WITNESS FOR THE DEFENSE

WITNESS FOR THE DEFENSE 1 Corinthians 15:3-8, 17 March 31,  2002 Given by: Pastor Rich Bersett [Index of Past Messages] Introductory Another would be scholar has emerged with another dubious explanation that she thinks will prove that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is a hoax. There have been many who have tried through the ages, but none have been able to discredit the historical truth of this great event--the resurrection of Jesus Christ from death. Her name is Suzanne Marie Olsson. She says she's convinced that she has found the final resting place of Jesus the Messiah. It is in a Muslim shrine in India. She wants permission to exhume the remains and run DNA tests on the body. Many others have tried to topple this foundational teaching of the Christian faith with so-called empirical evidence and and spurious reasoning. Scoffers and doubters have argued that Jesus actually didn't die on the cross--he only swooned and when they took him away to bury him, they hid him, dressed his wounds and three days later he went public and told people he was resurrected. Science and logic have shown this idea is preposterous. Some have said that Jesus' resurrection was a spiritual phenomenon--He didn't really rise bodily from the dead and appear to eyewitnesses. He was really just a ghost or an apparition and fooled the disciples into believing He bodily rose. If that were true it would certainly be the first time a ghost carried on lengthy conversations, appeared in solid 3-D form, invited doubters to touch his wounds in a most physical way and ate boiled fish for breakfast! Jesus went to great lengths for six weeks to establish that He was very much physically alive and resurrected. For hundreds of years ideas like these have come and gone, never casting any doubt on the historically verified reality of Jesus' physical return from death. So if Suzanne wants to exhume a body in India and run DNA experiments, great. She won't discover it was Jesus Christ, though, because your Savior and mine walked around alive for forty-plus days in his once-dead body, said good-bye and was taken bodily out of this world by ascension. He didn't leave any DNA! (One wonders how a DNA sample from 2,000-year old bones would or would not prove the body belonged to Jesus anyway!). While vain speculations like these have been purported over and over again, always failing to explain away the resurrection, you've got to wonder about a couple of things. First, why is this teaching such a lightning rod for cynics and suspicious people anyway? Second, why is there such an irrational prejudice against supernatural occurrence's like this? And why would so-called intellectual bias against the possibility of physical resurrection from the dead be so hard to accept? By and large, the objections come from people who say they honestly believe that human beings evolved by chance from an amoeba swimming in a gooey swamp which itself came about as the result of an explosion of chemical elements that just sort of appeared and have no explicable origin. You talk about a system of thought that requires faith!? But, just because God knows the tendencies of skeptical people, He arranged to provide enough historical evidence to establish bodily resurrection of Jesus in any courtroom. Listen, what happens on L.A. Law or when the prosecuting attorneys in the D.A.'s office have only circumstantial evidence and hearsay? They can't make the case! What do they need? They need an EYEWITNESS. If they do their homework and have a credible eyewitness to the crime, they can put the perpetrator away. God provided an exorbitant multitude of eyewitnesses to Jesus' resurrection Our text this morning is 1 Corinthians 15:3-8. "For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to al the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born." Before we consider this list consider the other list of witnesses to the resurrection of Jesus--a list Paul doesn't even go into here. The earlier list 1. Prophetic scripture At least 1,000 years before Jesus - Psalm 16:10 "...you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay..." This verse is later quoted by Peter in the first post-resurrection Christian sermon ever preached (Acts 2:27), applying it to Jesus. Then there is the remarkably accurate prophecy Isaiah, the greatest Old Testament prophet. In the 53rd chapter of Isaiah, "After the suffering of his soul, he will see the light of life, and be satisfied..." (Isaiah 53:11) 2. Jesus Himself On several occasions Jesus foretold His impending suffering and death. One of them was at Matthew 17:22-23 - "When they came together in Galilee, he said to them, 'The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into the hands of men. They will kill him, and on the third day he will be raised to life'...." Luke 9:22 - "And he said, 'The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.'" 3. The empty tomb and the angels When the women and the other disciples arrived at the tomb on Sunday morning, they did not find the body of Jesus there any longer, only his burial clothes and the empty tomb. It's as simple as this to these disciples: Jesus' body was here yesterday, in a sealed tomb, wrapped in these cloths, and now it isn't here! And once Jesus started physically appearing to people all over town, it became clear that the body wasn't just stolen or moved. Three instances of angels appearing and telling the disciples that Jesus had been raised from death. One of those is recorded at Luke 24:4-8 "While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, 'Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: "The Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, be crucified and on the third day be raised again."' Then they remembered his words." Prophecy from the Older covenant, Jesus' own prediction, and the evidence of the empty tomb and the testimony of angels. That's quite impressive evidence. But it could be argued as circumstantial and nothing more than hearsay! Where are the eyewitnesses? Your honor, defense calls as witnesses the more than 530 individuals listed in document "A," state's evidence, a.k.a. 1 Corinthians 15:3-8. The eyewitness testimony 1. Peter and the other twelve apostles (verse 5) You'll remember that Peter not only saw the resurrected Lord, but had private conversations with Him concerning being forgiven for His denial and desertion. And the other 12 included "doubting Thomas" who had to be convinced that Jesus was bodily raised from the dead in a most dramatic way. "[Thomas] put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put in into my side. Stop doubting and believe." (John 20:27) Now realize, producing 13 eyewitnesses in any court of law is far more than adequate substantiation to convince judge and jury. One is usually enough. Not only could these thirteen have been called to the witness stand for Paul to testify of the resurrection of Jesus, but they were in fact testifying to that glorious fact throughout Palestine at that very moment! And they were facing persecution for preaching the resurrection (Acts 4:1-20), but they nevertheless continued doing so, even to the point of giving their lives for that testimony. Friends, men might live for a lie, but they will not die for one! 2. More than five hundred of the brothers at one time (verse 6) Who were these guys? We don't know. All we know is that the resurrected Lord saw fit to show Himself alive and physically present after His resurrection. Could the prosecuting attorney raise an objection because they were prejudiced because they were "brothers"? Let me suggest that the response of most of them might have been, "Wait a minute. I'm one of the brothers now, but I wasn't when Jesus showed up that day with His crucified body very much alive! That's when I became a believer and a brother!" Did you notice the footnote on these hundreds of witnesses? Paul wasn't just padding his case here. Mot of these eyewitnesses were still alive and telling the story of when they saw the resurrected Jesus in person. 3. James and all the apostles (verse 7). This James is the half-brother of Jesus. He had never really believed Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of God. He was just His older brother. James may be the star witness, you know. After all, he knew Jesus well and was quite suspicious of His ministry all along, but, ever since he personally saw Jesus alive after He was dead--well, suffice it to say, he is convinced now. "All the apostles" might be a reference to a broader group of intimate disciples who had followed Jesus before His death and resurrection. Whoever they were, they represented a dozen more eyewitnesses to the resurrection. 4. Last of all, me, Paul (verse 8). Paul refers to himself as one "abnormally born". That doesn't mean there was trouble in the labor room. He's simply saying he was born a little too late to have actually met Jesus during His earthly ministry in Palestine. However, he did meet the resurrected Jesus, up close and personal, on two separate occasions: On the road to Damascus, when Jesus got His attention by knocking him off his donkey and blinding him temporarily. It was on that occasion and in the few days that followed that the Lord converted a persecutor of Christianity into perhaps the greatest preacher of Christianity that there ever was. The scripture records that after Paul was converted and called to be a missionary to the Gentiles, he went off into Arabia to pray and study. There he was taught directly by the Lord (Galatians 1:11-17). What a witness to Jesus's resurrection. Paul went onto preach the gospel at great personal cost, enduring hardship, shipwreck, beatings, threats, imprisonment's and eventually a martyr's death, preaching the resurrection of Jesus. He would write in this same chapter in 1 Corinthians, "Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep." (verse 20) In fact, he wrote, "If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins..."(verse 17) Conclusion Here is the absolute bottom line of the gospel of the Christian faith - "Christ died for our sins, according to the scripture, he was buried, and he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures..." All these witnesses, and more, verify it. The inspired and perfect Word of God declares it to be true. Romans 10:9-11 - "...if you confess with your mouth, 'Jesus is Lord,' and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. for it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. As the Scripture says, 'Everyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame.'" There could be several personal reasons you might refuse to trust Christ as your Savior, but you can't let one of them be that He was not raised from dead. All these witnesses make that excuse into perjury. The witnesses have been heard--what is your verdict. Wait a minute! You and I are not the judge. God is the judge! He's the one who passes out the verdict. And here it is: "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son." [webmasters note: John 3:16-18] Ready to make a decision or still not sure? Visit our eternal life page and make sure!     [Back to Top]