Latest / Pastor John Piper's answers / Evidence for the Cross and Resurrection

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Evidence for the Cross and Resurrection · Pastor John Piper's answers

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  Welcome back. This new week on the podcast starts off by wrapping up a
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  bundle of recent apologetics questions on the person and work of Christ. We recently
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  looked at six reasons why Jesus had to leave Earth after Easter. Imagine life
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  on earth if Christ was still here with us, He's not? Why not?
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  That was APJA nineteen seventy eight. Then we looked at why didn't Jesus
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  have to pay eternally for our sins? Isn't that the cost eternal judgment?
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  So why was his suffering cut so short? That was apj nineteen seventy nine.
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  And then we looked at even if the Christian faith is untrue, if
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  the Cross and Resurrection didn't happen, aren't Christians still happier than non Christians in
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  this life? Don't our present life priorities make for a more fulfilling experience of
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  this life than the non Christians seeking their joy in this world even if we're
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  wrong? That was ABJA nineteen seventy seven. And related to that, when
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  comes today's question, why don't we have more artifacts, more archaeology, or
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  even a more diversified record of historical documents to corroborate the death and resurrection of
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  Christ. Shouldn't we have more? The question is from a listener named Terry.
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  Pastor John, Hello to you. My question for you is why in
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  this age it remains so easy for nonbelievers to refute the crucifixion and resurrection of
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  Jesus. If God controls everything, why is the existence of Jesus and his
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  crucifixion not made more undeniable? People can so easily say that the events of
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  the Bible are not real. Why did God not orchestrate it so that there
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  were more witnesses, more archaeological evidence, more handwritten accounts. Why did he
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  seem to leave so much room for doubt? Best John, how would you
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  respond to Terry? I have two main responses to this question. The first
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  is that, historically speaking, the text of the New Testament, the Greek
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  text of the New Testament, which is the written accounts of first century witnesses
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  to Christ, is spectacularly reliable. That's number one. Come back to it.
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  Explain why. I'm second. The obstacles that hinder warranted belief, justifiable
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  belief in the truth of those first century testimonies are the same obstacles that people
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  experienced who were looking Jesus right in the face, and did not believe in
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  spite of all his signs. In other words, the root problem today and
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  then is not and was not absence of evidence. Now, why do I
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  say that the New Testament accounts of the first century Christian witnesses are spectacularly reliable?
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  Terry asks why did God not provide more hand written accounts. I wonder
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  if people who ask that have any idea of what they are saying. Caesar's
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  Gallic Wars was written about fifty BC, and there are ten surviving manuscripts.
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  Livy's History of Rome has twenty surviving manuscripts. Tacitus Histories and Annals, written
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  about one hundred AD, has two manuscripts. Thucydides History, which was written
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  about four hundred BC, has eight manuscripts. And most scholars of such sources
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  go about their work with confidence that they are in touch with the original witnesses.
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  Now, according to the Institute of New Testament Textual Research in Munster,
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  Germany, there are five thousand, eight hundred manuscripts or fragments of manuscripts of
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  the New Testament, not ten, not twenty, not eight. It is
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  a spectacular wealth of hand written accounts of what was originally written, and hundreds
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  of them are older than anything we have for those secular histories. The science
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  of textual criticism that handles these thousands of manuscripts is able to compare those manuscripts
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  and determine with astonishing accuracy what the original manuscripts actually said. Here's Ff Bruce,
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  he was from the previous generation, was alive when I was studying as
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  a seminary student. He wrote this, if the great number of manuscripts increases
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  the number of scribal errors copying errors as you go from one copy to the
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  next, it increases proportionately the means of correcting such errors, so that the
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  margin of doubt left in the process of recovering the exact original wording is in
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  truth remarkably small. That comes from the New Testament documents. Are they reliable?
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  Which can still get at Amazon? I recommend it. I also recommend
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  Paul Wegner, A Student's Guide and Textual Criticism of the Bible, and Craig
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  Blumberg The historical reliability of the Gospels. The remarkable fact is that most historical
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  scholars today, liberal or conservative, believe that the Greek text that we have
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  in the New Testament are really what the authors wrote near the time when the
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  events actually happened, which also means, for example, that when you're Muslim
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  friends tell you that the New Testament we have is not the New Testament that
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  was originally written, but a much later creation of the church, you need
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  to know there is zero, I'm talking zero, historical evidence for that claim
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  that there's an existing New Testament that we don't have that was before our New
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  Testament. They are not making a historically justifiable statement. It is demanded by
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  their faith, not by historical evidence, because they don't want anyone to think
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  Jesus was actually crucified. But in fact, the crucifixion of Jesus is one
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  of the most historically certain events of the first century. The view that it
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  didn't happen is highly eccentric from a historical standpoint. So let me turn now
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  to my second response, which I think is probably existentially the most significant part
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  of Terry's question. The obstacles that hinder justified belief in the truth of these
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  testimonies today is the same set of obstacles that people experienced who were looking at
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  Jesus in his own day, right in the face flesh to flesh, eye
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  to eye, and did not believe. In other words, the root problem
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  is not the absence of evidence. You remember the story of the rich man
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  and Lazarus in Luke sixteen. The rich man and the poor man. Lazarus
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  died. Lazarus went to heaven Abraham's bosom, and the rich man went to
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  torment. And in the torment he says across this chasm to Abraham, I
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  beg you send Lazarus to my father's house, for I have five brothers,
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  so that he may warn them lest they also come into this place of torment.
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  And Abraham said, they have Moses and the prophets. Let them hear
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  them. And he said, no, Father Abraham, but if someone goes
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  to them from the dead, in other words, if there's enough evidence,
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  if there's a sign, they will repent. And Abraham said to him,
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  if they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced
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  if someone should rise from the dead. Now that's amazing. What it means
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  is that the same inner condition of heart that keeps a person from believing the
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  Old Testament prophets also keeps them from submitting to the evidence of actually seeing someone
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  rise from the dead. That was true then and it's true today. You
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  remember the other Lazarus, Remember the two Lazaruses in the New Testament. Jesus
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  raised this Lazarus from the dead. He was dead four days and Jesus raised
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  him from the dead to give a sign that people would believe in glorify God.
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  And when that miracle happened, some believed. In fact, it says
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  many believed in John eleven. But others went and told the Pharisees, and
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  their response was they plotted to kill Jesus, and they plotted to kill Lazarus
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  to get rid of the evidence. More than once people demanded a sign Jesus,
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  even after he had done so many compelling signs already. And here's what
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  Jesus said to them. In John ten twenty four. The Jews gathered around
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  him and said, how long will you keep us in suspense? If you
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  are the Christ, tell us plainly. And Jesus said to them, I
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  told you, and you don't believe the works that I do in my father's
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  name. Bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are
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  not among my sheep. My sheep, hear my voice, and I know
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  them, and they follow me. Here's what Jesus said to explain that how
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  a person could come to see Jesus as true. He said in John seventeen,
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  if anyone's will is to do God's will, he will know whether the
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  teaching is from God or whether I'm speaking on my own authority. The problem
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  of unbelief is not mainly a lack of evidence, but a deep heart resistance
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  to God and his will. Changing that heart condition is a great work of
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  God. We are utterly dependent on it in our evangelism. So let's not
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  be deterred in our evangelism by anyone who says there's not enough evidence to justify
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  belief in Jesus. There is enough evidence. No one spoke like this man.
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  The self authenticating glory of God shines in the Gospel of Christ. So
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  let's tell the good news. Tell it everywhere, tell it all the time,
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  tell it as compellingly as we pause can. And let let's pray.
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  Let's pray earnestly, all the more earnestly that God would open the eyes of
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  the blind. Yes, a man fifty eight hundred manuscripts or fragments of manuscripts
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  of the New Testament. That's simply staggering. Thank you, Pastor John,
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  and thanks for joining us today. If you're wrestling with a hard question that
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  you need settled, ask Mastor John. Email your question to us that asked
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  Mastor John at Desiring God dot org. Next time we feel the question,
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  I can certainly relate to myself. We read our Bible in the morning,
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  we come across a promise or a text in the Old Testament. We write
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  that text out in a notebook, a journal, digital note file, something,
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  and we take that text or a promise into our day. And later
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  in the day we returned to the text to find ourselves wondering if we lifted
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  the verse out of context. We ask maybe it didn't really relate to me
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  like I thought this morning. The text feels more remote as the day goes
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  on. Has that ever happened to you? Well, it's happened to me,
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  and it has happened to Maureen as well. We need to figure out
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  what Old Testament promises are for us to day, and we will. Next
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  time. I'm your host, Tony Rankie. I'll see you Thursday