But I will send him unto you. And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment. Of sin, because they believe not on me. Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and ye see me no more. Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged. I have yet many things to say unto you, but he cannot bear them now. Howbeit, when he, the spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth. For he shall not speak of himself, but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak, and he will show you things to come. He shall glorify me, for he shall receive of mine, and shall show it unto you. All things the Father hath are mine, therefore said I, that he shall take of mine, and shall show it unto you. A little while, and he shall not see me. And again, a little while, and he shall see me, because I go to the Father. Amen. If you'd like to turn over a few pages then to Acts chapter 2. We're looking at the day of Pentecost. and reconsidering the preaching of the Apostle Peter. And last time, if I remember, I trust faithfully, we dealt with the fact of the Lord Jesus Christ was delivered by the determined counsel and full knowledge of God, that is verse 23, and yet they had by wicked hands have crucified and slain him. And we talked about God's purposes and God's plan and yet responsibility and accountability of those who actually took part in the deed. And of course there's a sense in which we, although we weren't there, We were responsible, you and myself, were responsible for the death of Christ inasmuch as he died for our sins. He suffered for us, the just for the unjust. He might bring us to God. We move on now to the next fact which Peter will bring to our attention. Whom God hath raised up. I'm going to spend a little time with this this evening. before we have probably, presumably, a brief time of prayer. Nevertheless, whom God hath raised up. Now, if I asked you a question, who raised Jesus from the dead? You would say, that's a funny question. It's obvious. God raised him from the dead. And of course, that would be absolutely true, because it says there, whom God hath raised up. norm as you go through Acts. We just mentioned a few verses. In verse 15 of chapter 3, you killed the prince of life whom God hath raised from the dead but of witnesses. Chapter 4 verse 10, Be it known unto you and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by him does this man stand here before you." And most of the references to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ are God. If I then said to you, well, let's break it up a little bit and define that. and to do so because we need to actually study a bit more deeply what the scriptures say to us. Bible studies are first study in the Bible, obviously, and we'd like to go a bit deeper than perhaps you would do on a Sunday. It is assumed, I hope not wrongly, that folk who come to a Bible study, a prayer meeting, midweek, are folk who are fairly familiar with the scriptures, they've been taught, they want to come, they want to understand more, a certain opportunity to go a little bit deeper into things. Now, someone might say, well, does it matter? God raised him from the dead. The important thing is he was raised from the dead. Well, yes, that is important, but if the scriptures teach us certain things, we need to know what they teach. So, who raised Jesus from the dead? Well, you'd say God. I've asked you to expand that. You'd say, well, God the Father. God the Father raised the Lord Jesus Christ from the dead and that is absolutely true. It is God the Father and primarily it is God the Father who is described as raising the Lord Jesus Christ, raising his Son. We need to pay more attention to the work of the Father in all he does in creation, redemption and so on. What I find increasingly concerning amongst evangelical folk, good evangelical folk, is that there's a mix-up of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. I would never say anything to anybody because, you know, who am I to do that? And people are sincere when they pray. But I always sigh. Let me tell you this. I sigh when I hear folk praising God, they're praising God, they're praising the Father for who he is, what he is. And then they say, thank you, Father, that you died for us. And I think, Now, I know they don't mean that. I hope they don't. I know they don't really mean that they believe the Father died. That obviously wouldn't be correct. There was in past church history, in the early days, a sect who actually believed that, that the Father actually died on the cross. And obviously, that's heresy. And I think sometimes we just wonder when we're praying, we're praising God for what he has done in sending his son and all the rest of it. And then we come to the cross and then instead of saying, Lord, thank you for giving your son to us, or switching and saying, thank you, Lord Jesus Christ, you died for us. Somehow they switch and they wander in and they start saying things like, thank you, Father, that you died for us. Now, the Father did not die for us. I don't need to label this to you folk, you know this ever so well. The Father did not die. It was the Lord Jesus Christ, God the Son, the Son of God, He was the one who actually died. So we normally think of the Father raising His Son. But there is a little verse, which you probably remember, in John chapter 10. In John chapter 10, the context is the shepherd, the good shepherd, who gives his life for the sheep. You remember that ever so well, I'm sure. And in chapter 10, in the context of that, Jesus says this. He's talking about the shepherd giving his life for the sheep, right? That's the kind of context. Therefore doth my father love me because I lay down my life. So here is the good shepherd who loves his sheep to such an extent that if need be, and it was needful, that he die for them. He lays down his life for the sheep. He gives his life for his people. And then he goes on to say that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me. Now, someone who knew little about the Gospels, they would read that and say, no man taketh it from me, but didn't the Jewish leaders virtually do that, or they arrested him, they delivered him to the Romans, and then the Romans took his life from him. So why does he say, or how can he say, no man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself? Well, you remember the discussion the Lord had with Pilate and Pilate said, ìDonít you know Iíve got authority over you? I can do as I will with you. I just slap my fingers and youíre crucified. I slap my fingers and you go free. Iíve got absolute power over you.î And the Lord says, ìWell, actually you donít. You donít have absolute power over me. You don't have any power really because any power that you exercise is that which has been granted to you by my father and the authority you have has been granted to you by my father. Almost as an aside, it's interesting isn't it that we will talk about voting for human leaders, prime ministers, presidents and so on and we would say the people have voted The people have put this man, this woman, in office. And on a natural plane, obviously that is true. But behind that is a sovereign God who ordains those are to be leaders. So we say we chose the Prime Minister or the Tory MPs. We have chosen this person to be our next leader. But behind that, it will be God's choice. Now, we can discuss for better or for worse. I'm not going to go there. All right? Same with the president of America, for better or for worse. But the ordination of the leader is actually in God's hands, as is everything. And so what the Lord is saying to Pilate, listen, you may be actually doing this. And you may be the one who's saying, right, crucify this man, or let him go, or whatever. You will do that. But behind that, the powers that be that are ordained of God, says Paul to the Romans. So, actually, I'm in control here. I have power to lay it down, and this is a bit of interest tonight to us, and I have power to take it again. Now, strange, isn't it? How does the Lord have power to take his life again if he is dead? Well, here's the mystery of the humanity of Christ and the deity of Christ. And I don't confess to be able to explain this very simply or cleverly to you, but it's just a fact that he was man and he was God. And it was the man, Christ Jesus, who died, not the eternal son of God. Charles Wesley puts it poetically, it is a mystery to all, the immortal dies. And of course, in a sense, that can't be right because the immortal, by definition, cannot die. Immortal, invisible, God only wise, and so on. So that which is immortal cannot die and does not die. But that which is human, that human body that you and I share with the Lord, that he shares with us, that dies. But the divinity of Christ, the deity of Christ, He's still God. Now, how you work this out, I don't know. But what I'm saying is this, that Jesus said, I have power to lay it down as a sovereign creator, as equal with my Father, as God the Son. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to rise it again. So in some way, somehow, however we understand it or explain it, the Lord Jesus Christ is involved in his own resurrection. Okay, so we've said God the Father's involved, we've said God the Son is involved, what about God the Holy Spirit? Is He involved? Well, before we come to think about that specifically, there's a little verse, it's a little verse tucked away in Hebrews, you may remember it, where it says something like this, of the Lord Jesus Christ who through the eternal spirit offered himself as an offering, as a sacrifice and so on. And it would appear that when the Lord Jesus Christ is actually dying as the Messiah who has been anointed of the spirit, it is the spirit who is enabling him to go through that experience of suffering and death. In other words, he's not on his own as it were. We sometimes say, there he was all on his own. Well, in one sense, because it was, as the Lord Jesus Christ, as the human son of God, he is suffering. Nobody is suffering for him in his body, in his mind, in his soul. He is suffering on his own in that sense. But he is enabled to suffer and enabled to go through it all, and in a sense enabled to die. by the person and power of the Holy Spirit. Now, move on to the resurrection. Are there any verses that would seem to indicate, and I think do, that the Lord Jesus Christ, the resurrection of the Holy Spirit was involved? Well, one of the main verses to me is Romans chapter 1, verse 4. Paul speaks about the Lord Jesus Christ, concerning his son Jesus Christ, our Lord, who was made of the seed of David according to the flesh, and declared to be the Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead. Now, some will take other views on this, and that's fine. The spirit is a small s. Spirit of Holiness. Is that the Holy Spirit or is it small s, Spirit of Holiness, small h? We can discuss this at length. There's a verse in Romans 8. It's not quite saying that the Holy Spirit was involved, but this is what it does say. It talks about And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is alive because of righteousness. But if the spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his spirit that dwelleth in you. Paul is making an analogy of the physical resurrection of believers, that is, being born again and, I'm sure, of a future resurrection. And he's making an analogy with the Lord Jesus Christ, who was raised from the dead, and the Spirit of Him. Is that the Spirit of the Father raised, or is it the Holy Spirit Himself who actually was involved? And if the Spirit of Him had raised up Jesus from the dead dwelling new, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by the Spirit. Now, one further verse from 1 Peter. One of the great, what I would call, gospel texts in Peter is 1 Peter 3, verse 18. And each context is suffering. and the suffering of God's people. And this is what he says in verse 18. For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened, or made alive, by the Spirit. Now that seems to me fairly conclusive. The Holy Spirit was involved in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, see the analogy. If, as we believe, and I believe, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit were involved in the death of Christ in various ways. The triune God was involved. The cross is so big. There's so much involved in this. The Father is involved, the Son is obviously involved, but the Spirit is also involved in the death of Christ and the sufferings of Christ. Surely it should follow, and I'm sure it does follow, and ought to follow, that the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are involved in the resurrection of Christ. It seems to follow. It seems to me to... It seems it should follow. Naturally. God is involved as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in this tremendous, momentous business of the resurrection of Christ from the dead. And you see, it's a practical, it's a practical outworking of this. Because the Triune God is involved in your salvation and mine. The Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, the Father planning it, the Son dying, the Holy Spirit regenerating and making us alive. Now, if they're involved in our salvation, will he not also be involved in our resurrection? If they were involved in the death and resurrection, and particularly the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, will he not similarly be involved with our resurrection? The Father will be involved, the Son will be involved, the Holy Spirit will be involved. This triune God will be involved in raising such as you and such as me from the dead! It's tremendous! Tremendous! It's no small thing. to know this God. It's no small thing to be saved. It's no small thing to be kept. It's no small thing in that great day to be resurrected and brought into the immediate presence of God. I think I've mentioned this before, so forgive the example yet again. I always am amazed at the skill of people who can work on all kinds of things. I mean, there's a little program on television called The Repair Shop. I'm looking at the repeats now. I've seen them all before, but I'm looking at them all again. They're wonderful. These people who repair, like a little clock. He repairs clocks. It's an old clock from Germany. And his grandmother had this little clock, and she was Jewish, and she was arrested. And she sewed it into a skirt, into a petticoat or whatever, and he never found it. And when she was actually delivered from the camps and came to England, he handed it to his son, and it never worked, the grandson. And this man is working on it. And he's got this big repair shop they've got there, where they do all kinds of things. And he said, I can't work on it here, because there's dust in the air. And take it into a special environment where there'll be no dust, because the dust will get on these fine little movements. brilliant. And there's another lady, somebody would bring up a broken vase, a vase if you like, a broken vase. And the person who was going to try and put it together, she just looks at it. You know, it's in bits. I mean, I've tried to stick things before, all right, but I'm super glued to it. And you can tell it's been a life and job, all right. But this woman, she puts things back together. And then she paints on the cracks and she fills them in. And you look at it and you think, ah, it's not the same one. She's gone and bought a new one. You know, come on. We're not daft. We're not fooled. She couldn't put all this together and do wonderful things. And yet she has. It's absolutely amazing. And it's very funny. Now, God does that with you and with me. He puts us back together. And he makes something amazing out of us, such as you and such as me. And God does that with such precision. And I'm sure the angels of glory say, wow, look at this. I remember that chap, little lad, little rebellious lad, good for nothing little lad. And God saved him. Bless him. I remember her too. Yeah, I remember her. Snooky little madam. And the Lord saved her. brought her to faith and look at her now! Wow! God does that. God Almighty, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, God does that. And He's been doing it continually and will do it until that day when He comes. And so you see, the writers of the New Testament go on from the resurrection of the Lord Jesus and talk about Him as being the firstborn from the dead. The first means there'll be a second and a third and a fourth and there'll be hundreds and thousands and millions thereafter. But Jesus is the firstborn, raised by the Father, raised by the Spirit, raised by Himself. And there'll be countless other four coming after Him, who'll be born again into the family, be kept and raised finally from the dead. This is a great salvation and we praise God for our Saviour, risen Saviour. Amen. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for our little brief look at this great fact. We know it. We know it. We sing about it. We love it. We celebrate it, particularly at Easter, and perhaps should celebrate it every single Sunday. The Lord's Day, the day in which the Lord rose triumphantly from the grave. We thank you for what the Scriptures teach us about this, the work of the Father, the work of the Son, the work of the Spirit, Perhaps things that we have not thought about too much, but we believe that this is such a great, great subject. With the death, the resurrection surely is one of these subjects. There can't be anything better and greater than the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is pivotal, foundational to the whole of what we believe. This is what the Apostle Peter preached on Pentecost and subsequent occasions. This Jesus who was dead and was raised. This is what Paul preached. This is what your people have preached and believed down these centuries. And this is what we believe today. Hallelujah. Oh, bless this to us, that we might realize that we serve our risen Savior who is in the world today. Bless us, Father, for Jesus' sake. Amen. Amen, amen. We're going to sing another little resurrection hymn. 235, low in the grave.