Morning. And good morning, ladies and gentlemen, on this Resurrection Sunday. Good to see each one of you as we come to celebrate our risen Lord. Amen. Amen. As they used to say, you know, the preacher would say he is risen. And the congregation would say, indeed he is. And with that, we are grateful. And we come to do a little singing today. Our taos tabernacle choir is down to the taos tabernacle duet. As I mentioned last week, on Easter Sunday in Taos, everyone leaves and goes to their families in various places except you good folks. I'm glad to see a wonderful crowd here today. Let's join together. Brenda, you know, I should say our other regular member now, Lynn's out of town and of course, some of the others live out of town. But Madison, who's always with us, is now engaged. She got a ring when she went home for Easter and so we are excited for that. Stay tuned for more information when she gets back. What's that? He's coming here? Yeah, we're not going to lose her. We're bringing him here. We're recruiting. There we go. Madison, congratulations. We're thrilled for you. Let's stand together and sing Christ the Lord has Risen today. Hymn number 270. And let's sing the first, second and fourth verses on this great hymn. And angel say raise your joy that triumph see me ever. The second lives again. Our glorious King where all death is now my sea was beast roller ya with the victory of grace and I'm the forest suddenly now where Christ has led Allah following our angles again like Him. Like if we rise up cross the dream the sky and let's have a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, we're grateful that your resurrection will someday equate to our resurrection and made like Him. Like him. We rise. We look forward, dear Heavenly Father, to the day in which there is no more crying, no more sorrow, no more sickness, no more pain, no more dying. These things are things we struggle with in this world today, dear Heavenly Father. But we know that there is a victory not only then, but also a victory now in our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, who died and was buried according to the Scriptures, rose again on the third day. And in this, dear Heavenly Father, is our hope. If there is no resurrection. We are of all men, most to be pitied, dear Heavenly Father. And yet we come today celebrating the living Savior. And we do it in Jesus name. Amen. And God bless you. You may be seated. Each one of you welcome again on this beautiful Easter morning. After a month of snow and cold and rain and all that, isn't it nice to have a beautiful Easter Sunday morning? And next Sunday we got a new series started. I gave you a little postcard to stick in your put on your refrigerator or give to your neighbor. Whatever you'd like to do unlearn it is the name of it unlearn. It deprogramming our evangelical mind. Anybody here have evangelicalism? You need deprogrammed? Get that out of there and let's go biblical rather than all the stuff that you just learned. We'll check that out beginning next Sunday on that series. But today, here to celebrate the resurrection a little bit going on this week. We've got the Wednesday night supper. Kay's making Mexican casserole. That'll be good. We'll bring anything that'll go along with that and have a good meal. Wednesday 05:00 in the fellowship hall. Come back in here to study Jereboham. Last week we got him king, just barely. He's now King Jarraboham. And we called this study The Good, the Bad and the Ugly and we have finished the good. We're going now from bad and it'll soon turn ugly in King Jerem's reign. We'll see all that Wednesday night. First Kings chapter twelve is where that is and you see all the other stuff there. Hey, Madison's. Got something new? I'll point that out. And April 18 and 25th, if you know some neighborhood kids april 18 and 25th Kids Craft Club at the Taos Youth and Family Center. Four to 05:00 p.m., no cost to that. Ages five through twelve. Check that out. Delighted that you are here and we have a guest from England. We're delighted that you're here. We like to embarrass our guests, especially those from England and if you don't mind tell us who you are and where you're from because we'll celebrate with you. My name is and I'm from South London. Southeast London. Yes, Imagin from Southeast London and we are very glad that you're here for our London listeners. You got your neighbor right here imaging right did I say that correct? Normally we give a pin to put in our map back there of visitors and we don't have England on the map, which is a shame. So we'll have to put it like in the Atlantic Ocean or something like that over east and do that. You know, Sasha and I were just looking at the map. I hadn't really realized. We're up to 48 states we need if there's anyone out there from Massachusetts or New Jersey maryland, was it Massachusetts or Maryland? Well we already forgot it's up there. Up there, you know in pagan country up there. If there's any Christians, come to New Mexico just for a Sunday. That's all we need for our map. But very delighted to have you imagine. Thank you. And a very happy Resurrection Day to all of those of you online and those of you who join us right here and it'll be a wonderful time of celebration and looking into the word. Why don't you stand and wish someone a resurrection greetings this morning and then we'll come together and sing our that's still that about but I know yeah. Well ladies and gentlemen, come on back in and have a seat on this beautiful resurrection morning. It is. Isn't it nice to have the young men in the front row? Yeah. Next we're going to get them in the choir so that I am not alone. We'll work on you, too. Okay. Glad to have you. Brenda and I are going to sing a special music here this morning, reminding us that not only is he rising again, but he's going to come again. Go ahead, try the nails in my hand. Laugh at me where you stand. Go ahead and say me the day will come when you will see the rise again. Ain't no power on earth can tie me down. Yes, I rise again. Keep me in the crown and mark my name. My love for you is still the same for him and very but very soon I will be free your name and say I didn't know but you will see that you were all don't try to lie the sun but I will see that I know again. Ain't no power that can keep me back if I come again how to take my people out and indeed it will be nice not only has he risen again, but he is coming again come to take his his people back and with that we rejoice. Excuse me here while I reset our pianist. There we go. And let's take our hymnals now. And we are going to sing what Christ Arose, hymn number 273. You can't hardly have an Easter without going with 273. Let's stand together and sing up from the grave he arose he is not here for he is risen and this indeed we do rejoice christ arose she Jesus my Savior waiting the day jesus, my Lord up from the grave hero heroes with the mighty triumph for his Moses rose a victim from the dark domain and he lives forever that is saints to rain heroes heroes hallelujah christ arose nonetheless cannot keep his grave jesus lost my savior jesus was away jesus, my Lord love from the grave hero heroes might be triumph for his nose heroes heroes are victor from the dark domain and he lives forever with his names to rain heroes heroes hallelujah Christ. And we go to all heaven declares him. Number 140 the glory of reason Lord there with the beauty of the Lord forever he will be the lamb upon the stroke let me call my knee and worship Him. I will proclaim the glory of reason who wants one place to reconcile man to God forever on your throat I got my worship you alone amen. All heaven declares if you need it, it's him. Number 277. He is lord. Our I brought the dead is for every shall every tongue come that Jesus Christ is Lord and indeed dear Heavenly Father, we celebrate the fact today that he is Lord. He has risen from the dead and he is Lord. And in this we find great comfort and strength on this resurrection morning we pray this in Jesus name, amen. You may be seated. We've got just a brief offer tory time. Our offering this month for Mission of the Month goes to our Vacation Bible School in July, in which Madison and her fiance will be working on and looking forward to sharing the gospel there for many children here in our community. And so if you give Mark to missions this month, it goes to Vacation Bible School. If you of course, leave it unmarked, it goes to the work of our church and all that we do right here. And we celebrate in that you can either put something in the box during the offery time or any time as we continue just to celebrate that he is Lord. And on this resurrection morning, we're going to start out in One Corinthians chapter 15, just as a wonderful reminder to us of the resurrection of our Lord. First Corinthians chapter 15 is a powerful and a wonderful text of scripture that has to do with the resurrection and it actually has to do with the resurrection of humanity, you and I, and believers especially. And yet it starts out with a reminder of the Gospel and the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ when Paul says in one Corinthians, chapter 15, verse one moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I have. Preached unto you, which also ye have received and wherein ye stand by which also you are saved if you keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless you have believed in vain. For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received. How that Christ died for our sins according to the scripture, and that he was buried and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures. And he was seen of Sephas and then of the Twelve, and that as seen and later seen above, 500 brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto the present, but some are fallen asleep. And after that he was seen of James, and then all the apostles. And last of all, he was seen of me also as one born out of due time. We'll stop right there. Isn't that a great reminder from the apostle Paul who sees the Lord lake on the road to Damascus is when he had his experience with the risen Lord. But he recounts how the Lord was seen of Sephas and he was seen of James, and he was seen of 500 brethren. And I like that the way he says most of them are alive to this day. That's kind of the way to saying, hey, you can go knock on their door. If you don't believe me, ask them. They're the ones that were the eyewitnesses. And in that we rejoice over the last several weeks this Easter season, we have been looking at a new look at an old story. And the story that we have the Easter story, of course, is for most, if not all of us, it is a fairly familiar story that we understand that which took place, and yet there are little aspects of it. I think you would agree with me after now of taking these. This is now the fifth sermon in this little short series miniseries, as we call it around here, five sermons, because some of my series are like 80 sermons long. But here in this little miniseries, I think you would agree there's these little aspects of the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ, what we'll call the Easter story, little aspects that we had read a thousand times and yet never seen it before. And I want us to look at one more of those today as we consider the resurrection. And I am going to say right up front that this sermon, first of all, is designed to remind us and to help us know that what we have now, even with the celebration of the resurrection and the understanding of the resurrection, is not the end of the story. There is more to come. And what we have now in our Christian life is not the ultimate in the Christian life. There is more to come and we are going in to that more now. That's what the sermon is about. Let me say that in the journey on the sermon, you might say that's the weirdest Easter sermon I have ever heard in all my life because we are going to talk an awful lot about wine. Have you ever had an Easter sermon in which the pastor selected all the passages in the life and ministry of Jesus on wine? Probably not. I can say I've never preached one. But we are in the talist Theological Seminary here and we can do this. And I think we're going to find that there is more to wine than meets the eye in the life and ministry of Jesus. But particularly from, let's say, the Friday night Arrest, if you go with a traditional chronology, which I'm going to go with, if you take well, I should Friday night, I should say the Thursday night, the Thursday night Last Supper into the Friday morning Crucifixion. We've got several references to wine that we're going to look at. We're going to tie it from the beginning of his ministry all the way to the future fulfillment, and we're going to tie that into the resurrection and see that there really is a wonderful connection that Jesus is giving a picture throughout his ministry of saying, I've got something great and I'm saving it for the end. And you and I can take this and say, even with the resurrection and the celebration that we have of the resurrection, it is not the end of the story. I wonder sometimes, and I guess I'll have to tell you later on this one, but I wonder sometimes if when we get to heaven, let's go all the way out to the new heaven and the new earth. The millennium has happened. Everything else has happened. I wonder if I know time is a little different and there's no sun in the holy city at least. But do you have an Easter morning all throughout history? All throughout future history? Can you call it history when there's no time? I don't know how this works. But anyway, in the future, will there be that celebration? I suppose there will be certainly some memory of the resurrection of the death barrel and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, which is the basis for all we've got. But I also suspect that by then we will be celebrating more the fulfillment of God's work. The resurrection was one step on the process of the fulfillment of the work. And in the future we'll be looking at it all. So in this new look at an old story, let's start out with the marriage feast at Cana of Galilee. Here's. Bartolome esteban. Muriel. I don't know him, but he painted this in 1675 and it is a picture of the wedding at Cana of Galilee. And if you don't mind, take in your scriptures and let's go to the Gospel of John and everybody knows. I suspect I suppose you could even go to most segments of American society that even are not well grounded in the word. I suspect I don't know, our friend from London could probably tell us. We Americans at least view London as more secular than we Americans are. I don't know if that's true or not, but I suspect you could even go to the heart of London and you could say to a passerby, maybe in front of Buckingham Palace, you could say, could you tell me, ma'am, could you tell me, sir, what was the first miracle of Jesus? And they would say, he turned the water into wine. This is a well known miracle. I got a nod from England. Good. This is a well known miracle and probably is the best known of Jesus's miracles. We could argue maybe the feeding of the 5000 or Jesus walking on the water or whatnot. But I suspect maybe just because it's first and perhaps because it's unusual and maybe because for Baptists anyway, it opens the door wide for a lot of jokes. Like the Baptist woman who was talking to her son about drinking. And he said, well, you know, Mom, Jesus turned water into wine. She says, oh, I wish he hadn't had done that. So whatever it is, there's about half a dozen good jokes on the water to the wine. We won't even go there on this day. But we know that very early in his ministry, really the first thing to introduce his ministry, john, chapter two. Let's look at chapter two, verses I don't know, one through seven, eight, nine or so and pick just a few things that come out of this at the beginning of his ministry. It says the third day. And the third day was the marriage at Cana in Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. I didn't get very far without thinking. I have to stop and talk a little bit. The third day. Why does it say the third day? If you follow it through, this is the 7th day of a series through First John, and yet the last one he talked about was three days ago. And you add the three and it makes seven. But you don't have to read the Bible very long. You can be at the beginner's class to know that the numbers three and seven are kind of significant in the Bible, right? And both of them are completeness, fullness, perfection kind of numbers. So it's kind of interesting here that the Gospel writer here points out this is the third day. You can expect something rich on this day, something that brings in the full dimensions on this day. This is the third day and they're at a marriage. In verse two, it says both Jesus and both Jesus was called and his disciples to the marriage. And when they wanted wine, the mother of Jesus said unto him, they have no wine. Jesus saith unto her, woman, what have I to do with thee? Mine hour has not yet come. Verse five, his mother saith unto the servants, whatever he saith unto you, do it. It's an odd response to Jesus and his mother and an odd response of his mother to Jesus. Woman, what have I got to do with thee? Don't say that to your mother. And her response is, do whatever he says. Do whatever he says. I think this is correct. You can check me on it. I think we only have two recorded sayings of Mary, and both of them are really good. One is, Behold the bondslave of the Lord. Be it done unto me as thou hast spoken. And the other is, whatever he says, do it. That's a pretty good rule of life, isn't it? Just right there. Maybe we'll have to make a sermon out of that someday. But whatever he says, do it. Verse six and there were set six water pots of stone after the manner of Purifying of the Jews containing two or three firkins apiece. Okay, that's a little archaic King James language, but let me translate it. It's somewhere around 150 gallons. Verse seven. Jesus saith unto them, fill the water pots with water. And they filled them up to the brim. And he saith unto them, draw out now and bear unto the Governor of the Feast. And they bear it. And the ruler of the Feast, when he had tasted the water that was made to wine, knew not whence it was, but the servants which drew the water knew. And the Governor of the Feast called the bridegroom and saith unto him, every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine. And when men have well drunk then that which is worse. But thou hast kept the good wine till now. The beginning of miracles Jesus did in Cana of Galilee. Everybody saves the bad stuff till later, but you later bring forth the good stuff. I think here on this resurrection morning we can say, and it almost sounds a little sacrilegious to say it here as we're celebrating the resurrection, but we can say in comparison later on the resurrection is going to look like the bad stuff. The good stuff is yet to come. I think there is a very strong reason that Jesus introduces himself with the making of this overwhelmingly good wine. In fact an abundance, 150 gallons of overwhelmingly good wine that Jesus uses as a way to introduce Himself. I don't know about you but that seems like an odd way to introduce yourself as a religious leader. Here I am to bring you all to good healthy moral living and we're going to start out by making 150 gallons of really good wine. That's odd to me. Maybe it's because I grew up Baptist, I don't know, but that's odd to me. It's a strange way to introduce yourself but I think there's some symbolism of a richness and a fullness and a bounty that is to come and Jesus says I'm your guy. I am the guy that is going to bring about richness and fullness. Now we go from there and that's odd way to introduce yourself and I want us to turn to let's go to Matthew chapter 26 here. So back up a little bit to the left and let's take ourselves to the Last Supper. Now we're on again using the traditional chronology. We're on the Thursday night and they are in the upper room and we meet in Matthew chapter 26, verses 26 through 29. Here is El Greco's painting of The Last Supper. Of course Leonardo DA Vinci got the famous one on that but I didn't want to bring that one up. You've seen it. So we'll get El Greco, the Spaniard, he was a Spaniard, he was a Greek who was living in Spain. So the Spaniards call him El Greco. There we go, 1568 I suspect, I didn't ask El Greco, but I suspect this is Judas right here across the table at the Last Supper. And so we pick up Matthew chapter 26, beginning in verse 26 and it says and as they were eating, Jesus took bread and blessed it and break it and gave it to his disciples and said Take, eat, this is my body. And he took the cup and gave thanks and gave it to them, said Drink ye all of it for this is the blood of the New Testament which is shed for many for the remission of sins. Now I want to stop there on verse 27 and I want to point out something that is not really stated but it is implied. Verse 27, he took the cup and gave thanks and gave it to them, saying, Drink, ye, all of it. Looks like he's not drinking the cup. That could go either way. But the strength of the text, I think, says, no, he's not drinking it. He says, I want you to drink it. This is what I am providing for you. It's the blood of the New Testament. That is, this is symbolic because it was wine in the cup. It was not blood in the cup, it was wine in the cup. And that wine was symbolic of the sealing of the covenant. The covenant very often in the Scriptures was sealed with blood. And yet the new covenant never had been sealed. It had been spoken by the Lord to the prophet Jeremiah, for example, about this new covenant for the House of Israel and for the House of Judah. And it's described in Jeremiah, chapter 31, fabulous future days of the New Covenant. And yet that covenant was promised, but never really was it sealed. I don't know, I kind of remember the old Western movies where they would have a blood bond and they're going to somehow put blood on this thing and show that this is a real thing. And so here it comes out, and Jesus gives that wine as the symbol of the blood that is going to come tomorrow. His blood that is going to come tomorrow. And so it's as if he says, you drink this cup, I'll drink that cup, and that will be yours will be a symbol, and mine will actually be the seal of the new covenant. Then in verse 29, he says something interesting. He says, But I say unto you, I will not drink henceforth of the fruit of the vine until the day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom. Okay, here is the maker of good wine who says, I will not drink from the fruit of the vine henceforth until I drink it with you. New, I drink it with you. He says, specifically in the Father's kingdom. Now, we don't have time to build the case. I think most of you would agree with me, however, that the Father's kingdom comes at the time at which Jesus is Messiah comes. Now in the Second coming. He comes in the second Coming. There is the resurrection, there is the judgment, and he establishes the kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven, the Father's kingdom, the Davidic kingdom, the Messianic kingdom. He's sitting upon the throne, and he says, then we'll drink wine between now and then. I'm not going to drink it. So that last cup of wine, then, at the Last Supper, stands as a memorial that someday something better is coming. Now put this together. Jesus introduces himself, and he says, the words aren't there, but the message says, the last is better than the first. I'll bring out the good wine later. You think it's good now that I am here in your midst and I can turn water into wine and later on feed the 5000 and walk on the water and all those kind of things, you think that's good. Now just wait, you haven't seen anything yet. Taste this wine that is a foretaste of glory divine. I want you to see what's coming. Now the words aren't there but we've read the rest of the book and so we can put that together and begin to look at that. And then he comes and he says then at the very last supper I want you to take this wine. I want you to take it as a memorial. That the best stuff's coming. But I tell you what, I'm not going to drink of it until we get there and we drink it together. That's the picture that we've got going here. And he wanted to show his followers really. Hey, the best is not yet come, don't worry about it. There's coming a time, imagine as we talked about last week, the disciples didn't really totally understand what was going on. And so the next day when Jesus has died upon the cross and they are despondent through the weekend, somebody had to think. He said, I'll drink it with you new in the kingdom. Does that mean anything? What do you think he was saying? Was he wrong? What's up? And did that give them a look and a picture and a vision of hope? I suspect that it did. Well, let's move from there from the Last Supper and let's go to the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ or the trial and the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ. Here we have a picture of Christ on the cross with John. And let's see, I cut off with Mary and John by a guy in 1457 who painted that. There are, I think five different occurrences of wine kind of in the crucifixion story. I'll show you what I mean by kind of here in just a moment. The first one definitely is there. And if you're in Matthew turn a little to the right to Mark chapter 15, verse 23. And I tell you what, I printed them on the outline. If you'd just like to look, if you don't trust me, turn to Mark 1523. But in Mark chapter 1520, verse 23, they are in the midst of the trial and the crucifixion. And it says specifically they gave him wine. This is the soldiers. They gave him wine mixed with mer, but he received it not. Well prior to this sermon maybe we would have just said I guess he wasn't thirsty. But now we know he said he wasn't going to drink of the fruit of the vine. He received it not no, thank you, wine mixed with myrrh. Now this is the soldiers giving it to them. And likely what this is is the soldiers said, well, speaking of the old Westerns. You remember when they told the guy to bite on the bullet? This is a way to take the pain away a little bit. This is going to hurt. And I think it's a way not only it's a little bit of compassion on the soldier's part who says, man, this is going to hurt, but I have a feeling the soldier is thinking, this hurts me too. I don't like to watch this grimace in here, but I got to do my duty and drink this wine mixed with myrrh. Myrrh, it is believed, was a type of medication that would take away a little bit of the reality along with wine and a little bit of the pain. So here's some wine mixed with merck. And Jesus says, no, I'm not going to have it. He does it. One, perhaps I think there are two reasons. One, perhaps is because he says, I want the full suffering. I am taking the suffering of the cross. I'm not going to medicate this at all. We're going the full thing. And two, he says no, because he says, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until I drink it new in the Father's kingdom, and this is not the Father's kingdom. So that is Mark, chapter 15, verse 23. Let's go to the second time then, which would be Matthew, chapter 27, verse 34, when it says, they gave him vinegar to drink mingled with gall, and when he tasted thereof, he would not drink. Okay, now this is a little bit different. It definitely hits his palate and he tastes this vinegar mixed with gall. Here's one of the problems. I don't know what vinegar mixed with gall is. We believe that it is some sort of alcoholic based high acidity like vinegar. Vinegar, if I understand my vinegar is the bacteria has actually eaten up the alcohol and you're left with the leftovers and it's sour. And then it's mixed with gall, which we believe again is some sort of medication that was put in there to help. So here he tastes it, but again, he would not drink it. We're not surprised he wants to go through the full suffering. He said he wasn't going to drink it. That's the second time, the third time. Luke, chapter 23, verse 36. It says the soldiers were offering him vinegar now in that passage, and if we were to look there, we would see that passage is actually connected to the mocking of Jesus. Ha. You say you're king of the Jews. They put the robe on him, you're the king of the Jews, and they mocked him, and they put a crown upon a thorn and they gave him this vinegar. It appears that the vinegar is part of the mocking. I don't know the full thing, and I don't know that anybody does, but I did study a little bit about Roman soldiers and their wine, and people have written about these things, and it appears that in the Roman Empire, wine was much preferred to, let's call it beer, okay? Wine was preferred to beer. Beer was the drink of a low life. I'll use that word. It was the drink of a low life. And if you are anybody, you drink wine. So I think it connects there with king of the Jews here, drink this low life stuff. And that is part of the mockery that is coming in that they are saying with the robe and with the crown. Yeah, you say you're king, but they're saying with the drink, you are just a barbarian, is all you are. And that was communicated in there. Now, it says they offered him vinegar. Again, it doesn't say that he took any of the vinegar. Okay, let's go to the next one, matthew, chapter 27, verse 48. And it says that someone came along. Now here it looks like a bystander. A bystander is there and he comes along and it says he took a sponge and filled it with vinegar. By the way, it is said in that Luke passage that there was a jar of vinegar there, took this vinegar, put it on a reed and gave him to drink. Now, it does not say, it just sort of leaves it to interpretation there. Did he drink it? Did he not drink it? All we know is somebody put it on a reed and gave him to drink. But I don't know if it's the most appropriate line right now, but you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink, right? So they offered him a drink of this vinegar one more time. Again, it looks like kind of out of compassion, they offered it to him. You know, there's one interesting aspect of this that they put it on a read and that actually it's the next one a hisp. I'll go ahead, though, with it in John, we're going to get to a hisp. We know that with the length of a man and the longest we can ever get hisop, that Jesus could not have been more than 8ft off the ground. His head could not have been more than 8ft off the ground. So if you think of, I don't know, according to that picture now, he's probably about ten or 11ft off the ground there. Most of our artwork, they need to lower him down just a little bit, is just a little bit above the ground. From if we take that as the measure. So then we come to the last one, John, chapter twelve, verses 29 through 30. And there it says, it was set a vessel full of vinegar there, as mentioned also in Luke. And they filled a sponge, this is a different occurrence. They filled a sponge with vinegar and put it on hisop and put it to his mouth. And when Jesus had received the vinegar, he said, it is finished. Now I'm going to take received the vinegar as drink it, you wouldn't have to. But in the Mark passage, the very first Mark passage in Mark 1523, it says they gave him a wine mixed with Mer and he received it not, he didn't drink it, but this time he received it. Looks to me like he drank it. Now you look at all that and you say, okay, Jesus, let's take these as five times. I think they are five different times, but let's take them as that four times you kept your word, you did not drink. The fifth time you drank it. Sorry Jesus, I guess the pain was too bad, you broke your word. I'll not drink of the fruit of the vine until now. You believe it or not, there are some out there and especially those who are looking for any discrepancy in the scripture, they look out there and first of all they mix these five things up as if they were the same thing. And one says he received it not, and the other said he received it. See, the Bible's full of contradictions. Well, not if you're talking about two different things. And I think definitely we are talking about five different things here. But the second thing they do is say, see, Jesus was a liar or a weakling, whatever it was, he received it. He finally you put enough pressure on him and he received it. But what they never point out is how come it only says wine on the first one and the other times it says vinegar is vinegar the fruit of the vine? Well, a lot of times people will say, in fact, I think the most common answer out there, if you were to look it up, what did they offer Jesus on the cross? They would say sour wine. It was wine that had soured. I don't know anything about wine, but I read a little bit about it and I found out that wine can sour. Okay, if you leave the top off, put it out there, the bacteria will come in, it'll turn the wine vinegarish, it will sour. And so they say that's what it is here. I think the problem is that very consistently the Bible uses a very different word for wine and vinegar, both in the Greek and the Hebrew, because in Psalm 69 there is a prophecy that says they gave me vinegar to drink. And it's a prophecy of Jesus on the cross and it does not use the normal Hebrew word for wine. And the normal Hebrew word for wine is used quite a bit in the Old Testament. And so I think what we've got is this is a grain based vinegar, which is normally what vinegar is, a grain based vinegar. So what have we got here? We got this issue that Jesus says there's something great happened. Jesus says, I am going to wait because there's something great happened. Then there are these five times that say, hey, Jesus did wait, he didn't ever drink the fruit of the vine again. And then I want us to go to one more passage in your Bible, if you don't mind. Let's look to the book of Amos. It's probably been a long time since you've been to the Book of Amos, right? And it's right after the Book of Joel, just in case you need to know. And Amos, chapter nine. If you're in a Schofield Bible, it's page 940, if that helps you out. Amos, chapter nine, verses one, verse 13, beginning in verse 13, this is speaking of the future kingdom. And it says in verse 13, behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes, him that sow a seed. And the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt. And I will bring again the captivity of my people, Israel. And they shall build the waste cities and inhabit them, and they shall plant vineyards, and shall drink the wine thereof. They shall also make gardens and eat the fruits of them, and I will plant them upon the land, and they shall be no more pulled up out of their land which I have given them, saith the Lord thy God. Now, here's a description of the future coming kingdom. And twice in that description of the kingdom, he uses the illustration of what wine the mountains will drop with sweet wine. Everyone will plant their own vineyards and have their own wine. And there's this beautiful picture that is come now, you put all that together. I told you it's going to be the strangest Easter sermon you ever had. So what did the preacher preach about on Easter wine? Well, there's that picture in wine. It's the picture that the best is yet to come. Here. We could stand today we didn't, but we could stand today. And we could sing, I serve a risen Savior, he's in the world today, and we could rejoice that he lives. There are times, and sometimes perhaps it might even be the case with us, that we come along and we say, boy, there's this great gospel and there is that Christ died according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he rose again on the third day, according to the Scriptures, he's ascended on high. He's seated at the right hand of the Father, that God, through Jesus Christ, is offering a free gift of salvation. That's pretty good, isn't it, right there? A free gift of salvation. Did you catch that? A free gift of salvation that is not of yourselves, not of works, lest anyone should boast. He's just offering it to any man, woman, boy or girl. Here it is. You can have a restored relationship with Jesus Christ. Heaven can be your home, you can be complete in Christ, you can be sanctified in Him. You can have the righteousness of God, within you. It is free. It is yours. What must I do to be saved? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. And we could say, it can't get any better than this. I mean, that's just as good as it gets right there, that I have this gift of salvation. And yet Paul says in that first Corinthians chapter 15 passage, we didn't read it, but we started there. Paul's the one that said, if there is not a resurrection, we of all men are most to be pitied. He says, because if this is the best we've got, well, it ain't that good. I mean, you and I have a good life, right? We're going to go home and eat ham in honor of the Jewish Messiah. We're going to celebrate the love, the sunshine, put on our pink shirt and tie, wear it with confidence, right? It's good. Life is good. And I agree, life is good. I really have no complaints about it. I enjoy the life that I live, and I think most of you enjoy the life that you live. But also when you hit your toe in the middle of the night on the corner of the bed, you think, it's got to get better than this. Surely there's something better than this. And the whole issue of the wine, jesus says there's something better. Jesus says, I am going to give that wine to you, but I'm going to wait until there's something better. Jesus or the Lord, through the word said to Amos and several of the other prophets, hey, someday the world is going to be so good. The best way I can describe it is the mountains drip with sweet wine, everybody will have their vineyard. And I think you and I today can say, with all the glory and the blessing of this resurrection Sunday, and all that is ours, and as believers in Jesus Christ, the strength and the hope that is ours. The good news is it gets better, even better, that someday out into eternity, we might look and say, can you believe we were so excited about the resurrection, we had no clue how good it was going to get? That it gets better from here. That's what the wine tells us in the story of the Crucifixion. Amen. Let's have a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, we are most grateful for these little subtle pictures that are given to us in the scripture that remind us, even with this fantastic gift of life that is given to us, that it gets better. This is not the end of the story. We serve a risen Savior, we're complete in Him. We've been given a gift of salvation. We've been given the righteousness of God within us by the work of Jesus Christ. We have the risen Lord to turn to, to lean upon, to rest upon, to find sustenance from, and we have the word of God to make us perfect and thoroughly equipped for every good work. And yet someday, dear Heavenly Father, there's the rapture, and even that will overshadow all that we have seen to this day. And then there is the establishment of the kingdom and the fulfillment of all the promises to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And seeing those promises fulfilled in reality, what a blessing that will be, dear Heavenly Father. And then there is eventually the new heaven and the new earth and the new Jerusalem, and what joy that will be. In fact, there really is no greater picture of life than the description of the new Jerusalem that we have with those pearly gates and the streets of gold. And the sun never goes down because there is no sun, because the glory of God is the light of that place. So, dear Heavenly Father, as we rejoice today in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, we also have a forward look and rejoice into the future. And we do so in Jesus name. Amen. And now, before we leave today, I think that I should introduce you to my newest grandson. Don't you all think so? Yes. And Miles. Come on up. Come on up here. And Sasha is going to be the photographer. And isn't this a beautiful family right here? She loves getting her picture taken. And I want to take a little Miles and give a prayer of dedication here. Dedicating him to the Lord. Look, he's even got a little bow tie and everything. He's got his eyes wide open for you. Let's pray together. Dear Heavenly Father, how sweet to hold a newborn baby and feel the joy and the pride he gives, but greater still the calm assurance this boy can face the future just because he lives. We rejoice in the life of our Savior. Dear Heavenly Father we rejoice in the new life that has been given to Nathan and Whitney and his big sister Halle. And our prayer, dear Heavenly Father, as you just protect this boy from danger and disease. As we give him to you and dedicate him to you and pray for great things as the soldier of God in this world. We pray it in Jesus name. Amen. Now what we are going to do is give him back to daddy here. And I just happen to know that she's not going to pose for a picture later. So smile. Thank you. And hallie. You're beautiful. I keep telling her she's got a thing for us. One of these days we'll get there. But on this beautiful Easter morning with this early service that we've had, let's just stand together and go out from here singing he is Lord, he is Lord he is Lord. He is risen from the dead and he is Lord. Every niche shall bow, every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. Thank you for being here on this beautiful Easter Sunday morning. Got so much more yet to come. Good to see each one of.