Editorials
how can we believe in the lord’s resurrection?
We are told in the Heavenly Doctrine that the Lord, after dying on the cross,
came back to life – not just in the spiritual world as all people do on the third
day after their body dies, but with the body He had in this world. “A spirit does
not have flesh and bones as you see I have.” (Luke 24:39)
As Christians this is what we believe, and as New Church people this
belief is bolstered by the comprehensive and rational explanation we have of
the whole process of glorification the Lord went through during His life in
the world. His Resurrection was the completion of that process and must be
understood in that context.
But still, it is mind-boggling – so what does it really mean when we say
we believe in it?
First of all, it is a miracle, and must be considered as such. In fact, it was
the culmination of a series of miracles, beginning with the Lord’s miraculous
conception and birth. If you believe in the Virgin Birth, in the miracles of
healing, and the others – turning water to wine, multiplying the loaves and the
fishes, walking on water, the raising of Lazarus from the tomb – then belief in
the Lord’s Resurrection is not quite such a stretch. If Jesus was Divine, then
miracles are to be expected.
The point is: the Resurrection is an integral part of the whole view of Jesus
as God. The alternative idea is that He was simply a good man, a wise teacher,
a charismatic preacher, a political revolutionary or social reformer – in which
case He is not worshiped as Divine, and the Resurrection is a moot point.
Real Christianity, though, is the worship of the Lord Jesus Christ as God
and Savior, and since miracles are what God does, they are part and parcel of
the Christian religion. If we believe the Lord can save us from hell and raise
us up into eternal life in heaven, then surely we can believe that He could
overrule His own death. Miracles, by definition, are beyond natural “proof,”
but the ability to know of things beyond the natural is an essential part of what
it means to be human.
Consider also that there are different kinds of belief. For example: that
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