The Resurrection of Jesus: What Does It Mean?

Sermon from selected texts by Bret Rogers, Pastor
Delivered on Easter Sunday, March 27, 2016

Today, we’ll have a bit of a crash course on Jesus’ resurrection. We’ll be looking at a number of passages. We certainly won’t cover everything. But I do want to cover some big things that Jesus’ resurrection means. But before we get started, let’s pray together.

The Resurrection Changes Everything

Many of you know that Andy and I traveled to Turkey last December. One of the things I love about these trips is that the Lord surprises you with many unique encounters. We were sitting in the Istanbul airport one evening, and we met this one fella—an English-speaking Iraqi attending a university in Arizona, but flying home to visit his family for a few weeks.

He learned that we were Christians, and we asked him if he’d heard about Jesus, and he said Yes. He had some church friends in Arizona who’d been telling him about Jesus. And he went on for a bit with the stories of Jesus healing, loving neighbors, and even dying on the cross. He thought Jesus was a very special person.

But at some point, as we’re all expressing agreement with the good things he observed about Jesus, we say something like, “and you know Jesus rose from the dead, too…” And you can see the expression on this guy’s face change from a more surface-level sharing of common interests to something that really mattered.

He said, “Wait, Jesus rose from the dead?” And we’re all going, “Yeah! That’s the rest of the story. Your church friends told you that, right?” He says, “No, I hadn’t heard that part of the story. But that would change everything. I would think that the disciples found that to be really important!” Uhhh…yeah! Really, really, really important! It makes all the difference in the world.

And that’s what we’re looking at today. We’re looking at why the resurrection of Jesus is such a big deal. What does the resurrection of Jesus mean? I want to give you seven answers to that question. But before I do, I need to make a couple clarifications.

What the resurrection of Jesus is…

First of all, these seven answers assume that many folks know what the resurrection of Jesus is. If you don’t, here it is very briefly. When the Bible speaks of the resurrection of Jesus, it’s not talking about a state that he entered immediately following death. It means new bodily life after a period of being dead (Dan 12:2; John 5:28-29; 1 Cor 15). In Jesus’ case, he rose to new bodily life on the third day being dead (Luke 24:1, 21; Acts 10:40; 1 Cor 15:4).

But we must also note that Jesus’ resurrection is more than mere resuscitation. Jesus rose from the dead with a transformed physical body. It was still his own physical body—we know that from places like Luke 24:39-42, Jesus says, “See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have” (cf. John 20:27; 21:13-14). Which makes his resurrection much different from ideas like reincarnation in other religions—it’s his own physical body. But it’s also a transformed body. As 1 Corinthians 15:42-49 describe it—it’s a spiritual body, a glorified body, a heavenly body, no longer subject to death and decay and corruptibility (Acts 13:34; 1 Cor 15:53; Phil 3:21; 1 Tim 1:10). It has put on immortality.

And it’s in this way that Jesus’ resurrection is unique. Others like Lazarus came back to life only to die again (John 11:40; 12:10). But not Jesus. He rose never to die again (1 Cor 15:45; Heb 7:16; 2 Tim 1:10; cf. Acts 1:9). Nowhere in history has any person entered death and then taken up their life bodily never to die again. Rather, again and again and again, the grave proves its power over us. We cannot escape death on our own. Death holds people in the grave because people have this massive problem called sin.

Death entered the world, because of sin (Gen 2:17; 3:1-7). Death isn’t just the natural end to life among some fixed chain of events—like our evolutionist neighbors might suggest. Death is God’s judgment against sin. Death is in our bones, because we rebel against God (Rom 5:12). Isaiah calls death the “covering that is cast over all peoples; the veil that is spread over all nations” (Isa 25:7). The entire created order, Paul says, groans to be released from its corruption and death (Rom 8:22). Death is a curse that rests on humanity, and nobody can beat it.

But there was one man who did. One man entered death and rose again to life bodily, never to die again. Jesus rose to life bodily leaving death behind altogether. In a nutshell, that’s what the resurrection of Jesus is.

Embracing the truthfulness of the Bible’s claims

A second clarification is this, the seven answers we’re about to look at also embrace the truthfulness of the Bible’s claims. Our access to the resurrection of Jesus is really no different than the access we have to nearly all historical events: we access historical events through the witnesses that were present and the testimony or records they left behind for us to read (e.g., Luke 1:1-4; John 21:24).

In the case of Jesus’ resurrection, we have the records of multiple eyewitnesses to the empty tomb in which Jesus’ body was laid, including several women and Peter and John and, ironically, even the soldiers who were guarding it (Matt 28:1-12; John 20:1-18). We also have the records of eyewitnesses to whom the resurrected Jesus appeared for forty days until he ascended into heaven (John 20:24-29; Acts 1:1-11). Paul lists people off like Peter, James, the Twelve, five hundred other brothers—most of whom were still alive when Paul was writing (1 Cor 15:5-7). And the idea is, “Hey, if you don’t believe me, go ask so and so. They’re still alive. They saw Jesus just like I did.”

So we’re not left with just the potentially open-ended testimony that the tomb was empty. We also have the complementary testimony that these witnesses also saw the resurrected Jesus and heard him and touched him and ate with him for forty days (Luke 24:41-43; John 21:1-9; 1 John 1:1-3).

That means the resurrection of Jesus isn’t just a religious idea: Jesus didn’t just rise in our hearts. His resurrection isn’t just a mythological story from which we glean timeless truths to live by. It’s saying that God almighty entered history in the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus died for our sins and then he really walked out of the grave alive never to die again. This makes Christianity vastly different from the majority of other religions. All that matters to most religions is whether the experience holds true regardless of historical verification. Christianity is dependent on its historical claims.

The resurrection of Jesus is a historical claim that everyone must face to their own salvation or their everlasting condemnation. It’s not something you can ignore.[i] That will become all the more clear as we now walk through our seven answers to this question: what does Jesus’ resurrection mean?

1. God Is Faithful to His Word

Number one, Jesus’ resurrection means that God is faithful to his word. In Acts 13:32, Paul says, “We bring you the good news that what God promised to the fathers, this he has fulfilled to us their children by raising Jesus.” Again in 1 Corinthians 15:4, Christ was buried and “raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures.”

God spoke of Jesus’ resurrection in the Old Testament (cf. Luke 24:45-46). He did so by direct prophecy: Isaiah 53, for example, speaks of God’s Servant suffering and then dying in the place of sinners, but not staying dead. By the end of Isaiah 53, the Servant is receiving the spoils of his victory and claiming his offspring (Isa 53:10-12).

The Old Testament also speaks of Jesus’ resurrection using various types, foreshadows. Psalm 16:10—King David says, “You will not abandon my soul to Sheol, or let your holy one see corruption”—and this is a pointer to Jesus, the true Davidic King who rises victoriously over death (Acts 2:22-28). We can also think of the story of Jonah: just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so Jesus was three days and three nights in the heart of the earth (Matt 12:40). Or some of you looked at Hosea 6:2 and 13:14 in Sunday school this morning. The point is that over and over, God promised to raise up his King, his Messiah, his Servant and now in the resurrection of Jesus, he proves his faithfulness to his word.

What kinds of words has God spoken to you? Words like this? “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (Acts 2:21). “The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet” (Rom 16:20). “He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil 1:6). “My God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus” (Phil 4:19). “The Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes” (Rev 7:17). These are God’s promises to you.

But none of those words would mean anything, if Jesus’ bones still laid in Jerusalem. But with the resurrection of Jesus, we see God’s faithfulness to his word. We have a concrete hope that God will fulfill his promises to us, because they’re bound to a person who can never die. As long as Jesus’ body lives—which is forever—God’s promises toward you are sealed and certain. Your faith isn’t blind; it’s linked to an object, to a person who is risen as a seal to God’s faithfulness to his word.

2. That Jesus Himself Is Righteous

Number two, Jesus’ resurrection means that Jesus himself is righteous. Turn with me to 1 Timothy 3:16…Paul is reminding the church of the gospel—“the mystery of godliness,” he calls it. But focus on the first two lines of this confession: “[Christ] was manifested in the flesh, vindicated by the Spirit.”

This vindication by the Spirit isn’t just a reference to Christ being anointed by the Spirit in his earthly ministry. It’s a reference to Jesus’ resurrection (cf. Rom 1:4).[ii] When God the Father raised Jesus from the dead by the Spirit, he vindicated Jesus. That means he showed the world that Jesus was the righteous one after all.

You see, as long as Jesus stayed dead, his righteousness was in question. Remember, death is God’s judicial response to sin. The reason death holds people in the grave is that people are sinners, and that has been true since Adam. As long as Jesus remained dead, his faithfulness to God, his righteous character, the words he spoke—it was all in question. Can you really be the Light of the world when darkness snuffed you out? When his lifeless and limp body was laid in the tomb, the question was this: did the world that crucified him pronounce the right verdict—criminal and blasphemer (e.g., John 18:29-31; 19:4)?

The resurrection shouts “No!” to the world’s verdict. The resurrection is an event in which God vindicated his Son from the wrong verdict pronounced by the world. And more than that, it was God’s way of saying that his Son was in fact righteous in all that he did as a man. The resurrection proves Jesus’ righteousness. What does that mean for you? Let’s go to our next answer and find out.

3. Jesus’ People Are Forgiven & Declared Righteous When They Believe

Number three, Jesus’ resurrection means that his people are forgiven and declared righteous when they believe. If Jesus’ resurrection proves his own innocence, if it vindicates him as the only righteous one, the question becomes this: then why did he die? The Bible’s answer is that he died for sins that were not his own. The world’s verdict against Jesus was wrong; God’s verdict against our sin was right. It deserved death, and Jesus willingly took that death upon himself in our place.

Romans 4:25 brings this out in relation to Jesus’ resurrection. It says this: “[Jesus] was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.” Let’s take each side of that verse. First side, Jesus “was delivered up for our trespasses.” Jesus died for the sins we committed, not sins that he committed. He identified with us in the punishment our sins deserved, namely, death under the wrath of God.

Now the second side: Jesus was also “raised for our justification.” In other words, our right standing with God wouldn’t have occurred without Jesus being raised from the dead. The same idea is behind Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 15:17, “if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins.” An unraised Christ means an unjustified sinner.

But if he has been raised, then our sins are truly taken away—he died for them—and we have a righteousness with God’s stamp of approval on it. By being raised from the dead, Jesus’ vindication as righteous one becomes the justification for all who identify with him. Meaning, what God declares of Christ in his resurrection body—he is righteous—he also declares of you when you put your faith in him.[iii] No matter what you’ve done or where you’ve been or who you’ve slept with, faith in Christ means God declares you righteous. The difference is that Jesus’ righteousness is innate to himself, and our righteousness is imputed to us from him. We won’t stand before God because of anything we’ve done, but because of everything Christ is for us.

That’s good news. But it’s only good news for those who believe in him. If you’re not in Christ today—if you’re trusting in yourself to make it, depending on your own good works to stand before God, you’re trying to clean up your act a bit by coming to church today—then I would plead with you to repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. Come as you are to him. I promise that he won’t leave you as you are, but come as you are. You need his righteousness if you’re going to withstand the holy gaze of the Almighty Judge. Believe in him, and all that he is as the righteous One—it will be yours too.

And if you’re already a Christian, my plea is the same for you. Never turn to trusting in anything except Christ’s righteousness to give you a right standing before God. Don’t start believing that you’re justification depends on how well you perform in any role, or how together your marriage is, or how studious you may be, or how smart you are, or how savvy you are at the office, or how unwavering your church attendance is, or how gifted you are with this or that, or how much you don’t smoke, drink, or chew or go with girls who do…Your ground for justification before God is Christ and Christ alone. He is the righteous one we need. Nothing else will do; nothing else will God accept.

4. Jesus’ People Are Free to Live for God

Number four, Jesus’ resurrection means that his people are free to live for God. The Bible teaches that apart from God’s grace, we are enslaved by sin (John 8:34). And when you’re enslaved to sin, you cannot please God (Rom 8:7). That’s not the way the world thinks. The world thinks that it’s free—they can do whatever they want whenever they want. But the Bible says that’s not freedom; that’s slavery. True freedom is the freedom to do what is right in God’s eyes.

The resurrection of Jesus makes this obedience to God possible, and I want you to see it from Romans 6. Verse 4: “We were buried therefore with [Christ] by baptism into death, in order that [now notice the connection], just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. [Verse 10] For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. [and here’s the connection again] So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus [that is, in the risen Christ Jesus].

In other words, there is an objective, historical reality—Christ died and was raised from the dead. But then there’s also a mysterious union between Christ and his people, such that what happens to Christ in the past makes necessary what happens to his people as they’re united to him by faith in their own lifetime. Christ’s historical resurrection transforms our present experience when we believe in him. Because he still lives to God, his people can live to God.

Some of us are only living according to half of the gospel. We know that Jesus died for our sins. We know that he offers forgiveness. But do we truly embrace the new life made possible through the resurrection? In my experience as a pastor here, and in my own experience as an individual Christian, we sometimes live as if the latter half of this gospel message isn’t true. Perhaps we fall into long periods of self-pity, thinking that our sin is just too great for grace to handle. Perhaps we think that the new life is just impossible to even try, that we’re just always going to be this way.

But the good news of Jesus’ resurrection is that when you’re united to him, moral transformation occurs. His resurrection gives you the want to obey God, the compulsion to love what he loves. The resurrected Christ no longer allows sin to reign in your mortal body. He transforms your members into instruments for righteousness.

The resurrection says, “You can overcome sin. You can overcome sinful anger—it doesn’t define you anymore. You can say No to temptation. You don’t have to give-in to the allurements of this world. You don’t have to take another drink or another puff. You can walk away from the love of money and from harsh attitudes with your wife and from the same-sex attractions and from talking behind your brother’s back.” You’ll still be tempted, but sin no longer rules those who belong to Jesus. Because Jesus is alive to God, you’re alive to God. And that reality leads straight into our next answer…

5. Our Resurrection Is Already and Not Yet

Number five, Jesus’ resurrection means that our resurrection is already and not yet. The Old Testament expected a final resurrection at the end of time. But part of the uniqueness of Christ’s resurrection is that it occurs before the end of time. In Jesus’ case, the final resurrection gets pulled back in history. It breaks one end-time event into two episodes: episode one, Jesus rises; episode two, his people rise.

This is what the Bible usually means when it says that God raised Jesus from the dead—meaning, from all the dead ones who will one day also be raised. It’s not just saying that Jesus beat death itself, but that he also beat everybody else out of the grave. “He is the beginning,” Colossians 1:18 tells us, “the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent.”

Or take 1 Corinthians 15:20. “But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.” What are the firstfruits? It describes the first part of the harvest that was brought to the temple and offered to the Lord. It represented the harvest as a whole, and it implied that more fruit from the harvest was coming. So, Jesus not only represents what each member of the coming harvest will look like—in our new bodies fit for eternity. He’s also our forerunner, our assurance that God will also raise us from the dead. And it’s even stronger than that: Paul is saying that the resurrection harvest has already begun.

It’s not here in full—it won’t be here in full till we get our resurrection bodies—but it has already begun. And that affects us in the present experientially. Ephesians 2:6 can say that even now the believer is raised up with Christ and seated with Christ in the heavenly places. We’re already raised and not yet raised. We’re raised invisibly now with Christ when we believe—our inner man, our soul has been raised with him—but we still wait to be raised visibly, bodily, when Christ returns again.

And this is why you see the New Testament doing two things for us simultaneously. On the one hand, it gives many moral exhortations to believers. The apostles do this because in terms of who we are in Christ, we’re already raised. We’re already seated with him. We have the ability in Christ to live out the new moral order of Christ’s future kingdom that has come crashing into the present. And so that means love your brother; show hospitality; have compassion; forgive each other; do honest work with your own hands…Why? Because you’re seated with Jesus, and belong to the new moral order of his kingdom.

On the other hand, it’s also why the New Testament keeps pointing us beyond to the age to come, when our own physical bodies will finally be raised to be like Jesus’ glorious body. 1 Corinthians 15:51-53, “Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality.”

As D. A. Carson puts it, “The ultimate hope of the Christian is not simply to be with Christ in some immaterial existence, but to have resurrection bodies in a renewed heaven and a renewed earth.”[iv] Our resurrection is already—the firstfruits have come in; our inner man is seated with Christ—but it’s also not yet—we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies (Rom 8:23).

6. God’s New Creation Is Already and Not Yet

Which is connected to yet a sixth answer to our question: Jesus’ resurrection also means that God’s new creation is already and not yet. 1 Corinthians 15:45 picks up this theme: “Thus it is written, ‘The first man Adam became a living being’; the last Adam [that’s Christ] became a life-giving spirit.”

The world has suffered a curse since Adam plunged humanity into sin. The ground has borne thorns and thistles. Families and relationships have been shot through with envy and hurt. Nations rage against one another with violence. Death is all around.

But the Bible also promises a day of future glory, a day when the curse is lifted, a day when thorns and thistles give way to a Garden-paradise, a day when weapons of war turn into farming implements. It’s the anticipation of a new world order, a new creation, where everything and everyone enjoys the rule of God on earth.

Jesus’ resurrection is the inauguration of that new creation. By rising from the dead, Jesus becomes the new and final Adam who establishes a new humanity dominated by the Holy Spirit. Why else does Jesus breathe on the disciples in John 20:22? You remember? He rises from the dead, gathers his disciples, and breathes on them saying, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” Why? He does it to make a statement. In the same way God breathed life into his first creation—which was now broken because of Adam’s sin—Jesus was breathing life into his new creation (cf. Gen 2:7; Ezek 37:1-14).

That has personal dimensions: 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.” And it also has cosmic dimensions: Romans 8:21, “the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.” So, we’ve already entered the new creation as believers, and we’re also waiting for the new-creation fullness.

But here’s the deal—the key move to bring history to that end has already been played. I was playing checkers with Luke last week. And he was creaming me at the beginning. I had like three checkers left, which finally made it to the other side and became kings. And slowly I started working my way back jumping one by one till finally my three kings had cornered his two kings. He couldn’t move anywhere. I had played the key move, and even though his checkers were still on the board, my victory had already begun. That’s what happened when God raised Jesus from the dead.

We still see the remnants of the old order all around us. But the key move has been played: God raised Jesus from the dead, beginning his new creation order. It’s why Hebrews 2:8-9 say that “at present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to man. But we do see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death…”

Perhaps you look at the political situation we’re in and become rather fretful of the kinds of people who could possibly serve as our next president. When you begin to face such fears and worry, turn off the phone, turn off the TV, and get on your face before God and remember Jesus, risen from the dead to usher in the new creation. The next president doesn’t determine your destiny or the world’s destiny. Jesus Christ alone determines your destiny and the world’s destiny. And one day it will give way fully to his new creation order, of which you’re already a part.

Or perhaps you don’t pay much attention to politics. But the wrinkles grow deeper with time. The muscles aren’t as strong anymore. The sorrow still comes. You want laughter so bad sometimes, but only sorrow seems to keep coming. You’re still having to drive to the funerals of your family members and friends. “Too many funerals, dear”—that’s what Rachel told me on our way to a sister’s funeral this past Wednesday. Then to see her ten-year old son and other four daughters talking bravely through tears about their mom inheriting glory… You feel the effects of your cancer taking life. Death lays siege of our world, it comes knocking at our door.

But we do see him, crowned with glory and honor. We do see Jesus, risen from the dead, to bring us a new world. We do see the key move that’s been played. And he is our hope. He is the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in him, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in him shall never die (John 11:25-26).

7. He Will Come Again to Judge the World

Finally, number seven, Jesus’ resurrection means that he will come again to judge the world. Acts 17:30-31: “The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.”

The immorality and wickedness of this world sometimes seems unbearable. With the saints of old we cry out, “Why, O LORD, do the nations rage? Why do you stand far away? Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?” (Ps 2:1; 10:1).

God’s answer to us is Jesus’ resurrection. Jesus’ resurrection shows that we do live in a world in which righteousness will finally prevail, in which good will ultimately win, in which life will swallow up death. For three days, it seemed like that wouldn’t be the case. But Jesus’ resurrection says, “Not so fast!” Death claimed him for our sins, but death had no right to keep him in the grave. His resurrection means that righteousness really triumphed, and that means the whole world is accountable to Jesus. He cannot be ignored if he’s truly risen.

He will sit on his great white throne. From his presence earth and sky will flee away. The dead, great and small, will stand before his throne. The books will be opened (Rev 20:11-12). And Jesus will get the final word.

Are you right with him? His resurrection does not allow us to approach him neutrally. It’s not something that we Christians commit ourselves to as a way of merely easing our troubled conscience. It’s not something that we can just keep to ourselves, as if it helps us to get through life personally but really has no bearing on any others. Rather, Jesus’ resurrection says that all are accountable to him, and that means that everything about our lives matters.

From the way we greet our wives in the morning, to the way treat our coworkers, to the way we eat our food and drink, to the way we paint on a canvas, to the way we write and read and speak and laugh, to the way we spend our money, to the way we give our money to this church and to the others around us in need, even to the way we sleep at night—everything matters. How are you spending your days? The resurrection says that we’ll be held accountable for all of them, and rewarded accordingly.

That’s a sobering reminder to make every day count for Christ. Let’s make every day one that we live in light of Easter. But it’s also a glorious hope for those who are in Christ. None of our deeds go overlooked. None of our labors will be in vain. All of them are accounted for and all of them will receive a reward—because all of them have been testimonies that Jesus is worthy to follow. Let us live for that day. Let us live for Jesus’ approval. Let us look forward to the unfading crown of glory set on our heads by the physical hands of our resurrected Lord.

Will You Be The Same?

What does Jesus’ resurrection mean? A whole lot. It means that God is faithful and Jesus is righteous. It means that Jesus’ cross really provided the forgiveness of sins and that Jesus’ vindication assures us of a right standing with God when we believe in him. It means that our resurrection and God’s new creation is already here and yet still coming. It means that one day, everybody will bow to Jesus’ righteous rule on earth. He can’t be ignored; he must be adored.

Truly, our Iraqi friend that we met at the airport got it right: Jesus’ resurrection changes everything. History can never be the same. And now, having heard of what the resurrection means, will you be the same?

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[i] For a the best historical defense of the resurrection of Jesus, see N. T. Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of God, Christian Origins and the Question of God, vol. 3 (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003).

[ii] An excellent treatment of the subject of Jesus’ vindication in relation to 1 Timothy 3:16 can be found in Richard B. Gaffin, Jr., Resurrection & Redemption: A Study in Paul’s Soteriology (Phillipsburg: P&R, 1987).

[iii] For further treatment of Jesus' vindication in relation to the believer's present justification and future vindication, see G. K. Beale, "The Role of Resurrection in the Already-and-Not-Yet Phases of Justification," in For the Fame of His Name: Essays in Honor of John Piper, eds. Sam Storms and Justin Taylor (Wheaton: Crossway, 2010), 190-214.

[iv] See http://www.desiringgod.org/interviews/a-biblical-theology-of-resurrection. I was pleased to find this quote and this biblical theological development of the resurrection shortly after finishing the sermon.