I want to invite you to take out your Bibles and turn with me to 1 Corinthians chapter 15 and hold your place at verse 12. We have been in this last few weeks in a series, a subject-based series on the topic of apologetics. And as we have noted over the last couple of weeks, apologetics is giving a defense of the faith. But I want to stress something as we begin today, a very important truth that is, I believe, often misunderstood. And that is that apologetics is not simply giving a defense for the existence of God, but rather apologetics, Christian apologetics, is giving a defense of belief in the God of Scripture and therefore in the Lord Jesus Christ. And I say this because I see so much of apologetics being defense of a mere deism. This is why I'm not a huge fan of what has become known as the intelligent design movement. Now, intelligent design has its place But the problem with the intelligent design movement is that it simply points to the fact that the earth and the universe demonstrate evidence of a designer, but many of them won't go forward and say who that designer is. They won't step out and say, we know who this designer is. It's the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It's the God who sent his son Jesus Christ into the world. It's Yahweh, this is the designer. And if the apologetics that we do is only an apologetics that gets us to bare deism, then that is not enough. We are not defending the mere existence of a creator because as we learned last week, the existence of a creator is self-evident. The Bible tells us that anyone who denies that a creator exists is a fool. And it says that anyone who looks at the world and creation can know by virtue of the creation that there is a God. and they are without excuse. So, apologetics is not about defending a bare theism. Apologetics is about making a case. That's what it means. Apologetics means to make a case for the God of Scripture, and moreover, the distinctly Christian God. So today we are going to look at the uniqueness of the Lord Jesus Christ. And what is it that Paul says is the ultimate Christian apologetic? Paul actually engages in the letter to the church at Corinth. He engages in a form of apologetics and he gives us what I consider to be the ultimate Christian apologetic. So let's stand together and we are going to read 1 Corinthians chapter 15. Beginning at verse 12, we're going to read down to verse 22. Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain, and your faith is in vain. Hear those words. He goes on. We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise, if it is true that the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Hear that. He goes on. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. But in fact, beautiful words, but in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. Let's pray. Father, I thank you for your word. Even now I pray that you keep me from error, that you open the hearts of the people to hear the word, that all that is said today would be in accordance with your truth, and that you would save according to your will. In Christ's name, amen. So far in this series, we have discussed the concept of apologetics and we said that the basis of the idea of apologetics comes from 1 Peter. We looked at that the first week, two weeks ago, where Peter says, that we are to be able to give a defense for the hope that is within us. And if you remember that first week, I stressed this very thing. I said, if this hope isn't within you, you have nothing to defend. So it begins with understanding where you are. Are you in Christ? Do you have this hope within you? Because Peter says, to defend this hope, it has to be in you. You have to sanctify the Lord Jesus Christ in your heart, always being ready to give a hope or give a defense for the hope that is within you. So is this hope within you? That's the first question that every man has to ask when it comes to apologetics. Is this my hope or am I defending the hope of someone else? Am I defending the faith of my parents? Am I defending the faith of my fellow Christians? Do I genuinely have this hope? I've called this, if you remember, I'm calling this series Foxhole Apologetics because I'm really trying to deal with what I consider to be real questions, real issues, things that are really being asked, questions that are really being addressed, and I said that there are three categories of objections that we run into in regard to apologetics in general and this is based on my own anecdotal evidence having done evangelism for years and gone out and talked to people and done open-air preaching and different things these are the three things that you tend to run into the most and the three things are first the existence and nature of God which we talked about last week the second is the person and work of Jesus which is what we're going to talk about today And the third is the nature and reliability of the Bible, and we're going to look at that next week. And here are the things that we've learned so far in our previous lessons. Number one, we've learned that when it comes to the existence of God, there is no neutral man, meaning that there's no one who doesn't know God exists. We are either ones who will receive God in faith and trust, or we will rebel against the God that we know that is there. But there is no neutral man. There is no one who is simply waiting for more evidence because the Bible says all men have the evidence. And what they do is they suppress the truth and unrighteousness. That's not neutrality. Neutrality doesn't suppress the truth. Neutrality welcomes the truth. They're not neutral. They're suppressing the truth and unrighteousness. So that's the first thing that we learned. The second thing we learned is that people do not need more evidence. They already are without excuse. According to Romans chapter 1, no man needs more evidence for the existence of God. And the third thing we learned last week is that science exists because God created a world which obeys laws, which can be observed and can be understood. And morality exists because God is just and he gives us a standard by which we can measure virtue. That is why we believe in science and we believe in morality because we know that God is a God of order. And therefore, again, when we look at the existence and nature of God, that's a couple of things that we draw from God's existence. But as I said in my opening, just a belief in God alone is not enough. I love this. I used to work for a school. When I was in seminary, I worked as a paraprofessional. which is basically a fancy word for a teaching assistant. And I did that at First Coast High School, and I did that for several years. And I had many conversations with students as I was in seminary, so I was very interested in talking about God and what I believed, and so I would talk to students. And then I went on to become a substitute teacher when I was ministering here as the pastor, I would substitute teach for years and years. And I, had many conversations with kids, I remember quite a few of them, but one conversation that always seemed to come up was people would, the young people, we would talk about salvation, they would say, well, I'm saved, I believe in God. And I would have to say, okay, it's good that you believe in God, but what do you believe about God? And who do you believe God is? Moreover, who do you believe Jesus is? Because just believing in God doesn't make you saved. Because as I said already, everybody knows God exists, right? Even the atheist in his heart, the Bible says, knows that God exists and he's without excuse. So people who say, well, I'm saved because I believe in God. That ain't how it works. Salvation is not the result of simply acknowledging that a divine being exists. Salvation comes through a personal interaction and response to the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, not simply acknowledging that God exists. And so when we talk about the Lord Jesus Christ, that's when things get really ugly. That's when the apologetic gets hard, because like I said, very few people. will deny that some kind of God exists. But you say, no, it's not just some kind of God, but it's the God of the Bible. And it's not just anybody's understanding of the Bible, but it's what the Bible clearly teaches about the Lord Jesus Christ, that He is in fact God in the flesh, that He was born of a virgin, that He lived a perfectly sinless life for 33 years, and on His 33rd year, He was taken and He was strung up and stapled to a Roman cross, and that on that cross, where our Savior died, the wrath of God was satisfied in Him and that wrath was poured out on Him and He received it and He took all the wrath of God for all who would ever believe and then three days later He gloriously and miraculously rose from the dead. That's what we have to believe. And that belief will change our life. But even in the first century, Even in the first century, there were those who were denying the resurrection. And I want to say this, I hope this makes sense. When it comes to apologetics, when it comes to defending the Christian faith, the one thing that we stand or fall upon is did Christ raise from the dead? If you cannot affirm a risen Christ, you're not a Christian. Now, I've heard the arguments, especially from liberal theologians, and yes, I do read liberal theologians too, and I do listen to what they have to say. And they'll say all kinds of things. Oh, we don't have to believe in a physical resurrection. We don't have to believe in a resurrected Jesus. We don't have to believe in ancient myths of dying and rising gods. Well, Paul thinks differently. And Paul's argument in our text today is very, very clear. His argument is this. If Jesus has not raised Our faith is useless. Now I didn't say that, Paul said that. We're going to look through it again in a moment, but understand this. Paul's apologetic for the gospel is very simple. It's Christ has raised or he has not. And if he has raised, that changes everything. And if he has not raised, nothing matters. So Paul is willing to base his apologetic for the Christian faith on the foundation of the resurrection of Christ. And so with that, it's important that we understand why that singular event becomes the linchpin, becomes the hinge, becomes the fulcrum upon which the entire faith turns or doesn't turn. It's the foundation upon which we stand or fall. Let's look again, beginning at verse 12. He says in the text, he says, now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, How can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? Now why is Paul addressing that in verse 12? He's addressing that because apparently in the Corinthian church there were those who were claiming that there is no resurrection from the dead. Now you may know people who believe that. You may know people who don't believe in resurrection. In fact, we know in the first century, we know of at least one group who was well known for not believing in resurrection. Does anybody remember who they are? The Sadducees? Remember, there were two very important religious groups. There were the Pharisees and the Sadducees. The Pharisees sort of represented the, what we might say, the more conservative group who believed in the law of Moses, who believed in the resurrection, who believed in things like angels, right? That was the Pharisees. And then you had the Sadducees, and I remember Miss Hoffman, my old Sunday school teacher, she said, these didn't believe in the resurrection, so they're sad, you see. So if you want to remember that, kids, that's how you remember the Sadducees. They didn't believe in a resurrection, so that group existed in the first century. We know they did. In fact, they tried to fool Jesus. Remember, they came to Jesus and said, hey, what if a man has a wife, and he dies, and she marries his brother, and then he dies, and he marries another brother, and then when she gets to heaven, when the resurrection happens, whose husband will she be? You know they were trying to fool Jesus with that question. They were trying to trip Him up. If you believe in this resurrection, well how do you account for this obvious discrepancy of logic? And Jesus' answer of course is, well in heaven we don't marry or give in a marriage like the angels. I tell my wife sometimes, I say, I don't get to be your husband forever but I'll always love you. But I'm not gonna be her husband forever. That's okay. But the reality of this is there were groups in the first century who didn't believe in a resurrection. And Jesus says, or Paul says rather, that there were some of those in Corinth. Now I don't know if they were Sadducees or if they were maybe of another cohort who believed, but there were some who were spreading through Corinth that there was no resurrection. So Paul says to them, if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can you say there's no resurrection? You're saying there's no resurrection, but if that's the case, then Christ isn't raised. You see the logic here. Look at verse 13. He says, if there is no resurrection from the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, notice what he says, then our preaching is in vain, and our faith, your faith, he says, is in vain. What does it mean to be in vain? Means to be worthless, useless, doesn't have any value, right? He said, if Christ is not raised because there's no resurrection, then your faith is useless. Your faith is meaningless. I will tell you, Christian today, beloved church comer, listen. If your Jesus didn't raise, you don't have a faith that's worth believing in. That's what Paul says. If you have a Jesus who didn't raise, you don't have a faith that's worth believing in. And he goes on. He says in verse 15, he says, we are even found to be misrepresenting God because we testified about God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise, if it is true that the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. Notice that's what's called a logical syllogism. Paul is making a logical argument. If the dead are not raised, then Christ was not raised. But if we say Christ was raised and the dead are not raised, we're liars. And we've proven ourselves to be false teachers. Because if the dead are not raised, then Christ himself has not been raised. You ever consider how logical the Bible is? How honest Paul is being here? Paul is being really clear. He's arguing, but he's arguing from a logical syllogism that if you deny resurrection, you have to deny that Christ raised. And if you deny that Christ raised, you're denying the faith that you say you proclaim. And then we get to verse 17, where he says, and if Christ has not been raised, Your faith is futile and you're still in your sins. Now isn't that interesting? And I don't wanna go too far off on this, but where was our justification purchased? on the cross right on the cross where jesus died the wrath of god was satisfied god made him who knew no sin to become sin for us that we could become the righteousness of god in him that took place on the cross when as jesus was there hanging between heaven and earth The wrath of God was poured out upon him and that wrath that was poured out upon him was the wrath that was due us because Jesus did not deserve wrath. Jesus had not incurred wrath. Jesus was sinless from the moment of conception all the way to the moment of ascension. He had never sinned in thought, word, or deed. He didn't deserve to be on the cross. He didn't deserve the wrath of God, but God took the wrath that I deserved, and he took it and poured it out on Jesus, and for those three hours on that cross, on that hill in Judea, Christ received the punishment I deserved. So why is he saying here that it's the resurrection that would make us still be in our sins? Because if Christ didn't raise, he would have proved himself a liar. You see, the Bible says he was raised for our justification. And I like that particular verse, I prefer the word vindication. Because what the resurrection does is it vindicates what Christ said of himself. He said, I am the Son of God. I am the one sent by God into the world. I am the Lamb of God who comes to take away the sin of the world. And if you tear down this temple, I will raise it up again in three days. Remember that? If Jesus hadn't raised, he would have proved himself a liar. So Paul is saying, listen, if Jesus didn't raise, you wouldn't have anything to believe in. And then he says this in verse 18. He says, then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. Now who is he talking about in verse 18? He's talking about those who have been persecuted and died for Christ. When he talks about falling asleep, he ain't just talking about fallen asleep, he's talking about dying. And when he talks about those who've fallen asleep in Christ, he's talking about those who have gone and presented their necks to the sword, who have presented their wrists to the nails, and who have been crucified in Christ's name, who have been beheaded in Christ's name, who have been burned in Christ's name. And he's saying all of those died in vain if Christ has not risen. And then he says this very important thing in verse 19. He says, if in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. What's he saying? He's saying, man, if this is all there is, if this life is all we get, what a pitiful thing. What a pity if that's what we believe. that if in this life only, we above all men are most to be pitied. Verse 20 ought to make you shout, make a Baptist shout as they say, but in fact Christ has been raised. Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruit of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has also come the resurrection from the dead. And then he throws in a theological point. He says, for as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. He's talking about the representative heads of Adam who represents all men in our sin and Christ who represents those who are in him in their justification. And he points out both of them and he says, you're in one or the other. You're either in Christ or you're in Adam. You're born in Adam. You're born again in Christ. And if you are in Christ, you have a resurrection to look forward to because Christ has been raised. Beloved, I'm telling you, if you're sharing the gospel with someone, if you're sharing the hope that is within you, and the hope that is within you does not include the resurrection of Jesus, where does your hope come from? The hope that we have has to come from the resurrected Christ. And if we don't have a resurrected Christ, we have no hope. That's what Paul's saying. Apart from a resurrected Jesus, we have no hope. But with a resurrected Christ, we have hope in this life and in the life to come. That's Paul's apologetic. His apologetic is centered on the death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, having said all that, I now want to address a few objections to this. Because as much as we can proclaim the cross, the burial, and the resurrection of Christ, as much as we can proclaim the truth of that, we also know there are those who reject it. We know that there are those who deny it. And so we have to be able to give a defense for why we believe in this historical event. And by the way, I want to mention that. The resurrection of Christ is a historical event. It's not something that just happened in the minds of men. This is something that happened in history, in time. It's a literal, physical act that happened. And I would argue there's more evidence for the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ than there is for many other ancient things. I would even say more recent history, things like George Washington crossing the Delaware, those things that we know happened because there's a painting. Really? That's how we know, right? No, we know because we've been told, right? That's what the history books say. But how do you know? There's more evidence for Jesus's resurrection than almost any event in the ancient world. And so let me just throw out a few of the arguments that are often used to deny the resurrection of Christ. Here are four. These are not the only four, but these are four very common ones that are usually used to deny the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The first one is called the swoon theory. Raise your hand if you've ever heard of the swoon theory. Okay, a few of you. Raise your hand if you heard it from me. I've talked about this quite a bit. I've taught on this quite a bit. Because the swoon theory, what does it mean to swoon? The word swoon means to faint or to pass out. And the idea of the swoon theory is that the Lord Jesus Christ, when he was on the cross, did not die. but rather he simply passed out and appeared to be dead and the Roman soldiers, not understanding what life and death were, took a still living man off of the cross, put him in a cold tomb and three days later he was able to physically overcome his wounds and he was able to crawl out of that tomb and make his way into Jerusalem and present himself to his disciples as a risen and victorious savior. That's called the swoon theory. It's believed by a lot of people. Jesus just didn't die on the cross. Well, I want to give you a thought about that. Because there's a Greek word for it. It's baloney. That's right. That's my favorite Greek word. Because that's what that is. Because it's based on several bad assumptions. Number one, it's based on the assumption that Roman soldiers didn't know how to kill someone. And if there was one thing that Roman soldiers were really good at, it was killing people. They had it down to a science. They had it down to the point where they enjoyed it. They made it almost a game. Before Jesus was taken out on the cross, he was flogged with a scourge. The scourge was a whip that had leather tongs on the end and those leather tongs had either pieces of bone or rock or other hard material sewn into the end of the tongs so that when the tongs would hit the intended victim the tongs would grab a hold of whatever flesh it was able to get and then when it was pulled back it would rip the flesh open and that happened to Jesus before he was taken to the cross because Pilate in a bit of what he considered to be wisdom thought if I give the Jews a flogging of Jesus that will satisfy their desire for their pound of flesh and maybe they'll let him go. Because you remember Pilate saw no guilt in Jesus. So Jesus was flogged And then they took a rough timber cross, they laid it across his back, and they forced him to walk up the hill of Golgotha, which on the way, Jesus, so bloodied and beaten by the flogging, was unable to continue to carry his cross, and so a man named Simon of Cyrene was forced to come and lift up Jesus's cross and take Jesus's cross the rest of the way. up the hill where Jesus was then laid bare back across that cross, stripped naked. We always see Jesus somehow clothed on the cross, likely stripped completely naked. It was a form of shame, laid completely naked upon the cross, his wrists stapled down to the post, the post then attached to a longer post which was lifted up and dropped into a hole in the ground. And there he stayed suspended between heaven and earth. And the death on the cross is death by asphyxiation, which means that the entire body weighs down upon the lungs. And as the person breathes in and breathes out, each time they breathe out they're able to breathe in less air the next time because their weight is continuing to crush the lungs. as the ribcage begins to compress against the inside of the body. And so Jesus, and miraculously, we know he said at least seven things from the cross. Isn't that amazing that he was even able to speak from the cross because he was dying by having the air taken out of his body one little bit at a time. As the day went on, the soldiers, wanting to hasten death, one of the things that they would do is they would break the ankles of the crucified person. By the way, they crucified thousands of people, so they knew how to do this. Because the way that men would keep themselves alive, and some people did. There is actually a historical record of men surviving for days on a cross. Because they would take and they would use the strength of their legs to push up on the nails in their legs and they would push up on those nails. Some people think the feet were like this and there was a nail through. More likely it was on the sides. There's some historical evidence that said the nails were actually put in sideways. But they would push up on those nails and they would get a breath. Right? And they would breathe, and then they would relax, and eventually they'd just run out of energy and collapse and die. But what they would do to hasten it, they would come and they would take a club and they'd break their ankles. Because if you break the ankles, guess what you can't do? You can't push up anymore. And if you can't push up anymore, you very quickly succumb to asphyxiation. So they come out, they've got the clubs, they strike the man on the right, the man on the left, but when they come to Jesus, they realize he's already dead. Because Jesus didn't die by a Roman hand, Jesus gave up his ghost. He says, what does it say? It says he bowed his head and he gave up his spirit. No man takes my life from me, but I lay it down on my own accord. All right, so Jesus is already dead. But to ensure his death, they bring out a spear. And they shove the spear between his ribs. and they pierce his heart. The Bible says what flowed from the wound was water and blood, which is debated as to what that means, whether it was the fact that he's already been dead long enough that the blood had already begun to separate because there is, in our blood, the platelets can separate and some of it looks clear like water. And they said, well, maybe that's what it meant by water and blood. Others believe that it was piercing the pericardium, which is the sac that surrounds the heart, which is filled with a liquid that would look like water. And so if that was pierced, it would have poured out water and blood. We don't know exactly how to interpret that. We can look at it scientifically and say it's one of those two things, most likely. But here's the point, Jesus was dead. And understand this, the Roman soldiers would have never taken Jesus off the cross. if they didn't know he was dead. They would have sacrificed themselves had they done that. Because the one thing they had to do was kill that person and if they didn't they forfeited their own life. So Jesus was dead when he goes in the tomb. And the idea that if he wasn't dead, they put him in a tomb, they put him behind a rock which would have been several hundred pounds, maybe even over a thousand pound rock laid in front of it. And let's just say for some reason he did wake up and then miraculously is able to dig himself out of the hole. The entire story is fanciful. The entire story is nonsense. A beaten, bloodied, broken, pierced man goes back into town and convinces anyone that he's a savior of anything and that he has defeated death? The story is the fever dream of fools. The wrong tomb theory is just as ridiculous. I won't spend as much time on it, but that basically says that the women went to the wrong tomb. And there are those who believe that. Well, they just went to the wrong tomb. Here's how you know that isn't what happened. Because if the women went to the wrong tomb and they went back and they proclaimed Jesus was raised, guess what Rome would have done? They would have went to the real tomb and produced a body. You know what they were never able to do? No one could ever prove the Christians were lying because no one could ever produce a body. Which is why the wrong tomb theory didn't really get very far. The one that does get far, though, is the third one. I'm sorry, the fourth one, which is the stolen body. The stolen body is the idea that the disciples came in and stole the body. That one's actually in Matthew 28. That's how the Pharisees said, hey, just tell them the body was stolen, and we'll satisfy your commanders, your leaders. Yeah, here's what happened. Peter and James and John and the fellas, who just a few hours earlier weren't able to even proclaim their faith in Jesus were able to go and fight off an entire Roman guard and retrieve the body of Jesus. To what end? To what end? So that they could spend the next 50 years of their life miserable proclaiming a Jesus who was raised that they know he didn't raise. Understand that. The argument is the disciples went and stole his body so that they could produce a religion that would get them persecuted for no reason because they knew it was a lie. That don't hold water. It doesn't make sense. And I've jumped over number three. The hallucination theory is that everyone just hallucinated this. Here's the problem with the hallucination theory. The hallucination theory is based on the idea that they would have all expected this to happen and therefore they hallucinated the reality of it. But the one thing that the disciples did not expect was for Jesus to rise. According to the text of the Bible, Jesus told them multiple times, I'm gonna die and three days later I'm gonna rise. And you know what happened when he died? They did not expect him to rise. And you know what happened when he did rise? They didn't believe it. The women brought the message back. Peter runs to the tomb, he sees it, and he believes, but he's amazed. What has happened? He doesn't get it. They didn't expect for Jesus to rise, even though they should have. N.T. Wright is a scholar who I've got some issues with, I'm going to be honest, but he does have some good historical stuff. And N.T. Wright, in his defense of the resurrection, points out something very important. And this is something you may not have ever thought of. But N.T. Wright points this out. He said if this story was fabricated, if this story was made up, if this story was created out of whole cloth, the one thing that we would not expect would be that the first people to see Jesus alive would be women. And the reason why is because in the first century, the testimony of a woman was not allowed in court. It was not considered to be trustworthy. In every one of the gospel accounts, who were the first people to see Jesus alive? Women. Who were the first to proclaim the risen Christ? Women. Isn't it amazing that in a story that was supposed to have been made up, they made up a part that would have made the whole story suspect if it weren't true. But in fact, He has been raised. One of the other things And you may have heard this, this is a modern argument, and by modern I mean in the last 200 years, is the objection that ancient people were unsophisticated and therefore there were many myths about dying and rising gods. And Jesus is just one of many myths that comes out of the ancient world. In fact, I'll ask this question. You don't have to raise your hand. But if any of you have ever seen the film Zeitgeist. Zeitgeist came out in 2007. It went viral throughout the internet. And the movie claimed that Jesus was no different than any of the other gods of antiquity. And they compared Jesus to Mithras, to Horus, to Attis, to Osiris, these gods of the ancient world, and they said, see, these gods also were dying and rising gods, and Jesus is just another dying and rising god, and he doesn't exist. In fact, I'll put these on the screen for you. Here's what is argued. One, Mithras was born of a virgin and rose from the dead. Number two, Attis was born of a virgin, rose from the dead. Number three, Horus, which was the ancient god of Egypt, one of the gods of Egypt, was born on December 25th, born of a virgin, baptized by Onup, the baptizer, had 12 disciples, was crucified, and raised three days later. Now, the movie, and by the way, Bill Maher did another movie called Religious, and it was based on the same idea. If these things were true, according to the documentary, they would call into question the vitality of the message of the Gospels because it would say that Jesus' story was not unique to him, but rather it was just a story that was copycatted from other stories, or what is known as parallelism, where we have parallel accounts between the various false gods and Jesus is just one of many false gods. But here's the reality, and something you need to know. The Zeitgeist movie, And anyone who claims these things is basing it on false or exaggerated history, not on what we actually know about ancient Egyptian and pagan mythology. Here's the things we do know. One, Mithras was not born of a virgin. According to Mithraic theology, and yes there is such a thing as Mithraic theology, and there are those who study it, according to them he was born from a rock. That's not the same as being born of a virgin. And also there is no account of his death, therefore no account of his resurrection. So going back to the first, it said he was born of a virgin and he died and was resurrected. That is not what it says. So that is a lie. Number two, Attis. What did it say? Attis was born of a virgin, rose from the dead? No, not according to the sources. According to the sources, those who actually believed and taught a faith or belief in this false god Attis, Attis was actually a young man who was in love with a false god or goddess named Sibylle and Sibylle cheated on him and therefore he killed himself accidentally. And as a result, he came back as an evergreen tree. It's not exactly the gospel account. It's not even close. But the one that's great is Horus. Remember what we said about Horus? Horus was, go back to the next one. Horus was born on December 25th, born of a virgin, baptized by Onep, the baptizer, had 12 disciples, was crucified. Now if that were true, that might make you think. But here's the problem. Every single one of those is a lie. Number one, there is no account of being born on December 25th. And guess what? Even if there was, guess what we know? Jesus was probably not born on December 25th. The Bible doesn't say Jesus was born on December 25th. We celebrate December 25th because it's the day that we all sort of come around and say we're going to celebrate Jesus's birth. But that's probably not the day he was born. Even though it could be, we don't know. But that is such a foolish thing to argue. He was born of a virgin. No, Horus was not born of a virgin. Horus was actually the offspring of the false gods Isis and Osiris. There's no specific date for his birth. There's no documentation of anyone called Anab the Baptizer. That's a lie. There was no documentation that he had 12 disciples and there's no reference to him being crucified and resurrected. The entire argument is based on a lie. And you say, why do you bring this up in a sermon? Why do you make this argument? Because this is the kind of junk your kids are gonna see and hear when they go out on the internet or they go to college and people are trying to debunk their faith. This kind of, I was watching this week as William Lane Craig, William Lane Craig is a Christian apologist, he was sitting in a college class, he was sitting with guys who have PhDs and master's degrees, and one of the dudes in the class stood up and he said, Dr. Craig, how can you believe in the Christian faith when all of the stories about Jesus are fabricated from Osiris and Horus and Attis and Mithras? And Dr. Craig just went, you have a degree. Like you went to school. That ain't how he said it, but that's, I mean, he looked at him like, It takes five minutes to actually investigate the history of these things and find out it's not true. But as has so often been said, a lie can make its way halfway around the world while the truth is still putting its shoes on. So you say, why do I bring this stuff up? I bring this stuff up for your benefit. I bring this stuff up for all of our benefit, so that when we are faced with ridiculous claims against our belief in the Lord Jesus Christ, when someone says, Jesus isn't any different than Mithras, Jesus isn't any different than Attis, Jesus isn't any different than Horus, we can say, not only is that foolish, but it's a lie. And it's a lie from the pit of hell. And we stand up and call it what it is. It's a lie. There is no account in all of antiquity that is comparable to the life, death, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, not one. And by the way, there is no other faith that grew out of the confession of a resurrection than the one we have. You know, the Muslims aren't running around confessing a raised Muhammad. The Christian is not running around, now they may claim he reincarnated, but that ain't the same. We have a faith based on a historic fact. Jesus Christ is raised. That's what our faith is based on. It is the historic fact of the unique Christ. Either he is raised or he is not. And we proclaim with the Apostle Paul, but in fact he has been raised. And therefore we come to what C.S. Lewis called the great trilemma. C.S. Lewis, in his book Mere Christianity, he said everyone when faced with the claims of Christ must come to one of three conclusions. Jesus is either a liar, he's a lunatic, or he's the Lord. If Jesus said what he said and did what he did and it was a lie, he's a liar. If Jesus said what he said and he knew it wasn't true or didn't know it wasn't true, he could have been a lunatic. But if Jesus said what he said and it was true, he is the Lord. So who is Christ? He is the Lord. He is the Lord born of a virgin. He is the Lord who lived a sinless life. He is the Lord who died a substitutionary death. He is the Lord who in three days in the ground showed himself to be dead, and on that great glorious Sunday rose from the dead, conquering death, hell, and the grave. And today, you will either have faith in that Lord, or you will continue in doubt, saying, I don't know if he raised. But I say to you again, as I've said so many times already, The Apostle Paul tells us, the Apostle Paul saw him and was willing to die for what he saw. But in fact, he has been raised. Let's pray. Father, I thank you for your word. Thank you for your truth. I pray even now, Lord, that you will begin to work on the hearts of men and women in this room, little boys, little girls. Lord, if they have not come to Christ, if they still wonder if He's truthful and trustworthy, if they still wonder if the message of the cross and the resurrection is true, I pray, Lord, that they would see today Christ is glorious, the one who overcame death, hell, and the grave. And, Lord, that through Him they would find salvation. And, Lord, now as we come around the table, and we are reminded, Lord, of what Christ has done in his death by receiving the bread and receiving the cup. Lord, prepare our hearts now as we share in this time together in Jesus' name, amen.