The Gospel's Answer To The "Love" Of Sin - Part Three

The Gospel's Answer To The "Love" Of Sin (Faith In Jesus) - Part Three

Having examined the character of these witnesses in our last lesson we need to look at the nature of their testimony. Hard, empirical evidence - Jn 20:25 "Although Thomas the Twin was one of the twelve disciples, he wasn't with the others when Jesus appeared to them. So they told him, "We have seen the Lord!"’; Ac 10:40-41 "But three days later, God raised him to life and let him be seen. Not everyone saw him. He was seen only by us, who ate and drank with him after he was raised from death. We were the ones God chose to tell others about him."; 1 Jn 1:1 "The Word that gives life was from the beginning, and this is the one our message is about. Our ears have heard, our own eyes have seen, and our hands touched this Word." Objective, not subjective evidence, testimony that cannot be attributed to hallucinations, dreams, etc.

Note the transformation which took place. Prior to the resurrection, they were cowards who had lost hope! They fled at His arrest - Mk 14:50 "All of Jesus' disciples ran off and left him." Peter denied Him. They hid for fear of the Jews - Jn 20:19 "The disciples were afraid of the Jewish leaders, and on the evening of that same Sunday they locked themselves in a room. Suddenly, Jesus appeared in the middle of the group." Yet, after the resurrection, they were praising God and proclaiming Christ boldly as having been raised from the dead! Praising God in the temple - Lk 24:52-53 "After his disciples had worshiped him, they returned to Jerusalem and were very happy. They spent their time in the temple, praising God." Proclaiming Christ, despite persecution - Ac 5:28-32"We told you plainly not to teach in the name of Jesus. But look what you have done! You have been teaching all over Jerusalem, and you are trying to blame us for his death." Peter and the apostles replied: We don't obey people. We obey God. You killed Jesus by nailing him to a cross. But the God our ancestors worshiped raised him to life and made him our Leader and Savior. Then God gave him a place at his right side, so that the people of Israel would turn back to him and be forgiven. We are here to tell you about all this, and so is the Holy Spirit, who is God's gift to everyone who obeys God.", 41-42 "The apostles left the council and were happy, because God had considered them worthy to suffer for the sake of Jesus. Every day they spent time in the temple and in one home after another. They never stopped teaching and telling the good news that Jesus is the Messiah." Even an honest Orthodox Jew admits that the transformation in their lives is strong evidence for their testimony:
"If the disciples were totally disappointed and on the verge of desperate flight because of the very real reason of the crucifixion, it took another very real reason in order to transform them from a band of disheartened and dejected Jews into the most self-confident
missionary society in world history." (PINCHAS LAPIDE, former chairman of the Applied Linguistics Department at Israel's Bar-Iland University). Lapide concluded that a bodily resurrection could have possibly been that reason! (TIME, May 7, 1979). The change in the apostles gives strength to their testimony.

Consider the high moral standard they taught and lived. They exhorted disciples to live holy lives - 1 Th 4:1-7 "Finally, my dear friends, since you belong to the Lord Jesus, we beg and urge you to live as we taught you. Then you will please God. You are already living that way, but try even harder. Remember the instructions we gave you as followers of the Lord Jesus. God wants you to be holy, so don't be immoral in matters of sex. Respect and honor your wife. Don't be a slave of your desires or live like people who don't know God. You must not cheat any of the Lord's followers in matters of sex. Remember, we warned you that he punishes everyone who does such things. God didn't choose you to be filthy, but to be pure." They lived their own lives in an unimpeachable way - 1 Th 2:10-12 "Both you and God are witnesses that we were pure and honest and innocent in our dealings with you followers of the Lord. You also know we did everything for you that parents would do for their own children. We begged, encouraged, and urged each of you to live in a way that would honor God. He is the one who chose you to share in his own kingdom and glory." Does this sound like people who would propagate a lie if they knew better?

Consider the sacrifices they paid in life and death. They endured much hardship because of their testimony - 1 Co 4:9-13 "It seems to me that God has put us apostles in the worst possible place. We are like prisoners on their way to death. Angels and the people of this world just laugh at us. Because of Christ we are thought of as fools, but Christ has made you wise. We are weak and hated, but you are powerful and respected. Even today we go hungry and thirsty and don't have anything to wear except rags. We are mistreated and don't have a place to live. We work hard with our own hands, and when people abuse us, we wish them well. When we suffer, we are patient. When someone curses us, we answer with kind words. Until now we are thought of as nothing more than the trash and garbage of this world." All but one of the apostles died violent deaths because of their testimony of the resurrection. Even James, Jesus' brother, was thrown off the temple and clubbed to death for his refusal to recant his eyewitness testimony of the resurrection of Jesus! Deny the resurrection of Jesus, and you impugn the honesty and integrity of these witnesses! They would have had to been rank liars and frauds, out to deceive the world! Yet, these are the very ones who tell us what we know of Jesus, whose life and teachings has transformed the history of the world and the lives of millions! These are the ones who gave us the New Testament, containing the highest standard of morality the world has ever known! Does it make sense to call such men liars and frauds? To accept their testimony and the fact of the resurrection is not only rational, it is the beginning of the kind of faith which will come to hate sin!

But there is even more evidence which creates this kind of faith, fulfilled messianic prophecy. This was also an important foundation upon which faith in Christ was based. Jesus used this to strengthen the faith of His disciples. Note the two disciples on the road to Emmaus - Lk 24:25-27 "Then Jesus asked the two disciples, "Why can't you understand? How can you be so slow to believe all that the prophets said? Didn't you know that the Messiah would have to suffer before he was given his glory?" Jesus then explained everything written about himself in the Scriptures, beginning with the Law of Moses and the Books of the Prophets." Also note the teachings of Jesus to the apostles - Lk 24:44-48 "Jesus said to them, "While I was still with you, I told you that everything written about me in the Law of Moses, the Books of the Prophets, and in the Psalms had to happen." Then he helped them understand the Scriptures. He told them: The Scriptures say that the Messiah must suffer, then three days later he will rise from death. They also say that all people of every nation must be told in my name to turn to God, in order to be forgiven. So beginning in Jerusalem, you must tell everything that has happened." In their own teaching and preaching, the apostles appealed to fulfilled prophecy; Peter - Ac 2:29-31 "My friends, it is right for me to speak to you about our ancestor David. He died and was buried, and his tomb is still here. But David was a prophet, and he knew that God had made a promise he would not break. He had told David that someone from his own family would someday be king. David knew this would happen, and so he told us that Christ would be raised to life. He said that God would not leave him in the grave or let his body decay."; 3:18 "But God had his prophets tell that his Messiah would suffer, and now he has kept that promise.", 24 "Samuel and all the other prophets who came later also spoke about what is now happening." Philip - Ac 8:35 "So Philip began at this place in the Scriptures and explained the good news about Jesus." Paul - Ac 17:2,3 "So as usual, Paul went there to worship, and on three Sabbaths he spoke to the people. He used the Scriptures to show them that the Messiah had to suffer, but that he would rise from death. Paul also told them that Jesus is the Messiah he was preaching about."

How strong is this evidence? Consider there are at least 330 prophecies in the OT fulfilled in Jesus Christ! Twenty-nine (29) were fulfilled in one day! Such prophecies were spoken at various times by many different people during the ten centuries from 1500 B.C. to 500 B.C. The science of probabilities demonstrates that it is nigh to impossible Jesus fulfilled these prophecies out of coincidence. In one study (by Peter Stoner), eight (8) prophecies were considered:
The likelihood of anyone fulfilling just these eight by chance was calculated to be 1 in 10 to the 17th power. This would be like finding on the first try, while blindfolded, a marked silver dollar in a pile of silver dollars two-feet high covering the entire state of Texas!
In another study (also by Peter Stoner), forty-eight (48) prophecies were considered:
The likelihood of a coincidence was 1 in 10 to the 157th power! How big a number is 10 to the 157th power? Counting at the rate of 250 a minute it would take you 19 million times 19 million times 19 million years to count such a number! Remember, that is just calculating the chance of any one man coincidentally fulfilling 48 prophecies - Jesus fulfilled 330!

Look at it another way. Your chances of surviving a fall from 10,000 feet without a parachute is 1 in 10 million - would you "willingly" jump and take such a chance? Yet to reject Jesus because one thinks fulfilling 330 prophecies was coincidental is infinitely more risky than jumping out of an airplane at 10,000 feet without a parachute! We would say that anyone who jumped out of an airplane with such odds against survival is either stupid, crazy or ignorant of the risks. What about someone who takes the chance of rejecting Christ in view of the overwhelming odds he is wrong about Christ???

This is the kind of evidence in the Word of God to create faith in Jesus as the Son of God:
Eyewitness testimony of the resurrection of Jesus by numerous, reliable witnesses.
Fulfilled messianic prophecy that overwhelmingly convinces any informed, rational and
objective person! Yes, "faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God." - Ro 10:17
What kind of faith? A faith that hates sin, for what it did (separated us from God). For what it cost (the death of God's only begotten Son). For what it can do when engaged in by the unrepentant Christian (crucify again the Son afresh - He 6:4-6).

A faith that loves God for what He has done, for what He is doing and for what He will do.
A faith that will do whatever God desires me to do, to rid my life of the guilt of sin (e.g., faith, repentance, and baptism).
A faith that will utilize whatever blessing God offers to overcome the problem of sin (e.g., remission of sins, gift of the Holy Spirit, the promise of eternal life). Do you have that kind of faith which the gospel both gives and requires...a loving and obedient faith?
"If you love Me, keep My commandments." (Jn 14:15)

This study is from The Executable Outlines Series, a collection of sermon outlines and Bible study lessons by Mark A. Copeland . These outlines were developed in the course of my ministry as a preacher of the gospel. Feel free to use them as they are, or adapt them to suit your own personal style. To God be the glory!
The Executable Outlines Series, Copyright © Mark A. Copeland, 2001