HE DIDN’T DIE

By Rick Mathes

1 Corinthians 15:12 (NASB77) ¹²  Now if Christ is preached, that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?

The whole fabric of Christianity depends on the literal resurrection of His body to everlasting life. If He didn’t our faith is a scam of no value. Most of the world, all the non-believing world would have another answer to the question, “Where is His Body?”

One that was very prominent at that time was that He really didn’t die; He just went into a swoon. This an best be explained by Eastern mystics that can so control their bodies that their heartbeat becomes indiscernible. If He did can you even imagine that He would fool His closest friends, have the strength to move the stone and then slip by the soldiers who were outside to prevent His escape or body theft?

A fascinating theory was that someone who looked like Him emerged from the tomb and fooled everyone. I think it would be impossible to fool His closest friends especially when 500 watched His feet leave the ground after 40 days of close-up and personal Bible studies. It’s a real stretch to consider that anyone other than Jesus had all that visibility and wasn’t recognized as a fraud. Believe me, if it was, someone would have made this fraud known.

How about vision theory? I really don’t believe all these witnesses could hae had the same bogus vision. I don’t care how high quality their drugs were!

The spirit theory claims that the Holy Spirit didn’t come upon Jesus until He was baptized and the Holy Spirit left the moment before He died so that He died fully and only as a man. The problem with this is the Scriptures don’t agree. All though the whole Bible including the Old Testament, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are united in the fullest as one.

And lastly was the heart theory whereby He was resuscitated and returned to life and came to America as the Mormons claim. There is absolutely no archeological or any speck of American native evidence that this occurred.

All the witnesses to His life, death and resurrection and ascension died with these truths on their lips. Men don’t die for a lie. He rose, ascended and is now in glory. The witnesses agree.