Christianity stands upon the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ. No one has ever disproved Jesus' resurrection, and of those who have truly studied Jesus' resurrection, many have come face to face with historic facts that support the bodily resurrection of Christ.

What are the facts?

Christianity would have been stopped at its beginning if the Romans or Jewish leaders who crucified Jesus could have produced his dead body!!! Since the Jewish and Roman leaders could not produce Jesus' body, we must ask, "Who had the body of Jesus?"
 

Many have attempted to explain what happened to Jesus' body or that the disciples were experiencing delusion about Jesus' resurrection. Even with all the research and attempted explanations for this historic mystery, no one has ever produced a good answer or proved the whereabouts of Jesus' body.

Jesus' followers went on to proclaim Jesus throughout the known world in their lifetime. Most of the disciples were martyred as enemies of either Judaism or the Roman Empire. As it turns out, Jesus' resurrection made the disciples fanatical in their spreading of the gospel. Jesus' truth could not be stopped. To this end, four profound facts came about because of the disciples' labors that support the bodily resurrection of Jesus.

Fact No. One - Sudden Emergence of the Church:

• Suddenly the church came into existence because of the disciples' work. The church appeared suddenly and has since spread across the face of the entire globe.

Fact No. Two - Worship on Sunday, the day of Jesus' Resurrection:

• Jesus' resurrection took place on the Feast of First Fruits, which always occurs on the Sunday following the Passover. So the Feast of First Fruits was prophetic of Jesus' resurrection. The New Testament records show that the early followers of Jesus worshipped on both Saturday, the Sabbath, and on Sunday, the day of the resurrection. The reason for the change can only be attributed to the bodily resurrection of Jesus on the Feast of First Fruits.

Fact No. Three - New Testament Documents Written:

• Jesus' followers took up the pen and wrote about his life, works, death, resurrection, and ascension into heaven. In these documents, we find the most positive words written about Jesus' resurrection, some of which follow:
  1. "We did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty." (2 Peter 1:16).
  2. "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched - this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ." (1 John 1:1-3).
  3. "After his [Jesus] suffering, he showed himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God." (Acts 1:3)
      
     In each of these verses, the disciples reveal how they were eyewitnesses of the resurrected Messiah named Jesus.

Fact No. Four - Martyrdom of the Disciples:

• Would you die for something you knew was not true? The disciples, just like you, would not have died for a lie. So why did most of the disciples go through all the hassles and pain of spreading the gospel to the nations? The only human or logical reason would be that they witnessed the resurrected Jesus, just as they wrote in the New Testament. Death, to the early apostles, was a passage from this world into the presence of God.

You can create any explanation about the whereabouts of Jesus' body after the crucifixion. However, you must still explain why the disciples spread the gospel throughout the known world and accomplished the four feats noted above. For example, you may believe that Jesus' body was burned and then the disciples conspired to say that Jesus had risen from the dead. Or let your mind create any scenario to explain the whereabouts of Jesus' body. If the disciples created any of these stories or false scenarios about Jesus, eventually someone would have told the truth.

Consider the Apostle Paul, who wanted to destroy the Christian faith at its very onset. He would have been like Osama Bin Laden in the 1st century. But something happened to Saul of Tarsus. To read his story, click here.

Jesus had a brother named James. The secular author Josephus wrote about James being martyred for his Christian faith in Jesus as the Messiah. But at one time, James did not believe in Jesus at all. What made James change his mind. To read James' story, click here.

In addition to these facts, the Bible contains numerous prophecies written centuries before Jesus' birth, which the New Testament proclaims that Jesus fulfilled. (Jesus will completely fulfill many remaining Old Testament prophecies at the Second Coming). Perhaps the most exacting of these prophecies is found in Daniel's time-oriented prophecy that foretold how the suffering Messiah had to appear in human history before the destruction of Jerusalem that occurred in AD 70.  

I have created a new web site that considers the viewpoint in the previous paragraph. Do you have friends or know people who do not believe in God. The new web site takes the most negative view of the Bible, that of an atheist. Regardless of taking such a negative viewpoint of the Bible , the evidence and analysis concludes at a high confidence level that Jesus is for real. To read the new web site, click here.