It's Friday, but Sunday is coming

This spoken word song by Jimmy Needham narrates the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, and challenges the listener to consider the claims of Jesus upon his or her life. May it speak to you as it spoke to me. 

Jump for joy

A clever Venn diagram based on Easter, and the cinema release of The Super Mario Bros Movie. 

Reflective

Heading into this Easter long weekend, this is a concise article on the meaning of Maundy Thursday, which some Christians will commemorate tonight. 

https://www.crosswalk.com/special-coverage/easter/what-is-maundy-thursday-5-things-christians-need-to-know.html

Good Friday reflections

A timely Good Friday message. Even in the midst of suffering and hardship, it's good to be reminded that Jesus is still on the throne, metaphorically speaking.

Please bring a plate

Happy Resurrection Sunday to my reader. A friend forwarded this video to me, Falling Plates. When I had cable television, one of the channels used to run episodes of The Best of the Ed Sullivan Show, a compilation of highlights of the American variety show , which ran on American television for 23 years from 1948 to 1971. If you didn't like musicians, dancers, comedians, acrobats, or ventriloquists, perhaps plate spinning would tickle your fancy. It takes the plate spinner a lot of skill to balance the plate on the end of a pole without it falling off.

Think of your life as a spinning plate on the end of a pole, and the pole as a wobbly foundation for your life, based on the temporal things of this world. Temporal pleasures cannot fill the deepest longings of the human soul for meaning, significance, a sense of purpose in life, for certainty and stability in a tumultuous and uncertain world. Only Jesus can offer this. Through his sacrificial death on the cross, in which he took the punishment for our sins, and his resurrection from the dead, he made it possible for humanity to be reconciled with its creator. The peace that only he can offer with God brings rest to the restless soul.

Underhanded?

The Jehovah's Witnesses had a literature stand set up on the street today. I stopped and talked to them briefly, and they gave me a leaflet with an invitation to one of their services. Some religious groups use Easter as an opportunity to do outreach, because some unchurched people will be thinking about the meaning of Easter. In the Jehovah's Witnesses' case, this is disingenuous, because they don't observe Easter. 

Don't bother me with the facts

The Easter long weekend is a time for reflecting on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, spending time with family and friends, or heading out of the city for a short break. 

If none of those things tickle your fancy, and you live in Melbourne, or have the means to get there, you might care to attend the Marxism 18 conference. 

I glanced over the conference program, and was surprised to see that some of the speakers are smiling in their photographs. Maybe I should go, just for the rare opportunity to meet an actual happy Marxist. I didn't know they existed. 

Presumably this conference is not just theoretical, and attendees (or comrades) will come away with renewed zeal to implement Marxism in Australia, but which version of it? Is it Lenin's? Trotsky's? Stalin's? Mao's? Ceaucescu's? The Kim dynasty's? Pol Pot's? 

My brow furrows as I write this. History clearly and consistently shows that their ideology has failed, so they choose to ignore it. Presumably, the deaths of as many as 100 million people at the hands of communist regimes is not important to them. That old saying, "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results," applies to them. 

A beautiful set of numbers

The Bible is an inexhaustible treasure of wisdom. I was reminded of this again on Easter Sunday, when I visited a Baptist church in one of Melbourne's outer suburban growth corridors. In his sermon, the pastor quoted from the words of Jesus, recorded in John 19:28 and 30. Just before he died on the cross, Jesus said, "it is finished."

In the Greek language, the word for this phrase is tetelestai. In the Strong's Concordance, the word also means to accomplish, complete, execute, conclude, or discharge a debt. I didn't know that in New Testament times, this same word was written on business documents or receipts when an account was fully paid. John, writing to a Greek speaking audience, deliberately chose this word. Their account with God was settled. Jesus had died to pay for their sins. He also died for the sins of anyone who truly puts their faith in him.

It ain't necessarily so

I'm a long time reader of The Age newspaper's weekly television and radio lift out, the Green Guide. One thing that its columnists seem notable for is their disdain and mockery of Christianity. Brad Newsome was prevailed upon to review The Jesus Mysteries, a documentary showing on the National Geographic channel on Good Friday.

Newsome, whose area of interest is science, wrote as follows: 

"One mystery is why everyone involved in all these Jesus documentaries seems to accept everything in the gospels as, well, gospel. True, there is next to nothing in the historical record to attest to Jesus' existence, let alone corroborate the gospel stories, so they're short of material to work with. But to proceed on the assumption that everything in the gospels is literally true is like making a doco on Islam and concluding that Muhammad really did fly around on a winged horse. The only scepticism displayed by the scholars and theologians assembled here has to do with extra-canonical matters. One of these is the belief that Jesus travelled to Britain and studied under druids (this began, we are told, with a yarn put about in the Middle Ages by an abbey in need of pilgrims). There's interesting stuff about the symbolism of the nativity stories, and the veneration and demonisation of Mary Magdalene. What would be even more interesting would be a documentary that took a serious look at the Bible as a human book, examining precursors and parallels in pagan religion and literature. Don't hold your breath."

Before I watch the documentary, let me offer the following responses to Newsome's review.

The majority of historians accept that Jesus was a historical figure. Likewise, when I discuss these matters with people, if you want to talk about the historicity of the gospels, I usually start with the gospel of Luke. Luke was a careful historian who compiled his account of the life of Jesus by speaking to eyewitnesses of the events described. Scholarly opinion on when it was written varies, either from 59 to 63 AD, or the 70s or 80s AD. In any event, it was written within the living memory of the eyewitnesses. As Craig S. Keener of Asbury Theological Seminary writes, "very few ancient biographies (the gospels are biographies) were written as close to the time of their subjects as the gospels were."

In any event, scholars believe that the synoptic gospels were written between 50 and 70 AD, and the gospel of John between 70 and 100 AD.

Then he conflates things by comparing Jesus to the prophet Muhammad, and Buraq the flying horse of Islamic belief. When I was at school and writing critiques of films or books, my teachers always marked me or my friends down if we went off on tangents and wrote about other subjects that were irrelevant to what we were writing about. If you don't want to lose marks, stay on topic.

Bart Ehrman is one of the scholars featured in this documentary. In contrast to classical Christianity, which holds that Jesus was God in human form, he believes that the early Christians attributed divinity to Jesus long after his death. Surely having a scholar of Ehrman's profile in this documentary should be enough to satisfy Newsome. Did Newsome know that Ehrman used to be a fundamentalist Christian, then a liberal Christian, but now self-identifies as as agnostic?

On the other hand, I share Newsome's skepticism that Jesus travelled to Britain to study under druids. Because some scholars believe that the gospels tell us nothing about the life of Jesus between the ages of 12 and the commencement of his public ministry as an adult, there is also a body of esoteric literature claiming that during these "missing" years, Jesus visited variously India, Tibet, Persia, Assyria, Greece and Egypt. This is reading things into the text that cannot be supported. It's more likely that he grew up like his peers, staying in his village of Nazareth (Luke 2:52), being schooled in Judaism, and learning the carpentry trade from his earthly father, Joseph (Matthew 13:55, Mark 6:3, Luke 4:22). In other words, Luke makes a summary statement about Jesus growing into adulthood, and he clearly was already well known in his community.

Newsome then sarcastically complains that the documentary doesn't deal with the Bible's precursors and parallels in pagan religion and literature. These objections are commonly made in atheist and skeptic circles. I wonder to how much depth Newsome looked at these issues? Did he watch the Zeitgeist movie, which also makes these claims, which a skeptic acquaintance of mine once suggested to me that I watch, in the hope that it might de-convert me?

Yes, the Bible is a human book. It didn't descend to earth from heaven, gilt edged and leather bound. Its authorship was superintended by God, with its authors writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. It comprises 66 books, written by 40 different authors over a period of hundreds of years, and from beginning to end, it narrates God's plan of redemption for humanity and all of creation.

I'm sure that Newsome is very good at what he does, but in this review he's clearly operating outside of his area of expertise. He's clearly not across his brief. It would be akin to me attempting to write a structural engineering textbook on stresses and tension in bridge design and construction.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-04-18/dickson-tips-for-atheists/539789

http://www.alwaysbeready.com/zeitgeist-the-movie

http://www.craigkeener.com/gospel-truth-luke-11-4/ 

http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/tv-guide/friday-april 18-20140416-36qbc.html#ixzz2zDJ5POVy

Empty tomb

In view of the fact that this is Easter weekend, I've cut and pasted this short article from Koinonia House about the evidences for the resurrection of Christ.

"I claim to be an historian. My approach to Classics is historical. And I tell you that the evidence for the life, the death, and the resurrection of Christ is better authenticated than most of the facts of ancient history ..."
E. M. Blaiklock - Professor of Classics, Auckland University

The Resurrection of Christ is the most powerful event in history. It has affected the last 2000 years of history and politics, from peasants to kings to nations. Christianity has spread across the entire world, into every country and into a vast number of ethnic groups and languages. Billions of people have experienced the life-giving, healing, forgiveness and freedom offered by God because Jesus Christ conquered death and rose again from the grave.

The apostle Paul wrote in 1 Cor 15:12-22 that without the resurrection of Christ, the Christian faith is useless. "And if Christ be not raised," Paul wrote to the Corinthians, "your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins. Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable."

There are many skeptics who disregard the resurrection of Jesus Christ of Nazareth as a fable. However, the evidence for Jesus' resurrection is extremely strong, even to the point of converting some who sought to disprove it:

The Empty Tomb: Though well-trained Roman soldiers guarded the tomb of Jesus Christ, it was empty 3 days after Jesus' death as Jesus had repeatedly foretold (Matt 12:40, Mark 8:31). The guards had fled (a death penalty offense). The massive stone had been rolled away, and the body was gone – and was never produced by the enemies of the Christians. The linen grave clothes in which the Jews bury their dead were still in the tomb, undisturbed. From the Jewish historian Josephus to a compilation of 5th-century Jewish writings called the "Toledoth Jeshu", even Jewish sources and traditions admit that the tomb was empty. The body was never found.

Living Witnesses: There were a multitude of witnesses who saw Jesus Christ alive after his death. The disciples, the travelers on the road to Emmaus and a number of women all spoke to Jesus alive. Thomas doubted until he was able to put his fingers into Jesus' wounds (John 20:26-27). He later spread the Gospel all the way to India. The apostle Paul tells of 500 people to whom Jesus appeared at one time, most of whom were still alive and available for questioning when Paul wrote his letter (1 Cor 15:6). When several people testify in a courtroom that they witnessed an event, and their accounts are found consistent with each other, their testimony is considered factual information. Jesus Christ was seen alive many times by hundreds of different people over the course of forty days after his death (John 20-21, Acts 1:3).

The Disciples: Christ's followers, who had been fearful and who had run away when Jesus was arrested, were completely changed after the Resurrection and became courageous witnesses. Peter, who had denied knowing Christ when recognized by a simple servant girl, became the powerfully bold leader of those who had seen Christ alive, speaking to the thousands gathered in Jerusalem for the Feast of Shavuot – Pentecost. A person may die for a lie if they do not know it is a lie. But people do not give their lives up and face severe persecution to spread a lie they themselves invented. The fact that the disciples willingly suffered beatings and persecution and death is strong evidence that they had actually witnessed the resurrection they refused to stop telling people about.

Saul of Tarsus: A devoutly religious Pharisee, who persecuted the Church and had Christ's followers thrown in prison, Paul had his life absolutely changed by his encounter with Christ. He became a devoted follower of Christ himself, spreading the Gospel throughout Turkey and Greece in the face of beatings and shipwrecks and imprisonment and, finally, execution.

"If the New Testament were a collection of secular writings, their authenticity would generally be regarded as beyond all doubt." - F. F. Bruce, Manchester University

Skeptics' Arguments Against the Resurrection:

The Hallucination Theory claims that the witnesses who met the resurrected Jesus were all "seeing things" - they were hallucinating. However, this goes against common sense as well as psychological principles. Five hundred people do not all hallucinate the same thing. Jesus appeared to many people at many different times. Also, the body was never produced.

The Swoon Theory argues that Jesus did not die – that he simply fainted from loss of blood and exhaustion. However, this also goes against common sense. The Romans were professionals who severely whipped Jesus, hung him on a cross, and then stabbed him in the side with a spear to make sure he was dead. He was in the grave for three days, wrapped head to foot in a burial cloth, without food or water or medical treatment. When he appeared to his disciples he was completely whole and healthy and his appearance inspired awe and worship that lasted throughout the rest of the disciples' lives.

The Disciples Faked the Resurrection: Discouraged, fearful fishermen and former tax collectors, whose teacher had been viciously murdered, were in little position to take on a detachment of trained Roman soldiers guarding the tomb. They would have had to create a fantastic plan in order to fight off or bribe the professional soldiers, raid the tomb, unbind the grave clothes from Christ's body, take the body away, and hide it where nobody would ever find it. The Roman soldiers faced death if they failed in their guard duty, and the disciples had little money for bribing anybody. Many people would have had to be involved in the conspiracy, and all those involved would not only have known the truth, but would know that they were risking meeting the same fate as their recently crucified leader. And what purpose could it possibly serve, if Jesus were dead? They would have had nothing to gain. Their leader was gone and they would have only faced persecution and death for their invented resurrection story.

And again, the disciples' attitudes completely changed after the Resurrection and especially after Pentecost. They became bold and courageous in spreading their message, fearless of beatings or imprisonment. They never sought to fight Rome or to establish any position or kingdom or authority for themselves. They had nothing to gain, physically speaking. They simply went about the known world, telling their story in spite of persecution and suffering, poverty and ridicule. Their message quickly spread across the Middle East and Europe and even into Asia without any military conquest or political support involved - and in spite of strong opposition. Only belief and hope based in the reality of their experiences would have produced such dedication in the lives of Christ's followers.

Perhaps the greatest evidence today of Christ's resurrection is the work that he is still doing in the lives of every day people. In the name of Jesus, people are still being healed emotionally and physically and spiritually by the same power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead. Sinners are being freed from the burden and pain and shame of sin – sometimes immediately, sometimes after long years of steady work by the Holy Spirit in their lives. Hearts are being mended and lives are being turned around. The best evidence today is the faithful follower of Christ who can say, "He saved me, and I am not the person I used to be" just as the apostles testified 2000 years ago.