Dear students, I hope you're finally able to begin enjoying and making the most of your holiday. You've made it through the somewhat gruelling PW Oral Presentations! I told 1SA2 that I would put up a post on what I had intended to show them during my last lesson with them for the year, and so here's it, even though it's a little late. 1SB1 and 1SA4 had an opportunity to watch a part of the documentary "Raised From the Dead", and I really wished I had more time to discuss it with them. For those of you who have watched it, I hope that it has encouraged you, at the very least, to think a little more about the big questions--those of life, and death, and whether God exists.
Just a little about this controversial video which was made known to me by a colleague several weeks ago: in short, it's supposed to document the testimonies of people who witnessed in some way the alleged miraculous resurrection of a Nigerian pastor in 2001. As a caveat, let me say that I'm not presenting the video as truth; neither am I pressing for belief in the Bible or the God of the Bible in whom I happen to believe. What follows, however,
are the ruminations of a Christian, and so I shall not attempt to sound artificially neutral, for example in the terms that I use, terms such as "God's Word"--this does not mean, however, that no objectivity is possible. This event is being touted as a 21st century resurrection miracle by many Christians even as it has its fair share of cynics and outright critics who suggest that this is a conspiracy to give some Christian ministry or other a financial boost. How are we laymen who do not have first hand knowledge of this event to view it? What would be the intellectually honest position to take when we encounter such claims? What could constitute reasons for believing or disbelieving in the claim that the Christian God has raised a modern day man from the dead?
There are many questions here, and it would obviously be impossible for me to even try to address all of them here. Thus, I shall limit myself to a few observations for now. Those of you who are interested in viewing the video can email me for a loan. Others who would like to pursue some of these questions are most welcome to comment or send me an email. If sufficient numbers of you express some interest in the subject, we could even devote a lesson or two to it in the coming year, as we ponder a little about that "sensitive" subject of religion.
1. Assume that the alleged resurrection did indeed take place. Now what does it show? What can it prove? It seems to me that such miracles do not constitute solid 100% evidence that God exists and is the God that the Bible tells us about. A man died, and that same man comes alive again after a few days with a story about what seems to be in general agreement with the biblical afterlife. What of that? There are at least two responses. First, if we do not already believe in the truth of the Bible, nor are inclined to, then for all we know, the world is simply a lot stranger that we imagined. There are forces at work which science has not been able to explain. What a coincidence that the resurrected man tells of a heaven that sounds almost like the biblical heaven--or maybe not such a coincidence since the man was after all a pastor whose mind could have been made to believe that he saw an embellished vision of what he had merely read prior to his death. However, if we are Christians or are open to the possibility that the Bible is true, then things will be somewhat different. If the man was truly resurrected, then it has to be the work of God for only He can give life in such a way. Glory be to God then for His wonderful demonstration of grace towards that man and his family! We do not know exactly why He has chosen to work this way in this man's life, but we can trust that all His ways are good. We can properly take this miracle as an encouragement to live more worthy of Him thereafter, to live our lives here on earth with more reverential fear, sense of mission, and joyful confidence of a heavenly home.
2. Continuing on how we should properly respond to this alleged miracle, we can also ask the related question about what the purpose of such a resurrection might be, in the biblical worldview. The resurrected pastor in question alludes to the account in Luke 16 where an unbelieving rich man has died and gone to Hades, and asks Father Abraham to send someone back from the dead to preach to his family so that they may repent and escape his fate. His request is denied, and Abraham's answer (i.e. God's Word) is instructive: "They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them. ... If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets (i.e. all the Scripture they had then in New Testament times), they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead." The ability of such a resurrection to convict the hearts of sinners is greatly limited. As said earlier, if one has set one's heart against believing in God, then one can come up with a multitude of explanations for such real or fabricated 'miraculous' phenomenon. Romans 1 also gives one key underlying premise of the Bible, which is that "since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have clearly been seen, being understood through what has been made..." God has created man with a knowledge of Himself that is accessible, no matter how obscured this knowledge is by man's sinful nature. What is it that brings sinners to repent and believe in Jesus Christ then? "Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God." (Romans 10:17) Only God's Word and the conviction of the Holy Spirit can bring one to belief, and basing our confidence in any created thing (such as testimonies or experiences of modern day miracles) will be folly.
3. Having watched the first part of the video and read a few internet sites that comment on the alleged miracle, I find myself unable to say for sure whether the miracle did indeed take place. Firstly, did Pastor Daniel really die? We may perhaps doubt the credibility of the doctor who after all only examined him with a stethoscope and based his pronouncement of death on the "dilated pupils". But then what about the mortician who supposedly embalmed the body? What does embalming in Nigeria consist of? Apparently some preservation chemicals will be injected into the body, and whether or not Pastor Daniel was injected with the full dose seems unimportant; he was injected with enough to keep his body stiff and from decomposing (supposing he was dead). Now if he wasn't dead, such chemicals would conceivably really adversely interfere with the normal workings of the body, to say the least (more research is needed here). By all accounts he was as good as a dead man for about 3 days and even placed inside a closed coffin for some time. One possibility is that our current state of knowledge has not yet given a name to a condition where one shows all the usual symptoms of death but is actually still alive. This, however, seems to me a bit of a stretch. Another possibility would be that this whole story is simply a hoax, a conspiracy between the main characters in the telling of it, deceiving even the church leadership and all the many people who saw Daniel after he was supposedly resurrected and resting on a chair in the church. However, I would be puzzled as to what the motivation of such a conspiracy might be, especially for the pastor and his wife, who by all accounts are godly people, and who would really be showing a brazen lack of fear of God by telling such a tall story that ironically is supposed to invoke godly fear in its listeners. Could monetary gain have been a motive? That's also hard to see, for the pastor and his family are today, despite the popularity of the VCD, not reaping obscene profits from its sales, and not living in luxury. In fact, it appears that he's used money that has been given to him to buy equipment for his rigorous evangelistic ministry instead of using it for personal gain. At this point in time, it really is beyond me to say why someone would do something like that if they knew that the whole thing didn't happen.
4. I'm not saying that resurrections cannot, or do not, happen. I know of at least 2 that have been recorded in the Bible, and the only one that is really of consequence, and indeed, of central importance to the whole Christian worldview, is that of Jesus Christ's. In His case, that he had died was beyond doubt. Roman soldiers pierced his side and out gushed water and blood, separated, a clear sign of death which by itself could well be a cause of death if the person was not already dead. Jesus was then wrapped in funereal cloths which would have suffocated one whose heartbeat was not discernible by primitive means. Jesus then was resurrected on the third day, just as He had told his disciples. This is surely the only resurrection that we ought to put our full trust in, for it is the only resurrection that saves.
