March 26, 2012  

Sunday Sermon at True Life Community Church

I had the opportunity yesterday to speak to True Life Community Church on the historical evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus.  It was an extraordinary opportunity to share with fellow believers and one atheist.  Although the atheist did not identify himself, I was told a woman was bringing her atheist husband to the service.  Maybe he felt, after hearing the talk, that he didn’t have enough evidence to confront me.  I just don’t know.

The talk centered on what are five historical facts about Jesus and His resurrection; the first being that Jesus died from Roman crucifixion.  The Romans were experts at death and when one considers that Jesus was scourged before crucifixion it makes the process even more certain of its desired outcome.  Scourging was called “half-way death” by the Romans.  Josephus once called it like “filleting a man to the bone”.  It is widely accepted by historical scholars that Jesus died at the hands of the Romans.  The thought that He may have survived the process is without a medical, scientific, historical, or reasonable basis.

The second historical fact was that Jesus was prepared for burial and placed in a tomb owned by Joseph of Arimathea.  There are several independent attestations of this fact.  The fact that there are numerous independent attestations of the burial of Jesus makes the fact of His death even more certain.  Why would there be so many accounts of Joseph going to Pilate to request Jesus’ body if Jesus were not dead?

It is also worth mentioning that knowledge of who buried Jesus and where the tomb was located, is also, therefore, multiply confirmed.

The third historical fact is that the tomb was found empty on the first day of the week following Jesus’ death.  This fact also has multiple attestations in the four gospels as well as in other New Testament writings.   The testimony that women were the discoverers of the empty tomb is the most compelling aspect of this fact.  Embarrassing details in historical accounts has for a long time been a significant indicator of historical accuracy.  One does not include embarrassing details about an event or a person if it isn’t true.  If the story were fiction, you would expect a much different story.  For example, one would expect that men found the tomb empty or that the disciples found the tomb empty.  But this has never been the case and it never developed in the early years of the church either.  The story has always been that women discovered the empty tomb.  The embarrassing detail is that women in first century Palestine were second class citizens whose testimony about anything was given no credibility.  Indeed, women’s testimony was not even accepted in a court of law at that time.  So for the story to be that women discovered the tomb empty in four separate gospels, the logical, reasonable assumption is that it actually happened that way.

The fourth fact is that Jesus’ disciples came to believe, against all odds, that they saw Jesus alive after His death.  Indeed we can verify that Jesus not only appeared to his disciples, but that he had additional appearances after his death to over 500 people, some of whom were skeptics and opposed to him.  When you consider the emotional state of the disciples after Jesus’ death, it is compelling that they saw something that caused them to have the dramatic behavior change that is documented.  Virtually all historians admit that the disciples preached of Jesus’ resurrection in Jerusalem, the very city in which he was executed, weeks after the event.  In the face of severe threats of death, they stuck to their beliefs.  Not one of them varied in their conviction that Jesus was the Messiah and that God had raised Jesus from the dead.  I like to ask, would you die for a belief you knew was a lie?

The fifth, and maybe most significant, are the conversions of James, Jesus’ half-brother, and Paul.  Here are two skeptics whose remarkable transformation to active followers of Jesus and ardent proclaimers of his resurrection is difficult to explain in any other context than that which is provided in the gospels, particularly that God raised Jesus from the dead.  James and Paul had to have seen the risen Lord to make that kind of dramatic behavioral change that we know occurred.

Considering this historical evidence, it is reasonable and logical to conclude that God raised Jesus from the dead.  The question then becomes, ‘So what?’.  This is where the discussion turned to one’s own decision and how that might be made.  It is important to have faith in Jesus, but it is just as important to examine the facts and the evidence that supports that faith.  We do this in our lives all the time, or at least we should.  When making an important decision we should base that decision on the facts and the evidence.  Is the decision right?  Does the decision reflect reality?  We may not always be able to be 100% certain that the decision we make is the best one, but if we enter into the decision making process with an open and clear mind, the chances of arriving at the best possible decision is increased.  Letting our emotions and feelings dictate our decisions without any reason involved, can, and often does, lead to disaster.

So it was a wonderful morning and, I hope, a productive one for the lone atheist in the crowd.  Maybe I planted a seed that the Holy Spirit will feed and develop.

Dr. John Lennox, professor at Oxford University and author of "God's Undertaker: Has Science Buried God?", is one of my favorite scholars.  Please follow the link to watch about a 45 minute lecture with questions that Dr. Lennox gave at Duke University recently.  Wait for the questions at the end, because the answers are worth the wait. The discussion was about answering the question, "Is God Rendered Irrelevant?".

I hope the link works for you. 

http://vimeo.com/37670839

 

New evidence has come to light recently that confirms that there were people believing in the resurrection of Jesus within two or three decades of his death.  This is much too soon for it to have become a legend, but instead must have been based on empirical evidence such as personal witness or from someone who was a personal witness. 

A group of scientists discovered and explored a first century Jewish tomb in East Talpiot, Jerusalem with a robotic arm and highly sensitive specialized camera with light. The preliminary report of the robotic camera exploration of the sealed 1st  century tomb was written up by James D. Tabor, of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.  What they found is conclusive evidence that people of the late 1st century believed in the resurrection of Jesus. They found Greek inscriptions on the tombs that refer to “raising up” and drawing of a fish with a stick figure coming from the fish in an obvious reference to Jonah and the whale which was used by Jesus himself to describe his resurrection from the dead.

Quoting from the report, “In both the case of the Greek inscription and the Jonah image context is everything.  Both are unprecedented in a Jewish tomb of this period.  We are dealing here with a family that is bold enough to write out the holy name of God in a tomb, with a declaration about “raising up” or resurrection – something totally unparalleled in any of the 900 tombs from the period known in Jerusalem.  And further, this is a family that is willing to put an image of a fish and a human, both eschewed by pious Jews as “graven images”, on the most prominent ossuary in this wealthy tomb.”

“We are convinced that the best explanation for these unusual epigraphic features in the Talpiot “patio” tomb is its proximity to the Jesus family tomb less than 45 meters away.  What we apparently have is a family connected to the Jesus movement who reaches beyond the standard burial norms of the Jewish culture of the period to express itself individually in these unique ways.”

This is truly a remarkable development.  Not only are the markings in direct opposition to normal Jewish custom, but these people were committed enough to place these markings in their family tomb to declare their Christian allegiance.

Now this alone is incredibly strong evidence that early Christians had belief in the resurrection of Jesus.  That it was not a legend that developed over time and was written down in later copies of the gospels.  There was no Jewish precedent for resurrection before Jesus.  The Jewish belief in resurrection and a Messiah was to come at the end times.  In Reasonable Faith, Dr. William Lane Craig states; “For a Jew, the resurrection always occurred after the end of history.  He had no conception of a resurrection within history.”  So for 1st century Jewish family to engrave inscriptions and drawings on a family tomb clearly indicating belief in resurrection within history is extraordinary and demands an explanation.  Dr. Craig continues this idea about 1st century Jewish belief; “For there existed no belief in Messiah’s prior resurrection at all.  That is why we find no instances of claims comparable to those of the disciples for Jesus”.

Ask yourself why the people buried in this 1st century Jewish tomb would engrave a clear reference to the resurrection and Jonah on several of the most prominent places in the tomb?  What are they trying to say? 

Now this evidence is not to be looked at in a vacuum.  This is just one more of many evidences and historical facts about Jesus of Nazareth and his resurrection from the dead.  There is the fact of his existence and sentencing to death by Roman crucifixion.  There is the knowledge of where Jesus was buried, the tomb owned by Joseph of Arimathea, the appearances of Jesus to his disciples and over 500 other witnesses.  The development of the firm belief in the disciples of Jesus’ resurrection despite all the reasons not to come to that conclusion.  The conversion of James, Jesus’ half-brother, and Paul, both of whom were initially not accepting of Jesus’ resurrection and who later changed their minds to the point of persecution and death.  Finally, the development of the early Christian church in the face of enormous persecution.  The only plausible and reasonable explanation of all the evidence is that God raised Jesus from the dead.

The question everyone should ask themselves is so what?  What should I do about that?  Should I do anything about it?  I can’t answer those questions for you, but I do know what my answer has been.  The evidence is so compelling, so overwhelming, so defining, that I believe Jesus is who he said he was and is indeed the revelation of God sent to earth to atone for our sins and provide us the opportunity to receive the grace of God and righteousness in God’s eyes through accepting Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross.