Michael Stewart

The guarantee of the Holy Spirit not only gives us hope for the life to come—He brings purpose, perspective, and action for the present in light of His promise of resurrection.

The wonder of both Christmas and Easter unite as we consider how the Word becoming flesh informs our future state and present hope.

Resurrection life bears both continuity and discontinuity with our current life—both similarity and dissimilarity. Without continuity, the promise of renewal would be meaningless; and without discontinuity, there would be no real rescue.

Having established that resurrection is physical, the second fundamental teaching regarding the nature of resurrection is this: resurrection is future. Only one person has ever resurrected from the dead: Jesus. His resurrection is the promise for our future.

Considering not even the disciples were sure at first what Jesus meant by resurrection from the dead, we take time to unpack the fundamental nature of this fundamental doctrine: Resurrection is a bodily event.

We consider the empty tomb in light of two strong indicators of resurrection: pre-crucifixion prophecies and post-death appearances. In doing so, we also consider why the disciples didn’t immediately conclude that a resurrection had taken place.

Part detective, part defense attorney, we tackle remaining theories that challenge the resurrection of Jesus, including the stolen body, wrong tomb, and hallucination theories.

Some discount the resurrection by attacking the core necessities, challenging that there was no resurrection … because there was no death. We answer the challenge with Scriptural, historical, and even medical evidence that leads to compelling conclusions about the body of Christ.