Fact or fiction. In Greek mythology there is story about the goddess of harvest. Just as we celebrate Thanksgiving in the fall the ancient Greeks celebrated their harvest too. Their harvest even had it very own goddess, a mythological woman named Demeter, and she had a daughter named Persephone. One day the god of the underground, named Pluto, came and snatched Persephone away, taking her back with him to the underground. Demeter was naturally quite grief stricken. In an act of retaliation, she caused the harvest to fail, and as the story goes, the earth became barren, and yielded no crops any more.
Persephone became a prisoner of the underworld, for she had made the mistake of eating some pomegranate seeds, and anyone who ate anything while in the underworld could never escape from it. After some negotiations however, Pluto and Demeter came to an agreement that resembles a modern day custody agreement after a marriage breakup. Persephone would spend six months with her mother Demeter, and the other six in the underworld with Pluto. Every time she went into the underworld, all vegetation, and crops would die. When she returned, six months later, everything would come to life again. There would be a time of new birth, and new life, new growth. In case you haven't made the connection, this was the mythological explanation for the seasonal cycle of fall, winter, spring and summer.
We have just recited the Apostles Creed, and have all reaffirmed our faith with it. That means we have said that we believe it when it says, "The third day he (Jesus) rose again from the dead." Last time we spoke about the importance of Jesus's death, and that he paid the price for us. Although that sounds like the injustice of God, it really is loving justice, for it is love that governed God’s actions on our behalf.
Today we see the ultimate limitlessness of God’s love. We will see that this whole account of Jesus’ resurrection must be true, or the purpose of God would be incomplete. It is the final chapter with the conclusion that without the resurrection our Christian faith would be futile, and quite pointless. As Paul wrote to the Church in Corinth, "If Christ had not been raised from death, then we have nothing to preach, and you have nothing to believe (I Cor 15:14).
The claim that Jesus rose from the dead, is far-reaching, and yet so important in the life of the Christian Church. Quite some time ago, I was at a conference sponsored by Church Alive, one of the four renewal groups within our United Church, where Dr. Graham Scott made this statement: "In order for the church to survive, we must recover the truth about the resurrection of Jesus Christ our Lord." I agree. The resurrection is a claim that has no half way about it. One cannot sort of believe it. One cannot sort of not believe it. One either believes it, or not. It is either fact, or fiction.
For many years now, there have been people who simply object to the resurrection of Jesus, because things like that simply do not happen. People never rise from the dead, and certainly not after three days. Why that is preposterous. That is the only reason they can give. But does it then automatically follow that it cannot happen?
Many of us will remember the late sixties, and early seventies, when the US was deeply involved with their lunar space program. Who can forget the TV pictures of men bouncing around on the moon in an environment with much less gravity then the earth. I distinctly remember the TV pictures of astronauts driving a golf cart on the moon's surface. If you are interested in seeing it, one such cart is on display at the Henry Ford Museum in Detroit MI. It was tremendous feat for man to walk on the moon. Who back then would have believed this could ever happen.
Yet there were people who did not believe, even after it happened. All the evidence was right there on TV, and yet they would not believe it. I know of one such person. He was a man who had moved from Mexico to Ontario, Canada, so he was familiar with deserts of Arizona. He, and others like him were totally convinced that the pictures they saw on TV were not from the moon at all, but from the deserts of Arizona. We smile and wonder at these people's naivety. For us the evidence speaks for itself. For them it was simply unbelievable. For millions, the Biblical evidence of the resurrection speaks for itself. For others it is absurd, and therefore they reject the whole thing, moving it from fact to fiction.
Some suggest that Jesus really didn't die. They are advocates of what is known as the "swoon theory". They say that Jesus only lost consciousness or fainted in a swoon, so to speak. He totally collapsed, but when he was put in the cool rock hewn grave, he slowly revived. He then somehow moved that heavy stone from the grave's entrance, and escaped.
Then there are some who suggest that the body of Jesus was stolen. Perhaps the disciples stole the body, and then claimed that Jesus rose from the dead. Well, you ask, "What about all the sightings, and interaction Jesus had with his disciples after his death. How can that be denied." Good question.
A very modern explanation is based completely on the psychology of the mind. The resurrection is explained by saying that the entire event was only in the minds of the followers of Jesus, probably no more than an hallucination, an illusion, or fantasy. At best, it was only a figment of their imagination. Even though the disciples were totally convinced that they had seen Jesus several times, it probably wasn't real. They only saw what their minds told them they wanted to see. Their desire to see him was so great that they actually thought they saw him, while it really only was the power of the deception of the mind at work. Jesus had been such a great part of their lives. As they remembered the great things God had done in history, the hope he had given, always turning disaster into something good, for them it simply followed that the good person with a good cause, always came out on top in, God's eyes, and who was a better man than Jesus. Consequently they sub-consciously reasoned that he must have risen. Then from that initial step of reasoning, they began to move toward believing, and soon they convinced themselves that indeed he had risen. Then love did the rest. Whether the resurrection took place or not, became a non-issue. All that matters was love and it was his unconquerable love that motivated them to believe that Jesus rose from the dead.
Strangely enough, it was not so much God's love, but love and concern for each other. In modern theological thinking, the resurrection takes place over and over again in the love and concern people have for each other. People need to be concerned about others, all-inclusive, we need to have concern for the poor, promote justice everywhere, and when we do the resurrection takes place again, because we show the same love God does. Therefore the resurrection is reduced to only following the example of Jesus. If you have trouble understanding all of this, don't worry. You have heard the saying, "truth is stranger than fiction?" Well I believe in this case, "fiction is stranger than the truth."
Did you know that if the resurrection had not taken place, it is doubtful that we would be here in church this morning? Before Christianity came into existence, the Sabbath day was on Saturday. For Jewish people the Sabbath was indeed the holiest of days. It was while the Christian Church was still in its infancy that the Sunday, the first day of the week became very special. Do you know why? It became the Lord's Day. . .the day of commemorating his resurrection. And Christian have been doing this ever since.
But it has to go even deeper than that. It has to be more than just a day of remembering and celebrating. It certainly was more for Paul. For him the resurrection was not only real, but also a part of the whole good news package. "You are saved by this gospel..this good news," (15:2) he writes to the Corinthians. This is of greatest importance. This is something not to be trifled with. Christ died for our sins, he was buried, and three days later he rose again from the dead. How does Paul know? Simple. He remembered all the witnesses who has seen Jesus...some five hundred of them. Jesus appeared in his glorified body to five hundred people, and certainly five hundred people could not be wrong, could they?
There was something even more convincing. Listen to Pauls' own words.."And last of all, he appeared also to me" (Vs 8). Christ appeared to Paul, on the road to Damascus, to call him to be the greatest of all apostles. Yet for Paul, it didn't matter one iota who preached this gospel, whether it was he, whether it was one of his contemporaries, it didn’t matter. Or whether it would be any preacher throughout the ages..it still does not matter. The truth is that Christ was truly raised from the dead, a truth on which the whole of the Christian faith hinges.
Have you ever noticed that some have a tendency to make our Christian religion quite complicated? I think this is because people try to make our faith something of the head rather than the heart. But there really isn’t anything complicated about all of this. Just think about it for a moment. What practical good would it have been for Christ to die for us if he not been raised? Would that have made any sense? "No," writes Paul. "If Christ had not been raised from death, then we would have nothing to preach! Further more, we would be lying about God..then your faith is a delusion! Your faith would be incomplete!" (Vs 14 ff).
Paul is adamant about this. "The truth is Christ has been raised from death" (vs20), and because of that all those who believe in him, will be raised from death too. That is why it is so important to preach this..to believe the truth of the resurrection. It completes God's plan of salvation. That is why it is important for the Church to recapture the resurrection if we are to survive. When Christ rose, he won the victory over death! Not only for himself, but also for all who believe in Him. It's a guarantee..an unconditional, eternal-life-time guarantee. That was the whole purpose of Jesus coming in the first place, to save people from eternal death. . .abandonment from God. . .through their union with Christ. Now I ask you, is there anything complicated about that?
Fact or fiction. The resurrection account makes the Demeter Myth sound rather foolish doesn't it? Again, we are not too far from Easter, but then, each Sunday is a celebration of the Resurrection. In the words of Paul, "If our hope in Christ is good for this life only, and no more, then we deserve more pity than anyone else in the whole world" (vs 19). Your hope can be broadened way beyond this earthly life. Christ was raised from death that you too may live. This is the sure hope of an eternal future with God. To him be thanks for giving us this hope. AMEN
