Weekly Pastoral Message prepared by Rev. Murray Adamthwaite
for Sunday 6th April 1997

From the Pastor: The Resurrection II

How do we know that Christ rose from the dead? Multitudes around us are insisting. like king Agrippa, that it is "a thing incredible that God should raise the dead" (cf. Acts 26:8). One popular answer appears in the Easter song which has the chorus, You ask me how I know He lives; He lives within my heart. While not denying for a moment that Christ's resurrection power produces a work within us, and a consequent experience (see Ephesians 1:19-20; Colossians 1:29), I must confess that I have always had a problem with this line of reply. A subjective experience is never the basis of knowledge in the New Testament. On the contrary, it is "what we have heard, what we beheld and our hands touched, concerning the Word of Life ... we proclaim to you also" (1 John 1:1,3). We know on the basis of the testimony of the apostles, who were eyewitnesses of the risen Christ (Acts 2:32). Though you have not seen Him, believe in your heart the apostolic testimony that he is risen indeed, and enter into the same joy as the disciples who were glad when they saw the Lord (John 20:20).