{"id":43617,"date":"2012-03-26T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2012-03-26T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/power-of-christs-resurrection-bursts-through-obstacles\/"},"modified":"2026-02-24T22:49:40","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T22:49:40","slug":"power-of-christs-resurrection-bursts-through-obstacles","status":"publish","type":"sermon-illustrations","link":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/power-of-christs-resurrection-bursts-through-obstacles\/","title":{"rendered":"The Power of Christ&#8217;s Resurrection Bursts through Obstacles"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Tim Keller tells the following story about the power of Christ&#39;s resurrection:<\/p>\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>A minister was in Italy, and there he saw the grave of a man who had died centuries before who was an unbeliever and completely against Christianity, but a little afraid of it too. So the man had a huge stone slab put over his grave so he would not have to be raised from the dead in case there is a resurrection from the dead. He had insignias put all over the slab saying, &quot;I do not want to be raised from the dead. I don&#39;t believe in it.&quot; Evidently, when he was buried, an acorn must have fallen into the grave. So a hundred years later the acorn had grown up through the grave and split that slab. It was now a tall towering oak tree. The minister looked at it and asked, &quot;If an acorn, which has power of biological life in it, can split a slab of that magnitude, what can the acorn of God&#39;s resurrection power do in a person&#39;s life?&quot;<\/p>\n\n<\/blockquote>\n\n<p>Keller comments:<\/p>\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>The minute you decide to receive Jesus as Savior and Lord, the power of the Holy Spirit comes into your life. It&#39;s the power of the resurrection&mdash;the same thing that raised Jesus from the dead &hellip;. Think of the things you see as immovable slabs in your life&mdash;your bitterness, your insecurity, your fears, your self-doubts. Those things can be split and rolled off. The more you know him, the more you grow into the power of the resurrection.<\/p>\n\n<\/blockquote>","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"template":"","tax_ctp_audience":[],"tax_ctp_authors":[],"tax_ctp_categories":[165],"tax_ctp_format":[171],"tax_ctp_illustration_types":[411],"tax_ctp_multimedia":[],"tax_ctp_point_editor":[],"tax_publications":[140],"tax_ctp_tags":[3359,3839,4471,4541,4670,4671,4828,4829,4830],"tax_ctp_topics":[],"class_list":["post-43617","sermon-illustrations","type-sermon-illustrations","status-publish","hentry","tax_publications-ct-pastors","tax_ctp_tags-abiding-in-christ","tax_ctp_tags-easter","tax_ctp_tags-ministry-of-holy-spirit","tax_ctp_tags-new-life","tax_ctp_tags-power","tax_ctp_tags-power-of-god","tax_ctp_tags-resurrection","tax_ctp_tags-resurrection-of-believers","tax_ctp_tags-resurrection-of-christ"],"acf":{"scripture_references":[{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null}]},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Power of Christ&#039;s Resurrection Bursts through Obstacles - CT Pastors<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/power-of-christs-resurrection-bursts-through-obstacles\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Power of Christ&#039;s Resurrection Bursts through Obstacles - CT Pastors\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Tim Keller tells the following story about the power of Christ&#039;s resurrection: A minister was in Italy, and there he saw the grave of a man who had died centuries before who was an unbeliever and completely against Christianity, but a little afraid of it too. 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