Why do you suppose is it that, faced with the same data, some people interpret it one way and some people interpret it another? You have only to look at the George Floyd riots – and the other ones later that year - to know that. Not even exhaustive investigations convince people whose minds are already made up. Many even jump to conclusions well before the evidence is collected. Far too often, people simply believe what they want to believe. They believe what their experience or worldview predisposes them to believe. And they read only the sources that agree with them, no matter how much evidence there may be for the other point of view.
Some people think that all truth exists only in our minds, in our responses to words or events. You’ve heard them; reality is subjective, everything is relative, whatever works for you. And there’s some evidence to back up that view. There are such things as self-fulfilling prophecies: If you think you’re going to fail, chances are you will. Or if you expect people to like you, chances are they will. And I’m sure you all have heard stories of people in primitive cultures who, once they’ve heard they’ve been cursed, have laid down and died.
But I don’t think that means reality is subjective. I just think it means that how we use our minds is very important. I think it means that being sincere in our beliefs is not enough. I think it means that what we believe should be based on good evidence, carefully evaluated. Because what we believe has life or death consequences, not only for ourselves but for others.
Let’s suppose you’re the prosecuting attorney, you have a good case, a passion for justice, and an understandable interest in maintaining a good win/loss record.
How would you choose a jury? Would you pick gullible people? People who’ll believe anything if it’s presented cleverly enough? Or would you pick stubborn people, people whose biases will keep them on your side no matter what kind of evidence or argument the defense offers?
I don’t think so.
Those kinds of juries might come up with a verdict that will win out for a short time. But I don’t think they’d come up with a verdict that would stand up to the test of time, that would make it through the appeals process, or pass the test of history.
If you want a verdict that will last, get solid, ordinary, capable people who are a maybe a little skeptical, but who are willing to look at the evidence, weigh it, test it, and act on it. People like Jesus’ disciples.
Let’s look in on them, there in a locked room in Jerusalem that evening. It’s the day after the Sabbath. They could go back about their normal daily routine again... except they don’t have any. They’ve left their jobs, their families. They’ve spent three years following a radical rabbi around the Palestinian countryside, and he has been executed by the occupying army at the instigation of their own countrymen’s ruling elite. Who knows what they’ll do next? They might come for you! And what’s more, it looks like someone’s even stolen the body.
Although that didn’t make sense. Pilate posted guards at the tomb because the priests were afraid the disciples would steal the body and claim Jesus had risen. And the disciples knew they hadn’t done it! But who else would take it? And how could they get past the guards? And besides, why would the linen wrappings still be there? John and Peter had seen them with their own eyes, the women hadn’t gotten the wrong tomb by mistake. Of course, Mary - you know, the one from Magdala - had said that Jesus had spoken to her in the garden and said to go to Galilee, he’d meet them there. But you know how women are, so emotional! How can we believe such a tale!
And besides it’s too dangerous to go out on the streets, we’d be recognized! So, there they are, dithering and quaking, when all of a sudden the door downstairs onto the street bursts open and they hear footsteps pounding up the stairs and knocking at the locked door! Who’s going to open it? They look at each other, fearing the worst. “Peter, James, it’s just us, open up, we’ve got something to tell you!” And then, Luke tells us, two of Jesus’ followers who had left that morning to go back home to Emmaus entered and began excitedly telling them about having seen and spoken with and actually even eaten with Jesus just that very evening! They had run almost all the way back to Jerusalem with the news.
And just as they’re trying to absorb this incredible story, suddenly among them stood their beloved teacher. And he was real! He was warm, and solid. And he said, “Peace be with you,” and suddenly they weren’t afraid anymore. “Is it really you, Jesus?” I can hear them say, touching his arm, his shoulder, his hand; “Is it really you?” And they looked at the holes the nails had left through his hands, and the deep sword cut in his side, and it is something that cannot happen, that has never happened before. Some of them had actually seen him die, others had watched Joseph and Nicodemus take his body to the tomb, and yet he was there. One or two even wept a little, from love and relief and sheer amazement. “Jesus, is it really you?” “Yes,” he says, understanding them, as he always had. “Yes, it’s really me. Don’t be afraid anymore. But listen, there’s work yet to be done. I’ve done what the Father sent me to do, I’ve done my piece. Now it’s your turn. Now I’m sending you. Phase two is about to begin.”
But Thomas wasn’t there, Thomas the hard-headed, Thomas the stubborn, Thomas the doubter. He must have
been from Missouri: “Show me,” he said, “Show me the holes in his hands,” knowing, of course, that they couldn’t. All they could do was tell him what they had seen and insist that yes, it was true, they weren’t drunk or hallucinating or fooled by a clever imposter. “Nope,” says Thomas, “Never taken any man’s word for anything in my life, not gonna to start now. Gotta see it for myself.”
And so, understanding them as he always had, Jesus came back the next week, when Thomas was there, and lets him see for himself, as he needs to do.
First they doubted. But when faced with the evidence, they weighed it, tested it, and then acted upon it. And the result of these appearances to these ordinary, skeptical, varied people was the transformation of the world. Their verdict has stood the test of time. And the grounds on which they stood are the same grounds upon which we can stand.
Eyewitness evidence may not be as convincing to CSI viewers as DNA, but absent a good modern forensic laboratory it’s pretty strong. It’s what the Bible requires for a capital conviction: two witnesses who agree. And eyewitness evidence is what we have. The evangelists take pains to assure their readers of this. Luke begins his gospel with, “Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word.” Peter writes in his second letter, “We did not follow cleverly written myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we ourselves had been eyewitnesses of his majesty.” And today’s reading from 1 John is equally emphatic. “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched, this we proclaim... we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which... has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard.”
But why should we believe them? The Greek word for “witness” is MARTYR. Many of these eyewitnesses died proclaiming their beliefs. And their deaths convinced many of the truth of their claims. Now I know that dying for one’s beliefs is not proof that they are true. We have only to look at the mass suicide of the members of Heaven’s Gate or other cults to realize that.
But someone said - I think it was C.S. Lewis - that although many people may be willing to die for something which is not true, no one is willing to die for something which they know is not true. And the apostles, remember, were not gullible, credulous men. Nor were they political activists with an agenda of their own to advance. After Jesus was arrested, Peter denied even having known him, and most of the rest were too panicked to appear in public. Some fled. The best we can say of them was that they stuck together afterwards. But after Jesus appeared, what a change! Peter and James and John were flogged and imprisoned for preaching in public. James the brother of John was killed by Herod Antipas, the same king who had killed John the Baptist and questioned Jesus before his death, in the wave of persecutions which followed the martyrdom of Stephen. Dying for one’s beliefs may be admirable, but it is not proof. But the death of an eyewitness carries a kind of weight that is different from the death of a mere follower.
So, O member of today’s jury, the rules of evidence state that, unless there is good reason to believe that the witness is lying, you may accept as valid the claim of an eyewitness.
What other kinds of evidence can you accept?
Forensic evidence, that is, physical evidence, is also allowed, even though we don’t have DNA. The empty tomb is forensic evidence. All the priests or the Romans had to do to disprove the apostles’ claims was to produce the body. They could not; thus, the tomb was, indeed, empty.
And lastly, members of the jury, there is circumstantial evidence. Circumstantial evidence, believe it or not, is acceptable in a court of law, and it can produce a verdict if there is enough of it. And there is more than enough of that. The book of Acts, in fact the entire ministry of the Apostle Paul, and the testimony and acts of believers down the ages creates an overwhelming abundance of circumstantial evidence.
Christ does not need a gullible jury, my friends. Christ does not ask people to close their eyes or their minds. Christ asks us to look at the evidence, to weigh it, to consider it, to ask him, if need be, for help to see and understand what is before us.
And beyond all these things many of us, I hope most of us, have experienced the internal witness of the Holy Spirit, which testifies to the truth of all that has been passed down to us.
There are two kinds of trials. There are civil trials, and there are criminal trials.
In civil trials, all that is needed to bring in a verdict is “the preponderance of the evidence.” That is enough, when only money or reputation is at stake.
But for criminal trials the evidence must convince beyond a reasonable doubt, because matters of life and death are at stake. My friends, the gospel of Jesus Christ is a matter of life and death, make no mistake about it. And you may be confident, as I am, that it is, beyond any reasonable doubt, true.
