Ep. 38 - Did Jesus Really Rise From the Dead?

07/13/23 • 49 min

Well, we’ve been on quite a journey over the last 37 or so episodes. We have been doing our best to look at Jesus from a number of angles. What was He like? What did He do? What did He teach? What did He claim? And then most recently, why did He die? And we saw that even though Jesus was killed by His opponents, apparently it was all according to God’s plan. And He was accomplishing all kinds of glorious things as we’ve seen in the last couple episodes. But in these next couple of episodes, we come to a major moment in the life of Jesus; the major hinge point in Christianity. His resurrection!

And this couldn’t be a bigger deal. Listen to what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:17-19— 17 “And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. 18 Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. 19 If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.” He’s saying if Jesus was not raised, if He didn’t physically, bodily, come back from death, Christianity is useless.

So today we need to ask, did it really happen? Was Jesus really raised from the dead? Here’s how we are going to answer that question. We are going to loosely follow the method of a scholar named Gary Habermas who uses what he calls the minimal facts argument. In 2,000 years following the death and resurrection of Jesus, there have been roughly six alternative explanations that have really stuck of what happened to the body of Jesus. Almost every natural or secular explanation for the resurrection, comes back to one of these six. So using Scripture and history, we want to put each of these alternative explanations on trial, and show that the Bible’s explanation of Jesus’ resurrection is the best one. Our hope in this episode is to give us confidence that Jesus really is alive. He really did rise from the dead.

Jesus is alive! The Bible’s explanation really is the best explanation! Yes it’s supernatural. But friends, God is supernatural. Jesus, who is God, really did live as one of us. And after His death, He really was raised. Physically, bodily, forever.

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Ep. 37 - Jesus Died to Show God’s Love and Extend God’s Grace

We are in our fifth and final week of asking, “Why did Jesus Die?”. His entire life had been moving to this point of His death. This was the reason why He came. In our first week asking this question, we saw that Jesus didn’t just die, He was killed. In our second week, we saw that Jesus wasn’t simply killed, He was laying down His life. Then, we saw that Jesus wasn’t just laying down His life, He was fulfilling Scripture. And then last week, we saw that Jesus was not simply fulfilling Scripture, He was taking our place. On that cross, He was bearing the punishment that we deserve. For those who believe, Jesus’ death saves us from God’s judgment, which we all deserve for our sin. This week, we peel back another layer and we are going to see that God is not simply saving us from something, He is saving us to something. Jesus was dying for us to show God’s love for us and to extend His grace to us, all for His glory.

That’s where we are going today. And we will primarily get there through four short passages— Romans 3:21-26, Romans 5:6-8, 1 John 4:8b-10, 1 John 5:11-13.

Next Episode

Ep. 39 - He's Alive! So what?

Over the last 38 Episodes, we’ve been doing our best to introduce Jesus to our listeners or to help each of us get to know Him better. And today, we come to our last week really zooming in on who Jesus is and what He’s done. We’ve seen what He did, how He came, what He taught, what He claimed, why He died, and then last week, we saw that He really did rise from the dead. The facts, the evidence really does point us to the Bible’s explanation— Jesus physically rose from the dead on the third day after His death.

Today I want us to ask, so what? Why is it such a big deal that Jesus is alive? What does it mean in general? And what does it mean for us? That’s what we’re talking about today. Five Big Implications of Jesus Resurrection!