Resurrection © by Earl-Wilkerson
Before you get upset, I didn’t call you a good-for-nothing. I said “you are good, for nothing.” As in “good for no reason at all”, you’re just wasting your time.
Unless the resurrection really did happen.
Without the resurrection our faith and goodness are pointless. But the resurrection is a crazy thing to believe in. People don’t just come back from the dead. But there were over 400 witnesses who saw Jesus after he was killed and buried. And men who interacted with him before and after his death wrote about it.
It’s natural to want to divorce the life and teachings of Jesus from the resurrection of Jesus.
Andy Stanley
We shouldn’t be so fast to say “I believe in Jesus” but say “there’s no way I can believe in the resurrection.” Without the resurrection then we just follow another teacher who said a lot of strange things and is dead.
There are definitely some people who teach that the resurrection really isn’t an important part to the Christian faith. But the men who wrote the Gospels and the letters of the New Testament firmly believed in the resurrection. They either witnessed it or talked to eye witnesses.
…and if Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation is without foundation, and so is your faith. In addition, we are found to be false witnesses about God, because we have testified about God that He raised up Christ-whom He did not raise up if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, Christ has not been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins.
1 Corinthians 15:14-17 HCSB
The “we” Paul is referring to is not you and me. We aren’t found to be false witnesses, we’re just found to be idiots who believe liars. The “we” is the apostles and those who experienced the resurrection first-hand. If they are lying about the resurrection then they are false witnesses. In a legal matter they would be committing perjury by lying about a key piece of evidence.
