Can We Believe in the Resurrection? Part 2: Historical Evidence

Sermon delivered on Sunday, Easter 4A, May 11, 2014, at St. Augustine’s Anglican Church, Columbus, OH.

If you would like to listen to the audio podcast of this sermon, usually somewhat different from the text below, click here.

Lectionary texts: Acts 2.42-47; Psalm 23.1-6; 1 Peter 2.19-25; John 10.1-10.

In the name of God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Last week we began to answer the question, how do we explain the rise of early Christianity? We saw that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is not only the turning point in history, it is the absolute foundation on which our Christian faith stands. We also defined resurrection and saw that when Jesus’ contemporaries and the NT writers used the term, they always referred to some kind of new bodily existence. As Tom Wright describes it, resurrection is about life after life after death and it is our ultimate hope as Christians. We then looked at some common objections raised about the resurrection and answered each in turn. I don’t have time to review each of these objections but if you did not hear last week’s sermon, I would encourage you to go to my blog and either read or listen to the sermon.

This week, I want us to focus on the positive evidence that the resurrection was an actual historical event. I want this evidence to help reinforce our resurrection faith so that we have no doubt that God really did raise Jesus from the dead in the midst of human history. This knowledge should also help us to further graciously answer our critics when they challenge our belief in the resurrection, e.g., by asking them what they propose to do with our answers to their objections or to the evidence we provide that God really did raise Jesus from the dead.

Of course, no one witnessed the resurrection directly (although if the Shroud of Turin, the purported burial shroud of our Lord, ever proves to be authentic, it will shed some fascinating scientific insight into the very nature of the resurrection, but that is a different conversation for a different day). So we have to look at historical patterns that developed in the early Christian movement that indicate the first Christians were convinced that Jesus had been raised from the dead and was indeed God’s Messiah and the world’s true Lord. To help us think these issues through, in Surprised by Hope, Bishop Tom Wright has noted seven significant modifications to the Jewish hope of resurrection (recall from last week that resurrection was a distinctive Jewish belief and teaching) and argues these modifications demand an answer as to why these changes occurred. I will briefly summarize these modifications and then as we did last week, I will address any questions or concerns you have at sermon’s end.

The virtually unanimous Christian thinking about life after death. The first significant change to the Jewish belief in resurrection is seen in the fact that the earliest Christians (at least for the first 150 years or so) were virtually united in their thinking about life after death. This contrasts to a wide variety of thinking about resurrection among first-century Jews (some, like the Sadducees, didn’t even believe in resurrection; that’s why they were sad, you see) and the fact that pagans didn’t believe in resurrection at all. Yet the early church was made up of both converted Jews and pagans, who ditched their previously held beliefs about life after death and embraced resurrection and the new creation patterned after Jesus’ resurrection. What possibly could have caused this change other than the early Christians were convinced that Jesus had been raised from the dead and that believers would share in his glory (cf. 1 Corinthians 15.12-26).

The vital importance of the resurrection to early Christians. This contrasts with the thinking about the subject on the part of first-century Judaism. Resurrection was important to first-century Jews, but not that important. But for the early Christians (as well as for us), it is the central and essential feature of the faith. This difference can only be realistically explained by accepting the fact that Jesus was indeed raised from the dead and it was a game-changer for the early Christians.

The early Christian teaching about the resurrected body. In contrast to first-century Judaism, which was rather vague about what the resurrected body would look like (even though it taught that the body would be raised), from the very beginning Christians based their teaching about the resurrected body on Jesus’ resurrected body. Paul was the first to offer a massive treatise on this subject (1 Corinthians 15.1-58). He wrote that the resurrected body would be a body in some sense, but it would be a transformed body like Jesus’ that was created out of the old material from his mortal body and had new properties. Unless Paul and Jesus’ disciples had first-hand experience with Jesus’ resurrected body in which to write and teach about our future resurrected bodies, there is no other credible explanation for this new teaching.

The new Christian teaching about a two-stage resurrection. Ancient Judaism taught that the resurrection of the dead would come at the end time when God would finally return and judge the world. In other words, there would be only one resurrection and it would happen to everybody at the same time. But this was not what the first Christians taught. They taught that the resurrection of Jesus actually signaled the beginning of God’s promised new creation and it had occurred surprisingly in the midst of human history! As Paul wrote and we recite in our Easter anthems each week during the Easter season, Jesus is the first-fruits of those who have died and we who are his followers will be raised on the last day. Once again, had Jesus not been raised from the dead, there would be no credible basis for this teaching.

The early Christian teaching about participating in the end times. Based on this belief in a two-stage resurrection and the launching of God’s new creation here on earth in the middle of human history, the early Christians believed and taught that they would be empowered by the Holy Spirit to work with the risen Lord to implement his achievement of new life, healing, and the forgiveness of sins that were to be part and parcel of the new creation. In working with the risen Christ in the power of the Spirit, the early Christians believed that they would embody and demonstrate their resurrection hope as they eagerly awaited the final consummation of the new creation, a belief we still share today since we too are living in the end times. They believed and acted this way because Jesus’ resurrection made them understand that creation matters to God and therefore it should matter to them!

Moreover, to declare that Jesus is Lord and to work on his behalf in defiant opposition to the worldly powers was to risk their very lives for Jesus. This makes little sense if he had not been raised from the dead. Why would they risk their lives for a lie or fabrication? As we saw last week, delusional people sometimes act on their delusions but the apostles were emphatic-ally not psychotic. The only reasonable explanation, then, is that Jesus Christ arose from the dead and interacted with the disciples in ways that convinced them beyond doubt that he was really alive, fantastic and unbelievable as that was for them to believe, and that this interaction had a radically profound impact on their teaching and the way they patterned their lives after Jesus.

The different metaphorical use of resurrection by the early Christians. Ancient Judaism used resurrection as a metaphor to speak about their hope in God’s returning to the Temple to end their exile as a nation and to defeat their pagan oppressors (cf. Ezekiel 37.1-14). When Jesus’ contemporaries used resurrection as a metaphor, it was always in this sense. They had in mind God’s restoration of the nation of Israel. Not so with the first Christians. Think especially how Paul used resurrection as a metaphor in Romans 6.5-11 and Colossians 2.11-13. This wasn’t about God restoring the nation of Israel. It was about baptism and dying and rising with Christ. Again, how else can we explain this radically different use of the term unless Jesus actually rose from the dead?

The Christian belief that Jesus was Messiah based on the resurrection. As we saw last week, none of Jesus followers expected him to be raised from the dead. And after the crucifixion, they surely would not have thought he was the Messiah because crucified Messiahs were failed Messiahs. As we saw on Palm Sunday, most Jews expected the Messiah to cleanse the Temple, drive out the pagan oppressors, and establish God’s righteous rule. Jesus had cleansed the Temple but he had not driven out the Romans. In fact, he was crucified by them. So what changed their mind about Jesus? The only possible explanation is the resurrection. Certainly there is widespread evidence that the NT writers thought Jesus had been vindicated by God when God raised him from the dead (see, e.g., Ephesians 1.20; 1 Peter 1.21) and there is no other reasonable explanation for this change in their thinking about him being the Messiah or Christ.

And lest we wonder if the gospel accounts are fabrications or stories made up by the later church to propagate its false teaching about Jesus and the resurrection, consider the following. First, consider that none of the gospel accounts use OT references in explaining the resurrection. This is almost unbelievable considering that all the gospels, especially Matthew’s, are laced with OT references throughout that interpret their various narratives about Jesus and his ministry (see, e.g., Matthew 1.22-23). Considering how central the resurrection is to the Christian faith, we have to wonder why there are no biblical references to interpret it. The most obvious answer is that the resurrection was so unexpected and so categorically different that the gospel writers and their oral traditions simply did not have any previous biblical events with which to compare it! This would also help explain the apparently confusing initial accounts of the first eyewitnesses. Their accounts express the bewilderment Jesus’ followers must have experienced that first Easter Sunday. If the later church had invented these stories rather than received them from the eyewitnesses (see below), they did a frankly lousy job in telling the stories because the four gospel accounts raise as many questions as to what happened on that first Sunday as they answer, and this is certainly no way to do apologetics!

Second, consider the fact that all the gospel writers tell us that women were the first eyewitnesses to the aftermath of the resurrection (Matthew 28.1-10; Mark 16.1-8; Luke 24.1-10; John 20.1-18). This is absolutely remarkable considering that the testimony of women was not valued at all in Jesus’ world and if the church wanted outsiders to believe an utterly fantastic story, they likely wouldn’t have identified women as their first apostles. In fact, we see the role of women quietly expunged in Paul’s recounting of the resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15.3-8. Paul’s letters would have preceded the gospels by several years and already by this time the women were dropped from the list of the first eyewitnesses. Yet there they are in all the gospel accounts. The only way to explain their presence is to acknowledge that the gospel writers’ sources were from the earliest eyewitnesses, which included the women’s testimonies. There is simply no way the early church would have reinserted the role of women in the gospel narratives in light of the later tradition that expunged their testimonies. The women’s testimonies were there because as Richard Bauckham masterfully demonstrated in his book, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses, eyewitness accounts were the gold standard for ancient historians, which would have included the evangelists. Moreover, in an oral culture folks were trained specifically to preserve the accuracy of those accounts (cf. 1 Corinthians 15.3, Greek paralambano). This premium placed on eyewitness testimony would also help explain the initial confusing accounts at the tomb because these stories represented the testimony and perspective of various individuals with all their bewilderment and wonder over a literally unbelievable event.

Third, consider the gospel writers’ descriptions of Jesus himself. Since they had nothing on which to base their accounts, with the exception of Daniel 12.3, which states that the wise (God’s people) will shine like the stars, it is remarkable that the Easter accounts do not describe Jesus’ risen body this way. We see a description like this for Jesus at his Transfiguration but not in the resurrection accounts (Matthew 17.1-2; Mark 9.2-3; Luke 9.28-29; cf. Luke 24.36-43; John 20.1-29; Matthew 28.9-10). This rules out the possibility that we looked at last week, that the gospel stories developed later from people becoming aware of the risen Jesus in some spiritual sense. But this is not what the gospel writers report. They report an empty tomb and Jesus’ risen, reconstituted body. All this suggests that the accounts we have come from our earliest sources and reflect eyewitness testimony.

Last, consider the fact that there is no connection between Jesus’ resurrection and the final hope that is ours as his followers in the resurrection narratives. The gospel writers focus on the event of resurrection and nothing else, and this is because as we have seen, it was so dramatic, unexpected, and one-of-a-kind. Had these stories been made up by the later church, we would surely expect to see our resurrection hope tied into these stories in the manner Paul did in his various epistles (cf. 1 Corinthians 15.12-26; 1 Thessalonians 4.13-18). But we don’t see any of this, clear evidence that the stories come from the eyewitnesses, not later fabrications.

All this leaves us with compelling evidence that the resurrection indeed occurred as advertised and that it transformed and energized Jesus’ first followers and beyond. I hope your faith has also been energized and reinforced after hearing these two sermons on the resurrection. As we saw last week, Jesus is no longer available to us in his bodily presence because he has ascended into heaven. But as our gospel lesson reminds us, he remains our Good Shepherd in the power and presence of the Spirit to lead and guide us. So my question to you is this. If you believe that the bodily resurrection of Jesus actually occurred in history to signal the launch of God’s new creation with its healing and transformation and forgiveness of sins, along with its breathtaking promise that we will one day get to live in God’s direct presence when the new heavens and earth are formed, are you living like the resurrection is a daily reality? In other words, are you living like Jesus is really alive and Lord of your life so that you are living out your resurrection hope right now in word and deed as the first Christians did? How (and how honestly) you answer this is the truest indication of your resurrection faith and hope (or lack thereof). It is my hope and prayer that each one of us has the kind of robust and energizing faith, or at least the beginning of this kind of faith, so that we all really will know we have Good News, now and for all eternity. Let us be still for a moment and pray.

Gracious God, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, we believe you have raised your Son from the dead and that he is present to us in the power of your Spirit to be our Good Shepherd to lead and guide us. We thank you for this.

Lord Jesus Christ, come to us in the power of your Spirit, we pray. Enlighten our minds with the knowledge of your love for us and enliven our faith so that we may be equipped to be glad and joyful kingdom workers on your behalf so that you might use us to help bring your kingdom on earth as in heaven until you return one day in great power and glory to consummate the work you started in your death and resurrection.

When we grow timid, weary, or afraid as your people, help us to remember that you are our risen and ascended Lord so that we can take comfort and strength from this knowledge. Hear our prayers, Lord Jesus, to the glory of your Name and for your tender mercy’s sake. To you be honor, praise, and glory forever and ever. Amen.

In the name of God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Remember V-E Day

Today marks the 69th anniversary of V-E Day (Victory in Europe Day), May 8, 1945, in which the Allies celebrated the unconditional surrender of Nazi Germany the day before. Take a moment today and thank God for bringing us victory over evil. Remember the brave men and women who fought the unspeakable evil of Nazism. If you know a veteran who is still alive, take time today and thank him (or her) for his service to our country. Ask that person to tell you his story and remember it so that you can pass it on to your children and others. Nazi Germany may be a thing of the past, but unspeakable evil certainly is not.

Happy Birthday, Mom

Today would have been my mama’s 92nd birthday, something she would have no doubt hated if she were alive today (it’s hard to grow old for one so young at heart). My mother was an exquisite role-model of motherhood. She loved me, spent time with me, loved me enough to instill what it meant to be a Maney, and disciplined me when I did not live up to that standard. I hated it at the time, but am grateful for it today. She allowed me to have a childhood that was second to none because she insisted that I be a kid and worked sacrificially to make that happen. In that regard, I miss her presence. But I cannot be sad because I would rather her be where she is than to be here with me and struggling with illness and infirmity (check out this reflection on grief and consolation over parents who have died).

Thank you mama, for being the mother you were. Thank you for all your sacrifice for me and for our family. Thank you for allowing me to grow up in a timely manner and not before it was my time to do so. Thank you for personifying sacrificial love for me. And thank you, dear God, for blessing me with the best parents a person could ever want or dream of having.

Happy birthday, mama. I love you. Enjoy your rest with the Lord who loves you and has claimed you from all eternity.

Rest eternal grant unto Margaret, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon her. May her soul and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace and rise in glory. Amen.

And for those of you whose mother is still living, make sure you remember your mama on Mothers’ Day this Sunday. Better yet, treat her like every day is Mothers’ Day. I know my mama would surely approve.

Today in History

Sixty nine years ago today (May 7, 1945), Germany surrendered to Allied forces at Reims, France. The next day (May 8, 1945), was declared to be V-E Day (Victory in Europe Day). Take a moment today and give thanks for the brave men and women from that generation who confronted the unspeakable evil of Nazism and prevailed. Thank God for this victory. Sadly, many of these men and women are now dead. But that does not diminish their courage, sacrifice, and accomplishment in the face of a terrible and ruthless enemy.

JFM3On a personal note, my dad served in the Army during World War II and I am very proud of him. He was a surveyor for the artillery, a job that men did before the advent of computer controlled firepower. The men and women of my parents’ generation truly were the “Greatest Generation” of the 20th century. Thank you, Greatest Generation, for your sacrifice and devotion to our country. Thank you, God, for giving them to us.

Augustine on Grief and Consolation

Little by little, after my mother’s death, I began to recover my former feeling about Your handmaid [Augustine’s mother, Monica]. I remembered how loving and devout was her conversation with me, of which I was now suddenly deprived.

And I found solace in weeping in Your sight both for her and for myself.

—Confessions 9.12

I think Augustine gets it exactly right here. Notice that he does not deny his grief. It is very real to him as he longs for the days when his mother was alive. And he also wisely understands that his tears and grief are the main vehicle in which God begins to heal and console us.

God’s consolation through our grief does not heal us magically and suddenly. It takes time and we must walk through the darkest valley as we grieve because death is a real and grievous thing. But as the psalmist reminds us in Psalm 23.1-6, those of us who have faith in the God and Father of our Lord Jesus do not walk through the valley alone. We have the love and presence of Christ in and through the person of the Spirit to sustain us and hold us up.

As Augustine hints, even when we are consoled, losing a loved one to death diminishes us as humans and leaves a permanent hole in our heart and lives. It really cannot be any other way when death breaks a real loving relationship because we were created to live life together, not in isolation or enmity to one another.

But even this does not leave us without hope or paralyze us. To the contrary, our Christian faith in God’s new creation that was launched at Jesus’ resurrection and which will one day be gloriously consummated is the basis for our hope right now that our loved ones are not lost, nor are we. We will one day be reunited with those we love who have died in the Lord and get to live in God’s direct presence forever! When that happens, we will have new bodies and new life to live together, thanks be to God through our Lord Jesus Christ!

This is our Easter hope. Is it yours?

And for those of you today who miss your mother (or father) dearly, pray Augustine’s prayer below and make it your own. Take comfort and like Augustine, let God use it to bring you his healing and peace.

Lord, let no one tear my mother (and/or father), [insert your loved one’s name here], away from your protection.

—Confessions 9.13

Can We Believe in the Resurrection? Part 1: Objections

Sermon delivered on Sunday, Easter 3A, May 4, 2014, at St. Augustine’s Anglican Church, Columbus, OH.

If you would like to listen to the audio podcast of this sermon, usually somewhat different from the text below, click here.

Lectionary texts: Acts  2.14a, 36-41; Psalm 116.1-3, 10-17; 1 Peter 1.17-23; Luke 24.13-35.

In the name of God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

As we saw two weeks ago on Easter Sunday, the resurrection of our Lord Jesus marks the decisive turning point in history because it signaled the launch of God’s new creation with its proclamation that God was beginning to take back control of his good world gone bad, and all that that entails. Yet almost from the very beginning, the resurrection has been challenged both within and outside of the Church. And because many have come from mainline Christian denominations or traditions which have frankly dropped the ball in teaching about the resurrection, many of us don’t have a firm understanding about it. We don’t know exactly what resurrection means and why it is important to our Christian faith.

The resurrection of Jesus Christ is not only the turning point in history. It is the absolute foundation on which our Christian faith stands. Take away the resurrection and we’ve got nothing. Nothing. As Paul tells the Corinthians, if the resurrection of Jesus is not true then we are still dead in our sins and people without hope (1 Corinthians 15.12-19). So it is vital for us as God’s people in Jesus to have a firm understanding of what the resurrection is and why we can have confidence that the resurrection is historically true and not a figment of imagination or wishful thinking on the part of early Christians. If we are ever going to be people of real hope who are changed by the love of Christ in the power of the Spirit so that we are literally new people who are equipped to embody our Lord Jesus and the hope of new creation to God’s broken and hurting world, we must firmly embrace the resurrection. It’s pretty hard to be changed by God to make a difference for God if we what we believe is a lie, don’t you think?

With this in mind, these next two sermons are designed to help us better understand and fully embrace the foundation of our Christian faith. This week I will address briefly some of the common objections that have been leveled at the historical truth of the resurrection. These objections usually come in the form of alternative theories for what happened on that first Easter Sunday. We need to know what the enemy is thinking and how to respond to him.

Then next week I will lay out a case for why we as Christians can be confident that the resurrection of Jesus really did happen in history so that we can be assured that our resurrection faith is based on a rock solid foundation. Because these are complex issues and because I might not necessarily address particular concerns you have, we will have a Q&A after each sermon. By all means, if you have questions or doubts or fears, please don’t be embarrassed to share them so that we can address them to your satisfaction. In preparing these sermons, I am heavily indebted to Bishop Tom Wright and the old Anglican rector and author, J.B. Phillips. If you want more than the Readers’ Digest version I will give you in these sermons, then pick up Wright’s, Surprised by Hope and Phillips’, Your God is too Small. In fact, Wright’s book is so important that if I had my way, anybody who wants to join our congregation would have to demonstrate to me that he or she has read Surprised by Hope and gets it. I want every one of us to have the kind of lively faith, hope, and understanding about the resurrection that is in Wright’s book because it is that vital!

Two additional comments before we start. The organizing question for this sermon series is: How do we explain the rise of early Christianity? Movements like this do not just happen spontaneously and this question demands an historical explanation. The answer these two sermons will provide is the simplest and most direct. The rise of early Christianity happened precisely because Jesus of Nazareth was raised from the dead, just as the earliest Christians claimed, despite the fact that nobody expected it to happen. More about that in a moment.

Second, we need to make sure we are all on the same page of the playbook about how to define resurrection as first-century Jews would have defined it and as the Church catholic has classically defined it (until the last 200 years or so). When we use the term resurrection we are not talking about life after death in the form of some kind of spiritual existence. Resurrection is not the same as dying and going to heaven (i.e., life after death). Christians believe that when we die our soul will indeed go to heaven (God’s space) to rest with our Lord Jesus and enjoy his protection and care (cf. Philippians 1.23; 2 Corinthians 5.6-8; Luke 23.43), but that is not what we mean by resurrection. If that were the case, then by any definition our created bodies are still dead and death has not been defeated as Paul claimed (1 Corinthians 15.26). When Jesus’ contemporaries used the term resurrection, they meant some kind of new bodily existence that happened after whatever sort of life after death there may be. It is life after life after death, so to speak, and it means new bodily existence, albeit in a changed body like Jesus’ resurrected body. Paul tells us that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom precisely because our current bodies are mortal and when heaven and earth are fused together when the new creation is consummated in full so that God’s kingdom comes on earth as in heaven, we will need bodies that are immortal and are equipped to live in that new environment (1 Corinthians 15.35-58). That is why death cannot be conquered until God has brought about the general resurrection of the dead. And we also need to be clear that resurrection was a distinct Jewish belief. It was not accepted in the broader pagan world of Jesus’ day. Many pagans simply believed in some kind of shadowy, terribly reduced existence after death. There was certainly little or no hope in that.

Turning now to objections to the resurrection, it is clear from our gospel reading this morning (and our last two gospel lessons from John 20.1-29) that even Jesus’ closest disciples were initially skeptical (cf. Mark 16.6-8; Matthew 28.17). Luke tells us earlier in his narrative that Jesus’ disciples considered the women’s story an idle tale and the Greek he uses can mean that they thought the women were out of their minds. Now on the road to Emmaus, Cleopas and his companion, probably his wife (cf. John 19.25), tell Jesus that they had hoped he was the Messiah but that the ruling authorities had gotten him as they usually did. We had hoped, but… These are not words of someone who is expecting Jesus to be raised from the dead! Given this fact, it should not surprise us that there have been so many alternative theories (or objections) to the resurrection over the years. Here, I will review only some of the more “popular” ones.

The swoon theory. This posits that Jesus didn’t really die on the cross, that he was drugged and revived in the tomb. But this cannot stand up to close historical scrutiny. Roman soldiers knew how to crucify people and ensure they were dead. Their very lives depended on it. If soldiers didn’t execute their victim, they would pay for it with their lives. And if you have ever seen Mel Gibson’s, The Passion, you will realize how silly this theory is. Often Roman scourging was enough to kill the victim and it boggles the mind that Jesus would have revived enough so that his disciples would have recognized him for anything other than the drugged and half-dead man he surely would have been. There is nothing here that would account for the very early Christian belief that Jesus was Messiah and Lord or that he had been raised from the dead.

The mistaken identity/wrong tomb theory. These are closely related and both posit that the women and early disciples mistook someone else for Jesus and that Jesus’ empty tomb  is explained away by claiming the women went to the wrong tomb on Easter morning. In regard to mistaken identity, if this were true, Jesus’ disciples would have discovered their mistake soon enough (e.g., Oh! You really are  the gardener!). In regard to the wrong tomb theory, a careful reading of the gospel accounts would expose this for the farce it is. All the evangelists make a point in telling us that the women went to the tomb to see where Jesus was buried and that Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea knew where he was buried (Matthew 27.57-61; Mark 15.42-47; Luke 23.50-56; John 19.38-42). So even if the women did make a mistake in identifying the tomb that Easter morning, that mistake too would have been quickly resolved. The only reasonable conclusion is that the women and disciples actually talked to the risen Jesus and that his tomb was empty for reasons other than hallucinations or body theft (see below).

The stolen body theory. This posits the disciples came and stole the body out of the tomb. Matthew actually addresses this issue in his gospel account of the resurrection (Matthew 28.11-15). But again if we think this through, it falls far short of being an adequate explanation. Given that the disciples didn’t expect Jesus to be raised from the dead in the first place, and given that they acted as cowards in the wake of Jesus’ crucifixion, how would stealing Jesus’ body and propagating a lie explain the disciples’ sudden change from being cowards to boldly proclaiming Jesus was alive and being willing to die for him? Only truly delusional people would base their entire existence on a lie, and whatever else they were, the disciples were emphatically not psychotic.

The hallucination/vision theory. The argument goes something like this. Many people have visions (some would say hallucinations) of loved ones who have recently died and this is what happened to the women and disciples after Jesus’ death. But this argument assumes that Jesus’ contemporaries did not know about phenomena like this, which is patently false. So had Jesus’ disciples simply experienced a vision of Jesus, they would have called it that. They would have said they had seen his ghost or spirit or his angel (cf. Luke 24.37; Matthew 14.25-27). This is emphatically what they did not say. They used resurrection language that emphasized they could touch him and eat with him, etc. (cf. Luke 24.36-43; John 20.26-29; Matthew 28.9-10).

Jesus only appeared to those who believed in him. This simply isn’t true. Thomas and Paul didn’t believe that Jesus had been raised from the dead, at least initially (cf. John 20.24-25; Acts 9.1-22). In fact Paul actively persecuted the Church until the risen Lord confronted him on the road to Damascus. And as we have already seen, none of Jesus’ original followers initially believed that Jesus had been raised. So belief in Jesus, while vitally important, was clearly not the essential criterion in determining to whom Jesus would appear.

Jesus was alive spiritually, not physically. This theory gained a lot of traction in the 20th century and is still very popular today. It argues that the early followers of Jesus had some kind of “spiritual” encounter with Jesus. He was still alive, albeit not bodily, and his disciples were still in touch with him, but only on a spiritual level. At first blush this has some plausibility because this is how we must interact with our risen Lord today because he is no longer bodily present to us because he has ascended into heaven. But this is an ascension issue, not a problem with bodily resurrection, and this interpretation of Jesus’ resurrection represents a Platonic view of immortality, not a Jewish one. As we have seen, resurrection was and is the final defeat of death, not simply a nicer description of it, and this theory also denies the clear gospel accounts of Jesus’ followers interacting with him in his new bodily existence: eating and drinking with him, being able to touch him, etc. (see above).

Things like the resurrection do not happen. This objection appeals to our world of experience and observation. Everyone knows that dead bodies don’t come alive again so the resurrection accounts must be fabrications. In response we must ask, “Says who?” Just because we have not personally experienced or witnessed something doesn’t mean it can’t (or didn’t) happen. Using this criterion, we would be forced to say that any unusual historical event must be false. But this is where we must stand up and graciously challenge our critics who use this argument as a reason the resurrection did not occur. What makes their worldview superior to the biblical worldview? Are we going to be so narrow and closed-minded that the only reality we can believe in is that which we can observe and measure? A quick moment’s thought will show us there are other kinds of knowledge besides scientific knowledge. Think, for example, of how two lovers know each other in ways that simply cannot be measured. Does that mean their knowledge of each other is therefore invalid? Please don’t misunderstand. I am not against empirically-based knowledge. I am simply challenging the notion that it is somehow supreme or the only valid kind of knowledge.

Moreover, this criticism also forces us to decide on what kind of God we worship. Do we believe in the God who indeed calls into existence things that are not and raises the dead to life (Romans 4.17) or is our god not big enough to accomplish something as remarkable and mind-blowing as the resurrection of the dead? How we answer this question will give us keen insight into the state and basis of our faith and hope, not to mention our love. We will talk more about this next week, but for now I hope I have demonstrated that typical objections to the resurrection strain our credulity more than accepting that the resurrection actually occurred. To put it another way, the resurrection is not something we choose to believe against all evidence, but rather something we can believe in because of the evidence.

Yet despite our arguments so far, the resurrection still requires faith. As we saw earlier, we as Christians believe that Jesus is both raised from the dead and ascended in bodily form into heaven (God’s space) so that he is no longer available to us on a physical basis (cf. John 20.17; Acts 1.6-11). So the real issue for us is how we can experience the risen (but physically absent) Christ right now. We will look more closely at Jesus’ ascension on Ascension Sunday. But for the moment, we can answer this question by turning once again to Luke. The risen Christ is available to his people in the power of the Spirit, in and through prayer, in the careful reading and study of Scripture, and in the Eucharist. If we wish to experience the risen Lord’s life-giving and healing presence in our life, we find out how in Luke’s account of the disciples’ recognition of him. Pay attention so that you too may experience the kind of heartburn Cleopas and his companion experienced!

The resurrection is an incredible thing, thanks be to God, and if we understand what it means and more importantly embrace it with all our heart and mind, we will surely understand why Easter is so critical to our faith and to the world, and that we have Good News, now and for all eternity. To him be honor, praise, and glory forever and ever. Alleluia! Christ is risen! The Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia!

In the name of God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Justin Martyr Writes About the Eucharist (Mid-Second Century)

I don’t know about you, but I love reading about the practices of the ancient Church, in part, because it reminds me that our Anglican liturgy is in line with how the Church has worshiped since the time we have records of its practices. Justin wrote about the eucharist a little over 100 years after the death of Jesus and would have been a “spiritual grandson or great-grandson” to the apostles. That means there is a high probability that he received what he wrote indirectly from the apostles themselves. And as Richard Bauckham masterfully demonstrated in Jesus and the Eyewitnesses, the early Church was very careful in passing down oral tradition to preserve its teachings intact.

It is an awesome thing to be part of the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. Check it out and see how it compares to how your denomination worships.

No one may share the eucharist with us unless they believe that what we teach is true, unless they are washed in the regenerating waters of baptism for the remission of sins, and unless they live in accordance with the principles given us by Christ.

We do not consume the eucharistic bread and wine as if it were ordinary food and drink, for we have been taught that as Jesus Christ our Savior became a human being of flesh and blood by the power of the Word of God, so also the food that our flesh and blood assimilate for their nourishment becomes the flesh and blood of the incarnate Jesus by the power of his own words contained in the prayer of thanksgiving.

The apostles, in their recollections, which are called gospels, handed down to us what Jesus commanded them to do. They tell us that he took bread, gave thanks and said: “Do this in memory of me. This is my body.” In the same way he took the cup, he gave thanks and said: “This is my blood.” The Lord gave this command to them alone. Ever since then we have constantly reminded one another of these things. The rich among us help the poor and we are always united. For all that we receive we praise the  Creator of the universe through his Son Jesus Christ and through the Holy Spirit.

On Sunday we have a common assembly of all our members, whether they live in the city or in the outlying districts. The recollections of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as there is time. When the reader has finished, the president of the assembly speaks to us urging everyone to imitate the examples of virtue we have heard in the readings. Then we all stand up together and pray.

On the conclusion of our prayer, bread and wine and water are brought forward. The president offers prayers and gives thanks as well as possible, and the people give their assent by saying: “Amen.” The eucharist is distributed, everyone present communicates, and the deacons take it to those who are absent.

The wealthy, if they wish, may make a contribution, and they themselves decide the amount. The collection is placed in the custody of the president, who uses it to help the orphans and widows and all who for any reason are in distress, whether because they are sick, in prison, or away from home. In a word, the president takes care of all who are in need.

We hold our common assembly on Sunday because it is the first day of the week, the day on which God put darkness and chaos to flight and created the world, and because on that same day our savior Jesus Christ rose from the dead. For he was crucified on Friday and on Sunday he appeared to his apostles and disciples and taught them the things that we have passed on for your consideration.

—From Justin, Martyr at Rome (ca. 167), First Apology, 66-67

Dr. Ben Witherington: Signs Point to a Hoax— The Jesus’s Wife Fragment

Another one (probably) bites the dust. Good riddance, if true. Despite persistent attempts to discredit/rewrite the Gospel, none have succeeded, thanks be to God. This stuff only finds an audience for those with itching ears. Listen if you have ears to hear!

From Dr. Witherington’s blog.

06judas_600-300x199How the ‘Jesus’ Wife’ Hoax Fell Apart

By
Jerry Pattengale
May 1, 2014 7:17 p.m. ET

In September 2012, Harvard Divinity School professor Karen King announced the discovery of a Coptic (ancient Egyptian) gospel text on a papyrus fragment that contained the phrase “Jesus said to them, ‘My wife . . .’ ” The world took notice. The possibility that Jesus was married would prompt a radical reconsideration of the New Testament and biblical scholarship.

Yet now it appears almost certain that the Jesus-was-married story line was divorced from reality. On April 24, Christian Askeland—a Coptic specialist at Indiana Wesleyan University and my colleague at the Green Scholars Initiative—revealed that the “Gospel of Jesus’ Wife, as the fragment is known, was a match for a papyrus fragment that is clearly a forgery.

Read it all.

Justin Martyr Explains Why People Are Baptized

We then lead them [catechumens] to a place where there is water and they are reborn in the same way as we were reborn; that is to say, they are washed in the water in the name of God, the Father and Lord of the whole universe, of our Savior Jesus Christ and of the Holy Spirit. This is done because Christ said: “Unless you are born again you will not enter the kingdom of heaven,” and it is obviously impossible for anyone, having once been born, to re-enter their mother’s womb.

An explanation of how repentant sinners are to be freed from their sins is given through the prophet Isaiah in the words: “Wash yourselves and be clean. Remove the evil from your souls; learn to do what is right. Be just to the orphan, vindicate the widow. Come, let us reason together, says the Lord. If your sins are like scarlet, I will make them white as wool; if they are like crimson, I will make them white as snow. But if you do not heed me, you shall be devoured by the sword. The mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

First Apology