Jesus/Mary's Tomb Found? Yeah Right!

Posted by James MacDonald at 06:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Will we never tire of the sordid and sensational? People are sadly so susceptible to the sizzle and the 'sell.' That's why I'm mildly irritated by all this talk in the media about Discovery Channel's featured documentary THE LOST TOMB OF JESUS where they try to make the case that the 2000-year-old Tomb of the Ten Ossuaries belonged to the family of Jesus of Nazareth.

Here are five quick reasons this is: ummmmmm, the word I'm looking for is . . . ummmmmmm, ahhhh, I know it's not S?????, it's ummmm, not very smart!

1) Jesus is alive, haven't you heard? The tomb is empty, the disciples died as martyr's for the gospel, even suffering painful deaths without recanting their claims of having been eyewitnesses to the resurrection. I kinda doubt they did that with an awareness of Jesus' cemetery location in the back of their mind.

2) Are we to believe that all stories of changed lives, all sermons, all answered prayers, all reported comfort in affliction, all miracles of all kinds--ALL of it is made up for 2000 years? Now that's hard for me to believe, but that is what you're asserting if you say we found Jesus' bones in a box.

3) I called this guy Josh (Joshua is the OT equivalent of Jesus) at my church to ask him what he thought. He's a lawyer and pretty smart so I thought he could help me. Anyway he wasn't there but his wife Mary answered the phone. She's a doctor, too sweet to debate this issue, but we did have a discussion of the statistical probability of another couple having the two most common names of that day. I love Josh and Mary. :)

4) These bone boxes were discovered 20 years ago. Why didn't we hear about the proof that Jesus was 'just a man,' back then? Ahhhhh, I've wasted 20 years, I didn't know . . . Or more likely our steady slide into secularism and shameless marketing technique has reached an all time low. It's not that they found more evidence, it's that after 20 years of boredom with this supposed 'discovery' someone discovered a level of integrity that allows them to feel good making money this way.

5) I'm gonna save my best argument for Easter Sunday, only a few weeks away now. But rest assured, this has not rocked me. Not even a little bit. Not even as much as my rocking chair, where I hope to be sitting reading my Bible when this happens:
"And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war. His eyes are a flame of fire, and on His head are many diadems; and He has a name written on Him which no one knows except Himself. He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God. And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses. From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. And on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, "KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS." (Revelation 19:11-16)

I think Jesus will have a lot to say to those guys who fabricated stuff about Him being dead and all. I think I'll let Him do the talking. If you are still struggling with this, there are a lot of links you can follow on Matthew's blog on this site.

Then if this is still bothering you, contact Matt Westerholm at our church maybe he can have you over for dinner to discuss evidence for the resurrection with he and his wife Lisa, and his brother Joshua, and his sister-in-law, Mary (all very uncommon names). Yeah right!
james