Bible Teaching
Calvary Temple Teaching Library
I Wound And I Heal Pt.12
Pastor Scott
April 30, 2000 Sun AM
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We want to talk a little bit about the resurrection this morning. We didn’t on Resurrection Sunday in the series that we were going on, but I want to go back and emphasize the resurrection a little bit. Let’s turn to Acts, as I shared with you, to spend a little bit of time in the book of Acts and cruise through chapters three through seven, and get a feel for what normative Christian living was all about.
Now what’s interesting is that today in America (started to say twentieth century again, I keep getting caught on that) here in the twenty-first century in America to live this way appears to be extreme and fanatical. To even hope to live this way seems to be a dream for most Christians that fill buildings like we’re in this morning. Normative Christianity has become a fantasyland to most Christians; but it’s something that is our heritage, it belongs to us, and we shouldn’t settle for anything less.
The Word of God is true, it’s the same yesterday, today, and forever, the living Word, and the written Word. Heaven and earth will pass, but there won’t be the failure of one jot or tittle, the Scripture tells us. So what is normative Christianity? It’s the same yesterday, today, and forever; and in this normative Christianity we see in chapter two of the Book of Acts, the ministry that was going forth following Pentecost. Now, remember its interesting that the Holy Spirit was poured out on the Day of Pentecost. Pentecost was the Festival of Harvest, the first fruits of the harvest. It’s the empowering of the Church that ensures us a harvest in these days of the proclamation of Jesus’ Lordship. He said, "lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest." (John 4:35) He said, " pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth labourers into his harvest." (Luke 10:2) I know we’re a fellowship that’s prayed that way, and I want you to understand something: God has heard our prayers. His ears are open to the cry of the righteous, and as our hearts burn for the lost souls of our world, and our eyes are opened, and we look beyond everything that glitters to the natural mind and the natural eye, we begin to look and see the fields white. We see the souls that are there in jeopardy, waiting for a messenger to come. The prayer of our hearts should be, "here am I; [Lord] send me." (Isaiah 6:8) Amen? You ready to go? Are you ready to go? And you say, "yeah! I’m ready, man. If God would speak, I’d just sell everything I have, and I’d move in a heart beat. I’d love to go with Ron and Tony over there and just be heralding the gospel." Well, what’s wrong with talking to your neighbor? How about the person at the gas station, and in the supermarket? Now, as a people, we do very well with the sharing of our faith, but what I want to talk about this morning is the ability to take those words that you’ve shared—and many of you have done well in that area—and let’s add to it now the power of the resurrected Jesus. Let’s begin to speak more than words. Let’s begin to live lives that have the evidence that God has raised Jesus from the dead. Lives that are changed so that we not only live separate from the world and have different standards of morality and ethics, but that we also live by the supernatural to where we’re not willing to compromise anything that the Word of God has to say because we know God is our source and we’ll not fear what man can do unto us.
This is what happened at Pentecost, and this is why Peter and the disciples were able to preach boldly in this second chapter of Acts. We find over in verse 32 these words—well actually, let’s begin at verse 31: "He seeing this before spake of the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell, neither his flesh did see corruption. This Jesus [Peter’s sermon goes on to say] hath God raised up, whereof we are all witnesses." "This [same] Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we are all witnesses."
Now, we’re going to talk about the witnesses of the resurrection this morning. What is really interesting and unique is that you and I are firsthand witnesses of the resurrection. Though we didn’t see Him literally with our eyes, we’ve been able to partake and experientially know the resurrection power of Jesus Christ because of the transformation of our lives. And it’s very important that we begin to see that each one of us then is just as uniquely called and equipped to proclaim this message: that God has raised Jesus up, and we stand here as His witnesses to you. You read on through this particular chapter, and I’m going to have to just highlight these. It’s a fabulous time. I’m sure some of you remembered to spend time studying these out, and see what it means to be a Christian, a light in a darkened world, an individual who’s allowed the basket to be pulled off of our candlestick and the light to shine. And the Scripture says in verse 38, "Peter said unto them, Repent and be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive this gift of the Holy Ghost." He’s talking about the gift of regeneration, and, of course, following what they’d just experienced in Pentecost, the infusing or the indwelling Holy Spirit that enables us to be power representatives of the Kingdom of God. You shall receive power, dunamis, not only authority, but also the dynamics of God’s resurrection power. The same power that raised Jesus from the dead is dwelling in you and me right now. Think about that. So the question is: is anything impossible to us? We saw Wednesday night that all things are possible to he that what? Believes. What do you believe? If you believe that Jesus is raised from the dead, and that same power is in you, then what’s impossible to you this morning? What do we have to be afraid of? Is there a weapon formed against us that can prosper? Can we say like Jesus, "you can’t take my life, I have to lay it down?" I want to tell you something: terrorists can’t take your life; disease can’t take your life. Jesus, the power of God, He who is the resurrection and the life, holds your life in His hand; no one can pluck us from Him, and we, by subordinating ourselves to His Lordship, entrust in Him, lay our lives down, but nobody can take it from us if we trust in that resurrection power. If God is for us, no one can be against us. Our steps are ordered by Him. And so as we become those bold witnesses and expect that divine protection and the divine benefits, we become witnesses with a message like Peter. That we stand up now and, in the midst of those that at times we cowered before, we’re able to proclaim boldly this free gift of our redemption.
It comes into the third chapter, and I want to get through here quicker than this. There are some things I want to share as it pertains directly to the resurrection. But what we’re looking at here is the consequence of normative Christian living because of this message of the resurrection. Verse 43 of that same second chapter says, "And fear came upon every soul: and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles. And all that believed were together, and had all things common." And so we begin to see here that as we’re aware of this resurrection message, there is a boldness that comes (verse 43) and because of that wonders and signs. Now meditate on that: "And these signs shall follow them that believe; in my name…" Wonders and signs follow our personal belief in the resurrection of Jesus. And I actually believe that they follow in direct correlation. And as we begin to stir up again this assurance in our hearts and become excited about the task that’s at hand, we’ll see the demonstration that these saw in their lives as Jesus added to the church such as should be saved.
You go down into chapter three (and we’ve spent a lot of time there already, but just to highlight a couple passages) down in verse twelve. You remember the healing of the man at Gate Beautiful, and we already went through why so many times they’d pass by and this man was not healed, and on this particular day God chose to raise him up. And as the apostles said, "look on us" and his eyes were fastened upon them, and they said, (verse 6) "Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee: in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk." And immediately he received strength into his feet and he began to leap, and jump, and praise God, and the Scripture says that the multitudes were filled with wonder and amazement at that which had happened to him. And Peter then responding to that said, (verse 12) "Ye men of Israel, why marvel ye at this? or why look ye so earnestly on us, as though by our own power or holiness we had made this man to walk?" What we need to see this morning is though we’re to expect the resurrection power of Jesus to manifest in our lives, we can never become deluded into thinking that it’s by our own power or our own holiness. We’re just vessels, we’re the instruments, the members of the body of Christ: the power and the glory is His. When we begin to understand that everything we’re doing is representative; everything we’re doing is for His power and His glory and that it’s not dependent upon our own holiness or our own power, we become liberated to go out and witness because He then confirms the word that we’re speaking with signs following. It doesn’t depend on us. It’s God’s message; it’s God’s method, we’re God’s messengers and we’re to be about His business.
And so he said, "don’t look on us as though by our own power or holiness we’ve done this thing, we haven’t done anything." Well, what’s the answer to this then? If you’re at work and you’re laying hands on people and they’re being healed, and you’re casting out devils, and people understand now that you’re moving in the supernatural and they begin to look and they say, "man, something’s different about you." And you say, "look, you’ve got to understand, it’s not me. Here’s what you need to understand." (Verse 13) "The God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God of our fathers has glorified his Son Jesus; [He that because of your sin, your denial, was offered up] But ye denied the Holy One and the Just, and desired a murderer to be granted unto you, And killed the Prince of life, whom God hath raised from the dead; whereof we are witnesses…" (verses 14 & 15). There it is again—the witnesses of the resurrection—you killed Him, but God has raised Him from the dead and we are witnesses of that. And because of that, we no longer cower before the little maidens as we try to warm ourselves around the fire. What happened between Peter’s cowardice and his own personal concern of warming himself by the fire, and the denial of the Lord; what happened between that and this message of Acts chapter two? What happened between the denial and the miracle at Beautiful? You say, "well he was filled with the Holy Ghost." Yes, but it was the filling of the Holy Spirit that brought the assurance, the seal; it was the culmination of the resurrection. When Peter had seen Him raised from the dead and was now convinced of that. When he saw that empty tomb; when Jesus appeared to him with the disciples; when he saw Him on the shores of Galilee and was then again re-commissioned into this ministry; when his eyes beheld Him as he was lifted up into the heavens, he became a candidate for Pentecost.
And the question I have to ask this morning is this. Have 2,000 years of teaching on the Day of Pentecost become something that’s been apprehended intellectually in Christianity, like so much of the other aspects of Christianity, where people have received a doctrine and not the person or the power? Have we received a baptism in the Holy Spirit that allows us to speak in tongues but not one that’s illuminated us into the power of the resurrection of Jesus Christ that causes us to represent the kingdom in power and in authority? What kind of a baptism do you experience this morning; is it one of fire; have tongues of fire descended upon you and given you the ability now to articulate the power of this resurrection and then see it confirmed with signs following? "I want you to understand something," Peter said in verse 16, "And his name through faith in his name hath made this man strong, whom ye see and know: yea, the faith which is by him hath given him this perfect soundness in the presence of you all." And so he brings this message forth of the resurrection, it’s confirmed again with signs following.
We read the story and Peter gets to how stand up against some persecution. And you’ll see as we go through and look at all of the arguments against the resurrection, in just a moment, that this is one of the arguments for the proof of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Men like people who cowered down in fear. The real question is: would a man who cowered down at that little maiden now stand up and proclaim a message of resurrection that would ultimately cost him his life? Would an individual who wouldn’t die for the man; who denied Him—who walked with Him and saw the miracles that He did and still denied Him—would that man now lose his life for a hoax that he propagated? Because you know, a lot of people say the resurrection is a hoax that was perpetrated by the disciples. And we have to ask these questions and let them be answered; again with some true forensic-type evidence.
Peter moving in the power of the Holy Spirit, chapter four tells us in verse two that he was being grieved. The people were grieved that Peter’s power and his message was one that was going to the masses as he talked to people and taught through Jesus, the resurrection from the dead. Not only preaching now that Jesus is risen, but that they also can experience their personal resurrection. It’s a very interesting thing to see this distinction of the bodily resurrection to Christianity. Many deal with all different parts of eternal existence, departed souls, and spiritual communion; but only Christianity speaks of this bodily resurrection that is specifically and personally identifiable to where each one is recognized in this body, though now unique and distinct, transformed into a spiritual existence that can glorify God. The resurrected life that you and I are going to experience is one of community and camaraderie, and yet not all of the natural intimacies that are known today; there will not be marrying and giving in marriage in this new spiritual existence. There is not going to be any need, as we studied the resurrected body and what Jesus said, to eat any longer. We just wiped out a big part of today’s society—intimacy and eating. I wonder what we’re going to do with our time. And they cast their crowns at His feet and they cried, Holy, Holy, Holy. The resurrection power that now is personally available to each of us—the assurance that we’ll rise again—that corruption will take on incorruption and mortality immortality. If you really believe that what do you do with your temporal life? If you really believe that for eternity we’re going to be in communion with God, then what are you going to do with these few years that we have, this seventy or eighty years or longer that we have here. What are you going to do with this time; how will you invest it now if you know that the investment is going to be what you reap in eternity because of how you live now? What you believe now. We say we believe in resurrection and eternity in heaven and in hell, and yet temporal things move us with such power. If not for the mercy of God, none of us would be able to stand. But He wants us free, and this same power that we’re talking about here is available to each of us.
Read on down into the tenth verse of this fourth chapter, and in verses ten through fourteen, this beautiful message starts actually in verse seven, " By what power, or by what name have you done this?" Then Peter, filled with the Holy Ghost said, "if you want to examine us about the good deed, and how this man is whole, you need to understand something," (verse 10) "that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by him doth this man stand here before you whole. This is the stone which was set at nought of you builders, which is become the head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved. Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marveled; and took knowledge of them that they had been with Jesus." You know, that’s something that as I was just meditating—I thought it was interesting—they took note that they had been with Jesus. And you know they’d been with Jesus in all of those years prior to His resurrection, and people had noted that. And there were things that were done as they went out—the twelve and the seventy—and the disciples however, were not always very impressive because they brought, as you remember the story, the young man and said, "why could your disciples not cast this spirit out?" He said it was because of their unbelief. It was because of their natural drive and reasoning among themselves whom would be the greatest. Because of that they gave place, and this type of self-exaltation doesn’t come out but by prayer and fasting.
There is only one way to deal with self-exaltation and that’s through death to self and a daily crucifixion, prayer and fasting—that kind of unbelief. But now they’re acknowledging that these men had been with Jesus. Isn’t it interesting that the three years prior to His resurrection didn’t affect them as much as those fifty days after His resurrection? They’d heard Him teach, and their lives were changed, and they were motivated. He gave them understanding through revelation and God visited them, and even great declarations were made, such as "thou art the Christ, the son of the living God, flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven." (Matt 16:17) God would illuminate Himself, and there were those moments, those sparks of revelation and power; and then they would lapse again into their doubts and their fears, and their humanity. But apparently, something is happening here in these men’s lives that is making them appear different now to the masses, even to their enemies.
How about going to work tomorrow and people starting to say, "you know there is something different. I’ve always known you were a Christian, but something—there is something different, what is it? We perceive that you were unlearned and ignorant before; but now they marvel, and they take knowledge. You’ve encountered Jesus. You’ve encountered Him in a way that’s changed you. There is something different about you. Now this, beloved, is following the resurrection and the infilling of the Holy Spirit. It says, "Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived [then, this relationship that they had had with Jesus; boldness is the consequence of that. When they saw the boldness of Peter and John, they perceived that they had been with Jesus] that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marveled; and they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus." (Verse 13) So they were looking at the transformation of these men’s lives. Now look at the two evidences, the two witnesses. They looked at the personal transformation, "my testimony is I lived for myself and now I’m alive for Jesus Christ; I used to be in it for what I could get out of it—life—and now I’m here for what I can give into the kingdom of God." And they took note of that, and then taking note of the personal change in their lives they (verse 14) beheld "the man which was healed standing with them, they could say nothing against it." They saw the change in their lives, and they saw the consequence of that change: the power of God now manifesting through them. The witness is our personal transformation and our personal representation of the power of God. The message of the resurrection confirmed with signs following.
The resurrection is interesting. You know, of course, it’s what Christianity rises and falls upon; and in that there are some things that are said by the prophets that begin to give the evidence of this resurrection. Strength in that it was predicted and not fabricated by the contemporaries. The greatest prophesies—turn over to Isaiah for just a moment; and in Isaiah 26, the key prophetic passage to the resurrection of Jesus, and as the prophet is speaking here in verse 19: "Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead." You begin to see this prophetic message coming by the prophet Daniel in chapter 12, verse 2. I want you to put these pieces together; there are some interesting messages. The resurrection was not a very familiar doctrine. The "departed souls" was always an acceptable message in religion, and the different spiritual camps, but this aspect of resurrection was a very limited doctrine. Some say that the Persians held to it, but other than that no one actually spoke of it. And in Daniel chapter twelve verse two, the great prophet is speaking, "And many of them that sleeping the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever." You begin to see this message of the prophet speaking of resurrection. Of course Job has a couple of very well known comments concerning this. Turn back to the book of Job for just a second; these are passages that a lot of people are more familiar with. Job 14:13-15: "O that thou wouldest hide me in the grave, that thou wouldest keep me secret, until thy wrath be past, that thou wouldest appoint me a set time, and remember me! If a man die shall he live again? all the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come. Thou shalt call, and I will answer thee: thou wilt have a desire to the work of thine hands." The 19th chapter, verses 25-29 are the most famous of all: "For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth; And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another; though my reins be consumed within me." You can read down through verse 29 and get the feel for that. Psalm 17, and we will end with this for these prophetic passages and then I want to take you into the practical aspects. In Psalm 16, verse 11: "Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy presence is fulness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore." You begin to see that there is a message of life, and it’s totally reliant upon the presence of God. That 15th verse of chapter 17: "As for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness." Isn’t that what the resurrection is all about? Awaking into His likeness.
We begin to see then, that that’s the hope that we have, and that same power that raised Jesus from the dead is dwelling in you and me right now. It’s the thing that’s making us whole in our lives. You study out this message, and it is the message of normative Christianity. Go back to Acts for just a second, chapter 17, and look at the message of resurrection. We looked at it in Acts chapter 2, Acts chapter 3, Acts chapter 4, and then this outstanding passage in the 17th chapter of Acts, verses 2 and 3. Paul is carrying out his ministry, "And Paul, as his manner was, [verse 2 says] went in unto them, and three Sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures." Not personal experience. Out of the Scriptures. Reminding them that Moses said, "there is another prophet coming after me like I am, hear Him, was the message that he brought. Moses said a greater prophet was coming and Jesus was the fulfillment of that. Jesus’ ministry in Palestine at Lazarus’ tomb showed the power of God and the purpose of God.
I was sharing with the men as we were riding the other day out somewhere (I can’t remember where it was). I was just sharing with them concerning the resurrection of Lazarus, and you see the power of God. You study Lazarus’ life, and there was no consequence to his resurrection that we would have said, "you know, the reason Lazarus was raised from the dead was so that he could preach the gospel and this nation was reached, or this great evangelist was sent forth or whatever." There was no evidence that was obvious, that was consequential to the raising of Lazarus. The reason that Lazarus was raised was so that 2,000 years later you and I would hear the testimony of it, and these words that Jesus said, "he was raised for this reason alone, that you would know that I am the resurrection and the life. It’s not about Lazarus, it’s about Me; it’s about the testimony of who I am. And when I rise, you’ll not be surprised. When you hear the rumors of Me having been raised from the dead, you’ll know that it’s true, and that all of the ridiculous stories that have been fabricated, that try to lie against the truth, will be filed away, and you’ll know that the resurrection power resides in Me because you saw it evidenced in this common man."
One of the greatest spoken (and it’s interesting that it’s the weakest argument, but probably one of the greatest in current days) arguments against the resurrection, is what’s called the ‘swoon’ theory. You know, those people that don’t want to believe—it’s interesting, if somebody doesn’t want to believe they’re going to come up with something else to believe that’s more difficult. And the ‘swoon’ theory is an interesting one. We’ve shared it; some of you have read about it, but the ‘swoon theory’ is this: that Jesus was under such pain, and had endured all He could, and they just thought He was dead. Thus He swooned, and when they came He appeared dead and so they took Him, and they buried Him in the tomb. And in the dampness of this tomb, and it cooled, it invigorated Him, and He woke up and "alas!" He was alive, and left the tomb and went out and showed Himself alive.
We talk about forensic evidence. Forensic evidence is interesting, it’s not just the fact that we go and we dig up bones and we get fingerprints. Forensic evidence has to deal with things that are actual, that are factual, that are discernable. In a court of law, of course, you have the forensic aspect and yet one of the greatest evidences that can come in a court of law isn’t just the evidence of a smoking gun. If they bring a gun into the courtroom, have checked ballistics, "Yep, that’s the one that took him out. Here’s this gun that’s registered to you, and your fingerprints are upon it. We therefore conclude you killed him." Anybody can buy that circumstantial evidence? What would have been greater evidence, though? "And I saw him do it. I saw him pull the trigger. In fact, he shot at me a few times." The forensics are important, the different aspects that can lead us to conclusions if there is no eyewitness satisfaction to the event. God set it up a long time ago—at the mouth of [what?] two or three witnesses, let every word be established.
There is something about human nature. It’s interesting. Trying to get two or three people to agree on anything is tough. Especially under severe scrutiny. If you get two or three people, you sit them down, and you get the right people, learned people, asking the right questions, you can find the holes in the stories much of the time. Let’s say for a moment that Jesus did pass out, and He’s in the tomb. We have a problem. Do you all remember Lazarus? "He stinketh." You all remember Lazarus? When Jesus spoke and he came back to life, what did they have to do? They had to unwrap him, didn’t they? They had to help him out. Jesus was not in your normal tomb. You all remember going to the tomb of Lazarus; remember when we were there and we went to the tomb of Lazarus on our trip to the Holy Land? Did you see how different Lazarus’ tomb was from the tomb that Jesus was buried in? Do you remember how small the entrance was, and how accessible it was? Do you remember at the tomb of the garden, do you remember the big trough that was made for the stone to be rolled into place? A rich man’s tomb—Joseph of Arimathaea—was used, and for these of course, we know that there were a lot of grave robbers, and desecration of the different tombs, and the rich could devise ways that their tombs could not be desecrated. The poor guys like Lazarus and some of these, (well he was middle class), were much more accessible. Lazarus had to be helped out. Jesus, behind this large stone that the Scriptures tell us was sealed and guarded, supposedly woke up, having been beaten beyond recognition; now unwrapped Himself from this mummification, folded up His grave clothes, (He was taught to be neat.) from the inside rolled the stone back, got around the sleeping guards, and was now free! We have a lot of trouble believing that a man in this condition, beaten beyond recognition as He was, could have that kind of strength to remove the stone, to unwrap Himself from the grave clothes. But let’s assume He did. We have another problem, don’t we? We’ve got a lying Savior, because now He’s out propagating a hoax, implying that He had died and was now risen. Pretty weak argument they have. So let’s throw that one out, that one’s no good, that’s a weak one.
The strongest and the oldest—it had been held to for years and years and years—is found in the Bible. Turn over to Matthew 28 for just a second. Now we’re talking about the fact of the resurrection here. Why? We need to understand that people are going to have these same basic arguments today. We need to give an answer of what we believe, and we need to then confirm His resurrection, not only through argument, but also through the power that we’ve been talking about. Matthew 28:11: "Now when they were going, behold, some of the watch came into the city, and shewed unto the chief priests all the things that were done. And when they were assembled with the elders, and had taken counsel, they gave large money unto the soldiers." I like that large money, they wanted these guys bribed real well. (They didn’t mean they gave them that money like you buy souvenirs when you’re out in some of these places. Large money.) Now watch: "Saying, say ye, His disciples came by night, and stole him away while we slept. And if this come to the governor’s ears, we will persuade him, and secure you." In other words, they said, "we’ll take care of you," because the penalty of sleeping on watch was death. Do you remember when Paul and the others were released in Philip, when the Lord opened the gates, and they were going to escape, and when the man thought that he had lost his prisoners, he was going to kill himself? And Paul said, "don’t do yourself any harm, we’re still here, we’re all here." And yet here’s the testimony: that they slept, and they got large money, and they were assured that they’d be covered for in this testimony. "So they took the money, and did as they were taught: and this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day." (Verse 15) That the disciples had come and stolen His body. And for years that was what was believed.
Again we come back to a court of law. I take the witness stand, and I begin to give my testimony. While I was asleep, Jim O’Connor "snuck" into my house. He stole my golf clubs because he heard they went straight (couldn’t resist that). What’s going to happen in a court of law when you give testimony as to what happened in your presence while you were asleep? And yet this has been accepted as the story for centuries and millennia. This account is not acceptable!
Now, you have that along with the fact that there were consequences to sleeping on duty. These men not only were not disciplined, but they were pretty well off now, because they had big money. We have to say, now, that these disciples who sneaked in, and again, perpetrated this hoax, are out now lying and you have another problem in evidence. One of the things that we look for when we’re listening to witnesses, and looking at evidence is this. Is there something in this particular individual, is this against their psychological, ethical makeup; is this something that just as their whole life is lived for this, and then suddenly we’re trying to say, "and they acted this way." These men who obviously were bringing a message of truth, of service, of integrity, all of these things. It doesn’t fit their character that they would do this. And then I think what I referred to earlier as probably the greatest evidence toward this: these men who so easily were swayed when the trials came in Gethsemane and they all tried to save their own necks, would you now, fainting there, perpetrate a hoax—and here’s what’s so beautiful—have you ever wondered why the original foundation experienced. (Have you all ever read Foxe’s Book of Martyrs?) What is this all about, this martyrdom, at that basic foundational level? I’ll tell you what, it’s evidence to you and me that you don’t make something up and then be willing to suffer, and be tortured, and die for a hoax. It doesn’t fit with humanity. You might be able to get one guy who just says, "Yeah, I’m not being swayed, man!" You might be able to get one guy who’s a big enough liar, and full of enough pride, or full of enough evil to bring that kind of deception, but you can’t get that many to agree and die under those circumstances. It’s not acceptable evidence. It can’t happen. It doesn’t happen that you can get that kind of communal commitment to this kind of a hoax and be able to have it stay intact under that kind of pressure. It doesn’t work.
So we have the ‘swoon’ theory thrown out. We have the "the stolen body" theory thrown out. I like this one; this is a good one. Resurrection Sunday morning, the women are pumped, adrenaline going, they’re excited. It’s still dark and they’re running to… And they went to the wrong tomb! He wasn’t there! And so they come back and they say, "He’s risen!" Hmmm. Pretty weak story. And the answer to that is the same as in the other story, that the authorities actually, the Jews or the Romans, somebody there moved the body, and they themselves then perpetrated this hoax. Doesn’t agree with chapter 4, does it? They were all trying to stop this message of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. "You’ve turned the world upside down with this message; you’re filling Jerusalem with this message." They were beaten, they said "you’ve got to stop preaching the resurrection of Jesus." Everything they were about was trying to stop this message; they wouldn’t have stolen the body and contributed to this. The obvious answer to this, the reason they did it, they were just setting them up, and trying to get them to believe in a lie, and then they were going to expose them. Well, here we are two thousand years later and nobody’s produced the body. You want to shut these people up that are out preaching this message? If the Roman authorities, if the Jewish authorities, or if the women had gone to the wrong tomb, and said, "He’s risen!" there was one very easy solution, what is it? Produce the body and Christianity’s over. All they had to do was come up with the body. They had paid large money; they had done all these things. All they had to do was come up with the body and Christianity’s over. No body. "Why seek ye the living among the dead? He is not here, but is risen." (Luke 24:5-6) Praise God!
We get so far separated from these events many times that we fail to look at them factually. Just take this resurrection that we’re talking about, bring it into current events, try to bring it into a court of law, put the evidence up against this thing, and begin to see how strong your case is for that empty tomb, the power of God invading it, Jesus being raised and, because of that, the assurance we have that He’s coming again. Now all of that isn’t the real issue is it? It’s the ten appearances that He made; the fact that Jesus now appeared to people after He was raised. These other arguments are okay; and we could say, you know, "hey, there is an empty tomb, there is an empty tomb, there is an empty tomb." Okay, the empty tomb we have, but now the real evidence begins to unfold. The fact that He’s showing up. Now we all know that people are reporting that they see Elvis. Usually He’s buying lottery tickets somewhere down in Arkansas or something, Tennessee. (Somebody should have bought a few more lotto tickets and a little less booze.) Ten distinct appearances.
It would be interesting if these appearances were just to one segment of society, but as you begin to study it out you see that the ten appearances were very interestingly spread over a cross-section of individuals. Learned, unlearned, intimate friends, obscure followers. One of the big arguments is that this was the consequence of mass hysteria; that these individuals were hallucinating; and through mass hysteria, and through the hallucinations we have, therefore, the explanation of His appearances. Interestingly enough though, hallucinations are very subjective and personal. It would be very strange for all of you now to simultaneously experience the same hallucination. We get close to it this time of day as you begin to all see food, and so let’s say that you all have a corporate vision of food, okay? Let’s say that happens, at 11:30 everybody has this vision of food. Okay, we’ll go along with that. Don Pablo's, That’s Amore, um-m-m! Jack Daniels Chicken, McDonald’s. It would be very unlikely that everybody would see the same restaurant; and it would be even more unlikely—because I’ve been out to eat with some of you—that everybody would see the same item on the menu. I’m the type person who gets the same thing every time, so I already know what I’m getting. My vision is already fulfilled. If I go to TGI Friday’s, I get Jack Daniels Chicken and Ribs. You say, "they don’t have a chicken and ribs." They do when I go in there. It’s not on the menu, but I told them, "Do you have chicken?" Yeah. "Do you have ribs?" Yeah. "Okay, put them together and we’ve got chicken and ribs." I don’t want ribs and shrimp; I want chicken and ribs. I don’t want ribs, and chicken lips or whatever else, you know. So you get that. (We were going out the other day, Steve asked me, he said we’re going to go—I’m going to get some food, do you like BLT’s? I said, "Yeah, I love BLT’s with ham and cheese on them." BLT’s—why bother? You have tomato, and some lettuce, and this lousy little stringy thing of bacon. Why bother, get some meat in there! I love BLT’s with ham and cheese. Man, that’s good!) And so you probably wouldn’t have the same vision. What would it be like for 500 people to simultaneously have the exact same hallucination? It’s easier to believe He’s raised, praise God. It is. If you know any thing about the psyche, it’s easier to believe that they saw something that was actual, factual before them. The cool thing was that the apostles said not only were they seen of 500, but that most of those guys are still alive today! Go ask them, he says in I Corinthians 15. The contemporaries, they were alive. Go interview them yourself, what did you see?
One of the other things that’s interesting about hallucinations is this: that most of the time, hallucinations are in the mind of someone who is now unable to cope with reality, and because of their strong belief, they’re projecting their belief. They’re projecting their belief. But that’s not the case in the resurrection of Jesus because the Scripture tells us in John chapter 20 that even after others had seen Him and testified, Thomas said, "I don’t believe it. If I don’t see Him with my own eyes; if I don’t put my fingers in the nail prints, I won’t believe." When they first heard the story of the resurrection, when the women came back, the men thought, "no, this can’t be true." These aren’t people who had now fabricated this, and had this strong desire, and were unable to cope with the fact that Billy was killed in the war, and just can’t believe it. Some day he’s going to come home, and every day at 5:00 he’d come through the screen door and I could hear it slam, and then one day it slams and it’s Billy. Mom had been wanting to see Billy for years and he finally showed up. She projected him. These people didn’t have that kind of commitment to the resurrection based upon their own desires. And so we see many of these different aspects of the resurrection.
We could go on. And, of course, a lot of this, as you’re going to argue this, the evidence becomes even stronger when you go into the Scriptures, but now we have to bring the evidence of the credibility of Scripture. We don’t have time to do that this morning. Internal evidences. The external evidence of the Scripture is overwhelming, that this is a book not written by men, but God-breathed, it’s a book like no other book. It’s alive, and it’s powerful. And so we know because of that, that Jesus is alive. We know because of our own experience of faith, the transformation of our lives, and that many of us believed these arguments until we encountered Him on our own road to Damascus. However it is you were knocked from your transportation to the ground, and surrounded by a great shining light and a voice coming out of the heavens, saying, "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks. And I said, Who art thou Lord? And he said, I am Jesus [of Nazareth] whom thou persecutest." (Acts 25:14-15) We have all had our own personal encounters, and our lives have been changed; and that transformation is the great testimony of His resurrection to you. Nobody more than you, knowing the wickedness of your own heart, the need of that ever-present power that brings a dependence, that makes us safe and secure. As the song writer said, "You ask me how I know He lives, He lives within my heart." But others can’t see into our hearts, they don’t know our heart changes entirely, and so they need to see our new ambitions, and they need to see the evidence of His power at our hands. They need to take note that you’ve been with Jesus and then look at the miracle at your side, and say, "we can’t deny it." And because of that a remnant will be reached, the Lord will be glorified, and then hopefully we can go home.
Father, we thank You for the Word of God this morning; and we just ask that You would stir our hearts with the assurance again of that great resurrection power, and that it would be evidenced in our life, and our hope, and our ministry. That the awareness of the resurrection would change our treasures, the things that are really important to us. Lord, that we would be so quick to say, "don’t look on us as though by our own power or holiness we’ve done this." That we’d be quick to respond that way when the power of God manifests, but we’ll never be in a position of having to respond that way if we think that somehow by our own power or holiness we can accomplish it. Strip us this morning, Lord, of our own strength, our reliance upon the arm of the flesh, the wisdom of men and the methods of men. Bring us to that normative walk in the Spirit that makes us no longer cowards but bold to speak this message of repentance and reconciliation. What do we believe? And what is the consequence of our belief? It must be a transformation: it must be an expectation of Your coming, and it must be a representation as Your witnesses. Make it real, Father, in Jesus name. Amen.
Let’s stand before the Lord. As Gary plays for us and we just take a moment in the Lord’s presence, keep your food vision at bay for another few minutes. Let’s focus on the greater thing, the worship of our Lord, and the celebration of the resurrection, the power of God. Is He alive in you this morning? Is the baptism of Pentecost subsequent to the knowledge of that resurrection, the regeneration that occurs when you believe in your heart and confess with your mouth that God has raised Jesus from the dead? Why do we make that profession? Because we’re going to represent that message. Don’t be talking about all these other religions, and all of the other ethical principles. What are you going to say about Jesus? Who is He? Is He God in the flesh? He’s not a great prophet. All of the other great prophets—Moses, Mohammed—they never proclaimed to be God. He said, "I am God, if you’ve seen Me, you’ve seen the Father." What are you going to do with this Man Jesus? If you believe He is God, Savior, Lord, risen and coming again, then we must believe that He meant what He said when He said, "go out, and in My name heal the sick, raise the dead, and make disciples." Open our eyes to see the fields white, Lord, unto harvest, and we will glorify You. Hallelujah! Through the intimacy of touching Your heart, Lord, we’ll know and do Your will. We thank You for that privilege of serving You. In Jesus’ name, in Jesus’ name. Let’s sing this together; worship Him this morning as we just draw into His presence.
"Jesus Draw Me Close." Yes, Lord. Oh, hallelujah! Lord, show Yourself mighty in the midst of Your people, our heart’s desire. Sing it one more time, as He is worthy. Just worship Him this morning. Oh Lord, that intimacy is ours. That men would take note that we’ve been with You. Hallelujah! It’s our heart’s desire, Lord. We long for that communion; we long for that infilling that we could represent You in word and in deed. Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Father, as Paul said, You were declared to be the Son of God, with power. By the Spirit of holiness and by the resurrection from the dead. The distinction made between holiness and resurrection power, both displays of Your presence and Your power. Ethical, moral, distinct from demonstrative, the dynamics of the miraculous. Lord, You were declared Son by both. Help us to represent You in both. In Jesus’ name. Amen. Before you go turn to somebody and say, "You’re His witness, praise God." Go in peace, God’s love go with you.
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