By Pastor St. Solomon Joah
The genuineness and the importance of any religion must be attached and pinned unto its relationship to death. If death, the dreadful and feared enemy of man, is not found to be vanquished and publicly demonstrated to be of no substantial threat to life now and in the future, then that religion is a joke, not meeting the very heart of the satisfaction demanded by all men. Perhaps, this is one of the reasons that Christianity, which claims an empty tomb, is hated and fought by all dead religions which are mere invention of Satan deception and made up of mere empty philosophy of men. What proof is there to support the claim that Jesus Christ truly rose from the dead physically?
Let every man understand that the resurrection of Christ is very important because it sets Christianity above the three other religions (Judaism, Buddhism, and Islam) that are based on personalities. The resurrection serves as infallible, irrefutable, and indisputable proof that Jesus is the Son of God, i.e. God manifest in the flesh. Secondly, the resurrection is the seal (God is saying “Thou art my Son, today I have begotten Thee”) of God to the truth of Christ’s claim to be the Son of God (Rom. 1:4). It is only God Who can say, “I lay my life down in death, for I have power to take it again.” Without the resurrection of Christ Christianity means nothing, because the resurrection is not merely the principal theme of God’s Word, but also the worth of all doctrines. The resurrection is the (1) explanation of the purpose of Jesus’ death; (2) prophetically anticipated as the Messianic experience; (3) apostolically witnessed ground for faith; (4) the cause of the outpouring of the Spirit; and (5) it certifies the Messianic and kingly position of Jesus of Nazareth. Thus the whole series of arguments and conclusions depends for stability entirely upon the Resurrection. Without the resurrection the Messianic and Kingly position of Jesus could not be convincingly established, the new outpouring of the Spirit would continue a mystery unexplained, and the substance of the apostolic witness would have disappeared.
Of the abundance of evidence in the Gospels and the epistles I have selected few to help the seekers of truth gain conviction that Christ arose. The strongest of them all are found under the category we might call the Post-resurrection Scene. The empty tomb has stood as an unexplainable evidence that has challenged skeptic scholars over the past centuries. Several theories have been concocted to explain the empty tomb, but no reasonable conclusion can refute the loud assertion of the empty tomb. As Anderson puts it, “The empty tomb stands, a veritable rock, as an essential element in the evidence for the resurrection. To suggest that it was not in fact empty at all, …seems to be ridiculous.” The reason is that the apostles and other made many visits at the scene. And if it were not empty, then why did not the Jews go there to bring the body of Christ and put it on display? Early that morning Satan’s first attack was to whisper unto the Guards at the door of tomb that they should say that Jesus’ disciples stole the body. But on close examination, this could not be since the disciples themselves were so scared that they had gone into hiding, and that they, with the exception of John, have only remembered that Christ will rise again after they saw His resurrected body. Based on Matt. 28:11-15, Hastings comments that the attempt on the part of the Jewish authorities to bribe the Roman guard to say that the disciples stole Jesus’ body proceeds upon the admission by the enemies of Christianity that the grave was empty—an admission which is enough to show that the evidence for the empty grave was “too notorious” to be denied.
Among the evidences presented in Scripture the strongest is the post-resurrection appearances of the Lord Jesus Christ. The fact that great number of people, at one time above 500 persons, saw and ate with Him must dispel our doubt at once. But of great importance is the encounter with the Disciples and Thomas in John 20:19-25. He first appeared to the ten disciples in the absence of Thomas, when Christ “showed them His hands and His side”; thus making the disciples glad (vs. 20). When Thomas doubted the report, He appeared the following Sunday to clear the doubt of Thomas who had vowed not to believe unless “I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into His side, I will not believe” (vss. 24-25). Christ then demanded Thomas to “Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and be not faithless, but believing.” The Lord ended by blessing those who have not seen, yet believe. Christ also showed Himself to His disciple by the Sea of Tiberias where He prepared a breakfast of fish, and where He rebuked Peter. Finally, the resurrected Lord Jesus was seen by over five hundred as they saw Him go into heaven. And here is the fearful part for those who have not yet believed: “And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in manner as ye have seen him go into heaven (Acts 1:10-11).
By: Momoh B. Siryon
