Why do you think the resurrection is important?
Without the resurrection the only thing that lies ahead of us is death. What’s more, it would mean that Jesus, whom we believe to be God, is also dead. Small wonder that Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15: “If Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith”.
In which case we should all convert to Judaism, or say with Nietszche, “God is dead”.
What do we mean by the resurrection anyway?
By ‘resurrection’ we mean more than just an incredible recovery from a medical emergency, like getting better after heart failure or stopping breathing. There are some amazing stories of individuals who have been submerged in freezing conditions for as much as half an hour yet lived to tell the tale. As I write, there are reports in the media of a man who has survived with an artificial heart for a few months. He’s not thriving but, hey, when you’ve got no heartbeat even consciousness is a pretty impressive feat.
Resurrection, however, means the raising to eternal life of a body that is completely dead by any medical or non-medical definition that anyone cares to choose. In the whole of human history we have so far had only one example of resurrection to eternal life, and that is the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
We are however expecting many more resurrections. At the end of time God will judge the world. Then, to quote Daniel 12, “Multitudes who sleep in the dust will awake; some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt.”
So we’ll have bodies when we are resurrected?
Yes, but like the rest of creation they will be transformed, fit for the new creation. Our present bodies are not fit for the new creation (1 Cor 15:50). So we’ll be provided with new, or rather renewed ones.
Will I be able to recognise my friends? Will they recognise me?
Of course. Transformed our bodies may be, but they will be the same bodies (1 Cor 15:42-44). In the life to come, we will even recognise people we have never met! (Lk 16:23).
Where’s the proof for all this?
The most important proof of the resurrection is historical. There were many witnesses to Jesus’ resurrection from the dead, over a period of 40 days from the time he first rose to the time he ascended to heaven (Acts 1:3). There is a summarised list of witnesses in 1 Corinthians 15:5-8, but for detail we need to go to final chapters of the four Gospels. All four Gospels either claim to be written by eyewitnesses, or consist of careful reports of such accounts. The police on my favourite TV show would call them “witness statements”.
Each story differs in minor ways on some small details, as you would expect in authentic independent eyewitness accounts. But they agree on the fundamentals: Jesus really was crucified, he was certainly dead when he came down from the cross, and though he was subsequently seen alive by many people on different occasions, the first witnesses of his resurrection were women. This in itself is impressive: a fabricated account would certainly have omitted the women or changed them to men, as the testimony of women witnesses was not acceptable in a first century Palestinian court of law.
Most importantly, the tomb where Jesus was supposed to have been laid was empty. The tomb was not some unidentified hole in the ground. It belonged to a rich follower of Jesus by the name of Joseph of Arimathea (Mt 27:57). It was sealed with a heavy stone and set under armed guard.
If Jesus’ body had been in the tomb it would have been a very simple matter to produce it when rumours of resurrection began to circulate. This didn’t happen. Alternatives such as theft of the body, death of a substitute, or the possibility that Jesus didn’t really die, fall apart when the Gospel accounts are examined for detail.
It still sounds like an urban myth.
Remind me to tell you the story of the vibrating cactus, the Disneyland kidnap and the polishing machine that killed … But the difference between the resurrection and an urban myth is that we have the names of many independent witnesses to the events. Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on your point of view, the more you investigate an urban myth (and believe me, people do it as a hobby) the more vague the details become, and the more the supposedly reliable witnesses turn into the friend of a friend of Aunt Betty’s third cousin who swears she heard it from so-and-so.
But even contemporary or near-contemporary non-Christian historians and writers such as Josephus, Suetonius and Tacitus, confirm such important points as the historical existence of Jesus, the establishment of a religion in his name, the identity of various people referred to in the gospels such as Judas and Pilate, and even the rumour that Jesus was reported to have risen from the dead. So much of the detail of Jesus’ life and times is confirmed by disinterested and even hostile witnesses.
All this may be true, but so what?
I would have thought that if someone were to defeat death, that in itself is pretty big news! Certainly it is something far more amazing than most of the things we tend to think of as important or worth taking note of.
Death, the last great enemy, has been defeated! (1 Cor 15:54-57)
On top of this, the bible makes a great deal more of the resurrection of Jesus Christ in particular. The most important point is that it fulfils all the Old Testament promises about the chosen King or Messiah:
- that God would send to rule, a king in the line of David who would “not see decay” (Ps 16:8-11);
- a man would die for the sins of others and yet “will see his offspring and prolong his days” (Isa 53:10);
- Isaiah 9:7 promises that a child who is born will be called “everlasting God” (Isa 9:7), which is hardly possible if that child grows up, is crucified, dies and stays dead!
Jesus understands this and makes repeated reference to his resurrection in his own ministry (Mt 12:40; 16:21; 17:9, 23; 20:19-20; Mk 8:31; 9:31; 10:34, etc, and Luke 24:46-7, where after the resurrection Jesus explains that this was in fulfilment of Scripture).
In Peter’s first sermon in Acts 2—the first Christian sermon after the resurrection—Peter makes the claim that Jesus has risen from the dead, and boldly teaches before his mainly Jewish audience that the one they crucified has been made Lord and King by God himself. Romans 1:4 says that in the resurrection, Jesus has been designated “Son of God” with power—again, because he has fulfilled the promises made by the Old Testament.
That’s either brave or stupid!
Whichever you think, it is another piece of circumstantial evidence that the resurrection happened. If Peter knew he was lying about the resurrection, then standing up and claiming that Jesus was alive in front of the people who had recently crucified him was a very silly move indeed. Not only could he be made to look a fool if the body was produced, but also he and the others who started preaching this message might themselves be arrested and put to death on similar charges to those brought against Jesus. Indeed most of the original twelve disciples were eventually arrested and put to death. The fact is, the resurrection changed lives and continues to change lives. The change happened because the resurrection led directly to the sending of God’s Holy Spirit to dwell in all believers and give them the ability to be forgiven, to trust and obey God and speak boldly for him (Acts 2:38 cf Acts 1:4-5; Jn 15:26, 16:5-17, especially v. 7; Rom 8:1-17).
So the followers of Jesus were completely transformed by the resurrection?
Yes—and the testimony of changed lives continues today. The Bible teaches that because we have believed in Jesus, we are sharers not only in his death but also in his resurrection life. He died to bring forgiveness, taking the punishment we deserved. He rose again and, to quote Romans 6: 5, “If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection.” That means that because of the resurrection, both the power of sin and the penalty due to sin have been permanently broken—as Paul explains in the same chapter.
To put it another way: how many atheists do you know whose lives have been completely and permanently transformed (for the better) by their conversion to atheism? Yet every day, Christians’ lives are being transformed in wonderful ways by the power of the resurrection.
In Romans 8, the end point of this process is described. We—and not only us, but the whole of creation—will be transformed into glory, through present suffering. Romans 8:11 says: “if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you”. A bit later the chapter he describes how the whole creation awaits the transformation and revealing of God’s sons (i.e. those who believe in him), so that “Creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.”
So all we do is sit and wait for this to happen?
Well, the most important thing is to be sure of being right with God. As well as being a promise of a glorious future, the resurrection is a guarantee that one day judgment will certainly come (Acts 17:31). On that day we want to be confident that we will stand before God with our sins forgiven—not because of anything we’ve done, but because of the death of Jesus on our behalf.
As for sitting and waiting, in one sense it is true that what we are doing is waiting in hope of God’s coming salvation. This, along with faith and love, is one of the great distinguishing marks of the Christian. Contrast our society, which is increasingly marked by a sense of desperation and hopelessness. Peter says, “In his great mercy [God] has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (1 Pet 1:3).
But this is not a licence for all-round apathy and laziness. Living the new life means putting to death the old (Rom 8:13). Paul describes his own Christian life as pressing on towards the goal of the resurrection, and Christ-likeness (Phil 3:10-12) This is hard work! But it is work which is not in vain, and one of the most significant things we can do in life is to live the resurrection out in our daily behaviour and encourage others to do likewise (1 Cor 15:58).
