Healthy plants have deep roots and strong pillars have solid foundations. If we are to be Christians who are deeply rooted in Christ and built on the solid Rock, then we need more than mere sound bites. One means that the Lord has used throughout church history to strengthen His people’s faith and witness is reading good books. This book review series is identifying books that can serve as shovels that help you dig deeper in your Christian life.
Book: Surviving Religion 101 – Letters to a Christian Student on Keeping the Faith in College - Michael J. Kruger
As a child it’s easy to simply accept the stories of miracles in the Bible, including the resurrection of Jesus. However, now that you are in college, you are asking more questions about what you believe and why you believe it. The stories that seemed plausible as a small child might now seem silly. In Chapter 9 of Surviving Religion 101, Michael Kruger helps us see that the arguments against miracles, in particular the resurrection of Jesus, are not as compelling as we might think. In fact, the historical evidence for the resurrection only supplies more reasons to receive the kingdom of God with a childlike faith (Luke 18:17).
1) Are Miracles Impossible?
The most fundamental reason people do not believe the miracles of the Bible is because they already believe something else, namely, that miracles are impossible. They have a worldview that rules out the supernatural from the outset. Thus, it doesn’t matter how good the evidence or eyewitness might be, all claims to the miraculous are simply rejected.
But how does a person know that miracles can’t happen? They might say, “Because I’ve never seen a miracle.” But that’s not a good argument. That’s like an Amazonian tribesman insisting that white, fluffy material falling from the sky can’t possible exist because they’ve never seen snow. The only way the skeptic could know that every miraculous claim is false is if he already knows that miracles are impossible. But to assume miracles are impossible at the outset is to argue in a circle.
2) Are Miracles Improbable?
Some skeptics will be more modest and claim that miracles are not impossible, but so highly improbable, that we should always choose a naturalistic explanation over a naturalistic one. This however runs into a number of problems. First, the probability of any event does not merely depend on the event itself but on the broader context that surrounds it. So if a person believed in a godless universe, than we’d have to assume that Jesus of Nazareth rose from the dead naturally which would indeed be extremely improbable. However, if the broader context includes the existence of the Christian God – a God who has intervened, and continues to intervene in the world, then a miracle would not be an unlikely occurrence.
Here’s the point: the probability of a miraculous event is contingent on a person’s overall worldview and the assumptions he makes about reality. For the skeptic to claim that a miracle is improbable, he has to show that the Christian God does not exist. Since he can’t do that, he has no basis for claiming that miracles are improbable.
The second (and bigger) problem with this probability argument is that sometimes it’s reasonable to believe that an event has occurred because there is good evidence supporting that conclusion. It is absurd to always reject improbable explanations in favour of more probable explanations without considering the empirical evidence, the reliability of eyewitness, and so on. Since we have no good reason to be closed off to the possibility of the miraculous, we need to consider the world’s most famous miracle – the resurrection of Jesus.
3) The World’s Greatest Miracle
The broader context to the resurrection of Jesus includes the existence of the Christian God who is able to raise the dead. But it also includes information about the identity of Jesus that shows us why God was particularly interested in raising Him from the dead. Jesus of Nazareth was known by friends and enemies as a great miracle worker, who claimed to be the incarnate Son of God. He taught that He was commissioned by the heavenly Father to be the promised Messiah who has come to fulfill numerous Old Testament prophecies give centuries earlier. Some of these prophesies even predicted that God’s Messiah would rise from the dead (Ps. 16:10; Acts 2:27). On top of this, Jesus made the risky move of predicting His own resurrection, which would either ruin or vindicate everything He ever said. This is why the Jewish authorities were so concerned about these predictions and sought to prevent attempts to steal the body (Matt 27:62-66). All of this shows that given the broader context, the resurrection of Jesus is not as unexpected as we might have thought.
Next, consider the historical evidence. Paul gives the earliest testimony that we have to the resurrection: “For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve. After that He was seen by over five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to the present” (1 Cor. 15:3-6).
What is noteworthy is that Paul is passing along earlier tradition that scholars date back even into the 30s of the first century, soon after Jesus’s death. This means there was evidence for the resurrection from the very start of the Christian movement. It was not just an idea that someone made up at a later time.
At the core of the evidence is the empty tomb (“He was buried,…He was raised”) – and the testimony of eyewitnesses – (“he appeared to Cephas, then to…more than five hundred brothers”). The combination of these two things forms a powerful case for the resurrection. If the tomb of Jesus had contained His body, then the early Christian claims that Jesus had been raised would have been quickly exposed by its opponents. And the experience of the eyewitnesses proved why the body was missing – not because someone stole the body but because Jesus had risen from the dead.
Beyond the empty tomb and the resurrection appearances, the continued existence of the early Christian movement is another strong piece of evidence. Why didn’t the fledging Christian movement end after its Messiah was killed, like the many other messianic movements of that age? Like other movements, the Christian’s Messiah was killed by the Roman government but shockingly this group did not disappear but prospered in such an unexpected historical development. The historical explanation is that the early Christians were absolutely convinced that their Messiah was not dead but alive. Thus, one of the best pieces of evidence of the resurrection of Jesus is the existence of the church itself.
4) Other Explanations?
If someone rejects the resurrection, they have to give a better explanation for the empty tomb, eyewitness testimony and ongoing existence of the Christian movement. Some have argued that the disciples stole the body and made up the story to launch a new religious movement. However, the terrified disciples were not in the state of mind to fight off the guards and stir up trouble with the Roman government. Even more, it’s hard to imagine their motive for stealing the body of Jesus. This theory makes the improbably suggestion that the disciples who sat under some of the greatest moral teaching suddenly became charlatans who were willing to suffer horribly and then be executed for a known lie.
Others suggest that Jesus didn’t die on the cross but swooned and passed out only to awaken in the tomb and appear to the disciples. The problem with this theory is that it assumes the Roman killing machine botched a simple execution. Also, are we really to believe that after Jesus suffered the most severe flogging, six hours of crucifixion, and a spear in the side that He could unwrap Himself from His burial clothes, push back the stone, fight off the Roman guards and make a convincing appearance to the disciples? That’s harder to believe than the resurrection! On top of this, we’d have to believe that Jesus was a cruel liar who was willing to risk other people’s lives in His effort to pretend He had risen from the dead.
Finally, the most popular theory is that Jesus’s disciples hallucinated – they believed they saw Jesus alive when He was, in fact, still dead. The problem with this is that hallucinations are not physical – you can’t touch them, examine them, and eat with them as the disciples did with Jesus. Also, hallucinations are not something that happens in groups, and yet 500 people saw Jesus at one time. Ultimately, this theory fails for a simple reason: the body of Jesus would still have been in the tomb. The Jews and Romans could have dispelled all the claims of the resurrection by simply supplying the body of Jesus.
For those committed to a naturalistic view of the world, all they have are naturalistic explanations. But these theors are riddled with such deep problems that it highlights that the resurrection of Jesus is the best explanation for the historical evidence.
Conclusion: God has given us very good reasons to believe even as adults – solid historical evidence that Jesus has indeed risen from the dead. We will not receive that evidence if we are closed to the possibility of miracles.
Surviving Religion 101 – Letters to a Christian Student on Keeping the Faith in College by Michael J. Kruger. Published by Crossway, Wheaton, Illinois, 2021. Softcover, 262 pages.