Evidence?

What evidence do I need?

Ask me about evidence…  are you joking?  I mean is this a joke?  You want me to provide you some kind of proof?  Some kind of evidence that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is a historical fact?

You know every year I hear the same refrain over and over again.

Arguments made for the historicity and legitimacy of the claim that Jesus Christ rose from the dead.

And they’re all good arguments with frankly just about as high a burden of proof being met as any claim would need to meet in order to be established as fact to any reasonable person.

But can I be honest with you?  As a personal friend of the Man, I’m indignant at the request.

I see all these appeals to the historical accuracy of the gospel accounts.  To the reliability of Scripture and the extra biblical historical sources that corroborate the testimonies we find in the Gospel accounts.

I hear the common appeals to the reasonability or logical soundness of the claim that Christ conquered the grave; why this audacious claim should in fact be believed as true.  It’s as if I can use the faculties of my feeble intellect to compel you, or perhaps it’s myself I’m attempting to convince here, that what I say I believe is actually true so then I won’t be, in fact, a mad man who believes the silly idea that a dead man up and walked out of his own grave and did so by his own power and volition no less.

Just hold up right there for one second okay.  Let me be totally honest with you for just a minute.

I have personally walked with this man for over 30 years.  I was just a little boy when I first heard his sweet voice.

I testify before God and all men, that the Lord Jesus Christ revealed himself to me and promised me that if I trusted him he would save me from my sin.

And every single day since, I have sinned and he has saved.

I have walked with him.  I have learned from him.  I have prayed to him and I have heard him.  I have run from him.  I have screamed at him at the top of my lungs.  I have begged and pleaded with him.  I have praised him and worshiped him. I have suffered with him and I have found him.  I have supped with him and he with me and I have known the steadfastness of his love and the immeasurable riches of his glorious grace.

I don’t know OF the Man.  I know HIM.  I know Him by experience.

So I’ll ask the question again.

Evidence?

What evidence do I need?

I know Him.

I know the Man I tell you.

Do you hear me?

I KNOW Him and I tell you he LIVES.