Afterward, he appeared to the eleven themselves as they were reclining at table, and he rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen. And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.” (Mark 16:14-16, ESV)
Have you ever had a hole-in-one, eagle, or a double eagle, only to suddenly realize there was no one there to see? Outside the obvious comeback, “Well, God saw it,” you still cannot verify to others that it happened. Maybe it is good enough for you and God to know it, and you could care less if no one else “believes it.”
About a decade ago, the USGSA produced a heartwarming commercial with a twelve-year-old boy making a hole-in-one only for him to look around in all directions to see if anyone had noticed. For a second or two, it seems no one saw it. Until the groundskeeper comes riding up and says, “Hey kid, nice shot; you know what this means, don’t you?” Immediately, in the next scene, the kid is buying the soft drinks.
It is a fact that Jesus physically rose from the dead in history in an immortal body. If his resurrection is only a “myth,” as some have argued, then we are, as Paul reasons, “of all people, most to be pitied.” Furthermore, if no one saw him after the resurrection, that wouldn’t mean it didn’t happen, but only The Triune God would know it.
If no one were there to see it and testify to it, that news would have never reached anyone, then or now. For you and I to know this and have our lives changed by its reality also requires other things to happen.
First, men and women in the first century had to see him, talk with him, eat breakfast with him, and watch him ascend into heaven on the “cloud of God.” In addition to that, these men and women had to report it. The Scriptures are chock full of eyewitness accounts of Jesus post-resurrection. But is that enough for us to be “saved?”
For this news to transform our lives, we must “believe and receive” this resurrected Jesus into our lives. In other words, the Jesus of history, who is now at the right hand of God and on the throne of heaven, must become the Lord of our lives. You might ask, “This is all good, but how does this happen?
One godly man I deeply admire is fond of saying, “The outside Jesus must become the inside Jesus.” What in the world does he mean by that? He means that Jesus, who died on the cross, rose from the dead, and ascended into heaven, must send his Spirit, the Spirit of Christ, to change our hearts and minds.
It is one thing to know the gospel’s content, summarized as follows: “Jesus died for our sins according to the Scriptures and rose again according to the Scriptures.” It is quite another thing to assent to those facts mentally. It is yet another thing to believe from your heart and give your life to the Resurrected King.
During the Protestant Reformation, those men and women committed to recovering “the gospel” made three important distinctions regarding the good news of salvation: First, there was the gospel’s content found in Scripture (Latin, Notitia; the eyewitness testimony). Second, that gospel required mental assent (Latin, Assensus; intellectual understanding). Finally, one must trust that gospel from the heart (Latin, Fiducia) to be saved from sin.
All this to say, it is not enough to know the facts of the gospel, nor is it enough to intellectually admit that Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection occurred; rather, it is essential to personally encounter the risen Christ through the Holy Spirit resulting in a spiritual rebirth that finds expression in total allegiance to the King of kings, Jesus the Christ!
Prayer: Father, may we say with the men on the road to Emmaus, “Didn’t our heart burn within us!”