Which Religions Preach The Resurrection?

Tom:

This is our Understanding the Scriptures segment, we are in he Book of Acts Chapter 17.Dave, we’ve got a few verses left, I’ll read 32 through 34.“And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked: and others said, We will hear thee again of this matter.So Paul departed from among them.Howbeit certain men clave unto him, and believed: among the which was Dionysius the Areopagite, and a woman named Damaris, and others with them.”Well, he stopped them short when he began to—seems like he had a rapt audience until Dave, he mentions the resurrection of the dead.

Dave:

Right, and of course he mentioned it in the context of Christ’s resurrections.He says in verse 31, God has appointed a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained:wherefore he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.So Tom, the resurrection is so important, and I probably said it a hundred times that, maybe even recently, Jesus didn’t say, I want you to go off, you know, after you guys steal my body and hide it in Peter’s basement, or wherever, and make them think that I rose from the dead, I want you to start preaching up in Siberia, and down in the tip of South Africa, nobody could check up on it there.No, Jesus said, I want you to begin in Jerusalem.Well, it was a short walk to the tomb.Look, the Romans, they’ve got a rebellion on their hands, they’ve got something going on here that they can’t stop.Their gods are being set aside for this God Jesus, that’s the way they are looking at it.If they could have displayed the body of Jesus Christ, that would have been the end of the so called Christian movement.And the rabbis, they certainly would love to do that.They put a guard there to make sure that the disciples did not steal the body.They said, Then the last error will be worse than the first, we’ll prove to them, because He said in three days He would rise from the dead.All we’ve got to do is have a guard there for three days, and if He hasn’t come out of that grave by then, then we will just publicize this and everybody will know He is a fraud.Well, in fact He did come out of the grave, as eyewitnesses tell us, and there’s an empty grave over there outside Jerusalem.Buddha’s grave is occupied, Muhammad’s grave is occupied, you know, the Medina, but the grave of Jesus is empty.Somebody said, Why follow a loser?This is the heart of it.The resurrection, it says of Paul, he preached Christ and the resurrection.No point in preaching about Christ as just a great example.Is He alive?He promised forgiveness of sins.He said, Because I live, you will live also.The proof of the pudding is, did He rise from the dead?If He didn’t rise from the dead, He is a victim of death itself.And Paul, writing in 1 Corinthians 15 says:The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death, then will be brought to pass, death is swallowed up in victory.Where is your sting, you grave, and so forth.So, Paul is preaching the resurrection, he got to, now, he’s on Mars Hill.Nevertheless Tom, this is the heart of Christianity.

Tom:

Dave, what do you think about those who try to use Paul’s address here on Mars Hill as a methodology for witnessing and evangelizing?Even to the point today we see attempts like the emerging church, where they say, Hey, Paul did it on Mars Hill, we’re going to go to the culture and we’re going to present things with regard to the culture that people can identify with, and so on.Do you think that’s effective?I mean, Paul, even though we see this in Scripture, it says just a few came to him, and howbeit certain men clave unto him, and believed, and just a couple.

Dave:

Yeah, Tom, it’s hard for us to judge because, for example, earlier in Acts, as we have seen a few months ago, I guess, in one place Paul raises someone from the dead and it says many clave unto him.Another place he heals a man named Anneas, and it says, All they, over in this area, turned to the Lord.So, was he ineffective here?We don’t know who thought this over later, but it’s not a great revival, that’s for sure, and I think it’s telling us that educated people, people who think they are smart, people who have degrees, or whatever, they are more difficult to reach than others because they are more self sufficient in themselves.And these people here, it shows their insincerity, they just lived to hear some new thing.Well okay, all right Paul, you had your say, now we want to hear something new.So Tom, I don’t know.Every time I witness to someone I just say a prayer inside, Lord, please, help me, and show me what to say.And somebody wants to argue and argue and argue, I’m not going to waste my time.And Paul was in the midst of some arguers, they were there to dispute.

Tom:

Not that Paul was put off by that, he did that quite often.

Dave:

Right, he was a good disputer, he deputed in the synagogues and the market place, it says.So, I don’t know, it says certain clave to him, and I suppose that’s the way it is.The scripture says, not many mighty, not many wise, not many rich.God has chosen the foolish things of this world to confound the wise, and the weak things to confound the mighty.So, I know that there are some Christian groups and they aim for leaders, important people.If we could just get him on God’s side, God would really have a better team than He had before.No, we’renot worthy, I mean, God can—well, you know, John the Baptist said, Think not to say within yourselves we are the seed of Abraham, God can raise up seeds of Abraham from these stones.He doesn’t need me, He doesn’t need my bright mind, if I had one, what He needs is my heart, and he’s going to have to reach these men through their minds, that’s where they spend their time, but ultimately, God has to get to their hearts, and they’ve got hard hearts.

Tom:

But that’s also the work of the Holy Spirit.We don’t know what seeds have already been planted, how the Holy Spirit is bringing conviction in the heart of individual, and then they respond to truth.

Dave:

See, Verse 33, is quite a contrast to some other verses in the Book of Acts, where it says, he continued there three years, or he continued there two years, and where God said, I have much people in this place, fear not, Paul.Verse 33, says:“So Paul departed from among them.”Paul is just saying, Look, I’ve spent all the time I am going to spend here, I want to go on to some people who will be easier to reach with the gospel.And then, Tom, that raises a problem.Are some people disposed to believe the gospel, other people are not?So, I guess it’s not my fault.If I have too big a brain and I’m too intellectual, I’m too well educated, and I’ve got several Ph.D’s, etc. etc, and therefore I don’t want to believe this stuff, does that excuse me?I don’t think so.And you know what I often say—People say, Well, why do some believe and others don’t?My response is, Why don’t you ask them?They’re the ones who made the choice.So Tom, I guess we can’t put a bottom line on this thing here.

Tom:

There are ways the Bible, the Scriptures indicate that we are to go about witnessing.You know, we’re heavily in favor of prophecy.That was Paul’s way, especially among the Jews.

Dave:

Jesus used different methods with different people, amazing!Right, but also with healing, trying to come up with a methodology for healing, you’ll be dumbfounded because it’s as God wills.

Dave:

As God wills, and as men are willing to respond.