The Resurrection is the eleventh article in the series, The Life of Jesus Christ. To read the whole series click here.
Yancey comments on the actions of the soldiers guarding Jesus’ tomb (Matthew 27:62-66; 28:11-15). “Soldiers standing guard outside Jesus’ tomb were the only eyewitnesses of the greatest miracle in history … But here is an astounding fact: later that afternoon the soldiers who had seen proof of the resurrection with their own eyes changed their story to a lie, parroting the priests’ line that ‘His disciples came during that night and stole him away while we were asleep’ … Those who did not believe found ways to ignore strong evidence.”[1]
Many ignore strong evidence. They would rather believe a lie.
The New Testament has strong historical evidence to support its reliability. Professors of ancient history, who aren’t Christians, study the New Testament purely for historical reasons. They regard the New Testament as a reliable history of the time and believe the contents have been faithfully recorded from what was common knowledge. This means incidents have not been added later nor were they an exaggeration of well-known events. Indeed, the evidence for the reliability of the Scripture is a lot stronger than for other works of antiquity.[2]
Yet many reject the evidence without even considering it. Considering the evidence is challenging because it brings up the issue of accountability to God. If there is no Jesus, no cross and no resurrection and therefore no God then I’m free to do whatever I like. But if Jesus was a real person, who lived, claimed to be God, died and rose again, then I need to change my beliefs. If I change my beliefs, I’ll have to change the way I live.
We have to accept the fact that some won’t be convinced. Not because the evidence isn’t sufficient but because they have chosen to ignore the evidence.
[1] Philip Yancey, The Jesus I Never Knew, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1995), 213-214
[2] John Dickson, The Christ files : how historians know what they know about Jesus (Blue Bottle Books, 2005)
