The Claim of Jesus’ Resurrection
Orthodox icon Resurrection of Christ. Greece.
Essay Written for Theology 1: What do you believe about the claim Jesus was raised from the dead?
Within the conviction of “Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again,” I bear witness to the claim that Jesus indeed was raised from the dead. I see this claim as true through the Hebrew prophets (Madigan and Levenson, 6-19), Jesus’ resurrection instilling the hope of transformation (21-23), and Jesus’ resurrection as an opening of the new world unfolding, which offers an invitation that as we wait we live for a God who loves unconditionally for a just more unified world (Oduyoye, 107; Migliore, 202-203; Gilliss, 134-135).
Even though Gilliss speaks to the mystery of resurrection, which I believe in, Madigan and Levenson illuminate viewing the resurrection through the belief and practice of Judaism which brings the mystery of resurrection closer through the unfolding of scripture and time (2). This hint of mystery makes resurrection less binary and invitational toward hope. These hints are crucial, as Madigan and Levenson state, and enrich the “anchor of Christian hope” through historical understanding and human experience (2-3). Even though Jesus’ resurrection was a surprise to the context, it wasn’t past the imagination as Israel had been living with “well-established norms” that God would come to restore and lift up their suffering into justice and life (4-7). In this understanding of Israel and its people into the first century, I can hold the claim of Jesus raised from the dead with deeper understanding and reverence for just how powerful this event was and is today for all of us.
Jesus’ risen body speaks to hope of transformation (Madigan and Levenson 3, 21-23). The fulfillment of Jesus’ resurrection is within the bodily and communal understanding of resurrection through ancient Jews and Christians (3). The risen Christ’s body “testifies to the reality and materiality of Jesus’ body after the resurrection” and to show Jesus’ body is not exactly the same - “it is a transformed body” (21-22). This difference in bodily representation not only speaks to the “the sign” our friends of the first century saw but offers an entry point for our present moments that resurrection is for us, too. I can hold the claim of Jesus raised from the dead with hope knowing that my queer body will be trans-magically transformed bearing the wounds of this world but separated from its harm through the embodiment of everlasting life with Jesus (22).
Migliore and Oduyoye bring forth the focus of Christ’s resurrection as a subversion of empire. “Jesus exposed the structures of oppression” and through Jesus’ resurrection radically subverts forever such structures having reign over God’s people (Oduyoye, 101; Migliore 202-203). Through this exposure and subversion is an invitation in Jesus’ resurrection. “Christ will come again” lives in this moment that we are now resurrection people with a call to believe and know our present moment and future is handled by God and our partnership. As Gillis offers, “Christ’s ongoing transformation of the world calls us to active participation” (134). Through resurrection God gives us the capacity to forgive, reconcile and the charge to “refuse to accept unjust suffering” (135-137).
Every Easter we wade through Good Friday’s silence and Holy Saturday’s somberness before crying, “He is Risen.” If we are Easter people, then we are resurrection people. To believe in Jesus’s resurrection means we lean into Jesus’ time, his bodily transformation and his resurrection invitation to participate in the new cosmos. With these held together, I believe in the claim Jesus indeed was raised from the dead and hold these beliefs whenever I speak, “Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again.”
Greek Religious Icon of Second Coming, c. 1700