Matthew 28 Resurrection...

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Matthew is one of the four direct descriptions we have of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

When people today, in our time and place, read or confront an account like this,

I think there are two questions we have to ask:

Did it really happen?

What does it mean?

Did the resurrection of Christ really happen? We have to ask that question because our culture is so skeptical of it.

If you don’t wrestle with, “How could this be?” your relatives and friends do, and you have to be able to speak to it.

It’s not good enough to say, “Well, my mother told me and I heard in church that Jesus was raised from the dead. That’s good enough for me.”

That doesn’t help your friends, and maybe it won’t help you throughout your entire life.

So we have to ask, “Could it really have happened? Did it really happen?”

After that, we have to ask, “What does it mean?” The resurrection is not a bare historical fact you just believe with your mind and it doesn’t change your life.

For example, human beings have walked on the moon. Did you know that?

It’s an absolute historical fact, right? Do you believe that? Does it change your life? Not really.

From what I can tell, the fact that human beings walked on the moon doesn’t have any effect on my life at all.

It’s possible to believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ as a kind of bare fact.

In fact, the majority of Americans do, I think, but it doesn’t change their lives.

What does it mean to believe in that? How should it affect you?

How should it change and transform you? Let’s get right into it.

How should it change and transform you? Let’s get right into it.

1. Did it really happen?

The average skeptic will say something like this:

“Well, Jesus was a good man and a fine teacher of love and wisdom, but as the years went by, as the decades went by, his believers in Christ started to develop higher and higher views of him.

They started to say he was divine and the Son of God, and the resurrection stories developed.

After a couple of centuries of these legends growing up, they were written down in the New Testament, and that’s how we have Christianity. That’s where it comes from.”

Of course, that’s a bit of a blend of what you remember from Religion 101, Philosophy 101, and The Da Vinci Code, all sort of wrapped up in one ball.

The only problem with that account is that absolutely every single part of it is wrong.

First of all, the New Testament documents written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Paul did not get written

centuries later after years and years of accretions developed on the accounts of Christ and

legendary material was incorporated and on it goes.

Sort of like “Whisper Down the Alley.” As time goes on, it grows and grows.

Notice, for example, in verse 15, it says,

So they took the money and did as they were instructed; and this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day.

Matthew is writing so soon after the events, he can still talk about the fact that this particular story was still in circulation.

In , we’re told Jesus raises a boy from the dead. The son of the widow of Nain has died.

In , we’re told Jesus raises a boy from the dead. The son of the widow of Nain has died. There’s a public funeral in the center of the village, and he raises him from the dead. Not only would most all of the village have seen it, but even those who weren’t there would have heard about it. Now what if that had never happened and you just wanted to write a document and say, “Jesus Christ raised a boy from the dead in the village of Nain”?

There’s a public funeral in the center of the village, and he raises him from the dead.

Not only would most all of the village have seen it, but even those who weren’t there would have heard about it.

Now what if that had never happened and you just wanted to write a document and say, “Jesus Christ raised a boy from the dead in the village of Nain”?

Maybe you could write that 130 years later, when everybody who ever lived there was dead, and get away with it.

You couldn’t write, “Jesus Christ raised a boy from the dead in the public square of Village X” 30 years later, when most of Village X is still around.

They would say, “That never happened. I never heard of that.”

That kind of faith doesn’t get off the ground. These accounts are written within the lifetime of the eyewitnesses.

In , Paul says that not only did Jesus Christ rise from the dead and visit numerous people

(he appeared to numerous people over a period of weeks),

but, at one point, he actually appeared to 500 people at once, and Paul says,

“Most of those people are still alive. You can go talk to them if you want.”

These accounts were not written years later. They are not legendary accounts.

These are accounts of something that happened, written within the lifetime of the people who were there.

Therefore, these are historical documents. They’re not legends.

You say, “Okay, so they’re historical documents. But the resurrection? You can’t believe in the resurrection.”

Well, let me give you some good reasoning from this text.

First, the existence of the women eyewitnesses.

— 8 So they went out quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to bring His disciples word.

The first witnesses of the resurrected Christ in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are women, and only women.

This is in a day in which female testimony was not even admissible evidence.

Women were not full citizens in any sense of the word. Now what does that mean?

The only possible motivation you would have for writing an account of the resurrection of Christ and saying women

were the first eyewitnesses is if it actually happened. Are you following me?

If you were making these things up, you would never put women in there, because that doesn’t help the credibility.

The average person would have said, “What? Only women?” That’s the way it was back then.

So the only possible reason women are the eyewitnesses of Jesus Christ’s resurrection in this account would be that they were in fact eyewitnesses.

There would have been tremendous incentive on the part of the Christian authors of the Gospels not to have mentioned it.

Why did the gospel writers write it this way? They had the incentive to hide it. Why did they write it?

Why did the gospel writers write it this way? They had the incentive to hide it. Why did they write it? Because the women were there and were almost certainly still alive. Mary Magdalene, the other Mary … Luke mentions other women by name. The women lived a long time.

Because the women were there and were almost certainly still alive.

Mary Magdalene, the other Mary … Luke mentions other women by name. The women lived a long time.

Many of the women who saw Jesus Christ were well regarded. They were respected members of various churches around the Mediterranean over the years.

Many of them lived a very long time and told their stories of the risen Christ.

Listen. There really was an empty tomb, and there were many, many hundreds of people who said they saw Jesus Christ.

You say, “Ah well, back then people were gullible.” Oh really? Look at

— 16 Then the eleven disciples went away into Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had appointed for them. 17 When they saw Him, they worshiped Him; but some doubted.

Isn’t that interesting? Jesus appears to them.

They can see him, they can hear him, they can touch him, and some doubt.

Isn’t it interesting that’s mentioned there?

First of all, if you were making that up, would you mention that some of the apostles, the founders of the church, doubted?

You probably would leave that out, right?

It’s also not the way legends and fairy tales operate, but this is how real life would be.

If Jesus Christ appeared to you and you could see him, would you right away say, “My Lord”?

You probably wouldn’t. You’d be saying, “What’s going on? What have I eaten?”

Wouldn’t a normal person doubt? Yes. They’re normal people. Don’t you dare say, “Oh, those people back then were gullible. They’re not like us. Oh dear, they’re not like us.”

That’s chronological snobbery. “We’re newer people; they’re older people.

We, of course, are smarter.”

People’s IQs have not gotten higher as the centuries have gone on.

There is absolutely no empirical evidence that we are any smarter than those people.

I want you to consider this. The Jews did believe in a resurrection at the end of time.

Well, it’s true that ancient people were more likely to believe in miracles and the supernatural than we are, but these were Jews, first-century Jews, and I want you to consider this. The Jews did believe in a resurrection at the end of time. A resurrected body is not just a revived body that then dies again. Lazarus was revived miraculously. The widow’s son was revived in . Jairus’ daughter was revived.

A resurrected body is not just a revived body that then dies again.

Lazarus was revived miraculously.

The widow’s son was revived in .

Jairus’ daughter was revived.

In other words, it was miraculous. They were dead, and they were brought back to life,

but then they died later. Why?

They didn’t have new bodies. They didn’t have resurrection bodies.

Jesus has a resurrection body.

The book of Luke says Jesus’ body passed through locked doors, and

yet he could still eat a fish and they could still touch him.

He wasn’t a ghost. He wasn’t a spirit. This is a resurrected body.

Jews did believe a resurrection was possible at the end of time, but none of the Jews

believed a resurrection could happen by one person in the middle of history.

Jews were the last people possible to believe that someone could be the Son of God whom they would worship.

Jewish worldview was dead set against the idea that a human being could be divine,

could be raised from the dead, could have a resurrection body.

So not only did the eyewitnesses exist, but they were not gullible, and, lastly,

their lives were changed by what they saw.

Do you see down here (v18)? “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations …”

We’ve been looking at that passage quite a bit lately. But have you ever realized what he’s saying? “You 11 uneducated fishermen from a backwoods, Judea,

now go out there and change the world, convert the world.”

And what do they say? “Okay.” Why?

Because they knew it was Jesus. He had been raised from the dead.

If that’s possible, anything is possible. Their lives were changed by it.

The Jews are the last people on the face of the earth to be willing to worship a human being as God, and yet

these Jewish people [the disciples] got such evidence

that he really was alive they did, and their lives were changed by it.

So are there good reasons for believing it really happened? So, there are good reasons for believing it happened,

but even if it did happen (and it did happen),

it’s not enough for you to believe it just as a bare fact.

2. What does it mean?

If Jesus was raised from the dead, what should that mean to you, and how can you believe it in such a way that it would change your life?

And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen.

The answer is this (though I’m going to break it into four parts): surely he is with you always.

You can say, “Oh, I love Abraham Lincoln. I’ve read his biographies, and I just admire him so much.

I’ve read his works, and I feel he’s always with me.

When I read the ‘Gettysburg Address,’ I feel like Abraham Lincoln is right there.”

You know what? That’s perfectly okay to say.

Just don’t think this is what Jesus is talking about.

“When you read my writings, even though I’m dead and gone, I’ll be with you.”

No, he has risen. He is raised from the dead.

When he says, “I’ll be with you,” he’s talking about … what? Four things: he’s with you in history, he’s with you in the gospel, he’s with you in Christian community, and he’s with you at the end.

First, he’s with you in history. Verse 18: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.”

Many of you know there are other places in the Bible that say when Jesus was raised from the dead, He ascended into heaven, and He sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty.

What does that mean? That’s not just rhetoric.

To sit at the right hand doesn’t mean he just went to heaven.

It does mean that, but to sit at the right hand is the place of the prime minister.

It’s the person who sits at the right hand of the king and

actually runs the country and rules and executes the will of the king.

When Jesus says, “I’m raised from the dead, I’m with you always,” what he means is,

“I’m in charge of history now.

I’m running things, and

I now have sovereign control of everything that happens in history

and in your lives.

I’m ruling everything on the basis of the cross/resurrection principle.”

What is the cross/resurrection principle? Do you see all the evil at the cross?

Do you see the suffering there?

Do you see the injustice, the

betrayal, the

rejection, Jesus experienced?

Do you see how awful that suffering was?

Yet in the end, what came of it? What happened to it?

It just led to greater salvation.

All of the things the world did,

all of the things the Devil did,

all the suffering,

all the evil,

just ended up accomplishing salvation and the resurrection.

The evil of the cross is swallowed up.

There were people who knew Jesus was a great man who

had been raising people from the dead and

healing the sick and

giving sight to the blind,

and they stood there in front of the cross watching him die, and do you know what they said?

“I can’t see any good God could bring out of this.”

That’s because they didn’t understand the cross/resurrection principle.

Are you looking at anything in your life and saying, “I don’t see how God can bring anything good out of this”?

That’s because you’re forgetting that all authority is given to Jesus. He is with you.

He is going to overrule that. He is going to control that.

It doesn’t mean that by next year things will work out for good.

: “All things work together for good to those who love God.”

It doesn’t mean at the end of five years, at the end of ten years, maybe not even within the span of your life,

but in the span of all of life and all of history, God is working everything out.

All the evil and suffering is going to be swallowed up to only make the eventual glory even better. Do you really believe because he’s risen he is with you in history?

Secondly, he’s with you in the Word and in the gospel. Notice he says, “All authority in heaven and earth is given to me. I’m with you always. Go make disciples. Teach them to obey everything.”

Jesus is actually connecting His presence especially to the ministry of the Word and the gospel.

When we go to people and say, “Jesus died for your sins. You can be saved by grace …”

In , Paul says to the Ephesian churches, “Christ came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to you who were near.”

Far away are the Gentiles; near are the Jews. He was saying,

“To you in the Ephesus churches, Christ came and preached peace to you, and

that’s how you were born again and saved and changed.”

The real question is … When did Christ do that?

Did Christ ever go to Asia Minor? All of the churches Paul is writing are in Asia Minor. Did Christ go to Asia Minor? No.

Then what is he talking about? He’s saying that when anyone preaches the Word, the gospel, to you,

when you read the gospel in the Scripture, Christ is preaching to you.

The risen Christ is really there, and not the way Abraham Lincoln is with you when you read the Gettysburg Address. He’s really there.

In , on the road to Emmaus, Jesus, the risen Christ, appears to these two disciples. They don’t recognize him at first. Later they do, and they say, “Weren’t our hearts on fire when he opened the Scriptures to us?” This is what I’m trying to tell you. You can really have him.

Not just the Word of God in general, you know, memorizing the judges and the kings and all of the details, but understanding the message of the Word of God, which is Christ died for your sins according to the Scriptures. The gospel is a way for you to really have him in your life, to really know him, to really sense his presence, to really have his love in your life. He can be as real to you as anybody. He can be, he must be, because he’s risen.

Thirdly, he’s with you in Christian community. He says, “Surely I am with you always.” Now if you’re from the South you say, “y’all,” which, as a Southerner might say,

is an improvement on the English language.

It makes it clear whether or not the person is saying you individually or you collectively.

The fact is the Greek word Jesus is using here is, “Surely I am with y’all.” That’s significant.

He’s saying, “I am present in particular in Christian community [in fellowship].”

C.S. Lewis’ book The Four Loves, where Lewis talks about how he had two dear friends and one died.

He realized after the first friend died, he no longer could see certain things

in his second surviving friend

that only the first friend brought out.

When he lost his first friend, he lost part of his second friend.

He didn’t really have more of him; he had less of him.

It takes a whole community to draw the full person out.

For you to know another person, you have to see that person in a full community and

see them relate to a lot of people, not just you.

Well, how much more true would that be of Jesus?

You’re never going to know Jesus unless you are deeply involved in community.

You’re not just coming to church on Easter,

but you’re walking with brothers and sisters and seeing them relate to Christ.

You’re going to see things about Christ

through them

that you otherwise wouldn’t see.

Not only that, you’re going to hear things from Christ

through them

that you otherwise would never hear.

When a Christian brother or sister says, “You are forgiven; Christ does forgive you,”

you can hear Christ speaking to you in a way

you couldn’t if you were just sitting all alone with your Bible in your closet.

He says, “I am with you all always.”

Finally he says, “To the end.” Do you believe in the resurrection of Jesus? Do you believe he died for you?

Have you put your faith in him, the crucified and resurrected Lord?

Then at the end of your personal story, He will be there,

which means the end of your story, whatever it is,

will be a happy ending.

It also means that at the end of history He will be there, because

He has risen from the dead.

That means in the end, everything is going to be made right.