Acts 242 Study

They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.

Tag Archives: Resurrection

Doubting Thomas

There are a few New Testament Bible stories that are so universally known that the main character takes on a life and meaning of his own. That character’s name and actions become synonymous with certain personality traits that supersede the story’s real intent. For example, the story that Jesus told in Luke 10:30-37 about a man being robbed, beaten and left for dead is not remembered as the answer to the questions that Jesus was asked, “who is the neighbor”, but is known as the story of the” Good Samaritan”. Now, anyone who helps out someone in need is called a Good Samaritan, even though that was not the point of Jesus’ story. A second example is a parable that Jesus told in Luke 15 to answer the question of why he would eat with sinners and tax collectors. The young man in the story who wanted his inheritance early and left the family has over time become known as the ”Prodigal Son”. If anyone has wandered from the faith and returned, he is called a prodigal son. Again, that was not the main meaning of the parable that answered the Pharisees question of why Jesus would be hanging out with sinners.

Another story that has this kind of handle attached to the character is the story of Thomas, one of the 12 apostles (disciples) of Jesus. Because of his questioning reaction to the news that his rabbi, whom he witnessed being crucified and then buried, had now come back to life and was seen by the rest of the disciples, he has been forever labeled as,” Doubting Thomas”. Today, if anyone has a tendency to be hesitant or skeptical of a situation, they are labeled as a “Doubting Thomas”. Is this a fair label to hang on this disciple of Jesus or should he be remembered in a different light? What do we really know about Thomas? A little digging will show that this little known member of the twelve was a fiercely loyal and faith-filled apostle that was willing to give his life and travel to the ends of the earth to share the good news that he had been witness to for the three years leading up to the incidents in Jerusalem. Yes, he had some misgivings and questions because of what he had seen, but in the end, we should all strive to be more like this devout follower of Jesus.

In Matthew, Mark, and Luke, Thomas is only mentioned as one of the twelve. In Matthew 10:3 and Luke 6:12-16 he is listed as one of the ones that were given the special title,” apostle”. The book of John has by far the most information on Thomas. In John 11: 16, we learn that he was also called, “Didymus”, which means twin, but doesn’t tell us who his twin was. A verse that gives us a great insight into Thomas’ personality is found in the same chapter of John. Near the end of Jesus’ ministry, in John 11:1-3, Jewish leaders were plotting to kill him. The disciples received news that their friend, Lazarus, was near death. Fearing for their lives, they tried to talk Jesus out of going to Lazarus’ hometown of Bethany, because it was too close to Jerusalem. Jesus was determined to go and Thomas spoke to the rest of the disciples and said, “Let us also go that we may die with him”. This statement, in the face of death, showed extreme courage and loyalty.

Thomas also showed extreme loyalty in John 14:1-6, when Jesus told the disciples that he was going to leave them very soon to go to his Father’s house to prepare a place for them. This confused the disciples and Thomas was the first to speak up and say, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?” This statement implies that Thomas wanted to figure it out and wanted desperately to go where his Rabbi was going.

Unfortunately, what Thomas is known for in the Gospels is a statement to the other disciples that he needed proof to believe that Jesus had actually risen from the grave. He wasn’t in the room when Jesus showed himself to the rest of the disciples (John 20:24-29). He was saying,” I want to see it as you guys did, so I can also believe”, which was an honest statement given the unbelievable thought that Jesus had somehow come back from the dead. Jesus lovingly gave Thomas proof and let him feel and touch his resurrected body. Thomas immediately confessed, “My Lord and my God”! He was not a doubter at all-like the others, he saw and believed!

What happened to Thomas after the resurrection? Acts 1:13 lists him among the disciples that witnessed the Ascension. From that miraculous event, we have to depend on church history to see what happened to ‘Doubting Thomas”. History records that he traveled east from Jerusalem to spread the gospel as Jesus had commanded them. He traveled to Parthia (modern-day Eastern Iran) and then on to the far reaches of the known world in India. Look at a map to see how far he went to spread the good news that he was a witness of. In 72 A.D. while preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ, he was killed with a spear by the local pagan priests who were vehemently opposed to his teachings. Like all the other disciples but John, he was martyred for his faith.

Let’s remember Thomas, not as a doubter, but a fiercely loyal follower of his rabbi, and our Messiah Jesus Christ.

Is Jesus in the Old Testament, Too?

The Appearance to the Apostles (Maestà)

The Appearance to the Apostles by Duccio di Buoninsegna

We often hear the catchy phrase that the Old Testament is the New Testament concealed and the New Testament is the Old Testament revealed. As you read the New Testament gospels, you can catch a glimpse of how the New Testament stories of Jesus might be revealing the answer to some Old Testament verses (such as the Passover Lamb and riding into Jerusalem on a donkey). However, we have a harder time looking in our Old Testament and finding Jesus. If it is concealed, how do we find them? For the most part, we seemed to be satisfied just to have the accounts in the New Testament of His life, death, burial, resurrection, and ascension, and don’t feel the need to see if it was prophesied somewhere long ago. Does the Old Testament really predict all of these events ahead of time and is Jesus really concealed in all its pages? Another fascinating story, on the heels of the Emmaus Road story in Luke 24:36-49 will shed some light on this question. Is Jesus really in the Old Testament?

The story in Luke has Jesus appearing to his disciples the evening of the day that he was resurrected. John 20:19 tells us that the disciples were meeting behind locked doors because they were afraid that the Jewish leaders were after them. Jesus suddenly appeared in their midst and began conversing with them. As you can imagine, even though he was standing among them, they were having a hard time believing that He had actually come back from the grave. Jesus showed them His hands and feet and ate a piece of fish so they would see that He was indeed alive and not a ghost!

Then, in verse 44-49, it says, ”he opened their minds so they could understand the scriptures.” In verse 44, He made this amazing statement, “Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses (Torah), the Prophets (Neviim) and the Psalms (Ketuvim).” The Hebrew Bible is called the Tanakh because of these three divisions. (Read, A Lesson from the Tanakh for a complete description). Jesus was saying, “I have fulfilled every prophecy in every part of the Hebrew scriptures that you know so well. Every section of the text refers back to me.” What a lesson that must have been when He showed them everything that had just happened in the Hebrew Text!

What was the result of Jesus opening their minds to understanding the fact that they had actually been traveling with the ”Son of God”, the, promised, “Messiah” for three years? Jesus told them that because they were eyewitnesses to the fulfillment of all these prophecies, they were going to be responsible to now go out “and preach repentance and forgiveness of sins in the name of Jesus to all the nations, beginning in Jerusalem.” This sounds just like the parallel verse in Matthew 28:18-20, that we call the Great Commission. And, that is what they did, starting in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the ends of the earth. The disciples ended up all over the known world, spreading the good news that their Rabbi and Messiah had taught and shown them while he was in their midst. What they had seen and been shown in the word convinced them to be completely sold out to their faith, even to the point of death, for all of them. This should give us more incentive to find Christ ourselves in the pages of the book and make his name known to a world that badly needs his promise of salvation.

P.S. An excellent place to start a study to find Christ in the Old Testament would be these two short articles:

  1. A Blueprint for the Messiah-Found in the Exodus
  2. Mining the Scriptures

The Emmaus Road

The story of Jesus meeting two travelers on the road to Emmaus, a small village seven miles from Jerusalem, is recorded in great detail in the Gospel of Luke Chapter 24:13-35. According to Luke, the story takes place on the evening of the day ( Sunday) Jesus was resurrected. One of the men is named Cleopas and the other remains unnamed. These two men were discussing the events that had taken place in Jerusalem over the recent Passover weekend, and in particular what had happened to the man named Jesus, who was crucified. They had also heard that Jesus’ body was now missing from the tomb and some were claiming that he was, in fact, alive. 

While they were walking and talking, Jesus came alongside them and began walking with them and listening to their discussion. They were prevented from recognizing him and were shocked that he didn’t seem to know about all these terrible things that had taken place over the weekend. They were completely downcast because it seemed that their hoped-for Messiah had now been killed by the Romans. Jesus interrupted them and told these men that they were not seeing clearly and weren’t understanding why all these sequences of events had to have taken place.

The next set of verses in this story, Ch. 24:25-27, are some of the most profound and revelatory words in scripture, but we probably read right over it! ”Did not the Christ have to suffer these things and then enter His glory? And beginning with Moses and the Prophets he explained to them what was said in all the scriptures concerning himself”. What “scriptures” was he talking about? The Old (Hebrew) Testament!! By saying, “beginning with Moses”, he was saying, the Torah and all the prophets. In other words, he was saying the whole of the Old Testament tells the story of how God’s only son had to come to earth, be crucified on a cross to be our Passover Lamb and then rise again on the 3rd day! Wouldn’t you have liked to have been in on that lesson? He would have shown them all the prophecies that had to be fulfilled to bring him to the spot where the events of the past weekend had unfolded. Can you imagine the look on their faces as everything became clear to them? The text says that after he had explained the scriptures to them, their eyes were opened and they recognized him as the risen Jesus! That phrase, “recognized” meant more than just him as a man-they now knew he was the promised Messiah.

The verses in Luke 24:25-27 are something we just typically overlook, but what he was saying was that Jesus is in the whole Bible, not just the New Testament. From Genesis to Maps, Jesus is on every page, we are just not always seeing him there. The whole Bible is one long thread that wonderfully portrays our Messiah Jesus as our Risen Savior.  Don’t we serve an amazing God?

The Ascension

See Mark 16:19, Luke 24:50-53, and Acts 1:1-9

"Ascension", Rembrandt Harmensz

“Ascension”, Rembrandt Harmensz

After Jesus’ resurrection, He appeared and spoke to His disciples and others for forty days, teaching them about the Kingdom of God (Acts 1:1-3). On the fortieth day, Jesus took His disciples out to the vicinity of Bethany, on the Mount of Olives, and while they were watching, He was taken up to heaven in a cloud. Put yourself in the disciples sandals and take a moment to think about what just happened. In the last forty days they have seen their rabbi, Jesus, who they thought would be their earthly king, arrested, crucified, resurrected, and now taken up to heaven in a cloud! The disciples have now witnessed what could be argued as the most dramatic event in all Scripture, ascending to heaven! As far as a major miracle, it would have had to be as equally impressive as the resurrection. Going to heaven to sit at the right hand of God was also a fulfillment of prophecy just like Jesus’ death and resurrection was. Yet, have you ever thought or been taught that the ascension was a major theological event? We have a day on the church calendar, forty days after Easter Sunday to commemorate the ascension, but you never hear anyone preach or teach or give the weight to this event like you do Easter and the resurrection story. In the Acts narrative in Chapter 1, we hear sermons on waiting on the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:4-8) and the commission He gave the disciples in Acts 1:8, but we don’t hear anything about the ascension itself. We celebrate Jesus’ resurrection in a big way, but His ascension is every bit as important to His deity as His resurrection. There is bound to be more here than we’ve known at first glance and has to be more to the story.

The ascension is not mentioned in Matthew or John and there is only one sentence on it in Mark. From the last few verses in Luke and the first few verses of Acts, we can piece together the story – and what a story it is! Luke’s story of the gospel of Jesus Christ has quite a profound ending. Jesus gathered His disciples around Him near Bethany on the Mount of Olives. Scripture says, ”He lifted His hands and blessed them and while He was blessing them, He left them and was taken up to heaven.” When the disciples saw this, they returned to Jerusalem with great joy. It is interesting to note that Luke begins His book by telling the story of an old priest, Zechariah, who was part of the line of Aaron and the official priesthood. This old priest is unable to bless because God took his voice after he didn’t believe the angel’s story of what was about to happen to him. The end of Luke’s book is a story of Jesus, who is not a member of the priesthood and was not supposed to be able to bless. However, Jesus raises His hands and blesses His disciples. In doing this, Jesus is claiming to be the promised Messiah who would be a prophet, priest, and king all rolled into one person. By lifting His hands to bless – which only priest were allowed and commissioned to do – Jesus was claiming the priesthood and displaying His divine nature as this triune being. This was why they returned to Jerusalem with such joy!

When the disciples saw Jesus ascending to heaven their Jewish minds would have quickly gone to the story of Daniel and the prophetic vision that he wrote down in Daniel 7 while in captivity in Babylon. In Daniel’s vision, four evil beasts came out of the abyss to bring chaos to the world. These four evil kingdoms of men misruled the earth and put it in shambles. Then in Daniel 7:13-14, Daniel sees, “one like a son of man”, coming with clouds to come and restore order to the chaos. This was taken by the Jewish minds as a reference to the Messiah who was to come and this is the first time in Scripture the Messiah was called the ”son of man”. Daniel’s vision then goes on to say that when this, ”son of man” went into heaven, He was led into the presence of God and was given authority over everything and that His rule and reign would be forever at the right hand of God. Interestingly, Jesus applied this title to himself several times and the disciples were definitely aware that Jesus called himself by this messianic term. In fact, the title “son of man”, is used for Jesus over one hundred times in the New Testament. Read Luke 9:21-22, Luke 9:26-27, Luke 11:29-32, Luke 18:31-34, and Luke 19:10 and also look at these passages in Matthew; Matthew 24:30-31, Matthew 25:31-33, and Matthew 26:64. From the Daniel story and by listening to what Jesus said about Himself, when they witnessed the ascension, they thought, ”He’s going to heaven now to sit at the right hand and rule with His father! He is the ‘Son of Man’ like He said He was!”

In Mark 16:19 it says that Jesus, ”was taken up to heaven and sat at the right hand of God.” This fulfills the prophetical verse in Psalm 110:1 where God declares the promised Messiah will sit at His right hand. Jesus says,”that’s me”, when He quotes that verse to the Pharisees in Matthew 22:41-45. In conclusion, because of prophecy and Jesus’ words to them, the disciples knew exactly where He was going, where He would be sitting, and what He would be doing when He got to heaven. He would now have all authority over the earth. When they saw Jesus ascend to heaven, they realized in a huge way, “Our Rabbis is King of the Universe! He’s in Charge! He does have all authority!” Then an angel comes and tells them that He will be coming back the same way that He left.

Given this background, isn’t the ascension every bit as important to God’s deity as His resurrection? The ascension proves that Jesus is the King; He is ruling and reigning over the universe now! Like the first disciples, we are also to be witnesses of His ascension. When He said to, “be my witnesses”, it was not only witness to the resurrection, it was witness to His ascension as well. We are to be witnesses that He is not only our Savior, but He is also our King! Evidently, the early disciples really believed that He was in charge of the world. Do we? By what we say and how we live, we also are witnesses to whether or not Jesus is in charge of the universe. Every time we choose to do what the King desires we are taking back a square foot of the Kingdom and are advancing the Kingdom of Heaven. Conversely, every time we choose not to do what the King desires and requires, we loose a square foot of the Kingdom. He didn’t say, “Just hang on till I get back”, He said to start advancing the Kingdom here on earth. We are to be expanding the Kingdom by the way we serve the ascended King. What square foot will you take today by living the way the ascend King wants?

The Resurrected Dead

Signorelli_Resurrection-pano

At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people.
– Matthew 27:51-53

A scripture we normally read over fairly quickly is the above passage in Matthew 27. The main reason we do not spend a lot of time on this story, incidentally only found in Matthew, is because of the part in verses 52 and 53 where tombs are broken open and dead people come to life. Since that is something we have never witnessed or heard of happening, it causes us some problems in trying to explain what and how this might have occurred. One amazing fact that we often overlook because of the quick read, is the fact that these resurrected people only appeared after Jesus’ resurrection, three days later! Only after Jesus’ resurrection did these holy people go into Jerusalem and witness to people. Where did they go for three days and is the fact that they appeared only after the resurrection significant?

The answer to this question is a resounding, “Yes”! These people were the first fruits offered to God of eternal life for the believer. Jesus himself was raised on the day the the Jews celebrated the Feast of First Fruits (see Exodus 23:14-19). The Feast of First Fruits had, at its center, the idea that you gave to God the very first harvest of your crops as a way of saying, “I trust you to provide and protect the rest of the crop to me at a later date when the full crop is ready to harvest.” Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:20, “Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.” (also read the next two verses, 1 Corinthians 15:21-23). Christ was the guarantee of the resurrection of all God’s saved and redeemed people and these first holy people were resurrected as the first fruits of that promise of eternal life. We have this promise in Scripture that God resurrected these people and will also give us that same resurrection from the dead.

Another interesting piece of information is that every major city in the Roman world had three parts. As you approached the city you first came to the graveyard, called the necropolis. Next was the city itself, called the polis, and finally came the acropolis, the high place that was fortified to withstand assault. Now, read 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 and picture in your mind Christ returning and picking up the dead in Christ – first on the outskirts of the city and then coming in to the city and picking up the living and taking them up to meet with him on the high place in the clouds. What an exciting picture of the hope that we have in Christ and a great thought for the upcoming Easter Sunday!

Roll Away the Stone

When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus’ body. Very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise, they were on their way to the tomb and they asked each other, “Who will roll the stone away from the entrance of the tomb?”

– Mark 16:1-3

Jesus died at 3:00 p.m. on Friday, which was the day of the Jewish Passover celebration. However, it was also Preparation Day (Mark 15:42-43) which was the day before the Sabbath (Saturday). Every kind of work had to be completed before sundown on Preparation Day (Friday) because no work could be done on the Sabbath. Joseph of Arimathea got permission from Pilate to take Jesus’ body down off the cross just before evening began. Jewish custom was that the body must be buried by sundown on the same day that it was deceased, so they hurriedly wrapped the body in linen cloth and put some spices on it to mask the smell. They then put the body in Joseph’s new family tomb that had never been used (Matt 27:60-61). The Jewish people did not believe in embalming or doing anything to preserve the body (many scholars believe the Jews of the day thought the flesh was where sin resided, so the quicker it decayed and left the bones, the better). A year or so later, the bones would be put in a box called an ossuary and they would rest with their ancestors that were already in the tomb.

The next day was Saturday and the chief priests and Pharisees were concerned about someone trying to steal the body and fake a resurrection. They asked Pilate to seal the tomb with his official Roman Seal and to put Roman guards on the tomb. The seal was just wax and wasn’t designed to seal it shut, just to say this tomb is occupied and you better not touch it or you’ll answer to Rome.

On Sunday, the Marys and some other women went early to the tomb to take the spices that they had prepared to finish the burial process. The Jewish custom was to wrap the body with linen and put lots of spices between the layers of linen. They would put the body on a shelf in the tomb and then close the tomb for three days. They would sit outside the tomb and mourn. At the end of the third day, they would crack open the tomb and call out the name of the deceased (Lazarus – John 11 esp. verse 17 and footnote and 38 and 39). If there was no answer, the deceased would then be legally dead and they would close up the tomb permanently.

When the women asked, “Who will roll away the stone?” the stone was not the problem. They could have gotten the tomb open. The problem was the seal. Who will break the seal and incur the wrath of the Romans? When they got there, the stone was already rolled away and they could look in. Somehow, we get the idea that the angel came and rolled away the stone so that Jesus could get out. Jesus didn’t need the stone rolled back! He was the resurrected Lord! He blew out of there; no grave clothes or stone could hold him back! The stone was rolled away so that the disciples could look in and see that he was indeed gone, that he had risen on the third day, just as he said.

The stone was also rolled away for our benefit, so that we could look inside and see that Jesus was not there. If we believe these truths, that Jesus is alive and risen, we must live in a way that shows that we are confident of these truths. We need to roll away the stone for others around us and let them know that the tomb is empty and that Jesus is alive and risen! The resurrection not only gives us purpose and meaning in this life, but gives us the certain hope of heaven and a life after this life with Christ. A hurting world needs to see that evidence in us that the stone has indeed been rolled away and he is risen!

P.S. When they looked into the tomb, there were two angels dressed in white, one seated at the head and the other at the foot of where Jesus body had lain. This is the exact same picture that we see in Exodus 25:17-23, when God instructed the Israelites to put an angel at each end of the ark of the covenant. Between those two angels (cherubim) is where God lived and met with them. What an amazing picture that was played out 1500 years after the ark of the covenant was made!