The Resurrection: Believing the Evidence

Sermon by the Rev. Matt Kennedy

Easter Day 2007

The Church of the Good Shepherd

There are few things in this life that are certain. Unless the Lord returns tomorrow, we can be certain that the sun will rise at around 6:30am and that it will set sometime around 7:00pm . The planets will continue running their courses even as we sleep and the various natural cycles of this planet will go on as they have for thousands of years. With almost equal certainty we can expect every year, generally in February or March, a new “earth-shattering” documentary or book will be published claiming that the historical event we celebrate today, the bodily resurrection of Jesus, is a hoax, a sham, or a lie.

In past years we've been treated to a myriad of theories. We've heard the “swoon” theory: Jesus didn't die on the cross, he just feinted or “swooned.” He merely appeared dead and since he didn't really die, he didn't really rise, he just woke up, found his way out of the tomb, appeared to his disciples, and claimed to have risen from the dead.

We've had “ghost” theories: Jesus really died and then he appeared to his disciples as a ghost or some disembodied spirit. Later the church made up the story that he rose from the dead bodily.

And there's always the popular: Jesus rose in his disciples hearts' theory: After Jesus died, his disciples were all very sad but on the third day they realized that they would always remember him in their hearts and so he “rose again” metaphorically speaking.

This year documentary filmmakers, James Cameron, and Simcha Jacobovici, claim to have found Jesus' stone-cut tomb and an ossuary, a small stone casket, containing his bones. The ossuary has the name Jesus son of Joseph on it and it was found with ossuaries for a woman named Mary, and a baby named Judah . Genetic tests show that the baby was the child of the woman named Mary and the man named Jesus. And, as everyone who's read The Da Vince Code knows, Jesus and Mary Magdalene were secretly married and had a baby and so this must be their tomb.

Scholars and archeologists from all over the world, Christian, Atheist, Jewish, you name it have come out to say that there's no possible way that this is Jesus' tomb. One scholar said that the names Joseph, Mary, Jesus and Judah were so common in the first century that ascribing them to Jesus of Nazareth and Mary Magdalene would be like an archeologist 2000 years from today finding a grave plot with the names, John, George and Paul and assuming it belonged to the Beatles.

Why, I wonder, do so many seek these alternate explanations for the resurrection? Why do so many go to such great lengths to believe them? It takes a lot of faith to do so.

One thing all these theories share is a reliance on storytelling. Let me illustrate.

Let's say you're accused of robbing a bank, arrested, and brought to trial. At the trial, your defense attorney brings in 4 eye-witnesses who claim to have been with you in a movie theatre at the exact time the robbery took place and he submits credit card receipts signed by you for food that you bought while at the theatre verifying the testimony of the eyewitness. When he sits down, the prosecutor stands up and he says, “Your honor, this defendant must have a twin brother, unknown to the eye-witnesses, who accompanied them to the theatre in his place and forged the defendant's signature on the receipts so as to fool you, me, the witnesses and the jury into thinking that the defendant is not in fact the culprit.” The judge looks at the prosecutor and says, “Do you have any evidence? Does the defendant have a twin?”

“No, your honor. I don't know, technically, whether he has a twin brother, but just supposing he does then our theory accounts for all the facts presented by the defense and besides, you have to admit, the defendant certainly looks guilty.”

What kind of an argument is that? Well it's not an argument at all, it's a story. The difference between a story and historical truth is evidence. The only historical documents we have dating from the first century that tell of the resurrection of Jesus are the documents found in the New Testament. In the NT there are 4 direct independent eye-witnesses accounts of the resurrection, people recounting in writing their own experience of the resurrected Jesus and up to 500 indirect eye-witness accounts. An indirect account is a record of what another person or other people saw. There are no other first century accounts of the resurrection. The next earliest, the Gospel of Thomas, comes in the 2 nd century about 100 years after the real Thomas died. That means that any other account you hear that counters what the New Testament tells us about the resurrection is based on what? Nothing. No proof, no evidence, a good story, but nothing more.

Those who would object to the resurrection accounts in the New Testament do precisely the same thing the prosecutor in my illustration did. They assume that the resurrection is not true from the beginning and then create a story to support that assumption to explain away the evidence presented. Now what reason might there be for assuming the resurrection did not happen? Anyone have an idea? Before even coming to the New Testament many of the scholars behind these theories have already decided that resurrection is impossible either because God does not exist or because he does not intervene in the natural processes of the world. So they're unable to examine the evidence with an open mind. But if you believe that God exists then you at least have to grant the possibility that the resurrection is true and examine the evidence at face value. If God wants a dead man to rise, a dead man will rise.

The fact is, the account from Luke that you heard this morning supported by Matthew, Mark, John, Peter, Paul and James and the 500 other NT witnesses has never been overturned. In fact, no other historical evidence has ever been produced to even challenge the NT evidence that on the first day of the week Jesus rose up from his grave alive and in the flesh.

You can certainly choose to believe the other stories, but you believe them despite the only evidence we have. And that takes a whole a lot of blind faith. You just have to close your eyes and believe by sheer will-power that the New Testament is not true. Good Luck. I don't have that much faith. I'm sticking with the evidence.

I suppose you could suggest that the disciples were lying. But it would be a stupid lie. The disciples went on to be martyred for the proclamation that Jesus rose from the dead. It's one thing to die for a lie that you don't know to be a lie. The terrorists who crashed planes into the world trade center did that. It's another thing to lose everything, to be despised, humiliated, and tortured to death for something you know to be untrue. If it really were a giant fib, what are the chances that out of all 12 disciples, Paul, James and Mary and the 500 others who saw the risen Jesus, not one of them would bend, not one of them would break down and confess the truth. If even one of them had done that, the Church would never have survived to this day.

The most logical and reasonable route is to take the accounts at face value. And if you do that then it will mean that the resurrection is not a religious belief, it's not just something you believe because you're a Christian, it's not just something you have to take on faith; it's an historical reality. Jesus rose from the grave in his body.

And the reason I'm belaboring this point and filling your heads with all of this stuff on Easter morning is because if Jesus really did rise from the grave, then that means that everything he said is true, everything he promised is true, and everything he predicted is true, everything he commands is right.

He promised his disciples that he would send the Holy Spirit to remind them of everything he taught; that he would reveal to them the truths of heaven to them so that they could reveal it to the world and they did that through the New Testament.

Jesus said, I am not just Jesus of Nazareth, I'm God the Son, the one who spoke and universe leapt into existence. I am the way and the truth and the life. There is no way to the Father but through me. I've come, he said, to call you to repent of your sins, to turn around, commit your way, commit your life, commit your heart wholly and completely to me, and if you do, he said, I can and will give you a new life, a new heart, and a new future, beginning now and lasting for all eternity.

He promised believers that whatever problems or trials or temptations or disappointments that we face in this world, that if we seek him out he will give us peace and joy in spite of our sufferings and that if we ask, that he'll act in our circumstances on our behalf. He promised that nothing will happen to us apart from his will and to work all things together for our good.

He promised to defeat death and the grave and he said that one day he would return and all those who have trusted in him would rise in the same way that he did and live forever with him in a new heaven and a new earth.

But let me ask you, what good would these promises, and words, and commands be if Jesus still lay in his grave? We'd have the promises and claims of a dead man with no power.

But my friends, the evidence does not lie. Jesus Christ rose from the dead on the first day of the week. And his rising from the dead validates or makes sure, makes certain, that what he said doesn't represent the ramblings of a crazy Jewish peasant, or just a good teacher, but the very Word of God. It means that those of you who have committed your life to him can sleep in your beds tonight knowing that there will never be a last day. That even after you die, you will wake up again. You can go home today and eat your Easter suppers in the sure knowledge that Jesus is alive and that he loves you and that he'll never forsake you.

But for those who've not made such a commitment or who made one and walked away from it, the resurrection of Jesus poses a challenge you cannot ignore. Because it means that all of this Christianity stuff about sin and hell and heaven and faith is not just a nice story, not just a crutch for weak people, not just one truth among many truths to pick from. It means that Jesus is the King and Lord of all the earth and that you've been given this time to surrender to him and trust in him and come to him but that the time is not forever. He will come again to judge and you will stand before his throne. But he loves you. He died for you. And he's risen for you and this day, he's calling you to come.

Amen