Proofs of the Resurrection of Christ

Thank you, Robert. As it has already been mentioned, we are just two weeks off from the coming Passover, Days of Unleavened Bread. One illustration about what God's feasts at least mean to me is an analogy. When we have preteens and they have an activity, sometimes we'll go bowling. Now, in these modern bowling centers, they actually have a system where if a little child gets to play, they program that when that child comes up, they raise these bumper rails on the side so that the ball can't go into the gutter when you're throwing it. And it's very convenient for the kids because many times when they're five or six years old, it's hard to get that ball all the way down to the pins, but at least with these bumper rails, they're going to hit at least one of those pins, if not more. Sometimes I saw some of the kids actually have strikes. But the point is that bumper rails guide the ball and avoid the gutters. Well, God's feasts are like bumper rails. They also avoid us falling into the gutter. They guide us. It doesn't mean we're going to get a strike, but at least we've got that guidance that the rest of the world doesn't have. For them, these days are meaningless. They have their own Easter and other types of, we don't call them, holy days, but holidays, which is a different focus. But at least God's seven feast days are like these bumper rails. They help us concentrate and focus on what God wants us to do. And I'm very appreciative as these spring holy days come along, that God kind of raises the rail and says, oh, focus here. Don't go into the gutter. Don't fall into the wrong way of thinking. And these spring feasts picture three great events in the Old Testament, as well as in the New Testament. The three events in the Old Testament have to do with the Old Testament pass over, the slaying of the lambs, and putting the blood on the doorposts. And that way, the death angel passed over the children of Israel. And actually that word, pasha in Hebrew, means passing over. And God passes over Israel's sins and forgives them and protects them while he strikes the firstborn of the Egyptians. So in the Old Testament, it's the pass over with the slaying of the lamb and the blood protecting Israel from punishment. The second great New Testament event has to do with the days of Unleavened Bread, that when they left Egypt, they did not have time to leaven their bread, and they left, and they actually crossed over across the Red Sea during those seven days of Unleavened Bread. And so it pictures the going out of the sins of Egypt. Israel was leaving a contaminated and sinful land and was going to be taken through the desert of trial into the Promised Land. God was preparing a people for his own desires that would be a light to the world. And imperfectly, as they have done it, we've got God's word thanks to the Jewish people and the Israelites that preserved the Old Testament and then in the New Testament. The church was able to preserve that section of Scripture. Then we have the third event, which is not as well known, but God in Leviticus 23 mentions that during that time of the days of Unleavened Bread, on the Sabbath, they were to have a wave sheath offering. Notice in Leviticus, let's go there. In Leviticus 23, we'll just touch the Scriptures that highlight this. Leviticus 23.

It says in verse 10, it goes on to say in verse 15, And so this was the third ceremony that was to be carried out, the first one to pass over, then the days of Unleavened Bread. And the wave sheath ceremony. This was the pattern in the Old Testament. Israel was going to be the first fruits of the nations that God would begin to use. In the New Testament, we have the three parallels to the events in the Old Testament. But now in the New Testament, the Passover is the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, whose blood is not placed over doorposts anymore. But actually, the blood is applied to each member who has repented and been baptized, and their sins are passed over. They are covered through the blood of Jesus Christ. Then the second great event had to do with the separation of God's people from the world during the days of Unleavened Bread that followed. God was preparing a people that were no longer going to be immersed in the world's sins, but were coming out. Now they were unleavened through the sacrifice of Christ. They would have a life where they would not be contaminated. They already had a way of life that was going to take them to God's kingdom, just as Israel eventually entered the Promised Land. So we have a kingdom of God to look forward to. And the third event, the way she's offering, represents the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It was done at the beginning of the Sabbath day during the days of Unleavened Bread, which coincided at that time with the resurrection of Jesus Christ. After three days and three nights of being in the grave from Wednesday evening all the way to Saturday evening, there were going to be three days and three nights, which are fulfilled as the sign that He would be the Messiah. So the way she's offering symbolizes the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Sometimes we don't talk about this as much as we should, because it is part of the three great events in the New Testament. The Passover, the bloodshed by Jesus Christ, the days of Unleavened Bread, the separation of God's people, being prepared for Pentecost when they would receive God's Spirit just 50 days later from His resurrection. And so Unleavened Bread is very important to separate the people and then the way she's offering Christ as the first fruits of the church, of those being called. And so how reliable is that resurrection of Jesus Christ? Because today we live in a skeptical world. People attack the Bible, its beliefs. More and more we see a secular society turning away from God and from Christianity. And so this fact of the resurrection is something that people come to doubt. One of the first things when people leave Christianity, they start doubting, well, maybe He really wasn't resurrected. Maybe this is what they call a pious fraud, which means religious people came up with this way in the past and people just have accepted it and believed it at face value without much investigation. Notice what Paul says, the importance of believing in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. In 1 Corinthians 15, verse 13, this is called the resurrection chapter. And he says, Yes, and we are found false witnesses of God because we have testified of God that He raised up Christ, whom He did not raise up, that the dead do not rise. For if the dead do not rise, then Christ is not risen. And if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile. You are still in your sins. Then also those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable. So if Christ was not resurrected, then He says our faith is in vain. So it's important to analyze this.

Now some believe that you shouldn't question what the Bible says. You should just believe it all. And that's a type of blind faith. Many times that's a faith that when is countered with arguments, people really don't have much to answer. And their faith can be shaken and doubts come in. This happens a lot when Christian children enter the university and they meet one of these secular professors teaching about science and religion and they start questioning and causing doubts. And many of the kids who have been raised up, who had not proven things, get their faith shaken and eventually leave Christianity because they had not proven it for themselves. And so it behooves us to analyze this to see what proofs we actually do have of Christ's resurrection. In Proverbs 18-17, it brings up this principle that the person who says and gives the first account of some things appears to be right until the other person comes and counters it and cross-examines, gives the other version. So it's not good to just have one version and believe it blindly, unquestionably. Our faith should be rooted in facts, in a strong belief. We have examined our faith, we have analyzed the evidence, and we have come to a reasonable conclusion. Notice in Hebrews 11, verse 6, faith is not based on just blind belief or what just the Bible says. Faith is based on analyzing and proving things. Hebrews 11, verse 6, it says, But without faith it is impossible to please him. For he who comes to God must believe that he is or he exists, that we believe that because we've analyzed the evidence. And that he is a rewarder of those who diligently seek him, that he is real, that he rewards, that he answers our prayers, that he intervenes in our lives. This isn't some impersonal God way out there that is uncaring. No, we have a personal God. Who cares for each one of us? Notice in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, Paul certainly exhorted the brethren to analyze things, to not take them for granted. Verse 21, he says, Test all things whole fast. What is good? What is correct? What is truth and truthful? Also, one more scripture in this regard. The recent personal appearance campaigns are based on this scripture in 1 Peter 3, verse 15. It says, But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you with meekness and fear. To give a defense, we're not to just say, well, you shouldn't question anything, you shouldn't analyze anything. You should just have this blind trust in things. And that's not the way the Bible works. We know the Bereans had to check things out. They had to analyze things, prove what was correct. We also should do the same. Have a reasoned faith, faith that has been checked out, examined. We know where we stand, and we know why we believe something. It's not some type of mystical idea that we have, something based on just emotion or blind belief. I just finished reading a fascinating book. It's called Cold Case Christianity by Jim Wallace, an L.A. detective who was in many years a detective in Torrance, just close by here. He was an atheist, and against Christianity, eight years of police work had hardened him.

He basically didn't believe in anything good about human nature or human beings. After all the crimes that he had to check out and deal with, murders, this is what he writes. I had been a cop for about eight years prior to being a Christian. In that time, I slowly lost my faith in people. I was suspicious. I considered everyone to be a liar and capable of horrific behavior. Nothing surprised me when it came to the depravity of humanity. I trusted no one and thought of myself as superior to the vast majority of people I encountered. I was cocky, cynical, and distant. My wife and kids were my entire world. I had a few acquaintances who were also police officers, but few other friends. My heart was shrinking and growing harder with every case I worked and with every passing year. None of this bothered me in the slightest. In fact, I saw my suspicion as a virtue that all changed when I put my faith in Jesus. As I began to understand my need and the gift I had been given, my compassion and patience grew. As someone who had been forgiven, I now developed the capacity to forgive. So he wrote a book carefully examining all the evidence for Christ's resurrection as if it was a criminal case.

And at the end of his investigation, he became convinced by the evidence and became a believer. He now teaches over here down the road in Biola University and became a pastor. That's how, drastically, examining the evidence changed this person.

So here's a summary of what he found, and I thought very enlightening and helpful. Number one, cross-examining the witnesses.

Where were those disciples there? Were they reliable witnesses? And so Jim Wallace undertook several weeks worth of study, carefully examining the four Gospels, four writings that were based on witnesses. Two of them were actually there. They witnessed the resurrection of Jesus Christ. That was Matthew and John. They wrote a personal account of what they saw. The two other Gospels, the Gospel of Mark and of Luke, were written by the assistance of apostles who had been direct witnesses as well. Do you remember who the apostle of Mark actually represented, giving Mark the evidence, the information?

Anybody knows who that was? Peter. Peter was the one who gave Mark the information because Mark was Peter's assistant at the end of Peter's life. Notice in 1 Peter, it talks about here in 1 Peter chapter 5. Peter is giving his farewell to the brethren. We can start in verse 12 of 1 Peter 5. He says, Our faithful brother, as I consider him, I have written to you briefly, exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God in which you stand. So Silvanus in this time was the one who penned the epistle of 1 Peter.

And then he goes on to say verse 13. Peter uses the term here Babylon, where he was visiting the church there. And he says, And I send the greetings also of Mark. He calls them my son. This is Mark who became so intimate, such a faithful follower, that he was called my son, like my spiritual son. Just like Timothy was the spiritual son of Paul.

And so basically the account of Mark is the account of Peter that was recorded by Mark. Also, later history all mentioned this in the second century of Mark being Peter's assistant. And then we have the epistle of Luke. Luke was the assistant of Paul. And Paul was a witness of the resurrected Christ as well. So we have these four accounts of the life of Jesus Christ, four different people, actually, and two more that were the ones that recorded it. We have Matthew, John, Peter, and Paul, and those written by their assistants, Mark and Luke. So these are four witnesses that present the life of Jesus Christ, and they all have basically the same testimony from different perspectives.

But they harmonize. Now, as a detective brings out, if you have two witnesses that have seen what happened in the crime, and if you leave them together for a time, you'll find that their testimony fits a lot cleaner because they've had time to talk to each other about these things.

But if you separate them, you're going to find there are going to be discrepancies in their view of things. It's not going to turn out that they all focus on the same thing. That's why a detective appreciates they isolate the witnesses so they can get each viewpoint without them colluding and talking together to harmonize things.

So what we have here in the Gospels are four different witnesses looking at things from a different perspective, and you do find that one adds details that the other one doesn't have. And so when Jim Wallace analyzed the four Gospels, he said, this is a typical situation of true witnesses.

They didn't copy exactly what the other person said. They didn't say it exactly the same way. But you can see they were all in the scene together. I remember learning a bit about this many years back when my daughters were still attending here at Savannah High School, and we picked up our daughters. And I remember my wife was in one car, and I was in another car, and all of a sudden I was following along. And then the car in front of her stopped suddenly, and sure enough, we had an accident. And my wife was the one that was doing the driving, but this car had an automatic seat belt that once you close the door, the seat belt came and buckled itself in that sense.

And so when the accident happened, my wife couldn't get out of the seat, and my daughter Jackie went around and opened the door and helped her because we didn't know how to detach the seat belt. I came and dealt with it at the same time. Well, because of the accident, they had a couple of witnesses. I remember one gentleman from a store that was in front there on Brookhurst, and he gave the testimony that actually my daughter Jackie was the one that was driving the car.

She was underage. And because he saw her on that side, the passenger side, he didn't see that my wife was still stuck there. And so when the insurance agents interviewed us, he said, well, what about this situation that this person testified that your daughter was dealing with? And of course, a police record also was there. And we had to explain to him, look, my wife was stuck. There was no way to unfasten this because it was an automatic seat belt, but that my daughter was actually on the passenger side. Well, you know what?

They believed us because they saw the model and they saw that this isn't just a normal seat belt. But this is the way witnesses can talk about the same scene, but get very different conclusions from it. So when the detective analyzed the four gospels, he saw the natural tendency to focus on certain details that the other gospel writers did not do so. And he also brought up an important point at a mark when he wrote about Peter's recollection of these things.

He left out a couple of embarrassing scenes of Peter. When he mentions about Christ walking on the water, he doesn't mention about Peter almost drowning and getting all wet because he lacked the faith. He left it out. Why? Well, just like anybody else, if you're with someone, if you're writing the account, and you don't want to put embarrassing material, he didn't say Peter wasn't there.

He just omitted it. And there are several cases where you see the person that's writing this Gospel of Mark is quite deferential to Peter, whereas Matthew tells it like it is. This is what he saw, and he didn't mind mentioning these points about Peter. So when the detective analyzed it, just like a criminal case, he said these four Gospel accounts talk about the same way as witnesses that are reliable. They speak with conviction. They don't over-dramatize things. They just give the facts as they saw them. Notice in the first chapter of Luke, Luke 1, Luke mentions the care he brought about the eyewitnesses.

He didn't add to it or take away. He says in verse 1, So Luke checked out who was there. Not secondhand information. Who was there? They were eyewitnesses. Eyewitnesses are about the most reliable and direct evidence, although it's not enough to just have them. Like I said, we had an eyewitness of what happened in that accident, but the man didn't get it all right. But when you have eyewitnesses, your case is much stronger. And so Luke says, here I interviewed these men.

Verse 3, it says, And in Luke's account, you see many references to historical personages and events. So Luke is very careful to have these historical markers. Notice, it says in verse 5, There was in the days of Herod the king of Judea a certain priest named Zechariah of the division of Abijah.

Then later on, when it goes in chapter 2, verse 1, And it came to pass in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be registered. This census first took place while Kyrenius was governing Syria. So here you have Caesar Augustus being mentioned, Kyrenius governing Syria. They found archaeological evidence for this. And so Luke is very careful not only to mention about Christ's life, but people that were there, they were, some were governing.

Because he wanted to have eyewitness reports and historical markers where people could check things out for themselves if it was true or not. Now, Matthew, who was an actual witness, gave the Gospel account from the Jewish perspective. What was important in the Jewish mind, if this was truly Christ the Messiah, if this was the truth, Matthew emphasized what a Jew was interested in, not necessarily the rest of the nations.

And so in Matthew, in chapter 1, what does Luke focus on, first of all? What a Jew would focus on? Verse 1 of chapter 1, the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. See, that's what a Jew first knew. If he was going to be the Messiah, he has to be a descendant of Abraham and also of David. So Matthew gives the genealogy, which traces back all of the descendants, all the ancestors, all the way back to Abraham.

That's what a Jew, first of all, wanted to find out. Do you know why that's so important? Turn to Ezra, the book of Ezra, chapter 2, in verse 62. These were the Jews that returned from Babylon back to Israel. And here you have all the genealogies. Genealogies are very important to the Jewish people because it showed you what tribe you were from and whether you came from a priestly descent or not.

And so here in Ezra, chapter 2, in verse 62, it says, These sought their listing among those who were registered by genealogy, but they were not found, therefore they were excluded from the priesthood as defiled. So some people claimed, oh yes, I'm a descendant of Aaron and the Levites.

I get to be part of the priesthood. Well, they had the genealogy all checked out. And guess what? They did not figure in the genealogy, so they were excluded. They could not be part of the priesthood. And so that was back in the days of Ezra. So all through the time in the future, Jews were checking out what kind of descent are you from? And Jesus Christ, the Messiah, had to come from the tribe of Judah and also be a descendant of David, the royal family.

So that's what Matthew tells them. Here's Jesus Christ, and he covers the legal descent that goes through Joseph, his father, and he says, check it out. And guess what? In the temple, they had a whole area. Just like today, we have the registry of people, and they have their social security number, check things out.

Well, in Jesus' day, they had the temple archives with all the genealogies, and they checked out. And guess what? The Jews never doubted, never questioned the genealogy of Jesus Christ. They would have immediately used that as a red flag. Oh, he claims to be the Messiah, but he's not a descendant of David. He's not a descendant of Judah. Well, here, Matthew showed them, and they had to keep quiet. They knew, and the records were checked time and time again.

And so that's what was important in Matthew. And then the Apostle John, what he did is he filled in the details, because he was the last one to die, probably around 95 AD. So he had decades when all these other gospels were available. And so he didn't repeat the same things that Matthew and Mark and Luke had written. No, he filled in the details that they had left out. He was a witness. He was an eyewitness. But his focus was to fill in the gaps and to add information that none of those other three gospels ever had.

And so, after examining the evidence, this hard-nosed detective said, This shows me these are reliable witnesses. They have all the signs of telling the truth. They've been cross-examined, cross-checked, and it is credible. So it's kind of like passing the first test of whether this is convincing evidence, evidence beyond a reasonable doubt.

Because you're never going to have 100% of the puzzle pieces, but you have enough that you say, this is the indication of it. Nothing else fits the explanation as this one, that they were eyewitnesses, that they were reliable. The second thing that a detective looks at is he looks for the motives. Why was this crime committed? And Jim Wallow says that there are basically three major areas of motives that crimes are committed.

It's either about money, sex, or other types of relationships, or power. It says all of the motives fall in these three different categories. And so he analyzed, okay, let's look at the disciples. Let's look at these who were eyewitnesses. Were they out there for the money? Well, they were dirt poor. They had to flee. They couldn't work normally. They were being persecuted. Notice what it tells us in 1 Corinthians 4, verse 11. 1 Corinthians 4, verse 11. Paul speaking here says, To the present hour we both hunger and thirst, and we are poorly clothed and beaten and homeless, and we labor, working with our own hands.

Being reviled we bless. Being persecuted we endure. Being defamed we entreat. We have been made as the filth of the world, the offscouring of all things until now. So if it was money, they did a pretty bad job of it, because they weren't into royalties. They weren't into making some big bucks and living in a palace in Capernaum. No? That isn't a motive. How about the second one? Sex and other relationships. Were they there to seduce some innocent women? Well, the accounts all show these were married men.

In the great majority of cases, Paul might not have been married or he might have been widowed. We don't know that. But these men, like Peter and others, they were married. They brought their wives with them. Notice what it says in 1 Corinthians 9. Paul says here, verse 5, Do we have no right to take along a believing wife, as do also the other apostles, the brothers of the Lord, and Cephas, which is another name for Peter? Or is it only Barnabas and I who have no right to refrain from working?

And so these were family men. They had children. They had wives. They weren't there to deal with sex and all kinds of activities. They were the ones that promoted chastity and purity. That was something that the Greek world didn't have. And yet they promoted staying away from sexual sins and following the good life. None of them were ever accused of having some type of a sex scandal. So that doesn't sound like a motive to have witnessed about the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Then we have the third motive, power. People do things many times to gain power, authority. This detective even said he had a case once that the husband actually killed his wife because he didn't want her collecting some of his social security. Can you imagine how cheap that is? So people do some of these things. I guess that had to do with money, but also with the power. But here you see the apostles, instead of gaining in power, even in their own congregations, they were humble men.

They fled when persecution came along. They faced torture and eventually martyred them. They died for their faith. They never denied these truths. So again, you don't see the motive of power getting involved. They lived normal lives with their families. And now comes the third line of evidence, the empty tomb. We read in Matthew 27, verse 59, that this tomb was carefully guarded.

Notice in Matthew 27, verse 59, it says, I'm talking about Jesus. This would have been on a Friday. Well, yeah, because Christ died on a Wednesday night talking about the next day. No, it actually was the first day of Unleavened Bread, which followed the day of preparation. The chief priests and Pharisees gathered together to Pilate, saying, sir, we remember while he was still alive how that deceiver said, after three days, I will rise. Therefore, command that the tomb be made secure until the third day, lest his disciples come by night and steal him away and say to the people, he has risen from the dead.

So the last deception will be worse than the first. Pilate said to them, you have a guard. He says, here are these Roman guards. Go your way. Make it as secure as you know how. So they went. It could have been a group of up to 16 different soldiers, usually in a group of four. And these soldiers were hardened Roman soldiers, and they knew if they did not carry out their duties properly, if they let somebody steal that body, they would suffer death as a consequence. The same type of death by crucifixion. So it says, so they went and made the tomb secure, sealing the stone and setting the guard.

So we don't know how many guards, but it could have been anywhere from something like four to 16 that were there. And then it goes on to tell us in chapter 28 verse 11.

When they had assembled with the elders and consulted together, these elders gave them a large sum of money to the soldiers. This is called hush money. Briding them, saying, tell them his disciples came at night and stole them away while we slept. And if this comes to the governor's ears, talk about pilot, we will appease them and make you secure. So they also would pay bribes to pilot and secure that they wouldn't be killed in this way.

So you can imagine how unlikely it would be for all these guards to fall asleep and to have these disciples moving that huge rock and all these guards are still asleep. And they put a seal, usually it was a cord with wax on both sides and the Roman emblem, that if somebody broke the seal, that was a capital offense by crucifixion. But this is what would be told from then on. And so verse 15, it says, so they took the money and did as they were instructed.

And this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day. So the Jews many times say, well, Christ's body was stolen. But where's the body then? Where did eventually it was never shown if it were to be found? And it doesn't explain all the resurrection appearances, because here he was sealed for all that time. And now he appears to all these people. That doesn't make sense. The body never appears, and it changed the witnesses' lives, those who witnessed the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The first who saw him were women. And usually at that time, women's testimony was not accepted in court. But how ironic that God used women as the first witnesses.

Then came Peter and others to see it. If you're trying to pull a hoax, do this pious type of deception, would you use women as your witnesses at first? The first ones who saw it? No, you wouldn't. And then you have the fact of these witnesses suffering torture and martyrdom. There was never one who recanted, who went back, who confessed that this wasn't so.

And then the second and third generations of those disciples, they remained firm. This happened, and they were willing to die, to put their lives on the line for the testimony of what they saw. You know, Christ said, if you deny me, I will deny you. And so God has given eyewitnesses. He has given all this evidence for people to believe. Now, some people say, well, some of these witnesses, how can we be sure years later, when they wrote the accounts, that it was accurate? This detective also brought up an interesting point, and that is people's memories, when there is a very important event, they recollect, they remember those things as if it happened yesterday.

Now, I don't know many things that happened in 1977. If you tell me what happened on March 5th, I couldn't tell you. But if you ask me what happened on January 9th of 1977, I can tell you everything that happened on that day. That's the day of my wedding. I remember where I was. I remember who was there. I remember what we ate. I remember the ceremony. Now, that's in my memory. It doesn't matter how many decades have passed. I still remember. You give me a notebook, I can give you all the information.

Now, you think these witnesses that were tortured, that eventually died, if you had asked them before, what were you doing on the day of Christ's resurrection? Do you think they're going to say, well, yeah, I don't remember too well what happened? I'll tell you, that was branded in their brain forever. That's why Peter could say this. Years later, notice in Acts chapter 10, this was repeated by one witness after another in Acts chapter 10, verse 34. He's there at Cornelius' house, the first Gentile that's going to enter God's church. And he says in verse 24, And the following day they entered Caesarea, verse 34, Then Peter opened his mouth and said, In truth I perceive that God shows no partiality, But in every nation whoever fears him and works righteousness is accepted by him.

Notice you have to fear God, but you also have to work righteousness. You have to obey God's words and commandments. It's not just only faith. And it's accepted by him. The word which God sent to the children of Israel, preaching peace through Jesus Christ, He is Lord of all. That word, you know, which was proclaimed throughout all Judea, and began from Galilee after the baptism which John preached, how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil.

So he says, we are witnesses. We're going to stand by our testimony. We'll never forget what that week was like, the Passover, the beginning of the days of Unleavened Bread, the resurrection. We'll never forget that. We are witnesses of all things, which he did both in the land of the Jews and Jerusalem, whom they killed by hanging on a tree. Him God raised up on the third day and showed him openly, not to all the people, but to witnesses chosen before by God, God-fearing people, believing people, even to us who ate and drank with him after he arose from the dead.

That's never going to be erased, Peter says, from my memory. And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that it is he who was ordained by God to judge, to be judge of the living and the dead. To him, all the prophets witnessed that through his name. Whoever believes in him will receive remission of sins. So, of course, these witnesses repeated it time and time and time again, and they were persecuted and they were stoned and they were whipped, and they still went to their death, testifying what they saw.

They would never forget that. They could never recant or deny what they had seen. Notice in 1 John chapter 1 what John said about his witness. 1 John chapter 1. Verse 1, That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and which our hands have handled concerning the word of life, the life was manifested, and we have seen and bear witness and declare it to you.

That eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us. That which we have seen and heard, we declare to you that you also may have fellowship with us. And truly, our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. These weren't men that were making things up. They were willing to die for what they had seen.

And they weren't out for money, fame, or any type of personal pleasure. They showed it with their lives. So, as we prepare for the Passover, the days of Unleavened Bread and the way sheaf that symbolizes the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and some are thinking about baptism and preparing for it, let's read 1 Corinthians chapter 15. That's one of the scriptures I began with, but I want to continue because I didn't finish the passage there. Let's read verse 19, 1 Corinthians 15.

It says, It says, So, this is the hope of the resurrection. And it's based on evidence when a hardened detective analyzes all of this. He's been able to tear away all the false premises. He's been able to undermine so many testimonies. He made a living getting to the truth. And he had analyzed this in a very calculated and analytical way, and he came out saying, This all points to it being truthful.

I'd like to quote, this is attributed to Napoleon before his death. He says about Christ, I know men, and I tell you that Jesus Christ is no mere man. Between him and every other person in the world, there is no possible term of comparison. Alexander the Great, Caesar, Charlemagne, and I founded empires. But on what did we rest the creation of our genius upon force? Jesus Christ founded his empire upon love, and at this hour millions of men would die for him. So even up to our day, the evidence stands, many are willing to die for their faith and the resurrection of Jesus Christ.