Mission 66 (English podcast)
Matthew 28 Christ is Risen Hallelujah!
There is more and better written documentation evidence for the resurrection of Christ than there is proof that Julius Caesar ever existed. The resurrection is one of the best attested facts of human history and yet really it seems that some people rather believe at "rageous speculations" than to just accept the report as it was entered by the gospel writers. This is Mission 66, a daily dive into God's Word. I'm Rob Dempsey. Today we continue our focus on the Gospels. Mission 66 originates from the Ministry of Bible Teacher and Pastor Dr. Louis Ciao and is produced and heard in multiple languages around the world in partnership with Trans World Radio. Let me remind you to download your free study guide of the Gospels. You'll be able to go deeper into God's Word and follow along with each day's program. It's a great companion resource of the audio teaching of John Matthews and Esther Susullo. To get your free study guide of the Gospels, visit Mission66.org. That's Mission66.org. John Matthews is our teacher. His co-host, Esther Susullo, gets us started today. It is with great joy that we welcome you to yet another Mission 66 program as we come to the end of the Gospel of Matthew, where in chapter 28 we'll read about a victorious end of what it seemed like a tragic play. Now it may have seemed like the Christmas story and the miracles, the healings as well as the teachings and the entire life in the ministry of Jesus Christ ended in a tomb sealed by the Roman army. But today we'll learn about the event that has become the cornerstone of the Christian faith around the world. Well our teacher John Matthews will lead this joyful procession with the theme Christ is risen, hallelujah. Thank you Esther, and so good to be with you all wherever you're listening to Mission 66 today. What a chapter. Let's get straight to Matthew chapter 28 and verse 1, which says, "Now after the Sabbath toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb, and behold there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning and his clothing white as snow, and for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, "Do not be afraid. For I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he has risen," as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead, and behold he is going before you too Galilee, and there you will see him. See, I've told you. No begins the last chapter of the gospel of Matthew and what a way to begin. Throughout history, many religious leaders have put themselves forward claiming to be somebody special, but every one of them are now buried under the ground. They're all dead. At funerals, sometimes the preacher will say that the departed loved one still lives with us in our memories or in our spirit. So Jesus didn't just rise from the dead in our memories. He didn't just rise from the dead in spirit. He arose bodily, and his resurrected body was seen and felt by eyewitnesses. Only Jesus Christ, the Lord, shows up as somebody who has conquered death triumphing with life. Jesus' resurrection was not just some interesting story that people like to read with a happy ending. This account proves that everything he said during his earthly ministry is true. It proves that he was indeed the Christ, the Messiah. It proves that he was the Son of God and has God's endorsement as the only one who even qualified to be the Savior. And the first people who noticed that Jesus Christ had risen were women. Which actually brings up a really interesting question, John, what were these women going to do at the tomb? I mean, what did they hope to find there? Did they already expect that Jesus had risen? You might think so when you read the passage, but this isn't what's happening here. They were only there expecting to prepare Jesus' body properly. These preparations included oils, perfumes and other special products according to the biblical customs in the region. So these women were heading to the tomb early on Sunday. And when they get there, there is this extraordinary surprise waiting for them. They were not expecting Jesus to literally rise from the dead, but that's what he'd done. And the women, like Mary Magdalene, were the privileged ones to see his risen body before anybody else did. And this reveals how Jesus cared and gave special attention to women. And by the way, as further proof of Jesus' resurrection, it was the testimony of the women which was believed. And that was unusual in this day and age because in this cultural context, the testimony of a woman was not even able to be used as evidence in court. Yet in this case, they were the ones who announced that the Lord had risen. And they were believed. And it says in verse 8, they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy. And they ran to tell his disciples and behold, Jesus met them and said, "Greetings." And they came up and took hold of his feet and they worshipped him. And then Jesus said to them, "Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me." Christ has risen. Hallelujah? or followers of Christ should tell it from the mountaintops. Tell others what God has done for you. And now let's see what's happening in another scenario, verse 11. While they were going behold, some of the guards went into the city and told the chief priests all that had taken place. And when they had assembled with the elders and taken counsel, they gave a sufficient sum of money to the soldiers and said, "Tell people, his disciples came by night and stole him away whilst we were asleep. And if this comes to the governor's ears, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble." So they took the money and did as they were directed. And this story has been spread amongst the Jews to this day. Yeah, John. And I think this explanation has endured, truly endured through the centuries by people who do not want to really believe what happened with Jesus. Yeah, you're right, Esther. Money paid to the soldiers for promoting that which they knew to be a lie. How often has that happened in human history? And before Christ returns ever, will it be? The resurrection of Christ is a joy to his friends, but it's a terror to his enemies. Many have been the doubters who've dismissed the eyewitness accounts of Christ's resurrection and have tried to say that there must be some other explanation for this. And let's look at one of the main explanations that mankind have come up with to try to convince themselves that it didn't happen. Explanation number one, that Jesus's disciples or somebody else could have stolen his body, lied about it, and made everybody think that he rose from the dead. Will this explanation really needs to be thrown out immediately as it doesn't even stand up under logic? Because nobody could have gotten past those Roman soldiers who were guarding the tomb if any of the soldiers were awake and if they were all asleep, how could they have known what had happened? And if any had been awake, they would have been duty-bound to rouse the others and catch the body snatches. And certainly if they'd all been asleep, they never would have dared confess it because then they would have been executed for dereliction of duty and you know those Jewish rulers would have been the first to call for their punishment. And remember, it was the priests who thought up this false report to cover up the account of Christ's resurrection and so they pay the soldiers off to spread a lie and promised to appease the authorities if the soldiers get into trouble. Now even if the disciples wanted to steal the body, how could they? The stone blocking the entrance weighed about two tons. The wrappings around Jesus' body, according to the customs of the time, were filled with material that probably weighed another 40 kilos. It would have taken a mighty effort even to get that body and to carry it anywhere, all the while being careful not to wake up any of the guards. I'm saying it's very hard to think that the disciples could have stolen Jesus' body even if they wanted to and another thing, and it's a big point in this. How would these disciples who had been scared stiff? Remember, they'd scattered. All of them had scattered when Jesus was being crucified. And now how would these men afterwards be able to preach the gospel in such a fearless way had they fabricated everything themselves? It doesn't make any sense if they knew they'd made everything up and Jesus had never really risen from the dead, then how would they have been able to face the persecution that they faced and the miserable deaths for something that they had simply made up? And where had their courage come from? What had changed? It doesn't make any sense at all. Now who else could have taken the body the Romans? Why would they have done that? They had no interest in stealing the body of some troublemaker, though probably glad he was gone. The Jews, they may have had the most to gain by stealing it because if anyone had been able to steal the body, all they would have to do was produce the body and prove once and for all that Jesus was still dead, and that would have been the end of Christianity right there, right then. The fact is, nobody has ever produced the body and nobody ever will because Christ is risen from the dead, isn't that the best news you've ever heard? Because Christ is risen from the dead. This is Mission 66, and currently we are exploring the Gospel of Matthew today with our teacher John Matthews, and we've been discussing several explanations that the world has come up with to try to deny or perhaps even explain away the truth of Jesus' resurrection. Well, at this point, we've dismissed the possibility that his body was stolen, but John, do you have any more that you'd like to share on this? Well, Esther, yeah, we've got another explanation, let's call it explanation number two because there are people who think, for example, that this story of the resurrection was inserted into the New Testament many years later after Christ had died. Now, today we know that this cannot be true because the documents, the writings of the Gospel, especially the book of Mark were written very close to the time of Jesus. So the idea that the New Testament was edited a century after everything had occurred is no longer valid because the writings were dated. We know when they were completed. Explanation three, let's call it that, the wrong tomb theory. Some skeptics say, "What if the disciples got bad information and they ended up at the wrong tomb which may have been empty and they mistakenly assumed that Jesus had risen?" Well, that's very, well, that's impossible to believe because then it would have meant the entire Roman guard detail must have also gotten the wrong tomb as well and were guarding the wrong tomb. Even so, why didn't anyone come up later and clear up the situation saying, "Hey, the right tomb is over here. This is the one with the body in." Explanation four, hallucination theory, maybe the disciples were seeing things, maybe they'd gone a little crazy with grief or something like that, maybe they wanted to see Jesus again so badly that they thought they saw him. Now, what's the problem with that theory? Well, there are several issues with that. One is clinically when hallucination occurs, the reason or whatever stress and strain that caused the hallucination eventually passes and the patient begins to realize that what they were seeing was just an hallucination. Every apostle testified in this story that they were eyewitnesses of the risen Christ. But all the apostles have been seeing the same hallucination for weeks afterwards. One Corinthians, it says that Jesus appeared to a crowd of more than 500 people. How could 500 people have had the same hallucination at the same time? And finally, explanation number five, the swoon theory or the apparent death theory. This one speculates that Jesus only swooned or fainted from all the suffering and appeared to have died, but really didn't. It proposes that Jesus was weak from all his beatings and then had heart failure on the cross. So there was no pulse, but that after he was put into that nice, cool tomb, he revived and got better. The only look dead, they say, and there was no coroner there to pronounce him dead like you'd have today. And so he got vigorous enough to get up, roll the stone away from inside the tomb, breaking the Roman seal in the process that maybe he became strong enough to knock out 16 armed Roman soldiers before merrily going out and telling everyone that he'd risen from the dead. Well, just think after being flogged, beaten up, crucified, stabbed in the lungs with a spear, losing all that blood, being torn down off those nails and being put into an empty tomb with a stone of two tons covering the exit. Do you think even a healthy human being would be able to get up and push that stone aside, walk out and just go around talking to people? You could believe that if you wanted to. In fact, you could believe any of those explanations if you wanted to, but there is more and better written documentation evidence for the resurrection of Jesus Christ than there is proof that Julius Caesar even existed. The resurrection is the best attested fact of human history, and yet really it seems that some people would rather believe outrageous speculations than just accept the report as it was written, as it was entered by the gospel writers. And so after this, we come to the very end of Matthew. And it says in verse 16, "Now, the eleven disciples went to Galilee, eleven, obviously, because Judas is no longer with them, to the mountain where Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him, they worshipped, but some doubted, look at that. Some of the disciples themselves still doubt Jesus' resurrection, even when they see him in the flesh for themselves." Do you remember the disciple Thomas in the book of John, sometimes known as doubting Thomas? And there's a reference in one Corinthians chapter 15 of James and Peter seeing Jesus. And when Jesus appears to 500 people, and now it says here, verse 18. And Jesus came and said to them, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age." Matthew ends chapter 28 with these words of Jesus, which have come to be known in Christian circles as the Great Commission. Jesus himself, directing or commissioning his believers to go and make disciples of all nations. And this is why we call our program Mission 66. We are on a mission to proclaim Christ's resurrection. This is our main reason for being on the radio right now. This is why the gospel has reached your home, your ears today because it is being preached all over the world to all tribes and languages and all nations and more and more people are learning about what Jesus did for us. Jesus also directed that everyone who becomes his disciples should be baptized in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, baptism as an outward sign of an inward washing or sanctification of the Spirit which seals and evidences the believers' justification. Everyone should also be taught to obey everything that Jesus himself has commanded us. And as we do this, Jesus promises to be with us and comfort our hearts to the end. He has risen. And what happens at the end of this life? Our forevermore begins. You see, this life is a drop in the ocean compared with eternity. You see, friends, the best is yet to be for those who believe in Jesus Christ. Ah, a man, John, well, you know, me, I always have questions and, you know, I was thinking Jesus was, was set to rise on the third day. But if he died late Friday, I think, and then only had Saturday and then resurrected on Sunday morning, that's only two days and that's based on a loose calculation. Yeah, well, as to some people have suggested, for example, that Jesus died on a Wednesday and then resurrected on a Saturday, which was the Sabbath. But this suggestion just doesn't fit into it to the biblical account in the New Testament. The Book of Acts tells us that the church met on the Thursday of the week, properly in honor of the resurrection. So it evidently took place on Sunday, the first day of the week. Also they had a different way of counting days back then. So according to the ancient Jewish traditions, they would have counted Friday as a full day, in which case Jesus was buried for three days, because Friday is counted as a full day, then Saturday, and finally Sunday, which is the third day, the day on which he came back to life. And obviously that's also counted. Okay. So what was he doing during those three days? Yeah, really interesting question, Esther, and nobody knows is the answer. It's been supposed by some that he went into the bowels of hell and snatched the keys of death and hell from the devil, or that he went to a place called Abraham's bosom and freed all the departed saints who'd been kept in limbo waiting for the resurrection. It's also supposed by some that he suffered the eternal pains of hell in that time, cut off from the presence and the love of his father for those three days as part of his atonement. Then again, as he told the penitent thief on the cross, today you shall be with me in paradise. So which is it? I'm afraid much of this remains a mystery until the time when all mysteries will be revealed. Yeah. And did anyone actually see the specific moment when Jesus was resurrected? I mean, is there any written accounts of how it happened? How can we know the details? Well, there's no account of how the resurrection itself actually happened. No one saw it occurring. There was no security camera, obviously, recording the event, but the tomb was certainly found empty. The grave clothes were found neatly folded, and we have the miraculous and extraordinary appearance of the angels who'd rolled away the stone, frightened the soldiers. They were described, weren't they, as being like dead men, and that's pointed out in Matthew. The huge stone that weighs about two tons had been moved. We know that. And Jesus shows up visibly and physically to the disciples several times after this. So there's no doubt that he really rose from the dead. And I think we've covered that quite thoroughly here on today's episode. Well, I can't believe that we've already finished the series in Matthew, and we'll be heading to the next gospel written by Mark when we meet you again, friend. But John, how will we summarize this wonderful last chapter of Matthew? Well, Esther, it can be summed up by a very short truth that contains 11 words, 11 words that will change your life if you believe them. I'll repeat that because you'll never hear anything more important in this life. Here comes 11 words that will change your life if you believe them. Jesus Christ died on the cross for sinners and rose again. This truth is supported by many undeniable proofs, including eyewitness reports who saw Jesus alive again and by the written accounts of all four of the gospel writers who are to be trusted and believed and believers are commissioned to go and tell it on the mountains and the valleys over the hills and plains everywhere effectively and to make disciples of all people at home and overseas wherever you may live. That Jesus Christ is the Messiah, the Son of God, has risen from the dead and he is with us to the end of the age and then forever more. Well, amen, friend. Thank you so much for being with us on Mission 66. I hope you'll join us next time as our teacher John Matthews unpacks the testimony from another gospel writer whose name was Mark. So until then, my name is Esther. Goodbye and God bless you. As we close today's program, let me remind you to download your free study guide of the Gospels. You'll be able to go deeper into God's word and follow along with each day's program. It's a great companion resource of the audio teaching of John Matthews and Esther Susullo. To get your free study guide of the gospels, visit Mission66.org. That's Mission66.org. It's a great resource. You can also support the Ministry of Mission 66 when you visit the site. You'll help continue the program here and around the world. Mission66 is a Ministry of Transworld Radio in partnership with Dr. Louise Ciao. I'm Rob Dempsey. (upbeat music)