Matt will be preaching on the Resurrection at Massey Presbyterian Church, 510 Don Buck Rd, Massey, Waitakere City, Auckland on Sunday 11 April at the 9.30am service.
All welcome.
If you cannot make it that Sunday he will be repeating the sermon at the Riverhead Presbyterian Church, Cnr Arthur and Gt North Rds, Riverhead, Auckland, at the 10 am service on Sunday 18 April.
To warm you up read his Good Friday: Why Celebrate Easter? post from last year.
Tags: Easter · Massey Presbyterian Church · Preaching · Resurrection · Riverhead Presbyterian Church21 Comments
A common objection to belief in the God of the Bible is that a good, kind, and loving deity would never command the wholesale slaughter of nations. In the tradition of his popular Is God a Moral Monster?, Paul Copan teams up with Matthew Flannagan to tackle some of the most confusing and uncomfortable passages of Scripture. Together they help the Christian and nonbeliever alike understand the biblical, theological, philosophical, and ethical implications of Old Testament warfare passages.
Is there resurrection? I am being told by another group that there is not such thing. That when we die, we just simply go back to God and that is the end of things! I read however that thre is a processing sort of for our soul or spirit that lets it come back and live for several times until it can be return to God eternally.
I’m envious – I’ve wanted to do an Easter sermon on the resurrection for ages!
What’s up with the guns?
Natural born killers?
Resurrection basically means surviving death outside the physical body. You can live in the afterlife on different levels before you reach God.
Reincarnation is when you return to the living (in a new body, new mind) to continue learning, experience or to fix bad karma.
I will just clarify with regards to reincarnation- you get a new body (correct) – you don’t actually get new mind, what I should have stated was you have your ‘memory is wiped clean and then refreshed’ and this happens on conception.
“Resurrection basically means surviving death outside the physical body.”
In Christian theology (as well as Jewish and Muslim theology), resurrection means survivng death with a physical body, and literally coming back to life.
Are you going to do an audio recording?
Glenn,
That is called resuscitation.
You are resurrected into your spiritual body (once you have passed over) but not back into the physical body you existed in, in the 3 dimensional world.
“Glenn,
That is called resuscitation.
You are resurrected into your spiritual body (once you have passed over) but not back into the physical body you existed in, in the 3 dimensional world.”
.. um.. no… the word resurrection is used by Christians to refer to a bodily resurrection as Glenn said. Don’t want to get into a debate about what words mean.. but in common usage resurrection means what Glenn said
Lily, before to try to tell people what words mean in Christian theology, it would be wise to find out first.
You are free to subscribe to a different religious tradition, but in the history of monotheism, resurrection means physically returning to life.
Jesus DIED at 33, he didn’t exactly hang around did he? In his physical body?
Lily – what? I don’t see what you’re getting at.
“Jesus DIED at 33, he didn’t exactly hang around did he? In his physical body?”
Yeah… he did… you might want to re-read the Gospels – particularly Luke. Hang around in his physical body is exactly what Jesus did.
In Corinthians1
42 So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption;
43 It is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power:
44 It is sown a natural body: it is RAISED a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.
So basically this could be the reason why Jesus couldn’t hang around, because He has been resurrected into a higher more spiritual body and that could be the reason Jesus had to skedaddle up to heaven. As his new spiritual body isn’t designed for the 3rd dimension.
He hung around for a bit- proving you survive death. Ghosts and spirits do this for short periods (and they can look as real as day). The spiritual body is a duplicate of your natural body.
But Jesus wasn’t resurrected back ‘alive’ into his physical body- if he had been – he wouldn’t have ascended.
“Ghosts and spirits do this for short periods”
Go read the descriptions of the risen Jesus and see if they look like a ghost to you – or like a solid person. Look out for eating, touching, etc. The gospels present him very much as solid and human.. he did not just LOOK real.. but clearly WAS real.
How on earth you get “his new spiritual body isn’t designed for the 3rd dimension.” I am not sure… as I have said… in the gospels his risen body seemed to work quite well in the 3rd dimension. Not sure what you think the Corinthians stuff shows.
Thank you Troll. =)
I know why I frequent theological blogs. There is absolutely no point in discussing Christianity with 20 year old sceptics who think Zeitgeist constitutes sound historical scholarship.
Or that Russell’s Teapot has any relation at all to the testimonies of witnesses of the resurrected Jesus.
“My momma told me, stupid is as stupid does.” Forrest Gump
And of course you were right there to witness the whole thing exactly like the Bible describes it!
“And of course you were right there to witness the whole thing exactly like the Bible describes it!”
I am very bad at this.. even in real life (worse yet online)… but was that sarcasm?
Lily, you have things exactly backwards.
We have the witness’s testimony in the books of the Bible. We have no evidence for the scenario you describe. Since you are making assertions contrary to the evidence it is up to you to provide something to back yourself rather than engage in passive-aggressive back-chat.
I think this is the way to describe how christian are?