Post Resurrection Appearances

The Challenge of Harmonizing the Resurrection Accounts

Alright, we are in the post-resurrection appearances. We looked at the women of the tomb last week. As I mentioned last week, what you're going to hear most often from critics of the faith, it doesn't matter whether they be religious or non-religious, is that in reality this is the Achilles' heel for the Christian faith.

Because it will be said in absolutist tones, with absolute certainty, that it is impossible to harmonize the resurrection accounts. And the argument is, hey, if the central aspect of the Christian faith in the resurrection, then this should be the clearest, easiest, most established aspect of anything we find in New Testament.

And people like Bart Ehrman and others will say, look, there's just too many discrepancies, too many contradictions. Now, we mentioned last week that those terms, especially contradiction, have specific meanings in logic.

If you study logic, you will encounter, as Professor Callahan has taught logic in the past, you will encounter specific definitions as to what a contradiction would involve. There were syllogisms that we had to work through in Professor Callahan's class, and you could mess up.

You'd make a mistake. And in the process, well, you wouldn't get that particular exercise correct. And hopefully, maybe he can confirm for me that it still works that way. In the modern world, they haven't come up with multiple answers to the logical stuff.

I didn't know if a common core had gotten to logic yet or anything like that. So, you know, modus ponens and everything else has gone out the window. So, it certainly has in public dialogue, but we're not going to get into that right now.

But as it may, the real issue for us, and I think for every Christian, and again, this level of discussion of the resurrection accounts probably wasn't overly normative in most Sunday, well, of course, our Sunday school classes are weird anyway.

It's one way or the other. We all know that. But in generations past, there wouldn't have probably been as much focus upon these issues as there is today. But we now live in a society that is intent upon disbelief, intent upon skepticism, intent upon destroying our faith in God having spoken.

And so every one of us, I don't care what we do and what our calling is, we are called to give an answer for the hope that's within us. And therefore, in our day, we have to go much deeper than has been gone into in the past.

Now, I think if we will allow historically, because criticisms of Christianity are not new either. Well, the first real well-known, nasty, Richard Dawkins-esque critic is Celsus around the time of origin.

So it's been around a while. So my question was, those earlier critics, pre -20th century critics of Christianity, are they pointing out to the alleged discrepancies? Post-enlightenment, yes. And Celsus did as well.

So we're not the first generation to do this, but you combine post-modernism with the internet, with everything else. And some of the things we're dealing with are somewhat unique along those lines. Partly because of not having as much information as preceding.

We have more information now than preceding generations did. So it's a broader spectrum of things we have to deal with. So each criticism is not new, but the incarnations that it takes can sometimes be somewhat new.

But all the way back to Celsus, you have this kind of conversation going on. And certainly, the discussion of the relationship of the Gospels is nothing new. But the broad spectrum attack, I think, is probably something that's new and means that if we want to be believers who really are active in speaking to our culture, these are things we just simply have to have in the background.

And I think a lot of Christians end up sort of backing away because they know they don't really have that bulwark ready to go, and they're a little afraid of being attacked along those lines. So, I think if we will be consistent, allow Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and John, because John's pretty much—well, Mark is gone after the women.

I think we've covered the textual critical stuff enough in the past. You know the two longest variants in the New Testament. You know that there's more evidence to the longer ending of Mark than there is for the story of the women caught in adultery.

It is definitely an early writing, but there are multiple endings to Mark. You have the short ending. It ends at verse 8. There's an intermediate ending. There's some that mix them together. You have the long ending.

And the very fact that you have multiple endings is, to me, the greatest evidence that the 9 through 20 ending that is in the King James and New King James comes long later. If it had always been there, there wouldn't have been any reason for the creation of other endings.

But while there are similarities with the longer ending and what we have in some of the others, you can see it. It is included in the text here, so you can see it there. But I think we really, after the women leave the tomb, are down to three sources if we're going to be consistent with our looking at textual critical issues and things like that.

And that is Matthew, Luke and John. And while there are similarities, there are also major differences in focus, and I think that's one of the key issues to get hold of. Almost all of the criticisms that are launched against the Gospels at this point are based upon the assumption that they're supposed to be telling the same story.

Well, in a very general way, that would be true. They are telling the story of the resurrection, but it's painfully obvious that they are focusing upon specific, extremely limited aspects of that post-resurrection period.

The Limited Scope of the Gospel Narratives

Now, when we when we look at the amount of time that is given to them, I was looking to see here, and I don't think that they do. It's too bad they don't include, for the fun of it, what is said in Acts in regards to the ascension.

They only give you Luke. Well, that's interesting. They give you 1 Corinthians 15, section 361. That's interesting, but they didn't go into Acts. There is a lengthy period of time between the resurrection and then the ascension where Jesus is ministering to the disciples.

Now, if you look at how many pages we have left, we could easily read them in a matter of moments. And if I, for example, were just to take the time to write up what I did yesterday with any level of detail, it would be much longer than what we have here.

So, obviously, we have a very, very selected amount of material that each of the authors is giving to us. And so what they're trying to do is each one is trying to communicate one particular aspect of the post-resurrection appearance.

Now, obviously, people might want to ask the question, well, why not have a full recitation? I mean, how wonderful would it be if we could have, for example, just the discussion that Jesus had with the disciples when he opened their minds to understand the scriptures and how he was prophesied from Moses through all the prophets and so on and so forth.

That would be worth having a 28th book in the New Testament. We could get along with an even thicker ESV study Bible. I mean, it would be OK. They could bind those extra pages in there. I'd be all right.

And so part of us wants to have more, more, more, more. And most of us have never really thought through, well, you know, why is it that you have all this material from before and so little of material after the period of the resurrection in the Gospels?

And I think that's something to reflect upon. I don't know that I have a specific answer for you as you know, I don't I'm not going to pretend to know what God's purposes were in inspiring X amount of material here and Y amount of material there or something along those lines.

I am simply recognizing the fact that as the Gospels exist, as we have them and clearly as they were written, because there is absolutely no evidence that there was anything other than these that was written or distributed amongst people or anything else.

It's very, very clear that the authors do not intend to give a extensive chronological or in-depth discussion of Jesus's personal ministry to his disciples after his resurrection. They just don't do it.

Luke and John give us a fair amount of material, but it's obviously very focused upon one particular aspect of things, and it's a different aspect. John's talking especially about the interaction between Jesus and the women, and then you've got the whole situation with Jesus and Peter and John chapter 21 and things like that.

Luke, very focused upon Jesus's interaction with the disciples as to opening their minds to understand the scriptures and the fulfillment of prophecy and things like that. Matthew doesn't give us a whole lot of anything.

He skips almost all that stuff, and as a result, what we need to recognize is to expect them to be focusing upon the same thing. There just isn't enough material to even begin to substantiate that kind of assumption.

They're focusing upon different time periods and different places. Some of the ministry that's focused upon is right there in Jerusalem. Some is on a mountainside in Galilee. Luke primarily focuses upon what happens right that day of the resurrection and the disciples and the road to Emmaus, and they're giving an exceptionally fragmentary portion.

I personally would speculate that the reason for this is that this is being written during the lifetime of eyewitnesses themselves, and so this was leaving room in the church for the testimony of those individuals who themselves had encountered the risen Lord.

I don't know. It doesn't say we are going to really give you a lot of information about what came before the cross and a small amount of information afterwards. Obviously, we get more outside of the Gospels.

You know, Luke obviously thought it was important enough to write all of Acts, though I think one of the best theories I've heard for the origination of Luke Acts, which, of course, originally circulated as primarily a single work and then got cut up when Luke was primarily put with the Gospels and the Gospels were distributed as a body.

But my the best theory I've ever heard for the origination of Luke Acts is that this was Luke's amicus brief is the filing of a friend of the court. This was Luke's demonstration or submission in Paul's imprisonment as to what it was that he was preaching and the origination of the Christian movement and what the Lordship of Jesus Christ was really all about.

That would explain why it ends where it ends and it doesn't give us. We all want to know. So what happened at the end of Paul's imprisonment? Did he get to go to Spain? Did he get to do this? Did he get to do that?

And we don't know, which would make sense if the reason it was written was to be presented to Caesar. And here's the story of this man. And here's why he does what he does. And here's the Christian message and so on and so forth.

But anyway, the point is that these documents only want to give us a very narrow slice of what took place after the resurrection of Christ. And so we try to force them to be exhaustive accounts. Then it's real easy to accuse them of not so much contradiction, but as just being completely out of harmony with one another.

And so the general argument is, well, you know, in one gospel, they immediately go to Galilee and another gospel. Then they're still in Jerusalem. And the point is, you're assuming that these are meant to give us a day by day itinerary of what's going on after resurrection.

And it's just not their intention to do. And so when you keep that in mind and keep in mind that probably the person you're talking to sitting in the seat next to you on the on the plane or on, you know, at the bus stop or whatever else it might be.

If they say, well, I, you know, I just can't believe the gospels because, you know, what happened after resurrection will depend on which gospel. Soon as you hear anybody say it depends which gospel you read, you know that they have been watching way too many Bart Ehrman videos on YouTube.

And that means you're getting all this stuff secondhand. They've not actually looked at themselves. And with someone like that, it's fairly easy to say, well, you know, have you ever really honestly looked at the gospels themselves and asked what if I were to be fair to these people, if I were to treat them with even a portion of the fairness that I would want to be treated with for my writings, which is that the conclusion I would come to.

John’s Account of the Empty Tomb and Peter’s Response

Sometimes you can get a conversation going that way, but most people are just repeating things that they have been told they actually haven't heard. So when we look at where we are right now, we had just last time seen the report of the women to the disciples, and we have a much fuller, not surprising account of what takes place coming from John.

And so she tells Simon, Peter, and the other disciples. So by tradition, Peter and John, Peter then came out with his disciple and went for the tomb. They both ran, but their disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first and stooping to look in.

He saw the linen clothes lying there, but did not go in. And Simon, Peter came following him and went into the tomb. He saw linen clothes lying in the napkin, which had been on his head, not lying with linen clothes, but rolled up in a place by itself.

So, you know, you get all the speculation that Peter's the old dude, John's the young dude. So the young dude outruns the old dude, which unfortunately does happen a lot. And I say as an old dude, frequently gets blown by while running by young people.

And I just go, well, my days of doing that have long passed. But anyway, but Simon and then, of course, you have then the other disciple who reached him first also went in and he saw and believed for his yet did not know the scripture.

He must rise from the dead immediately. But how many times did you said these things? Well, it, you know, I sort of mentioned this years ago. We looked at Matthew chapter 16 when Jesus is speaking to Simon and he says, son of man must be betrayed and rise again the third day.

It's almost like as soon as they heard die betrayed, everything else just became like any adult speaking in the in Charlie Brown. It just it just goes in one ear out the other doesn't seem to be recognition of what this is supposed to mean.

And we may struggle with that because we have the luxury of not being deeply influenced by the traditions and the traditional beliefs about the Messiah that would have deeply impacted the disciples themselves.

The idea of the crucified Messiah was just simply not something that would have crossed anyone's mind at that point in time. Certainly, there were all sorts of discussions of the Messiah, but the idea of suffering substitution, the traditions that developed around deliverance and rulership over the nations, not the idea of the suffering servant.

And so we we see that in John believes is it because John was younger and hence wasn't quite as crusty in his traditions. Possible. But for as yet, they did not know the scripture that he must rise from the dead is more of a description explaining why Peter didn't believe that is why John did believe.

Yes, so that you have no. There was no substitute for Messiah when he not really. No, I mean, you can find later on there develops ideas where the death of rabbis become substitutionary and things like that.

But during the intertestamental period, the because Israel was under the heel of all these world powers, the focus was upon deliverance from those world powers, not upon some kind of substitutionary. So, I mean, Isaiah 53 was there, but there were all sorts of.

Well, yeah, I'd say day nine, but, you know, it was there. They just did not see it as something that would involve the death of the Messiah at the hand of the Romans. I mean, that just didn't cross anybody's mind.

Yes, sir. Yeah. It says he was function as a high priest was prophesying. It wasn't because that was an understanding of the Jews that it wasn't because there is all we know that the Messiah is going to atone for the sins of Israel by by dying or something like that.

He was simply saying, it's better we kill this guy than the Romans come and take the rest of us away, not realizing what that actually meant and how that was going to work out. So, yeah, so they they.

So John is just explaining why one believe in one doesn't, and it's more of an explanation as to why Peter doesn't than it is why John did, because at the time John be being written, everybody would assume, well, everybody knows the prophecies.

I mean, by now, that was that was the essence of almost every service. When the Christians gathered to be a recitation of fulfilled prophecies in Jesus and things like that. Then the disciples went back to their homes, but Mary should we be outside the tomb, and as she wept, she stooped to look into the tomb and she saw two angels in white sitting with the body of Jesus had lain one of the head and one of the feet.

They said to her woman, why are you weeping? She said, then, because they have taken away my Lord. I do not know where they have laid him saying that she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but did not.

She did not know that it was Jesus. She said to her woman, why are you weeping? Whom do you seek? Supposing into the gardener? She said to him, Sir, if you have carried away, carried away, tell me where you have laid him and I will take him away.

She said to her Mary, she turned and said to him in Hebrew, Rabboni, which means teacher or, of course, as we would have rabbi. She said to her, do not hold me for. I have not yet ascended the father to go to my brother and say to them, I'm saying to my father and your father to my God and your God for the first appearance is to marry and this again goes against all expected norms of the day.

The testimony of women was not considered to carry the weight of a man, and so this first appearance to her really strikes a chord in many people in recognizing that there's certainly something new afoot.

In Matthew, Jesus meets. Behold, Jesus met them. See, verse nine comes after you meet the women and says that hail, and they came and took hold of his feet and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, do not be afraid.

Go and tell my brother to go to Galilee, and there they will see here is one of the issues. You know what the timeframe here. When do they go to Galilee? When did they do this? What about the parents, Thomas, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

Matthew is only going to focus upon the brief encounter with five. It's probably probably the same thing. The meeting with the five hundred is Matthew eighteen sixty twenty, which is section fifty nine.

Probably what Paul refers to when he says seeing a five hundred at one time. I mean, it might not be. We don't know, but given how few encounters are given to us in the text, if what Paul's referring to is recorded, it would be the encounter on the mountain in Galilee, and that's probably what Paul's referring to there.

As I said, Mark has moved on to other things. Actually, he's moved on to silence. Luke gives us the names and really doesn't focus on the women at this after this at all. Instead, he moves on to the women on the disciples and rogues of man.

Yes, I'm sorry. What? Oh, in verse. Yeah, it does say other ancient authorities adverse falls above. Yeah, I do not have my. Let me see if I can. There we go. There it is. I don't want to see what's new.

I just want you to see if that's got it. Luke chapter twenty four twelve. Why don't you give me my textual apparatus, please? And a twenty seven apparatus finally. That's interesting. It seems to have.

Well, that's very odd. I don't know why it's bracketed, because it's only missing from the old italic and Codex Vesey Canterbury Gensis, which is to me a highly unreliable source. And then it was put back into the N .A. twenty six because the discovery of P. Seventy five and P. Seventy five contains it.

So if you have the P. Seventy five contains it, it's very, very old. So it's only a single bracket and it probably shouldn't even be bracketed at that. So it seems to be a fairly strong foundation for that one.

The Road to Emmaus and the Opening of the Scriptures

All right. So what I want to do, what I would like to do is recognizing the different focus of the various writers. I would like to first focus upon Luke and then we'll look at Matthew and we'll finish up with John.

OK, because Luke does give us he doesn't give us as much as John does, but he does give us more that is directly relevant to the issue of the ministry, the nature of the ministry of Jesus, I think, to the disciples.

And it begins with this amazing story found in only one source. Now, it's a long section. So Luke obviously intended from the start to include this, to leave the room to do this. Is it why? Why does Luke choose to include this?

But Matthew doesn't or John chooses to include stuff about John. I think we can sort of figure out part of what John was about. Because the thing about him remaining until Christ returns, you know, needs to be corrected.

If John's being written in a much later period, then there needs to be a corrective offered there. But this story from Luke is simply fascinating. And it's it's got to be just one of many such stories.

There have been lots of stories like this. I mean, I'm not saying Jesus was bouncing around, appearing to all sorts of people, just willy nilly. But the story is just and I have somewhere I forget where it is, just a little painting.

We all seen the painting of the disciples in the road to Emmaus. It's just all it is, is this landscape with all these big trees and stuff. And the people in it are very small, actually. It's very minor elements of it.

It's not focused on them. But there are three people walking along the road and one is gesturing to the others. And just the way that it's done, you can see the other two are listening intently. And it's just just the road to Emmaus.

And it just captures everything as to what it must have been like to have been those two disciples. That very day, two of them were going to a village named Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, which doesn't sound much to us.

But remember, you're walking. So it was it was it was a waste. And talking with each other about all these things that had happened while they were talking and discussing together, Jesus himself drew near and went with them.

Well, that wouldn't be overly unusual. In fact, it'd be somewhat usual while walking along quiet roads for people to gather together. It's not like it's not like being in New York where it's sort of illegal to talk to people.

You know, I was waiting for the Long Island Expressway once, not Long Island Expressway, right. Long Island Railroad. And early in the morning, I was going into the city and I discovered much to my chagrin that that what you do at those train platforms is everybody has their spot.

You have a particular spot you stand at and you stand there with your coffee and your newspaper. And if you stop at the same place you always stop at to get a egg burrito or something on the way. And everyone just stands there like there's nobody else in the world.

And stupid me, I'm from I'm from Arizona, you know, so I'm up there, you know. Hi, Cole this morning, huh? Everybody's like, doesn't she know, you know, well, that's a that's a distinctly modern, modern situation that wouldn't have been the norm in in the ancient world still in the Middle Eastern world.

But their eyes were kept from recognizing him. Now, I just don't see any other way of understanding verse 16 in light of verse 31. Other than a supernatural event and their eyes were opened and they recognized him and he vanished out of sight.

So there was a purpose in blinding them to his identity that is then fulfilled by verse 30 and that stops. They would not have been able to have the conversation that they had if they had realized that they were talking with the resurrected Messiah.

And so it is specifically stated that their eyes were kept from recognizing him. And by the way, I would mention regards to very briefly having read John there regards to Mary's reaction. She doesn't recognize this posing him to be the gardener.

These texts are very frequently be used by groups that deny the reality of the resurrection to say see. He didn't rise bodily from the dead. This is just a taking on different forms to try to fool people or convince people or whatever else might be so on and so forth.

She's weeping greatly and we're not given any description of no and staring intently into his face or anything like that. Instead, she's got her head down. Her eyes are filled with tears and just acknowledging someone she thinks to be the gardener, not worthy of of doing anything more than just keeping your head down, especially as a woman, probably would anyways.

And saying they've taken my Lord's body. I don't know if you've taken him away. Please tell me where you laid him, et cetera, et cetera. And it was only when he when he said her name, Mary, that she recognizes the voice, the very fact she recognizes the voice is rather significant as well.

So there is a supernatural activity going on here. Their eyes were kept from recognizing what he said to them. What is this conversation which you're holding with each other as you walk? And they stood still looking sad.

Then one of them named Cleopas answered him. Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that happen there in these days? Hinge of sarcasm. Sort of like, really, you don't you don't know what happened over the over this time period.

And he said to them what things? And they said to him concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet, mighty indeed, and word before God and all the people and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death and crucified him.

But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes. And besides all this, it is now the third day since this happened. Well, there's a lot there. We know just in passing, of course, the importance of the dating.

This is the third day. You know, one of the big things we've talked about before. Well, it wasn't really three days. And and, you know, if it was actually three days and had been Wednesday because it has to be seventy two full hours, not a minute less or Jesus is a liar.

I've had people pull that one on me many, many, many times and not recognizing any part of a day is considered full day. And here they recognize this. This is the first day of the week and they say it's Thursday since it happened.

So they're thinking the exact same way. But they are sad. And here we have really what it would have been like to be at that dark time, which they're still in. We had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.

So what they saw happen. And the reality of everything they expected up until that point are just a complete loggerheads. Complete contradiction. They can't see how to fit these things together. They don't know what God is doing.

They just don't see it. Moreover, some women of our company amazed us. They were at the tomb early in the morning and did not find his body. And they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels who had said who said that he was alive.

So they have not. They are aware of the initial reports that have already been delivered to the disciples. Some of those who are with us went to the tomb and found just as women had said, but him, they did not see.

And so, you know, they don't go. Luke does not go into details concerning anything other. He just just mentions in brief and brief the idea of seeing the linen cloths by themselves. Things like that doesn't go into who went in first.

He skips over all of those details to give us this lengthy story. And in just in relating their answer to Jesus inquiry, we're given probably between that and the issue with Thomas. This is the most insight we're given into what it was like in those dark hours when Jesus is in the tomb, which we want to speculate a lot about.

I haven't seen this new movie. It just came out a scene risen. No, I've actually been told that it's actually fairly accurate. I don't know. I haven't seen it yet, so I don't know. I can't I can't comment on it.

It's supposed to be told from the perspective of one of the guards at the tomb. I'm not sure how that would work for a while, given that they went short short movie. Hope you got your popcorn. But they may have had to skip that part somehow.

I'm not sure. But what did you say? The black for a long time? How does that work? I don't know. But anyway, a. Between this Thomas's unbelief and then sort of the the amazing statement of Matthew that even when Jesus came up to the disciples.

Remember what says some worship and some doubt some worship and some doubt. That's that's not what you would write if you were trying to fool people. That's that's just being honest with with the reality of what would actually happen if you had seen someone crucified and then they're walking up to you later.

It's like really? OK. And he, Jesus, said to them, oh, foolish men. Oh, foolish men and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Let that one sink in for a second. I mean, I'm not sure that that would go over really well in some of the pastoral counseling classes and seminary.

You know, when dealing with someone in grief and shock, your first word should be to them. You know, I wasn't in any of the textbooks that I saw when I was in seminary. Wow. Oh, foolish men and slow of heart to believe all the prophets have spoken.

Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory? And this is these are not the words that would come from a community that was going, well, you know, it's been our personal spiritual experience that Jesus still lives in our hearts.

And, you know, when we look at the Old Testament, we can just sort of see that, you know, there's a way you can sort of look at it, maybe possibly this this wonderful idea of life, all this liberal garbage that is just all over the place today.

That's not really what the what the text is saying. The text is really being very straightforward. Hey, if you really believe the scriptures, then would you not? Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and enter into his glory?

Now, if all you did was read the intertestamental literature, you'd be sitting there and I imagine they were staying there going, I mean, what were they supposed to say in response to this? There was not a tradition that they could draw on that had been taught this by their rabbis and beginning with Moses and all the prophets.

He interpreted them in all the scriptures, the things concerning himself. Wow. We have like 30 seconds, but it just seems to me that that is a. A preview, and it gives us it gives us a calling. Listen carefully to the preaching of the early church, especially the book of Acts.

Look at their reliance upon the Old Testament, and when you see them quoting Old Testament text, you can guarantee it. This is where they got. This and then right afterwards in Luke, when he meets with the disciples and opened their minds, understand the scriptures and how all the scriptures testify of him, et cetera, et cetera.

You're going to get to see that, but you get to see it primarily in the book of Acts. You see that day of Pentecost with with with Peter and you see it in Paul's preaching, and that's where you're going to get through the fulfillment.

But here you have the announcement and what an amazing announcement it actually is. But our time has passed us by, so let's thank Lord for our time and go into. Father, once again, we do thank you for your word.

We thank you for the testimony gives us of what you have done in history in Jesus Christ, and we would ask that just as by your spirit, you open the hearts and minds of disciples to understand. Then so, too, we are dependent this day as well.

You open our hearts and minds that we might understand your word, be better servants of yours. We pray in Christ's name.