HALLELUJAH, CHRIST AROSE

Academic people who have nothing better to do sometimes argue about such foolish matters as the greatest day in the history of the world. When our astronauts landed on the moon, President Nixon announced that it was the greatest day in history. Others have argued for different days. Some theologians think the day Christ died on the cross was the greatest day. But what would be the significance of Christ's death if he were not raised from the dead? A dead Savior is of no particular value. There has never been a greater day nor could there ever be than the day our Lord came forth from the grave the victor over death. The Apostle Paul declared: "Thanks be unto God who gives us this victory through our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Cor. 15:57). Christ's resurrection provides for the resurrection of every person who has ever lived or will ever live. How could any day be greater than the day that gives us such hope?

The members of the Lord's church at Ephesus were converted from a pagan background. Paul describes the moral and spiritual condition of the Ephesians prior to their obedience to the gospel. "Wherefore remember, that you being in times past Genti1es in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called Circumcision in the flesh made by hands; that at that time were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world" (Eph. 2:11-12). Dr. William Hendriksen commentary on Ephesians (Grand Rapid: Baker, 1967) summarizes the pre-conversion condition of the Ephesians. They were "Christless," "stateless," "friendless," "hopeless" and "godless." But, oddly enough, Dr. Hendriksen thinks they might still be among the elect (pp. 129-131).

Secular humanists and other unbelievers have no more hope than the ancient pre-conversion Ephesians. Paul Kurtz, the primary author of Humanist Manifestos I and II (Buffalo: Prometheus Books, 1973) affirms: "Promises of immortal salvation and fear of eternal damnation are both illusory. They distract humans from present concerns, from self-actualization and from social injustices" (pp. 16-17). The truth is the very opposite of the humanist viewpoint. Faithful Bible believers are the ones who are mainly concerned about present concerns and social injustices. The reason Christians are dedicated to correcting the ills of society is because they want to have the Lord say in the final judgment: "Well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joys of your Lord." Bible believers know that we must be the salt of the earth and the light of the world (Mt. 5:13-16). Secular humanists and other unbelievers have no such motivation.

What would you say if you were called upon to preach the funeral of a secular humanist? Corliss Lamont, a prominent humanist philosopher, provides the information one might need to preach a humanist's funeral. In his little booklet, A Humanist Funeral Service (Buffalo: Prometheus Books, 1977), Dr. Lamont says the "humanist rejects the idea of personal immortality and interprets death as the final end of the individual conscious personality" (p. 8). Lamont makes some really strange statements. For example; "Because these bodies must perish we are greater than we know.... We recognize these truths. And we accept as inevitable the eventual extinction of human individuals and return of their bodies, indestructible in their ultimate elements to the Nature that brought them forth. In life as in death we belong to Nature." Lamont capitalizes the word "nature" as if it described deity (p. 16). Lamont quotes these words from the Victorian English poet, Algernon Charles Swinburne: "We thank with brief thanksgiving whatever gods may be that no life lives forever; that dead men rise up never" (p. 38). What a dreadful worldview!

How can any reasonable person receive encouragement or consolation from the hopeless beliefs of the humanists? When I stand beside my Molly's grave at Mayfield, Kentucky, I grieve and always will as long as I live - not for her - for me. How could anyone deal with the death of a spouse or of a child if we accepted Swinburne's view "that dead men rise up never?" I have said many times since my Molly died: "If I did not believe I would see her again, I do not know how I could handle her death." I grieve everyday for Molly, but I do not grieve as one who has no hope (1 Thess. 4:13). Paul told the Corinthians: "For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens" (2 Cor. 5:1).

But maybe my hope of seeing Molly again is just a pipe dream. Has the God who created us provided some guarantee that we shall live again and be united with our loved ones who have been faithful to the will of God? Paul used the Greek oidamen translated "know" in 2 Corinthians 5: 1. The tense of the verb means we have come to know and we still know; we have sure knowledge. If we were not sure of God's promise of having a "building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens," why would we labor to the point of exhaustion (1 Cor. 15:58)? If we are not going to be raised to eternal life, why not "eat and drink," for tomorrow die (1 Cor. 15:32)? Nothing in this life makes any sense without the assurance of life after dearth.

There were some people at Corinth - whether preachers or others, we do not know -who were saying there is no resurrection of the dead (l Cor. 15:12). Apparently those people did not deny the resurrection of Christ, but they were denying the resurrection of others. Paul refuted their unreasonable view by showing that Christ's resurrection guarantees our resurrection. Not all theologians agree with Paul. Leslie Weatherhead's book, The Christian Agnostic (Nashville: Abingdon, 1965), says it is "illogical to argue that because Christ rose from the dead we shall do the same. Because a unique Person had a certain experience, it does not follow we shall do the same" (p. 137). Were it not for divine revelation, we would have no basis for believing that because Christ rose from the grave we shall also rise. Incidentally, Weatherhead did not believe in the bodily resurrection of Christ. He argued: "What matters is not what happened to his body but that his personality survived and was recognizably active in the world" (pp. 130-131). The personalities of Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud and Mao Tse Tung have survived and are recognizably active in the world. If you do not believe that, you re not keeping up with what is occurring in many American colleges and universities and in Washington.

By the supernatural guidance of God's Holy Spirit, Paul informed the Corinthians: "If Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised: and if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; you are yet in your sins. Then they also who are fallen asleep in Christ have perished" (1 Cor. 15:14-18).

There is no doubt the Christian life is the most reasonable and productive way for men to live. Contrary to Humanist Manifestos I and II, "promises of immortal salvation and fear of eternal damnation" are not illusory and harmful (p. 16). By observing the moral principles the Bible teaches, we live longer and render greater service to mankind than those who accept any other philosophy or religion or worldview. Which hospitals, nursing homes, children's homes and universities have humanists established? They steal our college and universities, but they do not establish any. Almost without exception, devoutly religious people built these institutions. Even Harvard University was established to train preachers.

But none of this really matters in the long run if we are not going to be raised from the dead to live eternally with God and with the saints of all the ages. "If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable. But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them who slept" (1 Cor. 15:19-20). As every serious Bible student knows, the word "firstfruits" is an Old Testament concept (Ex. 23:19;34:26). The firstfruits of the crop served as a kind of guarantee of the full harvest. Christ's resurrection from the dead proves that every person will be raised "in his own order; Christ the firstfruits; afterward they who are Christ's at his coming" (1 Cor. 15:23).

There have been false teachers who predicted their own resurrection, but they are still in their graves. Jesus Christ predicted that he would rise from the dead the third day. The Jews asked for a sign that would point to his authority for the cleansing of the temple. "Jesus answered and said to them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up" (John 2:18-19). Our Lord was not speaking of the Jewish temple, but of the temple of his body. The Jews did not understand what he meant. His own disciples did not understand until after he had risen from the dead. When they did understand what Christ told the Jews, "they believed the scripture and the word Jesus had said" (John 2:19, 22)

We are not told which scriptures they believed when they knew the meaning of Christ's message to the Jews. Could it have been the passage the Apostle Peter quoted on the day of Pentecost? "For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell (or more precisely Hades); neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption." (This verse comes from Psalm 16:10 and is quoted in Acts 2:31). The Apostle Paul also used this passage in his sermon at Antioch of Pisidia (Acts 13:35). In his Parable of the Good Shepherd, our Lord assured his disciples: "Therefore does my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it up again. No man takes it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have the power to lay it down, and I have the power to take it up again. This commandment I have received of my Father" (John 10:17-18).

Matthew and Mark also record Christ's predictions of his resurrection. "And while they abode in Galilee, Jesus said to them, The Son of man shall be betrayed into the hands of men: and they shall kill him; and he shall be raised again" (Mt. 17:22-23). "And they (that is, the Gentiles) shall mock him, and shall scourge him, and shall spit upon him, and shall kill him: and the third day he shall rise again" (Mk. 10:34).

The Apostle Paul told the Corinthians: If Christ had not raised from the dead, the apostles would have been "found false witnesses; because we have testified of God that he raised him from the dead; whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not" (l Cor. 15: 15). Luke clearly understood the significance of Christ's resurrection. He introduces to Theophilus what "Jesus began to do and to teach, until the day in which he was taken up, after that the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the apostles whom he had chosen." The apostles had positive proof that God had raised Jesus from the dead. Christ showed himself "alive after his passion by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God" (Acts 1:1-3).

The expression, "many infallible proofs," is a translation of the Greek tekmerion, a word used only in this passage in the New Testament. According to A. T. Robertson's set of books, Word Pictures in the New Testament (Nashville: Sunday School Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, 1930), the verb form of the word (tekmairo) means "to prove by sure signs.... Luke does not hesitate to apply the word 'proofs' to the evidence for the resurrection of Christ after full investigation of this scientific historian" (volume 3, p. 6). In their very scholarly book, The Linguistic and Exegetical Key to the Greek New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998), Cleon Rogers Jr. and Cleon Rogers III affirm: "In logic demonstrative proof; in medical language demonstrative evidence, a sure symptom; in legal language proof from which there is no getting away, an indication which is irrefutable and indisputable" (p. 229). W. E. Vine says: "a proof does not require to be described as infallible, the adjective is superfluous" (pp. 892-893).

The death and resurrection of Christ were the very heart of Peter's sermon on Pentecost. Peter informed the Jews: "Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you, by miracles and wonders and signs which God did by him in the midst of you, as you yourselves also know: him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, you have taken and by wicked hands have crucified and slain" (Acts 2:22-23). Vine says the word "approved" means to point out and to exhibit forth (p. 64). The word involves authentication. The miracles, wonders and signs prove that Jesus Christ was the one he claimed to be - the Son of almighty God. The Apostle Paul adds: Christ was "declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection of the dead" (Rom. 1:4). Rogers and Rogers say the word "declared" means to "mark out the boundary, to decree, to appoint, to designate" (p. 315).

When the Jews murdered Jesus, they almost certainly believed they had gotten rid of him forever. But God raised him up, "having loosed the pains of death; because it was not possible that he should be held of it." The Apostle Peter quoted David's predictions concerning the Messiah; 'I foresaw the Lord always before my face, for he is on my right hand, that I should not be moved: therefore did my heart rejoice, and my tongue was made glad; moreover also my flesh shall rest in hope: because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption" (Acts 2:25-27). David could not have been speaking of himself. The Jews knew that he was dead and his grave was among them. So whom did David by divine inspiration have in mind?

Peter leaves no doubt. "Therefore being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, he would raise up Christ to sit on his throne; he seeing this before spoke of the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell, neither did his flesh see corruption. This Jesus has God raised up whereof we are all witnesses" (Acts 2:30-32). Christ's resurrection proved that he was truly what he claimed to be - the Son of God. Please remember also what Paul told the Romans: He was marked out ''to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead" (Rom. 1:4).

The Apostle Peter's sermon at the house of Cornelius, the first Gentile convert, also stressed the resurrection of Christ. Peter affirmed: "God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed with the devil: for God was with him. And we are witnesses of all things which he did both in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem; whom they slew and hanged on a tree; him God raised up the third day, and showed him openly; not to all the people, but unto witnesses chosen before of God, even to us, who did eat and drink with him after he rose from the dead" (Acts 10:38-41).

What is the key issue in our study of Christ's resurrection and our resurrection? Reason and experience tell us that ordinary men cannot raise dead people. I heard Richard Roberts, Oral Roberts' son, say his father raised a dead baby. No reasonable person believes that. Jesus told some of his Jewish contemporaries: "For the Father raises the dead, and quickens them; even so the Son quickens whom he will" (John 5:21). When Paul defended his beliefs and actions before king Agrippa, he asked: "Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you that God should raise the dead" (Acts 26:8)? If the God who created the world, including man, exists, there is nothing too hard for him. We know that God can and will raise the dead. Jesus promised: "Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all who are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth; they who have done good unto the resurrection of life; and they who have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation" (John 5:28-29).

Jesus Christ invites every human being on earth to come to him for salvation (Mt. 11: 28-30). The choice is yours. If you believe the gospel, confess your faith before men, repent of your alien sins and are baptized in the name of Christ for the remission of your sins, you are on your way to heaven. You must continue to walk in the light as Jesus Christ is in the light you will continue to have the remission of your sins (l John 1:7). I sincerely urge you to obey the gospel that you may be saved and so you may be raised to life eternal.

Winford Claiborne

The International Gospel Hour

P.O. Box 118

Fayetteville, TN 37334