I find it fascinating that nowhere in the New Testament do the disciples try to explain the resurrection.  They did not need to.  The resurrection explained them!  The entire New Testament itself plus all of the subsequent history of the Church over the past two thousand years is but a commentary on Jesus’ words, “I am the resurrection and the life!” (John 11:25)

Let’s take a look at how these words first came to be spoken.  In John 11 we have the touching story of the miraculous raising of Jesus’ friend Lazarus from the dead.  Many details of the story are puzzling to us, and some scholars are not even sure whether the author intends for us to take it as a literal historical event, but whatever our conclusion may be on that score, we must recognize that it was put into the Gospel to proclaim the fact that Jesus Christ is the resurrection and the life.  In the story, our Lord receives word of the illness of His friend, Lazarus.  Indeed, it is said in John that Lazarus specifically is a “disciple whom Jesus loved.” This has led some to speculate as to whether Lazarus is really the true author of this Fourth Gospel, for the unnamed author is often referred to as “the disciple whom Jesus loved.” That is a minority view, but it is a possibility.  In our Scripture we read that Jesus hears of the death of His friend, Lazarus.  He says in John.  11:11, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him.” The word Jesus uses, however, is ambiguous.  It may mean either death or normal sleep.  The disciples, supposing he means that Lazarus is merely asleep, say, “That will be good for him.  He needs the rest.” But Jesus then says, unambiguously, “Lazarus is dead.” “Lazarus is dead!”

Lazarus is dead!  How final those terrible words sound!  What more can be said?  Death seems to have the last word.  When we are on the receiving end of such words, they smash our hopes and tear at our hearts and gouge great holes into the fabric of our being.  In that moment, we begin to feel real grief.  Someone we have loved is dead.  What more can be said?  Lazarus is dead, and nothing more can be said.  Unless Lazarus is a friend of Jesus.  Without Jesus, death is terribly final.  With Jesus...well, let us see.  Jesus goes to Bethany, the home of Mary and Martha and Lazarus.  It is just over the Mount of Olives from Jerusalem, about two miles from the Holy City.  Bethany served as sort of a “bedroom community” for those who lived and worked in Jerusalem.  When Jesus visited Jerusalem, he usually stayed in Bethany, and commuted into the Holy City from there.  Jesus goes to Bethany, the home of Mary and Martha and Lazarus.  Martha, always the busy one, hurries out to meet Him.  She greets Him with what might be considered a rebuke, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” But she tempers her words by saying, “But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.” What a fantastic faith is expressed in those words!  Jesus says to her, “Your brother will rise again.” Martha replies, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” Again, what a fantastic faith she has.  That faith was not shared by everyone in Jesus day - or in our own day.  If you recall the various religious groups in Jesus’ day, you may remember that one group, the Sadducees, did not believe in a resurrection.  Another group, the Pharisees, did believe in the resurrection.  In fact, I would suggest that Jesus comes closest to sharing the faith of the Pharisees than any other group we meet in the Gospels.  So much so that in Matthew 23:2 He says that the Pharisees have the right ideas; it is their conduct that bothered Him. 

You see, the faith that death is not the end of life grew slowly over the centuries.  One of the surprising things we discover as we dig into the Bible is that in the Hebrew Bible (usually called the Old testament), there is no really developed belief in life after death.  It gives one pause to realize that most of the great heroes of the Bible lived and loved and served God without any fear of punishment or hope of reward in another life.  The idea that there might yet be another chapter to be written in the story of our human life beyond the grave grew slowly over many centuries.  The earliest glimmering of such an idea was the belief that at death the soul of every person, good or bad, went to a place called in Hebrew Sheol.  Sheol was not necessarily a place of torment, but merely a shadowy sort of existence, a place where God was absent.  Therefore it came as something of a shock when the author of Psalm 139 said confidently, “Even if I make my bed in Sheol, behold, you (God) are there!” (Psalm 139:8) Instead of being a sad place where God was not, the ancient writer said that Sheol is a place where God is, for God never lets go of any one of us.  God loves us too much for that.  What a magnificent faith!  Most of us still have not caught up to it!  But it was a minority view in the Old Testament. 

By the time of Jesus there were two main parties within the Jewish religion.  The Sadducees, as I said, did not believe in any sort of resurrection.  This life was it, period.  (Someone has quipped: “That was why they were sad, you see!”) But the Pharisees did believe in resurrection.  They believed that at death the two worlds of time and eternity met and kissed.  They believed that at the end of human history there would be a general resurrection of all the dead.  And Martha shared that Pharasaic faith.  She said to Jesus, “Lord, I know that my brother will rise again at the last day.” But then Jesus gave the whole conversation a startling twist.  He said, “I am the resurrection and the life!” Notice the present tense.  Here is where John gives us new insight into the meaning of life and death.  In the first three (Synoptic) Gospels, the phrase “eternal life” seems to refer primarily to something in the future.  It means “the life of the age to come, at the last days.” In John the emphasis shifts to the present.  Eternal life is something which has its beginning in the here and now.  Indeed, John says in 17:3  “...this is eternal life, (present tense), that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” Eternal Life, for John, is not simply a reward tacked onto the end of life, a lollipop given for “being good.” Rather, it is a quality of life lived in the here and now which is of such a quality of depth that it continues on beyond the portal we call death. 

“I am the resurrection,” said Jesus to Mary at Bethany.  And a few short moments later He demonstrated the truth of His words by raising her brother Lazarus from the dead.  And a few short days later He demonstrated them again by His own resurrection from death to life.  So, as I said at the beginning: the earliest Christians did not try to explain the resurrection.  Rather, the resurrection explained them.  Without the resurrection there would have been no faith to proclaim, no New Testament to publish, and no Church to proclaim it.  As a writer said some years ago, “trying to explain the Church without the resurrection would be like trying to explain Lake Michigan by saying that the mayor of Chicago left the faucet running!”

Pinchas Lapide, who is a Jewish scholar of the New Testament, in his book “The Resurrection of Jesus” says these startling words: “...as a faithful Jew, I cannot explain a historical development which, despite many errors and much confusion, has carried the central message of Israel from Jerusalem into the world of the nations, as the result of blind happenstance, or human error, or a materialistic determinism...  The experience of the resurrection as the foundation act of the church which has carried the whole Western world must belong to God’s plan of salvation.” (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1983, p. 142) Lapide says that we have to “explain the fact that the solid hillbillies from Galilee who, for the very real reason of the crucifixion of their master, were saddened to death, were changed within a short period of time into a jubilant community of believers.” (Ibid., P.129)

Of all the events of human history, none has been examined with more intense scrutiny than the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and it has always come forth from such examination unscathed.  Some years ago a brilliant lawyer by the name of Frank Morison set out to tear the evidence for the resurrection to shreds.  What happened was that he merely exposed the unshakable evidence for it, and wrote a book about his experience of being converted to faith in Christ in the process, a book titled “Who Moved the Stone?” His book is a cracking good mystery story as well as a living testimony of the faith that has moved millions down through the centuries.  In the 18th century, a French philosopher named M.  Lepeaux came to visit the Prime Minister of France, Charles Maurice Talleyrand.  Lepeaux made this visit, he said, to tell Talleyrand that he had invented a new religion which, in his judgment, was far superior to Christianity.  His difficulty was that few people were accepting his new faith.  Lepeaux wanted Talleyrand’s advice concerning how he should present this new religion to the French people.  Lepeaux explained the superiority of his religion to Christianity.  He told of his own efforts and the efforts of his followers to propagandize their faith.  He ended his presentation by asking the Prime Minister what more he could do to encourage people to accept his new religion.  Talleyrand replied that starting a new religion was most difficult.  He said that it was something he personally had never tried - so he hardly knew what advice to give.  “Still,” he said after a moment’s reflection, “There is one plan which you might at least try.  I should recommend that you contrive to have yourself crucified, and on the third day rise again!” His point was well taken.  No other religion has as its founder One who has risen from the dead.  Christianity is the only religion with a risen Savior.  Other religions have their tombs and their monuments.  Their followers can tell you where their founders were buried or cremated.  They can describe the funeral and the interment.  But when it comes to Jesus Christ, we have some tombs where some people think he may have been buried...two of them in Jerusalem, to be exact, but they are empty.  (I personally believe after many years of researching the question that the older one, the one covered over by the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is the correct place.) But whichever one you choose, they are both empty.  Death could not hold Him in its clutches.  On Easter Sunday the stone was rolled away, and an angel (a messenger) from God said, “He is not here!  He has risen as He said he would!” And He who was the resurrection for Himself is also the resurrection for others.  That is what gives us the courage to stand beside the grave of a loved one and solemnly but joyfully intone the words of our Lord, “I am the resurrection and the life, the one who believes in me shall never die!” He also said, “I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you.   In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live.  On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.  (John 14:18-20)

“I am the resurrection!” Jesus said.  He also said, l “I am the life!” What did He mean?  Well, in the Greek there are two words for life.” There is bios, which means “life” in the sense of asking, “Is there life on Mars?” The answer to that question is probably “No,” even though in recent years a vice president declared that there could be on the basis of the “canals” which some purport to be able to see through a strong telescope.  That view is not widely held among astronomers, however.  I suppose a much more relevant question would be: if we keep on building stockpiles of nuclear armaments just how much longer will there be life on earth?  But I digress.  That is one meaning of bios -“life” which simply exists.  But there is another Greek word for life, and that is zoe.  This word means “life” in the sense that one might say, “I never knew what real life was until I fell in love!” This is life with a capital “L.” Jesus said in John.  10:10: “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.  I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” The word “life” which Jesus uses here is a hopeful word.  (Greek: zoe, which is used in the New Testament to refer to a special quality of life, a life which God has in Himself and which God gave to the Incarnate Son, which the Son manifested to the world, and which He promised to all who put their trust in Him.) In other words, Christ brought an infusion of life and hope into the world.  The poet Swinburne said that “Thou hast conquer’d, O pale Galilean, and the world has gone gray from thy breath!” But I would suggest that precisely the opposite is the case.  The only breath of fresh air and fresh hope that we have in our world has come because of Christ.  If God’s resurrection power as manifested in Jesus Christ could turn the worst that the world could do (Good Friday) into the best good news the world has ever heard (Easter Sunday) - then just think what God could do with our tired old world if we would only give God half a chance! 

I think that the resurrection faith could work wonders in our personal lives, too.  There are so many things that defeat us every day: sins, selfishness, petty jealousies, habits that we don’t seem able to break.  But how often the writers of the New Testament speak of the power of Jesus Christ to raise people from the death of sin to newness of life; not just after we die, but right here and now.  The writer of the first Epistle of Peter said to the first Christians, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!  By his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” (I Peter 1:3) No wonder the most obvious characteristic of those first Christians is that they were happy.  They were beaten, persecuted, kicked down and kicked around, laughed at, ridiculed and rejected, but they were happy.  They were happy because they were absolutely convinced that sin and death would not have dominion forever.  They believed Jesus when he told them that He was the resurrection and the life.  And they brought their message into a world which had just about given up hope.  Many had abandoned the traditional religions.  Others believed that they were caught up in the hands of a blind Fate; their destiny determined by the stars, or the planets, or the gods, or whatever - and there was no help or hope for them.  After Lazarus emerged from the tomb, Jesus said, “Unbind him, and let him go!” (John 11:44) Well, millions of people all around us are wrapped up in themselves, in their sins, their selfishness, wrapped up in despair and hopelessness.  To them, through us, Jesus says, “Unbind them, and let them go!” He still brings newness of life to people.  A converted and reformed alcoholic was once asked whether he believed the miracles of the Bible.  For instance, did he believe that Jesus turned water into wine at the wedding feast at Cana?  The former alcoholic replied, “I don’t know whether Jesus turned water into wine, but I do know that in my house, he turned beer into furniture!” Unbind him, and let him go! 

Jesus Christ is still raising people to new lives.  It doesn’t have to be as dramatic as that.  Many of us are selfish, dead to the feelings or needs of others, so involved in petty dishonesties and disloyalties that we are dead to honor; or so frightened by the forecasts of imminent disaster which come from the peddlers of doom in our world that we are dead to hope.  Many of our marriages are dead to love and need to be resurrected to new life.  And Jesus Christ has come to give us all that new life.  “I am the resurrection and the life,” He said.  No wonder the early Christians were happy.  They were convinced that sin and death could not have ultimate dominion over them.  St.  Paul said, “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me.  And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” (Gal.  2:19b, 20)

In our imaginations, let us go to that Upper Room in Jerusalem on that first Good Friday evening.  We find the door shut, and the disciples huddled behind it, their faces ashen with fear.  They are heartbroken and disillusioned.  We quickly go away for a pall of gloom hangs over the place like a mushroom cloud.  But three nights later, we return again.  Can this be the same house?  The same people?  It was all darkened and shuttered up.  Now, it is filled with light and life and joyous singing.  Were we to ask, “What happened?” They would reply, “Christ happened!  He has risen from the dead, and we have seen Him!” You see, to them, resurrection meant something more than merely the promise of life after death.  It meant the promise of life before death as well.  It meant that life, true Life, had broken into their lives here and now.  We live in a world where Christ is alive, and He is at work bringing new life to people.  That was their ringing testimony, and it is the testimony of the ages.  We do not explain the resurrection., The resurrection explains us. 

The poet John Masefield once wrote a dialogue in which Pilate’s wife Procula comes to speak with one of the guards who had been in charge of the crucifixion of Jesus, immediately after His body had been taken down from the cross.  “Is he dead?’ she asks.  The soldier answers, “No, lady, he is not dead.” “Well, where is he, then?” she asks.  And the soldier answers, “Let loose in the world, lady.  Let loose in the world, where neither Roman nor Jew can stop his truth!” Nor anyone else.  Amen and amen.