Matthew 28:6-7 He is not here: for he is risen, as he said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay.… Why? For this reason: The fact of Christ's resurrection is at the basis of Christianity. Our whole religion must stand or fall with the coming to life again of the Man Jesus. "If Christ be not risen from the dead, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain." God hath therefore hedged it round with special tokens, evidences which may well hush the doubter and strike the sceptic dumb. In the Old Testament we read that contact with the sacred dust of the Prophet Elisha did once raise a man to life; and a Jewish superstition invested the bones of their holier heroes with a similar power. Had this been an old and much-used grave, the enemies of Jesus would have been quick to suggest that as the cause of the resurrection. So Providence provides a new tomb, where never man was laid. Again, old tombs and ancient sepulchres often had secret passages, subterranean avenues, and connections with each other and the outer world. How ready would the unbelievers have been to suggest that by such secret means the body had been carried off by His disciples and interred elsewhere I Hence it is a new tomb, cut in the face of the solid rock, one only means of entrance and of exit, watched and tended by the Roman guard. (J. J. Wray.) Parallel Verses KJV: He is not here: for he is risen, as he said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay.WEB: He is not here, for he has risen, just like he said. Come, see the place where the Lord was lying. |
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