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Luke 24:6b–12
“Remember how [Jesus] told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise” (vv. 6b–7).
We have been looking at Luke’s account of the resurrection of Jesus and at some of what the other Gospels say about this event. As we have seen, though there are differences between the records, none of them amount to a true contradiction. The resurrection took place in real space and in real time; if it did not, then the world has no hope (1 Cor. 15:17).
As we consider the resurrection of Jesus, it will be helpful to consider why Jesus had to rise again. Plainly, once God had determined that Jesus would die for the sins of His people, the resurrection became a necessity. Why? Remember that death is the punishment for sin (Gen. 2:16–17). It has a claim only on those who are actually personally guilty of sin. Jesus was susceptible to death because the sins of His people were imputed to Him (2 Cor. 5:21). Yet He had no personal sin of His own, and He exhausted the punishment due to God’s people for their own sin (1 Peter 2:22–24), so death could not hold Him under its power forever. Jesus therefore had to rise from the dead. Dr. R.C. Sproul comments: “Death had no claim on [Jesus] whatsoever. Though He died for the sins of people, Jesus remained sinless, and corruption had no title to Him; death had no title to Him. And so He got up, and He walked out of the tomb.”
The resurrection proved our Lord’s sinlessness and thus that He was an acceptable sacrifice for sin on behalf of His people. He was raised for our justification (Rom. 4:25)—the perfectly righteous One rose again, revealing that God regards all those who are united to Him by faith as righteous as well. This was what the Scriptures and Jesus had been saying all along, such that when the angels spoke to the women, they could point back to what Jesus had taught. Matthew Henry comments, “These angels from heaven bring not any new gospel, but put them in mind, as the angels of the churches do, of the sayings of Christ, and teach them how to . . . apply them.” Any angel who will not preach the gospel given by Jesus and His Apostles must be rejected (Gal. 1:8–9).
Today’s passage names some of the women who went to the tomb and tells us that the disciples did not believe them at first (Luke 24:8–11). Peter, however, went to investigate, and he marveled when he saw that the tomb was empty (v. 12). He did not take a blind leap into the dark when he believed, but his faith rested on tangible evidence—the women’s testimony and the emptiness of our Lord’s tomb.
Coram Deo Living before the face of God
Christian faith does not demand that we believe contrary to evidence. Instead, it is a trust in things unseen based on sound historical testimony. On account of that testimony, we know that Jesus has been raised and that God will forgive everyone who believes in Jesus. That is the good news of the gospel that we are called to share far and wide.
For further study
- Ezekiel 37:1–14
- Daniel 12:2
- John 20:1–10
- Revelation 1:17–18
The bible in a year
- Jonah 4–Micah 2
- Revelation 9