“I see dead people”: Objections to the Resurrection
12But tell me this—since we preach that Christ rose from the dead, why are some of you saying there will be no resurrection of the dead? 13For if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised either. 14And if Christ was not raised, then all our preaching is useless, and your trust in God is useless. 15And we apostles would all be lying about God, for we have said that God raised Christ from the grave, but that can’t be true if there is no resurrection of the dead. 16If there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised. 17And if Christ has not been raised, then your faith is useless, and you are still under condemnation for your sins. 18In that case, all who have died believing in Christ have perished! 19And if we have hope in Christ only for this life, we are the most miserable people in the world.
20But the fact is that Christ has been raised from the dead. He has become the first of a great harvest of those who will be raised to life again. 1Cor.15:12-20 (NLT)
Jesus is risen! That is the confession of faith of every Christian; on every lip that says Jesus is Lord! The church from the time it began says, “we preach that Christ rose from the dead” (v.12). If the CSI (Crime Scene Investigators)teams were sent to the tomb of Jesus that first easter, the evidence would point to the resurrection.
Yet there are many who object to the fact of the resurrection from the dead, as the apostle wrote “why are some of you saying there will be no resurrection of the dead?” Sounds fantastic, people rise from the dead, twilight zone stuff. How can this be real? Do you see dead people walking around? Maybe in the movies, such as the Sixth Sense, where a child is haunted by ghosts and he says “I see dead people” spooky stuff. But is the Easter story just another ghost story?
Just suppose the objectors are right. There is no such thing. Just suppose the movie, the resurrection, the Passion of the Christ, Easter, is just a figment of somebody’s active imagination. What would that mean to Christians today? The Bible has some answers to that
1. Christ is still dead: If there is no such thing as resurrection – Christ then is not raised from the dead. Jesus would have suffered the same result as anyone who has ever founded a religion, Jesus is dead (v.13)
2. Communication regarding Christianity is a waste of time: If Christ is not raised then messages (or preaching) from the church is useless (v.14). The empty tomb of Christ is the foundation of the Christian message. Shoot this down, all of the preaching in Christianity goes to the toilet, every Sunday’s sermon is not worth listening to.
3. Our God is not worthy of trust: It is a worthless faith, there is no use trusting God, because He propagates a message based on the resurrection (v.14). Betting your life on God is crazy then. You might be better off betting on Lotto 649 and believing you just won millions.
4. That the apostles were liars (v.15) “since we preach that Christ rose from the dead” (v.12). Disregard the testimony of the New Testament which was written by the apostles, they were liars, conspirators who conned the world into believing something that did not occur. They gave their lives for what they knew to be false and whole church movement of the past 2,000 years is nothing but the most insidious gory story ever told.
5. No vindication for Christ: Jesus died believing that once He suffered on the cross and died, He would be raised to life, thus, vindicating His life and suffering for the sins of the world. (v.16) There is no honor, no profit, He died a criminal! He would died and suffered for nothing!
6. No life: No hope for those who died believing in the resurrection – no life beyond death! (v.17)
7. No hope: (v.19) Jesus is the proof for He was the first of a great harvest. That is there is more to come. The word picture of a “great harvest” suggests many people will benefit. You and I can be part of it, if we receive this message, receive Christ as our Savior and get into this harvest. This past week, I refuse to get into Am express card’s offer of loss of income insurance. They warned me if I don’t sign up, I’ll have to pay any money owing to my creditors if I lose my income. I lose out on someone else paying my debt. I said I understand, I don’t want to apply for those benefits.
The fact is Christ has been raised (v.20). This fact means:
1. Christ is alive!
2. Communication of faith in Jesus is vital, not useless, valuable, needed, constructive, practical, worthwhile!
3. God is worthy of your trust!
4. What the apostles tell you in this document called the Bible is absolutely true!
5. There is vindication for what Christ did on the cross. He did not just die, He died and offered the world the proof of the resurrection to bolster the claim that He did not lie about offering life to anyone who repents and believe in Him.
6. There is life beyond the grave. Life does not end when we die. There is another book, with more chapters to be written and each chapter gets better and better for no eye has seen, no ear has heard what God has prepared for those who love him.
7. There is an abundance of hope
So basically, when we refuse what God offers, i.e. to cover our debts we owe, when he offered his life on the cross for us, refuse to sign up, the benefit of what He did for us will be lost. The resurrection benefit will be lost. Each one must sign up on their own. Don’t rely on someone else to sign you up.
Yet a few major theories have surfaced over the years to dispute the resurrection as fact.
1. The Swoon Theory: I.e. He never actually died but swooned or fainted on the cross. When body was placed in tomb, he revived by the cool air of the tomb.
Those who have seen the passion movie, cannot accept that… the torture on the cross is too much for anyone to just fake death. Can you imagine anyone surviving that torture? T.J. Thorburn wrote, “It would be difficult to imagine even the most powerful of men, after enduring all these, not succumbing to death.”
A skeptic by the name of David Strauss, who is not a believer in the resurrection, says this:
It is impossible that a being who had stolen half-dead out of the sepulchre, who crept about weak and ill, wanting medical treatment, who required bandaging, strengthening and indulgence… could have given to the disciples the impression that he was a Conqueror over death and the grave, the Prince of Life, an impression which lay at the bottom of their future ministry. Such resuscitation could only have weakened their impression which he had made upon them in life and in death… but could by no possibility have changed their sorrow into enthusiasm, have elevated their reverence into worship.
Think through it, if Jesus was just an injured man, not God, not fully resurrected, He would have to struggle out of the grave clothes, move a great stone over the grave which historians believed would take several men to move, in a severely weakened condition, a body that is in shock, dehydrated, tackled the Roman guard with no weapons (maybe in movies they do that like Jackie Chan), or step over the soldiers if they were asleep which they could not be because if caught sleeping while on guard duty they too will die, and then made His escape. Can you see this is just too incredible to believe?
2. The Theft Theory:
The body was removed by the enemies or by friends. If the body was removed by enemies, all they need to do is produce the body and Christianity would have died a natural death. If the body was removed by friends of Jesus, they would not have died as martyrs of the Christian faith, protecting a lie they fabricated. And how in the world could they have fought the professional soldiers guarding the tomb where Jesus laid?
3. The Wrong Tomb Theory:
Kirsopp Lake in 1907 proposed this theory – the women got lost. “Lake didn’t generate any following with this, The reason is that the site of Jesus tomb was known to the Jewish authorities. Even if the women had made this mistake, the authorities would have been too happy to point out the tomb and correct the disciples error…”
4. The Hallucination Theory
By its very hallucinations are individual occurrences. They do not occur to a group of people. According to psychologist, people who hallucinate need a fertile mind of expectancy or anticipation, and the disciples were not in the mood for that experience as they were fearful, doubtful, despairing, not expecting Jesus to rise from the dead. Unless they were all on ecstasy, which was not readily available then. Again many disciples died for their faith, would they have died for a hallucination?
If you believe these theories to explain away the resurrection, I like to sell you my toaster oven which broke down last week, for $1,000. It takes more faith to believe these theories than believing that Jesus is risen.
The fact remains and the Bible proclaims “Christ has been raised” (v.20).
Just suppose you were hiking on the North Shore mountains. You got lost. Suppose you came upon two rescuers from the rescue team. They are wearing their bright rescue gear. But suppose one of them was alive and the other just dropped dead from a heart attack. Which one would you want to follow out of the woods?
When it comes to eternal matters, of life after death, who are you willing to follow? The dead leaders of the world’s religions? Or the One who is attested and known to be alive! All the great religious leaders of the world have great bright gear on them, great teaching, good things but remember not one of them return from the dead. Would you rather not follow the only founder of a major religion who claimed to be God and who proved it by rising from the dead?
Many are lost today, but the resurrection tells us Jesus is alive to lead us out of the wilderness of death and sin. Will be choose the wise course and follow Jesus?
There is a scene in the movie the Sixth Sense, a child psychologist asked a troubled child “think about what you want from our time together.” The child answered: “Instead of something I want, can it be something I don’t want?” “I don’t want to be scared anymore.”
“I want to tell you my secret now. I see dead people”
The child psychologist probed “Dead people, like in graves and coffins.”
“No, walking around like regular people”
“Do you know what ‘yo no quiero morir” is?”
It’s Spanish. It means ‘I don’t want to die.’”
Are you scared? Haunted by death, and questions of is there life after death, maybe you see dead people and ponder about your own mortality? There is no escaping death, no cheating death, all of us will die, sooner or later. There is a universal fear of death… people don’t want to die. They want to live. All the death and destruction caused by people - because they want to live. They kill to live. They bear arms, cause they don’t want to be scared. Why do gangsters engage in turf wars, is it not so that they don’t get killed, for self-protection? They don’t want to die, right?
They don’t want to sacred anymore, they don’t want to see themselves or their loved ones as dead people, They want to see people alive. But death haunts, scares us. Because it is real, no one escapes it, no one is immune to it.
But praise God, there is hope today, Jesus is risen! This is the awesome benefit of Easter for us "Since we have been united with him in his death, we will also be raised as he was."
We will also be raised as he was! Repeat that! Write that down!
He has met the enemy called death and destroyed it.
Every Easter, we are reminded of and confronted with the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Jesus died to remove our sins and give us life, that reality is stamped with the power of His resurrection. Death has lost its sting, Jesus snatched victory away at the jaws of seeming defeat at the cross.
Daily bombarded with news of terror, death, destruction, murder, disease, but for the believer death has lost its sting!
There is a decision to be made with this. Either this Easter story really is true or it is patently false. You decide. If it to follow Jesus Christ into eternal life, if that is what you want, it is all yours for the taking by asking in faith, believing and turning away from your harmful ways into His life. Maaake it sure today, sign up with Jesus, pray to receive Jesus as Master and Commander of your life. If you are already a believer, you have great reasons to be confident and be full of joy. Your sins are forgiven and because He lives, you can face tomorrow, all fears are gone. Jesus is the resurrection and the life! Jesus is risen!
