Why Do We Believe?
St. Peter said that we should be prepared to give the reasons for our belief in Christ.
“Always be ready to make your defense to anyone who demands from you an accounting for the hope that is in you; yet, do it with gentleness and reverence.” -1 Peter 3:15-16.
Two men carefully examined the evidence pro and con, for the truth of Christianity. One was a committed atheist, Lee Strobel. One was a devout Muslim, Nabeel Qureshi. They both came to the same conclusion-Christianity is true. They both wrote books about their findings. Lee Strobel’s book is The Case for Christ, and Nabeel Qureshi’s book is Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus. Another book, Atheist Delusions by David Bentley Hart, examines the effect of Christianity on Western Civilization.
Nabeel Qureshi expressed the issue this way: “If we can determine that Jesus claimed to be God, that he died on the cross, and that he rose from the grave, then that would be a good case for Christianity.”
The Reliability of Scripture
The Huge Number of Manuscripts.
In all there are about 24,000 manuscripts in existence.
“There is no body of ancient literature in the world which exists such a wealth of good textual attestation as the New Testament.” -F. F. Bruce
The Eyewitness Accounts
“There can be no doubt that…Paul is citing the eyewitness testimony of those who were recipients of resurrection appearances.”- Richard Bauckham
The Attesting of Second Century Fathers
Papias AD 128
“Mark had accurately recorded Peter’s eyewitness observations. Matthew had preserved the teachings of Jesus.”
Irenaeus AD 180
“Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Peter, himself handed down to us in writing the substance of Peter’s preaching. Luke, the follower of Paul, set down in a book the Gospel preached by his teacher. Then John, the disciple of the Lord, who also leaned on his breast, himself produced his Gospel while he was living in Ephesus in Asia.
Did Jesus Claim To Be God?
Jesus’ Response to the High Priest
“Again, the high priest asked him, ‘Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?’ Jesus said, ‘I am, and you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven.’ “– Mark 14:61-62
This reply combines allusions to Daniel 7:10 and Psalm 110:1. In this context, ‘Son of Man’ means far more than a simple human being. Jesus is describing himself as the ‘one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven who ‘approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence and given authority and power over all humanity, leading to universal worship and everlasting dominion. This claim to be far more than a mere mortal is probably what elicited the verdict of blasphemy from the Jewish high court.
In Mark 14:62, Jesus claimed to be the divine Son of Man and the sovereign heir to the Fathers throne. He was boldly claiming to be God. -Craig Blomberg, New Testament Scholar
Jesus Spoke with Divine Authority
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”-Matthew 5:27-28
“Instead of basing his teaching on the authority of others, he speaks on his own authority.” -Ben Witherington
Jesus’ Divine Actions and Words
The Deity of Jesus Christ – Ed Komoszewski
In Mark when Jesus healed people, cast out demons, or performed other miracles, He did so not by asking God in prayer to do these things, rather, He spoke the Word and it happened (1:25-27,41). He forgave a man’s sins, which the scribes recognized was the sole prerogative of God (2:5-7). He claimed to be the Lord of the Sabbath, transcending the laws of its observance (2:28). When He was on the Sea of Galilee with his disciples and a violent storm threatened to pull them down, Jesus told the storm to ‘be still’ and it did. (4:30). When he was questioned by the high priest, Jesus said that he would sit at the right hand of the Power in heaven (14:62). In other words, He was going to rule from the throne of God alongside the Father.
Did Jesus Really Die on the Cross?
The Historical Evidence
As far as we know, no one in history ever survived a full Roman crucifixion. Many people died during the flogging alone. Most scholars agree that they can be more assured of Jesus’ death by crucifixion than of anything else in his life.
That Jesus was crucified and died through the process is granted by virtually 100 percent of scholars who study the subject. -Nabeel Qureshi
The core of the story is the same: Joseph of Arimethea takes the body of Jesus, puts it in a tomb.
Joeseph of Arimethea is undoubtedly a historical figure. – William Craig
“Christ…suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hand of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilate”-Tacitus, Roman historian
The Medical Evidence
In The Case for Christ, Alexander Metherell, MD, PhD, gave a detailed description from a medical perspective of the excruciating pain inflicted by Roman flogging and crucifixion. His conclusion: “There was absolutely no doubt that Jesus was dead”.
“Clearly, the weight of the historical and medical evidence indicates that Jesus was dead before the wound to his side was inflicted…Accordingly, interpretations based on the assumption that Jesus did not die on the cross appear to be at odds with modern medical knowledge.”-Dr. William A. Edwards, 1986 article in Journal of the American Medical Association.
Did Jesus Really Rise from the Grave?
Central Proclamation of the Early Church
“The resurrection was undoubtedly the central proclamation of the early church from the very beginning. The earlier Christians didn’t just endorse Jesus’ teachings; they were convinced they had seen him alive after his crucifixion. That’s what changed their lives and started the church. Certainly, since this was their centermost conviction, they would have made absolutely sure that it was true.” -Gary Habermas, PhD, DD
The Appearances of the Risen Christ
In the Gospels
Gary Habermas
• to Mary Magdelene, in John 20:10-18 • to the other women in Matthew 28:8-10
• to Cleopas and another disciple on the road to Emmaus, in Luke 24:13-32 • to eleven disciples and others, in Luke 24:37-49
• to ten apostles and others, with Thomas absent, in John 20:19-20
• to Thomas and the other apostles, in John 20:26-30
• to the disciples, in Matthew 28:16-20
• And he was with the apostles at the Mount of Olives before his ascension in Luke 24:50-52 and Acts 1:4-9
In Acts
Acts 2:32: “God raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of it.”
Acts 3:15: “You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. We are witnesses of this.”
Acts 10:41: “Peter and others ‘ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.”
Acts 13:31: “For many days he was seen by those who had traveled with him from Galilee to Jerusalem. They are now his witnesses to our people.”
The Importance of 1 Corinthians 15
I Corinthians 15:3-8
“For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn had received. That Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers and sisters at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died. Then he appeared to James. Then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.”
This is earliest account of the resurrection appearances.
“Paul received this material three years after his conversion when he took a trip to Jerusalem and met with Peter and James”. -Gary Habermas
“This tradition, we can be entirely confident, was formulated as tradition within months of Jesus’ death.” -James D.G. Dunn
Here were names of specific individuals and groups of people who saw him, written at a time when people could still check them out if they wanted confirmation.
Pauls’ conversion was about 32. He met the apostles about 35, so this account was within two to five years of the event.
Nobody questions that Paul wrote 1 Corinthians, and we have his affirming in two places that he personally encountered the resurrected Christ. He says in 1 Corinthians 9:1, “Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord?” And he says in 1 Corinthians 15:8 “Last of all he appeared to me also.
” The Historian Josephus
“Jesus was the Christ. He was crucified…on the third day he appeared to them restored to life.”
Michael Green
“The appearances of Jesus are as well authenticated as anything in antiquity…There can be no rational doubt that they occurred, and that the main reason why Christians became sure of the resurrection in the earliest days was just that.
The Empty Tomb
Nabeel Qureshi
Christianity began in Jerusalem, and if Jesus’ body had still been in the tomb, the Jewish authorities in Jerusalem could have easily ended Christianity by parading Jesus’ body throughout the city.
When asked about Jesus, the Jewish leadership said that the disciples had stolen his body, implicitly agreeing that the tomb was empty.
Circumstantial Evidence
• The willingness of the disciples to suffer and even die for what they experienced.
• The revolutionized lives of skeptics like James and Saul.
• The radical changes in social structures cherished by Jews for centuries.
• The sudden appearance of Communion and Baptism.
• The amazing emergence and growth of the Church.
J.P. Moreland
“When Jesus was crucified, his followers were discouraged and depressed. They no longer had confidence that Jesus had been sent by God because they believed anyone crucified was accursed by God. They also had been taught that God would not let his Messiah suffer death. The Jesus movement was all but stopped in his tracks.
Then, after a short period of time, we see them abandoning their occupations, regathering, and committing themselves to spreading a very specific message-that Jesus Christ was the Messiah of God who died on a cross, returned to life, and was seen alive by others.
Ongoing Encounters
The ongoing encounter with the resurrected Christ that happens all over the world in every culture. They will all testify that more than any single event in their lives, Jesus Christ has changed them.
Conclusion
Sir Lionel Lockwood – the world’s most successful lawyer
“I say unequivocally that the evidence for the resurrection of Jesus Christ is so overwhelming that it compels acceptance by proof which leaves absolutely no room for doubt.”
The Effects of Christianity
David Bentley Hart
The Rise of the importance of Christianity
“The old gods did not – and in their nature could not – inspire the building of hospitals and almshouses, or make feeding the hungry and clothing the naked a part of spiritual enlightenment, or foster any inherent concept of a dignity intimate to every human soul.
Christian teaching, from the first, placed charity at the center of the spiritual life as no pagan cult ever had, and raised the care of widows, orphans, the sick, the imprisoned, and the poor, to the level of the highest of religious obligations.”
Once Constantine became emperor and shifted state patronage to his new religion, storerooms became storehouses and the church became the first large organized institution of public welfare in western history.
The Protection of the Weak
Christianity both forbade the ancient practice of the exposure of unwanted infants – which is almost certainly to say, in the great majority of cases, girls – and assisted upon communal provisions for the needs of widows-than whom no class of persons in ancient society was typically more disadvantaged or helpless.
The Abolition of Slavery
If nothing else, the Christian church admitted slaves to full membership and allowed them full access to its mysteries, and inspired masters and slaves to worship and pray together as equal members of the one household of faith.
The driving impetus for the abolition of slavery was the evangelical awakening in England. Christians rammed abolition through Parliament in the beginning of the Nineteenth Century. [Strobel]
Liberation From Hopelessness
Whatever else Christianity brought into the late antique world, the principal gift it offered to pagan culture was liberation from spiritual anxiety, from the desperation born of a hopeless longing for escape from the sadness of having to forsake all love of the world absolutely in order to find salvation from a morbid terror of the body, and from the fear that the cosmic powers on high would prevent the spirit from reaching its heavenly home.
An Exalted View of Humanity
What is perhaps far more important is that it also gave that culture a coherent concept of the human as such, endowed with infinite dignity in all its individual “moments”, full of power and mysteries to be fathomed and esteemed. It provided an unimaginably exalted picture of the human person-made in the divine image and destined to partake of the divine nature without thereby diminishing or denigrating the concrete reality of human nature, spiritual, intellectual or carnal.
If Christianity Is True, Then So What?
Lee Strobel
• If Jesus is the Son of God, his teachings are more than just good ideas from a wise teacher. They are divine insights on which I can confidently build my life.
• If Jesus sets the standard for morality, I can now have an unwavering foundation for my choices and decisions, rather than basing them on the ever-shifting sands of expediency and self-centeredness.
• If Jesus did rise from the dead, he is still alive today and available for me to encounter on a personal basis.
• If Jesus conquered death, he can open the door of eternal life for me too.
• If Jesus has divine power, he has the supernatural ability to guide me and help me and transform me as I follow him.
• If Jesus personally knows the pain of loss and suffering, he can comfort and encourage me in the midst of the turbulence that he himself warned is inevitable in a world corrupted by sin.
• If Jesus loves me as he says, he has my best interest at heart. That means I have nothing to lose, and everything to gain by committing myself to him and his purposes.
• If Jesus is who he claims to be (and remember no leader of any other major religion has ever pretended to be God), as my creator he rightly deserves my allegiance, obedience, and worship. Nabeel Qureshi Now I knew what it meant to follow God. It meant walking boldly by His spirit of grace and love, in the confidence of everlasting life given through the Son, with the eternal purpose of proclaiming and glorifying the Father.
