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DAY 5
Sunday, March 9
... then he was seen by over five hundred brothers at one time, of whom the majority remain until now, though some fell asleep (1 Corinthians 15:6)
When I was a senior in college, I faced a great crisis of faith. I would soon graduate, enter seminary, and spend my life in Christian ministry. I found myself asking, "Is my faith based on facts or tradition? Should I spend the rest of my life spreading a message I can't be sure is true? How do I know?"
How would you answer my questions?
What God's word means
The risen Christ spent 40 days with his followers before returning to heaven (Acts 1:3). After he appeared to Peter and the other apostles, he was seen ("he was made manifest") to over ve hundred brothers. This fact shows that Jesus' followers numbered far more than the Twelve or even the 120 later gathered in Jerusalem (Acts 1:15). "Large crowds from Galilee, the Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea and the region across the Jordan followed him" (Matthew 4:25), and 5,000 families later did the same (John 6:10). As a result, we should not be surprised that 500 brothers met the risen Christ three years later.
Our Lord met them at one time, not individually or in small groups, pointing to a singular gathering not otherwise described in the New Testament. Jesus' repeated references to Galilee as the place where he would meet his disciples (Mark 14:28; Matthew 28:7, 10) may have been disseminated among his larger band of followers, most of whom were from this region (cf. Matthew 4:23). Given the dispersion of his disciples after Jesus' arrest (Mark 14:50), it is likely that the Galileans would have retreated from Jewish and Roman authorities in Jerusalem by returning to their homes. Perhaps he met them in Galilee, along with the "eleven disciples" at "the mountain where Jesus had told them to go" (Matthew 28:16).
Of this number, the majority remain, indicating that Paul knew them or of them. Until now refers to the two decades that passed between Easter and the writing of 1 Corinthians. However, some eyewitnesses fell asleep, a typical biblical metaphor for a believer's death (cf. Acts 7:60).
Paul's point is that his readers could still interview these eyewitnesses to the risen Christ if they wished. As signi ficant and foundational gures in the Christian movement, perhaps some were even known to the Corinthian church.
Lee Strobel quotes a psychologist who describes hallucinations as individual events. Strobel comments: "If 500 people have the same hallucination, that's a bigger miracle than the resurrection." Chuck Colson noted: "Watergate embroiled 12 of the most powerful men in the world—and they couldn't keep a lie for three weeks. You're telling me 12 apostles could keep a lie for 40 years? Absolutely impossible." Remember that these believers all faced severe persecution for refusing to recant their commitment to their risen Lord. They were part of a group of 500 Christians who continued to claim that they had met the risen Christ, 25 years later. We do not have a single record of a single eyewitness recanting his or her testimony.
If 500 credible witnesses claimed to have seen a meteor streak over their region, and reporters could still interview most of them 20 years later, would skeptics deny that such an event occurred? If they did, would we be more likely to fault the eyewitnesses or the bias of the critics?
Jesus' post-resurrection appearance to 500 eyewitnesses is further proof that Easter is not just a tradition or a holiday, but a fact of history.
How to respond
As a college senior, I began investigating the truth claims of Christianity for myself. I learned that Roman and Jewish historians documented Jesus' life and death, and recorded the fact that early Christians believed him to have been raised from the grave. But I could nd no reasonable explanation for his empty tomb. If the disciples or women stole the body, they then kept their secret and died for a lie. If the authorities stole the body, they would have produced it. If the disciples went to the wrong tomb, the Romans or Joseph of Arimathea (the tomb's owner) would have pointed them to the right one.
If the disciples' encounter with the risen Christ was a hallucination, we must explain how 500 people had the same hallucination. If Jesus didn't really die on the cross, he somehow survived his mummi ed airtight burial shroud, shoved aside the stone, overpowered the battle-hardened Roman guards, made his way through locked doors, and did the greatest high jump in history at the ascension.
I could nd no other explanation for the changed lives of Jesus' followers, or for the changes he had made in mine. So I concluded that Jesus rose from the dead. Therefore, he must be God, his word must be true, and his service must be worth my life. That day, I renewed my commitment to him as my Lord and King.
Would you join me today?
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