I am writing this article on Easter Sunday. The day when, over two thousand years ago, our Lord rose from the tomb. Yet, even at the very start of, what we consider to be, our Christian church, there were people outside the faith who did not believe that Christ was alive. I, however, have three points to put to you, which I believe, prove that Jesus did indeed walk out of that tomb on that first Easter day.
The first point, concerns the folded grave-clothes. Each one of the Gospels mention this. We could ask ourselves, what is the big deal? But think about it for a moment. Christ’s enemies would have us believe that his apostles stole the body. If this was true, do you really believe they would strip Jesus of his coverings and fold them neatly? Its far more likely that they would just pick up the body and run out with it. If the clothes fell off, they wouldn’t stop to pick them off the floor.
The next point is about the body itself. Its jesus a gospel of love been over two thousand years and no one has ever found Jesus’s remains. This is probably, not, for the want of trying, for if Christ’s body was found it would be the greatest scoop of all time. But the fact remains, Jesus’s body has never been found, because it is not around to find!
The third point is that the tomb itself was under guard. Soldiers were stationed there, in order to stop anyone taking the body, as there was a rumour that Jesus’s followers would claim he had risen from the dead by stealing the corpse. So, either, the Roman soldiers were asleep on the job, and did not hear the heavy stone being moved, or see the disciples taking their fallen leader out of the tomb. Or else, Jesus did in fact rise from the dead. I think the resurrection is the easiest of all those things, to believe, under the circumstances.