In the 16th Chapter of the Book of Matthew we read that Jesus taught his disciples that he would suffer and die and then be resurrected on the 3rd day. The importance of Jesus’ resurrection to the credibility of Christianity can’t be overstated. The Apostle Paul went so far as to declare to the church at Corinth that if Christ had not been raised then their faith was in vain and that followers of Jesus should be pitied. It is for this reason that the way the Jewish leaders responded to reports of Jesus’ tomb being empty has carried such great weight down through the ages.
Specifically, I am referring to the decision of the Sanhedrin to circulate the story that Jesus’ disciples had stolen his body. With the luxury of hind-sight it seems that this response was a serious misstep by those who desired to shut down Christianity.
Considering that the group that had conspired against Jesus had long since abandoned any concern for honesty or ethics, there was at least one lie that might have served them better. For the sake of argument, if the leaders had produced the unrecognizable body of another recent victim of crucifixion and presented it as the body of Jesus it would have been very difficult for Jesus’ followers to convince the public that he had in fact been raised on the 3rd day as he himself had predicted. But the local powers didn’t do this. They instead made a claim that both confirmed that the tomb was in fact empty and at the same time blamed the theft of the body on a group that had been cowering in fear for their own personal safety ever since their leader had been arrested and would not have been capable of stealing the body even if they had wanted to.
In order to accept the stolen body claim, Jesus’ ragtag band of followers would have had to overcome the highly trained Roman guards who were guarding the tomb (certainly a suicide mission) break the Roman seal that covered the tomb (a death penalty offense), roll away the gargantuan stone that sealed the tomb, and then carry the body through the crowded streets of Jerusalem to a destination where it would never be found even to this day.
In their haste to attempt to lay one more charge of wrongdoing at the feet of Jesus’ followers, the Jewish leadership actually strengthened the case for the resurrection. As incredibly important as Jesus’ sacrificial death upon the cross was for all of mankind, it is the resurrection that confirmed that he was the Son of God as he had claimed to be. There was no body in the tomb on the first Easter morning, there was no body produced by the Romans or Jews that purported to be the body of Christ, and 2000 years later no body of Jesus has ever been found.
Added to this, the risen Jesus reportedly appeared to people on at least 10 separate occasions immediately following the resurrection. These sightings occurred at differing places, times and to a variety of people. On one occasion he was sighted by over 500 hundred people at a single time. And these were not brief, wispy, encounters. On some of these occasions Jesus touched, spoke with, and even shared a meal with his stunned followers.
When one considers all the circumstances surrounding the empty tomb and the numerous and varied reports of Jesus appearing to people, post-resurrection, there is only one plausible answer for why the tomb was found to be empty on that first Easter morning- a reason that will echo as an affirmation among believers around the globe on the 21st of this month. He is risen! He is risen indeed!
Comments