The resurrection of Jesus Christ

In the strange economy of the atonement this meant that we were freed from the dealing death powers that held us in thrall and we were released into life. “The special thing, the new thing about the exaltation of Jesus Christ is that One who is bound as we are is free, who is tempted as we are is without sin, who is a sufferer as we are is able to minister to Himself and others, who is a victim to death is alive even thought He was dead, who is a servant (the servant of all servants) is the Lord.” (Karl Barth) This is the language that is proper to the discussion of the resurrection of Christ, it is metaphorical as the parables of Jesus are metaphorical. It refers to realities that are subjective rather than objective but nevertheless hold the key to our understanding of life.

The appearances of Jesus to his disciples did not happen in a golden age when such things could happen, but is the primary experience of all Christians in all times. Specifically, the reason that Christians attend church is to experience the presence of Christ, in his body that is the church and in the Word preached and the sacraments celebrated. Christian theology is always a theology of presence; the church cannot be reduced to a memorial society or a body of people who follow a common religious way. It is said that every Sunday is a celebration of the resurrection. Perhaps it is better to say that every Sunday is a celebration, and experience, of the presence of Christ.

Mark (16:1-8) has no account of the appearance of Jesus. At the end of the gospel Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James and Salome go to the tomb to anoint the body. They discover a young man dressed in a white robe (clearly Mark’s version of an angel) who says to them “Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. But go, and tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.” The gospel then ends in an inauspicious way with the verse: “So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” So inauspicious is this ending that later authors added verses that recounted appearances of Jesus as well as of an ascension.

While it is easy to discount Mark’s gospel because it was the earliest and does not have the stories of Luke or the grandeur of Matthew or the subtlety of John, this is an important witness to the resurrection because it points to the discovery of the risen Christ in Galilee (read world) in the future. Mark deftly avoids all of the arguments about the nature of the resurrection appearances and points instead to the future of the Church. The resurrection is not an event in time that is quickly relegated to the past, but an ongoing expectation in future time and in the world; we live in the resurrection. This is similar to the last words of the risen Christ in Matthew’s gospel: “And remember, I am with you always to the end of the age.”

The experience of Christ is a work of the Spirit and as such is subjective. This is quite unlike the life and death of the Son which is an objective historical datum. That Jesus was “crucified under Pontius Pilate” confirms this historical nature. That there were no witnesses to the resurrection and that the dominant expression of the resurrection is in the form of “appearances” bears witness to its subjective nature. The problem with modernity, since the rise of empirical science, is that historical fact takes precedence over, or even abolishes the subjective in the name of truth. This has produced “scientific man” who will not believe anything unless there is objective, observable evidence. A thorough application of this principle would produce a person who was uninterested in art or love, a frightening prospect. It is no wonder that there exists the character of the mad scientist.

The resurrection is at the centre of Christian faith and there have been many attempts to remove it as a problem for modern man so that belief is possible. In the process it has often been left behind as a superfluous myth to our loss. In this brief article I have attempted an apologetic for the resurrection without reducing its power and importance to the faith while giving a theological treatment of it that is faithful to the Scripture. My hope is that Christians may be able to rejoice on Easter morn with the traditional greeting “Christ is risen!” and be answered equally enthusiastically by “He is risen indeed!” and do so with a clear conscience.