faith has saved you. Go in peace. 
He rebuked the wind and the raging waters and said, Where is your faith?
Don’t be afraid, just believe and she will be healed
Rejoice that your names are written in heaven
Go and do likewise
Ask and it will be given to you
Where your treasure is there your heart will be also
He who humbles himself will be exalted.
Let’s have a feast and celebrate
If you have faith as small as a mustard seed
Rise and go; your faith has made you well.
What is impossible with men is possible with God.
For the Son of man came to seek and save what was lost
The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone
Yet not my will, but yours be done
Father, forgive them

These are the words which define my life.  These are the words of challenge, which keep my faith off balance.  These are the words of hope which keep me going. These are words my heart remembers when God does the unexpected in my life. I remember his words!  Isn’t that where we live? 

Luke then paints a picture that strikes even closer to my heart.

Luke 24:9-12   When they came back from the tomb, they told all these things to the Eleven and to all the others.  It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the others with them who told this to the apostles.  But they did not believe the women, because their words seemed to them like nonsense.  Peter, however, got up and ran to the tomb. Bending over, he saw the strips of linen lying by themselves, and he went away, wondering to himself what had happened.

Here is where I really think Luke is connecting to his life, as well as to my life.  Peter could not quite bring himself to believe the women. And I guess that’s understandable. (Did I say that out loud?) But, he believed the women enough to go see.  This is what God calls all of us to do. So, Peter went to the tomb and he saw the strips of linen, lying by themselves; according to the NIV.  I believe the NLT paints a little clearer picture.

NLT Luke 24:12 However, Peter ran to the tomb to look. Stooping, he peered in and saw the empty linen wrappings;

One of my beliefs is that Jesus transported out of his mummy suit.  This specific detail meant something to Peter, also to John – as you read an even more elaborate comment in the Gospel of John - and to Luke and to me.  How does a body get out of a mummy suit without unwrapping it?  Why were the linen wrappings left behind?  Where was Jesus?  Head questions.

But Luke captures where I live in the rest of verse 12.

Luke 24:12  …then he went home again, wondering to himself what had happened. 

God does the unexpected, we remember his words and attempt to live there, and then we wonder what’s going on and what’s next.  That is the suspense of Luke 24:1-12 and the suspense of our lives.  God moves us from unexpected storms, to helpless acts of love, to reminding us of his words, to unexpected miracles, to giving us evidence of his work, to leaving us wondering what he did and what is going to happen next.  That is where I live. 

I recognize I have been a little esoteric in this sermon. Now, let me make it real.  As most of you know Hanna, our granddaughter, began having seizures about 3 months ago and was diagnosed with epilepsy.  Certainly that was an unexpected storm; bam, out of the blue, epilepsy?  Where did that come from? 

And we began to do like the women bringing spices to the body of Jesus; we did whatever we could to help; whatever medicines were there. Let’s do something.

Then we began to remember his words:
I am willing, be clean
Your faith has saved you. Go in peace. 
Don’t be afraid, just believe and she will be healed
Ask and it will be given to you
If you have faith as small as a mustard seed
Rise and go; your faith has made you well.
What is impossible with men is possible with God.

The elders have anointed and prayed for her, as have most of you have.  We went to a healing service, and God did something for her. Just like the angels telling the women, “The Lord is risen.”  It was exciting and unexpected.  It was the empty mummy suit. 

She was different.  For the last month, she has been getting off the medicines and eating a special diet.  God has changed it all.

And now, we are living like Peter in wonder, but not knowing what God is doing.  She still has epilepsy, maybe, but it is different. We think we have been battling Satan, with our faith. We are living in the time between the empty tomb and the appearance of Jesus.  We are wondering what God is doing… next? 

And that is why I think Luke read my heart and wrote this passage for me.  This is where we live.