The Christ of the Bible: The Resurrection of the Christ from the Dead
We shall consider in this chapter, The Christ of the Bible: the Resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ of the Bible, from the Dead. Ponder to begin with five passages from God’s Word.
First, 2 Tim. 2:8:
“Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, of the seed of David, according to my gospel.”
Second, 1 Cor. 15: 1-4:
“Now I make known unto you, brethren, the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye received, wherein also ye stand, by which also ye are saved, if ye hold fast the Word which I preached unto you, except ye believed in vain. For I delivered unto you first of all that which also I received: that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; and that He was buried; and that He hath been raised on the third day according to the scriptures.”
CRU Cisat sh. 21) oo
“And in these days Peter stood up in the midst of the brethren, and said (and there was a multitude of persons gathered together, about a hundred and twenty), ... (21,22) Of the men therefore that have companied with us all the time
that the Lord Jesus went in and went out among us, beginning from the baptism of John, unto the day that He was received up from us, of these must one become a witness with us of His resurrection.”
Fourth, Acts 2: 29-36:
“Brethren, I may say unto you freely of the patriarch David, that he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us unto this day. Being therefore a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins He would set One upon his throne; he foreseeing this spake of the resurrection of the Christ, that neither was He left unto Hades, nor did His flesh see corruption. This Jesus did God raise up, whereof we all are witnesses. Being therefore by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He hath poured forth this, which ye see and hear. For David ascended not into the heavens: but he saith himself,
The Lord said unto my Lord,
Sit thou on my right hand,
Till I make thine enemies the footstool
of thy feet.
Let all the house of Israel therefore know assuredly, that God hath made Him both Lord and
Christ, this Jesus Whom ye crucified.”
Fifth, Acts 17: 30, 31:
“The times of ignorance therefore God overlooked; but now He commandeth men that they should all everywhere repent: inasmuch as He ‘hath appointed a day in which He will judge the (ere Chas be On Dior Br ilk 131
world in righteousness by the Man Whom He hath ordained; whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath raised Him from the dead.”
These verses do not contain all that we have to say upon this subject, but simply give the keynote of what we have to say, but I shall say nothing that is not plainly taught in these verses or in other verses from God’s Own Word that I cite to you as we proceed. I shall not tell you merely what I guess about the Resurrection, or even merely what I think about the Resurrection. That might be interesting and that is what many are doing to-day; but I shall do something vastly more worth while, and that is, I will show you what God Himself plainly and unmistakably says about The Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the Dead. We shall not take up here The Certainty of the fact of His Resurrection. I have done that already in various books, and have clearly shown that the evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the Dead is overwhelmingly convincing, so convincing indeed that no man who really desires to know and obey the truth, can carefully and thoroughly study this evidence without being fully convinced that the body of Jesus was yaised from the dead just as 1s recorded in the four Gospels.
But to-day we shall not consider the Certainty of His Resurrection, but what God tells us in His Own Word regarding it. We shall consider first, The Importance of His Resurrection; second, The Manner of His Resurrection; third, The Results of His Resurrection,
I. THE IMPORTANCE OF THE RESURRECTION OF
JESUS CHRIST.
First of all then, let us look at what God says in His Own Word regarding the Importance of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.
1. In the first place, We see the Importance of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ in the fact that the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the Dead is mentioned directly a hundred and four or more times in the two hundred and sixty chapters of the New Testament. Some of the passages that mention it cover many verses and even whole chapters.
2. In the second place, We see the Importance of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ in the fact that the apostles made the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the Dead the most prominent point in all their testimony and the very center of all their teaching and preaching. Let me cite a part of Peter’s sermon on the day of Pentecost, the very heart of his argument, Acts 2:24, 27-36:
“Whom God raised up, having loosed the pangs of death: because it was not possible that He should be holden of it.... (27-32)
Because Thou wilt not leave my soul unto
Hades,
Neither wilt Thou give Thy Holy One to
see corruption.
Thou madest known unto me the ways of life;
Thou shalt make me full of gladness with Thy
countenance. Brethren, I may say unto you freely of the patriarch David, that he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us unto this day. Being therefore a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins He would set One upon his throne; he foreseeing this spake of the resurrection of the Christ, that neither was He left unto Hades, nor did His flesh see corruption. This Jesus did God raise up, whereof we all are witnesses. Being therefore by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He hath poured forth this, which ye see and hear. For David ascended not into the heavens: but he saith himself,
The Lord said unto my Lord,
Sit Thou on My right hand,
Till I make thine enemies the footstool
of thy feet,
Let all the house of Israel therefore (that is because God raised up Christ) know assuredly, that God hath made Him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus Whom ye crucified.”
Peter’s whole sermon on the Day of Pentecost turned upon the fact of the Resurrection of the body of Jesus, the Christ of God, from the dead. Peter bases all his reasoning upon that fact of which he says he himself was a personal witness, having seen Jesus with his own eyes after His Resurrection from the Dead.
We have a summary of the teaching and continuous teaching of the apostles when they were filled with the Holy Spirit in Acts 4: 31, 33:
“And when they had prayed, the place was shaken wherein they were gathered together; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they spake the Word of God with boldness.... (33) And with great power gave the apostles their witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus.”
Now listen to the climax of Peter’s sermon in the household of Cornelius, the part to which all that he
had
said before had been leading up, the fact upon
which he based his closing statement that to Christ Jesus “bare all the prophets witness, that through His Name every one that believeth on Him shall receive remission of sins” (Acts 10:43). Read carefully what precedes this remarkable statement, Acts 10: 38-43:
“Even Jesus of Nazareth, how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power: Who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with Him. And we are witnesses of all things which He did both in the country of the Jews, and in Jerusalem; Whom also they slew, hanging Him on a tree. Him God raised up the third day, and gave Him to be made manifest, not to all the people, but unto witnesses that were chosen before of God, even to us, who ate and drank with Him after He rose from the dead. And he charged us to preach unto the people, and to testify that this is He Who is ordained of God to be the Judge of the living and the dead. Yo Him bear all the prophets witness, that through His Name every one that believeth on Him shall receive remission of sins,”
Now look at Paul’s sermon in Antioch, the climax of that sermon and the point on which Paul bases his glorious statement in verses thirty-eight and thirty-nine, “Be it known unto you therefore, brethren, that through this Man ts proclaimed unto you remission of sins: and by Him every one that believeth is justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses.’ Listen to Paul’s argument, Acts 13: 32-39:
“And we bring you good tidings of the promise made unto the fathers, that God hath fulfilled the same unto our children, in that He raised up Jesus; as also it is written in the second Psalm, Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee. And as concerning that He raised Him up from the dead, now no more to return to corruption, He hath spoken on this wise, I will give you the holy and sure blessings of David. Because He saith also in another Psalm, Thou wilt not give Thy Holy One to see corruption. For David, after he had in his own generation served the counsel of God, fell asleep, and was laid unto his fathers, and saw corruption: but He Whom God raised up saw no corruption. Be it known unto you therefore (that is, because God raised Him up), brethren, that through this Man is proclaimed unto you remission of sins: and by Him every one that believeth is justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses.”
Listen to Paul’s sermon at the Areopagus, the most celebrated center of Greek philosophy in Paul’s day, and to an audience almost wholly composed of phi-
136 THE*CCHRISIN OF TEE Bip iia
losophers, Epicurean and Stoic philosophers, Acts DAU ile LO) 2s GOna Ue: “So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and in the market-place every day with them that met him. And certain also of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him. And some said, What would this babbler say? others, He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods: because he preached Jesus and the resurrection. And they took hold of him, and brought him unto the Areopagus, saying, May we know what this new teaching is, which is spoken by thee?... (22) And Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus, and said... (30, 31) The times of ignorance therefore God overlooked; but now He commandeth men that they should all everywhere repent: inasmuch as He hath appointed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man Whom He hath ordained; whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath raised Him from the dead.”
We could easily multiply illustrations, but instead of doing that let me make this statement (that you can verify for yourself) that every sermon recorded in the Acts of the Apostles, without a single exception, centers in the fact of the Resurrection of the body of Jesus Christ from the dead. Furthermore, when it was seen to be necessary to fill up the full quota of the twelve disciples by the choice of one to supply the place which the betrayal and tragic death of Judas
Iscariot had left vacant, Peter said, as recorded in etsoUs 2p 224 “Of the men therefore that have companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and went out among us, beginning from the baptism of John, unto the day that He was received up from us, of these must one become a witness with us of His resurrection.”
It is evident then that the central and the most fundamental thing in the apostolic testimony was their testimony to the Resurrection of the body of Jesus Christ from the dead. The one who is perhaps the most influential teacher in the Methodist Episcopal Church to-day is Prof. Franklin Harris Rall. Every candidate for the ministry in the Methodist Episcopal Church is required to study two of his books. It is true the last General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church voted by an overwhelming majority to put these two extremely dangerous books out of the course, but the Board of Bishops, in utter contempt for this decision of the General Conference, have put the books back into the course. Professor Rall says in one of these books, “Nor is it important to answer the second question” (that is, the question as to the manner of the Resurrection), and he goes on to say, “The only issue is whether we believe in the reality of the spiritual world.” Now evidently either Professor Rall has not carefully read the Acts of the Apostles and studied the sermons of the Apostles as therein recorded, or else he makes bold to set up his own opinion against theirs. At the close of his paragraph Professor Rall says,
138 TAB CHRIST OF (PRR BIBicE
“The one clear fact without which the wonderful story of early Christianity is a mere riddle, is the fact that these disciples were following a living Lord, and not a dead and defeated Leader.” ‘This statement of Professor Rall’s is utterly untrue. The “one fact” that is “clear” as day to any one who studies his Bible to find out what it really teaches and not merely to make it fit into his own unbelieving or heretical notions, is that the Apostles and other early Christian disciples “were following a Lord” Who was not only “a living Lord,” but One Who was “living” because His once dead body had been raised from the dead. THE FACT. OF (THE “RESURRECTION VOR tiem BODY OF JESUS CHRIST FROM THE DEAD WAS THE VERY CENTER AND HEART OF ALL: THE APOSTOLIC” TESTIMONY WAND PREACHING. It is evident from all that we have just read from the Bible that the Resurrection of Jesus Christ had a prominence and importance in New Testament teaching that it has not in most of our, modern preaching. It is the one fact upon which the apostles were constantly ringing the changes.
3. In the third place, We see the Importance of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from Paul’s clear and defimte statement that there are just two fundamental facts in the Gospel and that one of those two funda-. mental facts 1s the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. You will find this statement in 1 Cor. 15: 1,2,
“Now I make known unto you, brethren, the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye received, wherein also ye stand.... (3, 4)
For I delivered unto you first of all that which also I received: that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; and that He was buried; and that He hath been raised on the third day according to the scriptures.,”’
These two facts constitute the Good News (or, the Gospel): the first fact of the two facts is the one that we studied in the fourth chapter, the fact that Jesus Christ died for our sins and was buried; and the second of these two all important facts is, that He was raised on the third day. Gospel preachers in these days preach the Gospel of the crucifixion of Christ, His atoning death; but the apostles preached also the Gospel of the Resurrection from the dead of that Christ Who was natled to the cross.
The crucifixion loses its meaning without the Resurrection. Without the Resurrection the death of Jesus Christ would become nothing more than the heroic death of a noble martyr; but with His Resurrection from the dead, it becomes the atoning death of the Son of God. The Resurrection shows that the death of Jesus was of sufficient value to cover all our sins because it was the sacrifice of One Whom God Himself attested to be His Son. In the Resurrection from the Dead of Him Who died upon the cross for us, we have an all-sufficient ground for knowing that our blackest sin is atoned for. My sin may be as high as the highest mountain, but the sacrifice that covers it is as high as the highest heaven. My guilt may be as deep as the ocean, but the atonement that swallows it up is as deep as eternity.
4. In the fourth place, We see the Importance of
140 DHE CIPRisT OR HE BIBLE
the Resurrection of Christ Jesus, the Christ of the Bible, in that Paul tells us that the one great fact to be remembered about Jesus Christ as the very heart of His Gospel was that He rose from the dead. This we read in 2 Tim. 2:8: “Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, of the seed of David, according to my Gospel.”
The Resurrection of Jesus Christ was the one great fact about his Gospel that Paul wished Timothy never to lose sight of. God grant that none of us shall ever lose sight of it.
5. In the fifth place, We see the Importance of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead in that the Christian faith stands or falls with the Resurrection of the body of Jesus Christ from the dead: if He did not rise from the dead, Christian preaching is empty and the Christian faith forceless and useless. This Paul tells us in 1 Cor. 15:14, 17:
“And if Christ hath not been raised, then is our preaching vain, your faith also is vain.... (17) and tf Christ hath not been raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins.”
There is no escaping the significance of these “‘God-breathed” words of Paul. They declare in the plainest possible kind of language that the Christian faith stands or falls with the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, that if He did not rise from the dead, then all Christian preaching is ““empty’’ and thé Christian faith is “forceless” and ‘“‘useless.”’:
The two different Greek words used in these two verses and translated, in each case, “vain,’’ mean “empty” and “forceless” (or, “useless”). If the body of Jesus Christ was not raised from the dead, then the Christian faith must go and the preaching of Christ it utterly “empty.”’ The Devil knows that as well as we do and we see his subtility and rare cunning at the present time in his inducing so many young preachers to give up believing in or preaching the Resurrection of the body of Jesus. On the other hand, as we shall see later, IF JESUS CHRIST DID RISE FROM THE DEAD, AS BEYOND AN HONEST AND INTELLIGENT DOUBT HE DID, CHRISTIAN PREACHING AND CHRISTIAN FAITH RESTS UPON A SOLID FOUNDATION OF IMPREG-NABLE FACT. Christian faith is no longer a mere theological speculation, but a certainty demonstrated by an indisputable fact.
6. In the sixth place, We see the fundamental and unmeasurable Importance of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead in the fact that the truth of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead has power to save any one who believes it with the heart. This Paul tells us in very simple, easily understood but deeply significant language in Rom. 10:9, 10:
“If thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord, and shalt believe in thy heart that God raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved: for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.”
We are here told that there is one truth and only one that a man needs to believe in order to be saved and that that one truth is that God raised the Lord Jesus from the dead. This truth, however, of the
Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead carries with it a great many other truths. Indeed it carries with it every essential doctrine of Christianity. Believe in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and you are logically forced to believe in every essential truth of the Christian faith.
It must be clear to any person of intelligence and candor, from what we have said, that the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead is one of the most important of all the facts about the Christ of Whom God tells us in His Own Word and that any one who preaches any other Christ than the One Whose body was raised from the dead, 1s preaching an entirely different Christ from the Christ of the Bible.
II. THE MANNER OF THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST FROM THE DEAD.
We come now to a consideration of the Manner of the Resurrection of the Christ of the Bible. * Here again the Bible is unmistakably clear.
1. In the first place, Jesus Christ did not raise Himself from the dead, but God raised Him from the dead by the working of the strength of His might. This we are told for example, in Acts 2: 24, 32:
“Whom God raised up, having loosed the pangs of death: because it was not possible that He should be holden of it.... (32) This Jesus did God raise up, whereof we all are witnesses.”
We are told again in Acts 10: 40:
“Him God raised up the third day, and gave Him to be made manifest.”
Paul tells us the same thing in Rom. 10:9: “God raised Him from the dead.’ And Paul tells us this again in Eph. 1: 19, 20: “And what the exceeding greatness of His (i.e., God’s) power to us-ward who believe, according to that working of the strength of His might which He wrought in Christ, when He raised Him from the dead, and made Him to sit at His right hand in the heavenly places.”
It is not so much that Jesus Christ arose by the power of a life that dwelt in Him as that God raised Him up by an exercise of His power from without. It was God Who put forth the might, it was God Who “loosed the pangs of death.” Jesus Christ was raised by an act of power from without and not by the fullness of life within. He laid down His life to the fullest extent. He was dead, utterly dead, there was never a deader man in all this world’s history than He was; and it took the strength of God’s might to raise Him up.
2. In the second place as regards the Manner of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, The Resurrection of Jesus Christ was of such a character that after His Resurrection from the dead He had a real Body: He had hands and feet, flesh and bones and all the appearance of a man, and after His Resurrection He ate and drank. We are told this over and over again in the various accounts of His Resurrection and in numerous references to the Resurrection of Jesus Christ found in the Bible. For example, we are told in John 205,27:
“Then saith He to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and see My hands; and reach hither thy hand, and put it into My side: and be not faithless, but believing.”
We read in Acts 10: 40, 41:
“Him God raised up the third day, and gave Him to be made manifest, not to all the people, but unto witnesses that were chosen before of God, even to us, who ate and drank with Him, after He rose from the dead.”’
Now turn to Luke’s account of the Resurrection, Luke 24: 41-43:
“And while they still disbelieved for joy, and wondered, He said unto them, Have ye here anything to eat? And they gave Him a piece of broiled fish, And He took it, and ate before them.”
We read in the twenty-ninth verse of the same chapter:
“And they constrained Him, saying, Abide with us; for it is toward evening, and the day is now far spent. And He went in to abide with them.”
Now read Luke 24:15, 18:
“And it came to pass while they communed and questioned together, that Jesus Himself drew near, and went with them. ... (18) And one of them, named Cleopas, answering said unto Him, Dost Thou alone sojourn in Jerusalem and not know the things which are come to pass there in these days?”
John tells us in Jno. 20: 14, 15: “And when she (that is, Mary Magdalene) had thus said, she turned herself back, and beholdeth Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing Him to be the gardener, saith unto Him, Sir, if Thou hast borne Him hence, tell me where Thou hast laid Him, and I will take Him away.”
And we read in the two descriptions of His last appearance to His disciples before His ascension into Heaven in Luke 24: 50, 51:
“And He led them out until they were over against Bethany: and He lifted up His hands, and blessed them. And it came to pass, while He blessed them, He parted from them, and was carried up into heaven,”
and Acts 1:9:
“And when He had said these things, as they were looking, He was taken up; and a cloud received Him out of their sight.”
Evidently and beyond all honest question the Resurrection of Jesus Christ was entirely different from the shadowy appearances of the dead in the alleged materializations of the spirits of the dead as exploited by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle or any of the most expert modern mediums. The latter are well named “mediums.” They are mediums, medium between the Devil and his dupes. Thank God the believer in the Christ of the Bible is not dependent upon a degenerate medium but has a Divine Mediator, the Resurrected Man in the glory.
3. In the third place, as regards the Manner of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, The Resurrection of
146 THE: CHRIST OF sbi BIBEr
Jesus Christ was a Resurrection of the very Body that was nailed to the cross and died and was afterwards taken down from the cross and laid in Joseph’s tomb, but was preserved from corruption and was raised from the dead and passed out of the tomb, leaving the sepulchre empty, and after the Resurrection still had the print of the nails in His hands and the hole left by the spear in His side. That is, the same Body that was crucified was raised. ‘This, the Bible declares repeatedly in terms that cannot be mistaken or misunderstood by any one who really desires to know the truth and not merely to bolster up a theory framed up by his own misguided imagination. Read Acts 2: 22-32:
“Ye men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God unto you by mighty works and wonders and signs which God did by Him in the midst of you, even as ye yourselves know; Him, being delivered up by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye by the hand of lawless men did crucify and slay: Whom God raised up, having loosed the pangs of death: because it was not possible that He should be holden of it. For David said concerning Him,
I beheld the Lord always before my face;
For He is on my right hand, that I should
not be moved:
Therefore my heart was glad, and my tongue rejoiced;
Moreover my flesh also shall dwell in hope:
Because Thou wilt not leave my soul unto Hades, Neither wilt Thou give Thy Holy One to see corruption. Thou madest known unto me the ways of life; Thou shalt make me full of gladness with Thy countenance. Brethren, I may say unto you freely of the patriarch David, that he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us unto this day. Being therefore a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins He would set One upon his throne; he foreseeing this spake of the resurrection of the Christ, that neither was He left unto Hades, nor did His flesh see corruption. This Jesus did God raise up, whereof we all are witnesses.”’ These verses tell us in the plainest possible terms
that the Body of Jesus was crucified and afterwards taken down and laid in a tomb and preserved from corruption and that His Spirit went into Hades (not Hell, but Hades, the abode of the dead, righteous and unrighteous, until the ascension of Christ), but that the soul of Jesus was not left unto Hades but was brought back from Hades and that His Body was raised up, and soul and Body reunited. Read Matthew’s account in Matt. 28:5, 6:
“And the angel answered and said unto the women, Fear not ye; for I know that ye seck Jesus, Who hath been crucified. He is not here;
~
148 TE CHRIS DLORGGH Bs SEaioE:
for He is risen, even as He said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay.”
Here the angels tell the women at the tomb that the thing that they were looking for was not there. What were they looking for? Was it the spirit (or, soul) of Jesus? No, beyond a doubt they were looking for the Body of Jesus to embalm it. Then the angels go on to tell the women that what had been there was risen. What had been there? The spirit or soul of Jesus? No. It was the Body of Jesus that had been there. His soul had been in Hades and the angels say that the Body that had been there had been raised, and for that reason was there no longer, and they invited the women to come and inspect “the place where” the Body had lain.
There is no room here for the theory of Pastor Russell of Millennial Dawn fame, that the Body of Jesus was not raised but simply the spirit, and that the Body was either taken away and deposited somewhere for safe keeping or else evaporated into gases. Neither is there any room for the theory so widely taught in theological seminaries in America and in missionary universities in China and elsewhere, that the Resurrection of Jesus Christ was not a Resurrection of His Body but a purely spiritual Resurrection, a Resurrection of His spirit. In order to believe that theory you must throw your Bibles into the fire. That would be far more honorable than to try to distort and twist the Bible’s utterances and try to make the plain declarations of the Bible mean something they did not say, in order to fit in with one’s own foolish imaginings. Now turn to Mark’s account in Mark 16:5, 6:
TEE ORMRES OR HAE {BIBLE 149
“And entering into the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, arrayed in a white robe; and they were amazed. And he saith unto them, Be not amazed: ye seek Jesus, the Nazarene, Who hath been crucified: He is risen; He is not here: behold, the place where they laid Him!”
The meaning of these words is unmistakable. The angelic message reads, “Ye seek Jesus, the Nazarene, Who hath been crucified.” Now, what about Jesus was “crucified”? Certainly His Body. Then he goes on to say, “He is risen; He is not here: behold, the place where they laid Him!’ What had been laid in that place that was now empty? Certainly the crucified Body of Jesus. And what was not there now? What was risen out of the place where it had lain? Beyond the possibility of an honest doubt or question, the Body of Jesus. THE ONLY RESURRECTION Bites wons ih; CHRIST OF GOD) THAT THE BIBLE KNOWS ANYTHING ABOUT OR TELLS ANYTHING ABOUT IS THE RESUR-RECTION OF THE BODY OF JESUS, the Body that had been nailed to the cross, that had been taken down from the cross and laid in Joseph’s tomb, the Body that had been laid in that very spot at which the women were now gazing, and which Body was no longer in that spot, or in the sepulchre. The only Resurrection of Jesus of which the Bible has one word to say is the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus, and those would-be wise men and the self-styled ‘modern scholars,” who say they believe in the Resurrection of Jesus, but in a merely spiritual Resurrection and not a Resurrection of His Body, are believing in an unsubstantial chimera of their own disordered and befuddled fancies for which there is not one shred of evidence, and instead of being ‘modern scholars” and scientific and philosophical rationalists, they are in reality merely modern empty dreamers and utterly bamboozled irrationalists, credulously believing something for which there is not one smallest shred of historical evidence, or evidence of any other kind.
Now read Luke’s account of the Resurrection of Jesus, the Christ of God, Luke 24: 3-7:
‘“‘And they entered in, and found not the body of the Lord Jesus.’’ (What is it we are here told that they found not? These are Luke’s words, “found not the body of the Lord Jesus.” That is plain English, isn’t it? It is just as plain in the Greek). ‘And it came to pass, while they were perplexed thereabout, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel: and as they were affrighted and bowed down their faces to the earth, they said unto them, Why seek ye the living among the dead? He 1s not here,’ (What was not here? Verse three tells us that it was the body of the Lord Jesus that was not there). “He is risen: remember how He spake unto you when He was yet in Galilee, saying that the Son of man must be delivered up into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again.”
The angel Himself said that what would rise again was what was “crucified.”” What was crucified? Certainly it was the Body of Jesus that was crucified. What the Bible teaches is as plain as day; and it is also as plain as day that what the Bible teaches is not what these would-be “‘scientific’ theologians who deny a Bodily Resurrection of Jesus and teach a merely spiritual Resurrection, teach. If it is true that “the modern mind can not believe in a Resurrection of the Body of Jesus, but does believe in a spiritual Resurrection of Jesus,” then “the modern mind” is thoroughly and hopelessly unscientific.
Now turn to John’s account of the Resurrection in John 20: 24-27:
“But Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said unto him, We have seen the Lord. But he said unto them, Except I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe. And after eight days again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Jesus cometh, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you. Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and see My hands; and reach hither thy hand, and put it into My side: and be not faithless, but believing.”
What was it that appeared in the room where Thomas and the rest were and that Jesus invited Thomas to investigate? Beyond a question, the Body of Jesus that had been crucified and that still bore the marks of the nails in His hands, and the spear thrust in the side. Each one of the four Gospels knew of no Resurrection except the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus, so that it is as clear as language can make tt,
152 JHE CHRIS TOR THER Tp
that the very Body that was nailed to the cross and afterwards taken down dead and laid in Joseph’s tomb, was preserved from corruption and was raised from the dead and passed out of the tomb, leaving the sepulchre empty, and after the Resurrection still had the prints of the nails in the hands and still had the hole left by the spear in the side: that is to say, that it was the same Body that was crucified that was raised.
4. In the fourth place as regards the Manner of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, There was so great a change in the Body of Jesus Christ after His Resurrection that it was not clearly recognizable at once even by His most intimate friends. It was the same Body, but the Body was not the same, it was greatly altered. This we see from John 21: 4, 12:
“But when day was now breaking, Jesus stood on the beach: yet the disciples knew not that it was Jesus.... (12), Jesus saith unto them, Come and break your fast. And none of the disciples durst inquire of Him, Who art Thou? knowing that it was the Lord.”
The same thing is evident from Luke 24:15, 16, ROR
“And it came to pass, while they communed and questioned together, that Jesus Himself drew near, and went with them. But their eyes were holden that they should not know him.... (30, 31) And it came to pass, when He sat down with them to meat, He took the bread and blessed; and breaking it He gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew Him; and He vanished out of their sight.”
5. In the fifth place as regards the Manner of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, The Resurrection Body of Jesus Christ was of such a character that He could appear in a room when the doors were shut, and could become invisible. The Resurrection Body of Jesus was not subject to some of the limitations under which ordinary earthly human bodies now exist and act. This is evident from Jno. 20: 19, 26:
“When therefore it was evening, on that day, the first day of the week, and when the doors were shut where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.... (26) And after eight days again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them, Jesus cometh, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you.”
Read also Luke 24: 31:
“And their eyes were opened, and they knew Him; and He vanished out of their sight.’
The four Greek words translated “vanished out of their sight,” in this verse mean literally, “became invisible from them.”
6. In the sixth place as regards the Manner of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, The Resurrection Body of Jesus Christ was of such a character that it could be taken up from the earth into Heaven in apparent defiance of the law of gravitation. This we see in Acts I:Q-II:
“And when He had said these things, as they were looking, He was taken up; and a cloud received Him out of their sight. And while they were looking stedfastly into heaven as He went,
behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; who also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye looking into heaven? this Jesus, Who was received up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye beheld Him going into heaven.”
It is to be noted however, that we are not told that the body of Jesus ascended because of its own lightness, but it was “taken up,’ and of course God could take up if He chose, an ordinary body. Indeed, we are told that “Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven” (2 Kings 2:11).
7. In the seventh place, as regards the Manner of
the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, The Body that Jesus
now has is a transformed Body, incorruptible, glorious, mighty, spiritual, heavenly, not flesh and blood. ‘This we see from a comparison of Phil. 3:20, 21 with 1 Cor. 15: 42-50. Let me read Phil. 3:20, 21:
“For our citizenship is in heaven; whence also we wait for a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall fashion anew the body of our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the body of His glory, according to the working whereby He is able even to subject all things unto Himself.”
Here we are told that our resurrection bodies are to be in the likeness of the Body of His glory, that is the Body He now has in the glory. So if we can find what the character of our resurrection body is to be we shall know just what the character of His Resurrection Body now is. The character of the resurrection bodies we are to have we are told in 1 Cor. 15: 42-50:
“So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: it is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: it is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. So also it is written, The first man Adam became a living soul. The last Adam became a life-giving spirit. Howbeit that is not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; then that which is spiritual. The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is of heaven. As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.”
While the Body of Jesus was not “flesh and blood,” He Himself declared in Luke 24: 31-40 that it was “flesh and bones.” His blood was shed on Calvary. The blood had been the life of His Body while on earth, just as our blood is the life of our bodies to-day, but at His resurrection His Spirit evidently became the life-giving and energizing power of His Body, and so shall it be with our glorified bodies at the resurrection of our bodies when our Lord comes again. Won’t it be great to have a body that is energized by, and under the complete sway of our glorified spirits? and such we shall have when Jesus Christ comes again. And that is infinitely better than the airy “ectoplastic’’ ghosts of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s dopy dreamings.
Sir Arthur has been so long immersed in the imaginary career and mental acuteness of Sherlock Holmes that he seems to have become incapable of dealing with real facts, solid and substantial facts, and has lost all power of distinguishing between entertaining fiction and solid fact. A man or woman with an overvivid imagination, or who has overworked his imagination, is always an unreliable witness, and unless he is very much on his guard is likely to degenerate into a consummate liar. I have met in my life, some very painful illustrations of this fact, of people who in other ways were exceptionally fine people. But anyway, what need have we of Conan Doyle’s fantastic fancies and weird and uncanny fantasies when we have the absolutely reliable and wonderfully inspiring (as well as undoubtedly inspired) records and revelations of the sure Word of God?
III. THE RESULTS OF THE RESURRECTION OF THE CHRIST, OR WHAT DOES THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST FROM THE DEAD PROVE?
We come now to a careful and thorough consideration of the vitally important question of the Results of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the Dead; or, What Does the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the Dead Prove?
1. In the first place, The Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead provides a solid and unshakeable foundation of scientifically demonstrated historic fact for our belief in the existence of a per-. sonal God and that the God of the Bible, the God of both the Old Testament and of the New Testament, is the true God. This we are told in 1 Pet. 1: 18-21: “Knowing that ye were redeemed, not with corruptible things, with silver or gold, from your vain manner of life handed down from your fathers; but with precious blood, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot, even the blood of Christ: Who was foreknown indeed before the foundation of the world, but was manifested at the end of the times for your sake, who through Him are believers in God, that raised Him from the dead, and gave Him glory; so that your faith and hope might be in God.”
Throughout at least twenty-five centuries of civilized history men have been looking for intellectually convincing, conclusive and decisive proofs of the existence and nature and character of God. They have devised the teleological argument, i.e., the argument from the marks of creative intelligence and design in the material universe, and also the historical argument, i.e., the argument from the many evidences of an intelligent and righteous guiding hand in human history, and the ontological argument, and other arguments. But all these arguments are philosophical in their character, and more or less speculative, and at the best they point only to the strong philosophical probability that there is a personal, righteous and beneficent God. But in the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the Dead, we have an incontrovertible fact of history that demands the existence of God to account for it, and that points with scientific certainty to the existence, power and holiness of the God Who raised Him. It” is one of the most elementary and universally accepted principles of modern science that every effect must have an adequate cause, and the only cause that is adequate to account for the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the Dead is God, the God of the Bible. By the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the Dead, our faith in the existence of God is removed from the domain of the merely speculative and probable into the domain of the scientifically proven and certain.
Just how does the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead prove the existence of God and that the God of the Bible, the God of the Old Testament as well as the God of the New Testament, is the true God? In this way: when Jesus Christ was here on earth He proclaimed God, the God of the Bible, the “God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob” (as He constantly spoke of Him), the God of the Old Testament as well as of the New Testament. He unhesitatingly asserted that after He Himself had been put to death this God Whom He proclaimed, the “God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,” the God of the Old Testament as well as of the New Testament, would raise Him from the dead the third day. This was indeed a stupendous claim to make. It was apparently an absurd claim. For centuries men had come and men had gone; they had lived for a longer or a shorter period on the earth and then had died, and as far as human observation went that was the end of them: and here one man after all these centuries of uniform experience, declared that His experience would be entirely different from that of all the countless millions of others who had gone before Him. He claimed that He would live and die as others did, but that He, unlike all the rest, would be raised again, to die no more. This claim appeared like the height of absurdity; but as a matter of historic fact He did die, and as a fact of absolutely certain history His Body was raised from the dead, just as He had proclaimed that it would be. And this fact of the Resurrection of His Body from the dead demonstrated that the God Whom He proclaimed, the “God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,” the God of the Old Testament as well as of the New Testament, existed and was indeed God, and was the true and only God as He constantly asserted that He was. In the light of the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the Dead, our belief in the existence of the God of the Bible is not merely a felicitous fancy or only a more or less probable theological guess; it is a firmly fixed faith resting upon an incontrovertibly firm fact: it is a well established scientific conviction. In the light of the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the Dead, atheism and agnosticism in all their forms have absolutely no standing ground, they are scientific absurdities.
Incidentally to this, the proven Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the Dead sounds the death knell to any doctrine of Evolution that teaches that every new thing that comes to be is entirely the result of development by purely natural laws and processes (without any interference from without by a personal God) from the things that already were. Beyond the possibility of intelligent and honest doubt the Resurrection Body of Jesus Christ was not a development by natural law, by any inherent forces in the body that was crucified. The so-called ‘Modernist’ in the theological world sees this very clearly, and that is the ultimate reason why these ‘““Modernists’” contend so vigorously against belief in the Virgin Birth of our Lord and against belief in the Resurrection of the Body of our Lord Jesus Christ. These ‘“Modernists’” are all committed irrevocably to an extreme doctrine of Evolution. Their whole reputation as thinkers and intelligent scholars depends upon the truth of that doctrine. If the Evolutionary Hypothesis falls, their reputation for scholarship and intelligence falls with it; and is forever shattered. They are committed to a doctrine of Evolution that rules out miracles and any interposition of God by the bringing in of any new and higher manifestations of God’s power in nature or in man; and they see clearly that once prove the Virgin Birth of our Lord or the Resurrection of His Body from the dead and the whole Evolutionary Hypothesis collapses and falls in utter and hopeless ruin: it receives its death blow. But the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead is a conclusively demonstrated historic fact; and no mere theory, no matter how brilliant and fascinating that theory may be, and no matter how many great names it may summon to its support, can stand against scientifically demonstrated facts. Belief in any extreme doctrine of evolution cannot co-exist in any logical and well-balanced mind with the belief in the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead. But the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the doe CHRIS OR THs BIBLE 161
dead is entirely beyond any honest question. Therefore, every extreme, or all comprehending, doctrine of Evolution must go. It certainly will go. It is doomed beyond hope.
2. In the second place, The Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead proves that Jesus, the Christ of God, was a Teacher sent from God, Divinely inspired and absolutely inerrant, who spoke the very words of God. How does the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead prove that Jesus of Nazareth was a Teacher sent from God, Divinely inspired and absolutely inerrant, Who spoke the very Words of God? In this way: Jesus Christ while here on earth declared that He was a Teacher sent from God, that He was Divinely taught and absolutely inerrant, and that THE WORDS HE SPOKE WERE THE VERY WORDS OF GOD. He declared this time and time again in one form or another. Let me read you some of His utterances regarding this matter.
First of all listen to Jno. 7: 16:
“Jesus therefore answered them, and said, M y teaching is not Mine, but His that sent Me.”
Again He said in Jno. 12: 49, 50:
“For I spake not from Myself; but the Father that sent Me, He hath given Me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak. And I know that His commandment is life eternal: the things therefore which I speak, even as the Father hath said unto Me, so I speak.”
In Jno. 14:24, he says:
“He that loveth Me not keepeth not My Words:
and the word which ye hear is not Mine, but the Father’s Who sent me.”
Now here is the plainest possible declaration that the words which the apostles heard from Him were not His own words, but God the Father’s own words.
In Jno. 3:34, we read:
“He Whom God hath sent (that is, of course, Jesus Christ) speaketh the words of God: for He giveth not the Spirit by measure.”
In John 17:8 on the night immediately preceding His crucifixion, the Lord Jesus declares in one of the most solemn moments of His earthly life, when He was speaking not to men but to God Himself:
“The words which Thou gavest Me I have given unto them; and they received them, and knew of a truth that I came forth from Thee, and they believed that Thou didst send Me.”
Here again is the plainest possible declaration on our Lord’s part that the very “words” that He spoke were God’s Own “words.” This was Jesus Christ’s undoubted claim: His claim was that His “‘words’’ were the very “words” of God. This was a stupendous claim to make. But making this claim does not prove it to be true. Others have made similar claims; but the difference between their claims on this matter and the claim of Jesus Christ is that Jesus Christ substantiated His claim and no one else has ever substantiated his. God Himself unmistakably set His stamp of endorsement upon this astounding claim of Jesus Christ by raising Him from the dead. In the light of the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead, those who question the infallible authority
fae.
Pee CURIS by ORs nh ART BI BICE, 163
and absolute inerrancy of Jesus Christ, including those who teach that during His earthly life “He emptied Himself” of His Divine wisdom and was subject to the same errors as other men of His day — lI say in the light of the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead, those teachers who thus question the infallible authority and absolute inerrancy of Jesus Christ, have absolutely no logical standing ground. Furthermore in the light of the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead, those supposedly “scholarly” Biblical critics who demand that we give up the authority and inerrancy of Jesus Christ and of the Bible and accept their authority and inerrancy in their place, make themselves a laughing-stock to all intelligent, thoughtful and fair-minded men.
3. In the third place, By the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead a solid foundation of imdisputable, unassailable, impregnable and scientifically demonstrated fact is laid for our belief that Jesus Christ was the Son of God, the Son of God im sense that no other person, either man or angel, 1s or ever was the Son of God; that He was God mamfest in human form; a Being to be trusted and obeyed and honored and worshiped even as God the Father 1s trusted and obeyed and honored and worshiped.
This was beyond a doubt the unhesitating claim of Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ of the Bible, when He was here on earth. He says in Mark 12:5, 6 (see R.V.), that while all the prophets of the old dispensation, even the greatest, were “servants,” that He was the “Son,” the “beloved Son” and the “One (and only) Son” of God.
He says in Jno. 10: 30:
“I and the Father are One.”
He even went so far as to say in Jno. 14:9:
“He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father.”
He demanded of His disciples that they put the same absolute faith and trust in Him that they put in God the Father.
We see this in Jno. 14:1 where He says to His disciples when they were dismayed at the thought of the separation from Him:
“Let not your heart be troubled: believe in God, believe also in Me.” (A.R.V.)
Here is a clear demand that the disciples put the same absolute confidence in Him that they put in God. These words of His are found in what is to the majority of Christian people, the most precious chapter in the Bible; and, if you give up these words of Jesus you must give up the most precious chapter in the whole Bible.
Jesus of Nazareth even went so far as to say in NON Sees
“All men should honor the Son (that is, of course, Himself), even as they honor the Father.”
This was indeed a stupendous claim to make. If not true, it was a blasphemous claim; and He Who made it, Jesus Christ our Lord, was in that case either the most daring and outrageous blasphemer in human history or else one of the most hopeless lunatics. But the claim was substantiated. God endorsed the claim by raising from the dead the one Who made it.
Jesus Christ declared to the ecclesiastical rulers of the day that they would put Him to death for making this claim, but that God would set His seal of endorsement upon the claim by raising Him from the dead. They did put Him to death for making the claim, but when the appointed and plainly and precisely predicted hour was come the breath of God swept through that sleeping clay and God raised the One Who made the claim from the dead, and thus proclaimed to all mankind for all coming ages that this stupendous claim of Jesus Christ to being a Divine Person, equal to the Father, was true. By raising the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead God announced to all ages in a way more convincing and more satisfying than if He should speak with an audible voice from Heaven to-day, “Jesus Christ is My Only Son. He is so fully and completely Divine that to see Him is to see Me and all men should honor Him with exactly the same honor with which they honor Me.”
As we have clearly seen, if we candidly face the facts in the case, we are compelled to admit the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead; and this admission of the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead leads logically and inevitably and inescapably to an unquestioning faith in His Deity.
In the light of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, Unitarianism in any of its forms, or any other system of thought that denies the real Deity of the Lord Jesus Christ has absolutely no logical standing ground, Unitarian conceptions of Jesus Christ fall to the ground in hopeless and irreparable ruin.
4. In the fourth place, By the Resurrection of the
166 THE ‘CHRIST OF THEY BiBin
Body of Jesus Christ from the dead, God gives us His Own indubitable assurance that there is to be a Judgment Day and that the risen Jesus, the Christ of God, Christ Jesus, is to sit as the Judge in that Day. Paul, when he was speaking to that notable gathering of Epicurean and Stoic philosophers at the Areopagus, the most celebrated seat of Greek philosophy in his day, put it in this way, Acts 17:30, 31:
“The times of ignorance therefore God overlooked; but now He commandeth men that they should all everywhere repent: inasmuch as He hath appointed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man Whom He hath ordained; whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath raised Him from the dead.”
Here Paul declares that the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the Dead was a God-given assurance that there was to be a judgment day and that Jesus Christ was to be the Judge in that day.
How does God by raising the Body of Jesus Christ from the Dead, as it lay there in Joseph’s tomb outside of Jerusalem, give assurance to all men that God is to judge the world by this Man, Christ Jesus, Whom He raised from the Dead? In this way: When here on earth Jesus Christ declared that there was to be a Judgment Day and that He Himself was to be the Judge in that Day. He says in Jno. 5: 22, 27-29:
“For neither doth the Father judge any man, but He hath given all judgment unto the Son.... (27-29) And He gave Him authority to execute judgment because He is Son of man. Marvel not at this: for the hour cometh, im which all that are in the tombs shall hear His voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of judgment.”
Here is the clear and definite claim on the part of our Lord Jesus that there was to be a Judgment Day and that He Himself was to be the Judge. The ecclesiastical authorities of that day hated Jesus Christ for making this claim and put Him to death for making this claim (and the other claim involved in it, that of His Deity and of His equality with the Father); but before He was put to death Jesus Christ asserted that God would set the stamp of His endorsement upon this claim by raising Him from the dead. Men did put Him to death in the exact way that He predicted that they would, but God raised Him from the dead and in this way set the stamp of His endorsement upon the claim which men rejected.
Now this Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead is an historic certainty and by raising Him from the dead God set His own seal to Jesus Christ’s claim that there was to be a Judgment Day and that Jesus Christ Himself was to be the Judge. The absolutely certain Resurrection of Jesus Christ in the past points forward with unerring finger to an absolutely certain Judgment Day in the future in which Jesus Christ is to sit as Judge.
If men ask me how I know there is to be a Judgment Day in which Jesus Christ will judge the world in righteousness, I reply, “I know it because I know that Jesus Christ arose from the Dead.” Belief in the Judgment Day is no mere conjecture of theological speculation, it is a positive and proven faith founded upon a scientifically proven fact. It is a scientifically proven theorem, not a merely speculative theory. In the light of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the Dead, those who flatter themselves that they can go on in sin and not be called to strictest account for it, above all those who try to comfort themselves with the hope that they can continue in that most damning of all sins, the sin of rejecting Jesus Christ, God’s Son, and not be called to the sternest account in the future Day of Judgment, are flattering themselves with an absolutely baseless hope and are blindly dooming themselves to an eternity of darkness and despair.
5. In the fifth place, By the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead, God declares to every believer in Jesus Christ that he is justified, that His Own absolutely perfect righteousness in Jesus Christ is put to the believer’s account.
Paul says this in Rom. 4: 24,25. These are his words:
“Jesus our Lord... was delivered up for our trespasses, and was raised for our justification.”
The Greek preposition twice translated “for in verse twenty-five should be translated in each case “because of” or ‘fon account of,’ and the verse would then properly read, “Who was delivered up because of our trespasses, and was raised because of our justification.” THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST FROM THE DEAD POSITIVELY DEMONSTRATES THAT EVERY BELIEVER IN JESUS CHRIST IS JUSTIFIED. How does the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead demonstrate that every believer in Jesus Christ is justified? In this way: when Jesus was here on earth He said that He would offer up His life a ransom for many. These are His words as found in Matt. 20:28:
“The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many.”
The hour came to offer up His life, and He offered it up on the Cross of Calvary “as a ransom” for us. Now He has offered to God an atonement for sins; but there still remains a question, Will God accept the atonement which has been thus offered? For three nights and three days that question remains unanswered, Jesus’ body lies there in the grave cold and dead, but at last the long predicted hour arrives and the breath of God sweeps through that sleeping clay and Jesus, the Christ of God, arises triumphant from the dead and is exalted to the right hand of God the Father, and God thereby proclaims to the whole universe, “I have accepted the atonement which Jesus, My Christ, has made.” By raising Jesus Christ from the dead God declared that He had accepted the propitiation that Jesus Christ offered and thereby declared us righteous in His Own sight.
When another agrees to settle for my responsibilities I always want to know whether the settlement has been accepted. The Resurrection of Jesus Christ is God’s declaration that He has accepted and is satisfied with the settlement that Jesus Christ has made in my behalf. Therefore by that Resurrection I am declared righteous in God’s sight. I look at Jesus Christ upon the cross and I know that a propitiation has been offered to God, but I look at the empty tomb and the risen Christ and know that God has accepted the propitiation that Jesus offered. In the light of the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the Dead we see clearly that there is pardon and justification for the vilest sinner that walks the earth, on the sole and single condition of faith in Him Who died on the cross in our behalf.
Furthermore, when Jesus Christ died, He died as our Representative; when He arose, He arose as our Representative; when He ascended into Heaven, he ascended into Heaven as our Representative; when He took His seat at the right hand of the Father up yonder in the glory, He took His seat as my Representative and yours, and to-day that is our real position, seated together with Him “in the heavenlies.” (Biph)-20/17).
As One risen, ascended, seated, Jesus Christ is declared to be God’s chosen, accepted and righteous One and all who are in Him are declared to be chosen, accepted and righteous in Him. There no longer remains one single sin on me, if I am a real believer in Jesus Christ, no matter how many or how great my sins may have been. My sins may have been as high as the mountains, but in the light of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the Dead the atonement that covers them is as high as Heaven: My sins may have been as deep as the ocean, but in the light of the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead the atonement that swallows them up is as deep as eternity.
To put it in the wonderful words of the Apostle Paul found in Acts 13: 38, 39:
“Be it known unto you therefore (that is, because of His Resurrection), brethren, that through this Man is proclaimed unto you remission of sins: and by Him every one that believeth is justified from all things.”
6. In the sixth place, The Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead provides a foundation of solid and unassailable and impregnable fact for our belief that all who are united to Christ by a lwing faith shall live again; and that not only our spirits shall live again but that our bodies shall be raised from the grave and glorified. Paul puts it this way in 1 Thess. 4: 14-16:
“For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also that are fallen asleep in Jesus will God bring with Him. For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we that are alive, that are left unto the coming of the Lord, shall in no wise precede them that are fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself shall descend from Heaven, with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first; then we that are alive, that are left, shall together with them be caught up in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”
Paul puts precisely the same thought in different words in 2 Cor. 4:14:
“Knowing that He that raised up the Lord
Jesus shall raise up us also with Jesus, and shall present us with you.”
The believer is so united to Jesus, the Christ of God, by a living faith that if He arose from the dead we also must arise from the dead some day. If the grave could not hold Him it cannot hold me. Praise God!
For centuries men have been seeking proofs of immortality, of life after death. We have had the dreams of poets and speculations of theologians and philosophers to cheer us with the hope that we should live again; but the best of philosophical arguments only points to the probability of life after death, but in a matter like this the human heart craves and demands something more than probability — it demands certainty. In the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead we get something more than probability, we get absolute certainty, we get scientific demonstration of life beyond the grave, and of the Resurrection of the body. The Resurrection of Jesus Christ removes the hope of immortality from the domain of speculation and probability into the domain of scientific and absolute certainty. We know that there is life beyond the grave.
While I was in England the most prominent of the “New Theology” men in that country declared, “Not a few are not at all sure that there is any life beyond the grave. They wish it could be proven. So do I. But we can do no more than infer it from the moral constitution of the universe.” I thank God, that this “Modernist” preacher was utterly wrong in his statement. Before the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus
LHE CHRIST OFV THE ‘BIBLE 173
Christ from the dead, perhaps the best that we could do was to “infer it from the moral constitution of the universe,’ but since the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead that is no longer true. In the light of His Resurrection it is no longer left to uncertain inference “from the moral constitution of the universe,” it is a scientifically proven fact. No further proof is needed.
We know that God will raise us up because as a matter of historic certainty He raised Him up.
As Paul puts it in Rom. 8:11:
“If the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwelleth in you, He that raised up Christ Jesus from the dead shall give life also to your mortal bodies through His Spirit that dwelleth BVO:
The Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead has robbed death of all its terrors for the believer. Instead of cringing in terror in the presence of death we triumphantly shout, ‘“O Death, where is thy sting? O Grave, where is thy victory?’ (1 Cor. 15:55).
By the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, life after death and the resurrection of the body is scientifically demonstrated; and to any one who will calmly ponder the facts in regard to the Resurrection of Jesus Christ all unbelief or agnosticism in regard to the future life becomes an impossibility.
In the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead we have immeasurably better proof of life after death than in the supposed and shadowy materializations of the spirits of the dead in darkened and skillfully prepared rooms, exploited by Sir Oliver Lodge and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and an endless list of mediumistic fakers, all of whom are sooner or later proven to be shameless tricksters and frauds. By the scientifically demonstrated Resurrection of the: Body of Jesus Christ from the Dead, Life after Death and the Resurrection of the Body are scientifically demonstrated.
If any one will ponder the facts in regard to the Resurrection of the Body of Jesus of Nazareth, unbelief or agnosticism in regard to the future life, or the resurrection of the body, becomes an intellectual impossibility. In the light of the first Easter morning I go out into the cities of the dead where now lie asleep in Jesus the bodies of my father, my mother, my two brothers and two of my daughters and all my tears are wiped away, for I hear the Father saying, “Thy father shall live again, thy mother shall live again, thy brother shall live again, thy two children shall live again, clad with far greater beauty than was seen in their faces when they were here upon earth.”
7- In the seventh place, The Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead proves that we
have an ever-living High Priest at the right hand of
God in the glory to continually make intercession for
us and Who 1s therefore able to save to the uttermost
those who come unto God through Him. This Paul tells us in Rom. 8: 34:
“Who is He that condemneth? It is Christ
Jesus that died, yea rather, that was raised from
SS ee ee”
the dead, Who is at the right hand of God, Who also maketh intercession for us.”
And God tells us again in Heb. 7: 25:
“Wherefore also He is able to save to the uttermost them that draw near unto God through Him, seeing He ever liveth to make intercession for them.”
The words, “to the uttermost’ are very expressive. Their literal force is “unto all completeness.” Salvation is begun by the atoning blood of Jesus Christ; it is continued by the Resurrection and consequent intercession of Christ. We have not only a Saviour Who died and so made a perfect atonement for sin, but we have also a Saviour Who arose and carried the blood He had shed on the cross into the Holy of Holies, into God’s own very presence, and He presents it there, and He ever lives to plead our cause in every new case of failure.
Ass Ounwptits it in It Jno. 2: 1%
“My little children, these things write I unto you that ye may not sin. And if any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus — Christ the righteous.”
He always lives to plead our cause, if we are believers in Him; and so we are forever safe, for the Father heareth Him always (Jno. 11:42). In this unceasing intercession of the Risen Christ in our behalf lies our abiding security and our assurance of the ultimate perfect completeness of Christ’s work in us.
8. In the eighth place, Because of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ every believer in Christ is joined to a risen Christ and therefore brings forth fruit to God in Ais daily life. Listen to the way Paul puts it in Rom. TAS “Wherefore, my brethren, ye also were made dead to the law through the body of Christ (that is through the death of His body on the cross); that ye should be joined to another, even to Him Who was raised from the dead, that we might bring forth fruit unto God.”
The only living or doing or accomplishment in the Christian life that is effective or acceptable to God is through union with the Risen Christ. Through our union with the crucified Christ we get our pardon, our cleansing from guilt, our justification, our perfect standing before God: through union with the Risen Christ we get power for life and to bring forth fruit.
One chief reason why there is so little of life and fruit bearing in many professedly Christian lives to-day is because there is so little knowledge of and so little meditation upon the Risen Christ. Paul tells us that we were raised together with Christ “through faith in the working of God Who raised Him from the dead” (Col. 2: 12), and he tells us in another place that we were raised with Him “So we also might walk in newness of life’ (Rom. 6: 4).
The full power of Christ’s Resurrection we shall not know until we attain unto the Resurrection of the dead ourselves (Phil. 3:10, 11), but “the power of His Resurrection” in our moral and spiritual lives, begetting us unto “newness of life’ and “fruit unto God” we may know even now by being “joined to Him
Who was raised from the dead.”’ May I put to each one of you the question, Are you “joined to Another even to Him Who was raised from the dead”? Herein lies the whole secret of holy living, newness of life, victory over sin, fruit unto God.
9g. In the ninth place, The Resurrection of the Body of Jesus Christ from the dead proves that it is every believer’s privilege to have daily, hourly and constant victory over sin. We are united, as we have just seen, not only to the Lord Jesus Who died and Who thus made perfect atonement for our sins and Who thus delivered us from the guilt of sin, but we are united to the Lord Jesus Who arose again and Who “ever liveth to make intercession for us,’ and Who therefore “is able to save to the uttermost.” We are united to the One Who has power to keep us from falling day by day, the One Who “is able to guard us from stumbling and to present us before the presence of His glory without blemish in exceeding joy.” (Jude 24). In myself I am weak, utterly weak, unable to resist temptation for a single hour; but He is strong, infinitely strong, and He ever lives to give me help and deliverance every day and every hour. The question of victory over sin is not at all a question of my weakness, it is entirely a question of His strength, His Resurrection power which is always at my disposal. He has “all power in Heaven and on earth” (Matt. 28:18), and what my risen Lord has belongs to me also. In the light of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, failure in daily living is unnecessary and inexcusable. In His Resurrection, life and power it is our privilege and our duty to lead victorious lives:
To use an illustration that I used some years ago on this platform and that is found in one of my books: Four men were once climbing the slippery and perilous side of the Matterhorn. First came a guide and then a tourist and then a second guide and then a second tourist, all roped together. The tourist in the rear lost his footing and slipped over the side of the mountain. The sudden pull on the rope carried the lower guide with him and he in turn carried the other tourist with him. Three men are now dangling over that dizzy cliff. But the guide who was in the lead, when he felt the first pull upon the rope, drove his pike into the ice, braced his feet and held fast. There they hang, three men dangling over that awful abyss and yet three men perfectly safe because tied to the man that stood fast. The first tourist regained his place upon the path, the guide regained his place and then the tourist in the rear regained his, and on and on, and up and up, they went in safety to the summit of the mountain. Just so the human race was ascending the icy cliffs of life. The first Adam lost his footing and was swept out over the abyss, he pulled the next after him and he the next and the next and so on until the whole human race hangs over the frightful abyss. But the second Adam, the Man in the glory, stands fast, and all who are united to Him by a living faith, even though dangling over the awful precipice, are safe, because tied to the Man in the glory.