My Critics

The below “dialogue” between me and “PCfree” took place on Cal Thomas’ website. The site features several atheists or agnostics, as the case may be, who fight tooth and nail against the reality of God’s knowable existence and/or the death of Christ and it’s significance.

In the below exchange “PCfree” militates against the resurrection of Christ. He does so by appealing to a few  “near death” experiences as “evidence” against it. He basically contends that Jesus didn't really die on the cross or that he “died” and was revived in his beaten and battered state. He then proceeded to convince the disciples that he was the “Prince of Life.”

For More information on the historical physical resurrection of Jesus click here

PCfree posted:

I find it interesting that you totally avoided the point that many have died and returned from the dead including a co-worker of mine who died twice.  As I stated, he was dead-dead.  But thanks to modern medicine, he is alive today.  You talk about Roman soldiers being "masters" of death with their executions, yet when I bring up medical doctors, who have much more skill in detecting "life" in a body and medical equipment that Romans could have never dreamed of to determine the lack of life in a body, yet people have "come back to life" in morgues in hospitals after being pronounced dead by doctors, you have totally avoided these points. And what about Lazarus? Didn't he rise after being dead-dead?  Dead to the point of smelling really bad?

Dear PCfree

Come now. Let's be fair in this interaction. You raise many issues that cannot be answered without taking up much space; so, I deal with the issue I think is more pressing. The denial of Jesus' death and the empty tomb are issues that I find much more important than whether or not you know someone who has experienced a NEAR DEATH experience.

I guess I will outline some of the differences between the ones you KNOW and the ones in scripture. First, CLINACALLY DEAD doesn’t ipso facto mean ACTUALLY dead. In fact, the incidents about which you have read, experienced, and posted are commonly known as near death experiences.  I am glad that your friend didn’t actually die. Whether he was revived by doctors or "chance," I am glad that he is still alive. He has been given more chances than most to receive Christ as Savior.

No matter the medical differences between the first and present centuries, “actually dead” is, well, actually dead.  I also find it interesting that you are eager to accept the testimony of much of the biblical text, albeit with a naturalistic slant in your interpretation, and refuse to accept the testimony that Jesus was dead as the text says. Of course, if you deny the supernatural a priori, as you have done with the resurrection, you must work hard to make the pieces fit.

Second, none of those mentioned in your last post had reached the point of decay as you admit happened to Lazarus. He was obviously dead according to the text. He had been dead for 4 days and may have started to stink.

Third, the near death experiences you mentioned didn’t require supernatural intervention, the very thing you seem to deny throughout your tirades.  The raising of Lazarus, however, was recorded as a supernatural act by Him who possesses inherent life. Even the religious rulers, those who wanted Jesus Dead, couldn’t deny the raising of Lazarus and it was this event that pressed them to seek his death because of their fear that all men would follow him, to destroy him. John 11:45

Fourth, the Bible mentions several people that came back from the dead.  These events, however, are better explained as resuscitations. The people who died were revived after their actual death and according to the natural process of life - died again.

Finally, the resurrection of Christ is qualitatively different. His resurrection was no mere resuscitation and it was of such a nature that He will never die again. His body was changed. The Christian is promised a body like His in the resurrection and it will be a body fit for eternity - capable of standing in the presence of the Living God.

The tangibility of Jesus’ resurrected  body is noted throughout the gospels. It was not believed to be an ethereal or ghostly phenomenon. Luke 24:39 notes the lengths to which Jesus went to prove that he was RESURRECTED not just resuscitated. In fact, a merely resuscitated Jesus would have been unbelievable, given the crucifixion, even if he had survived; nor would he have gone to such lengths to convince the disciples that he had indeed risen – bodily.

Other issues are relevant here. Take for example the resurrection claims of a battered, wounded and weak Jesus. Logically speaking, he could never have convinced the disciples that he was the Prince of Life if he had been mangled and weak from a devastating and blood draining crucifixion.

Nor would he have been able to convince them that the gospel, a message to which the resurrection was central, was a message worthy of a commitment   unto the death. History declares the fact of the disciples’ deaths and it accompanied their preaching of the gospel which always included the resurrection. It is clear that the disciples thought that Jesus had risen from the dead bodily in a sense unlike no other had ever done. I am convinced that any doubt of such in the minds of these eyewitnesses would have yielded, logically, other results.

Tony

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