Saturday, April 22, 2017

HAD JESUS NOT ARISEN

   To begin, the New Testament of the Bible would have never been written.
   The Catholic Church of Rome would have never been invented.
   The Protestant Reformation would have never been needed.
   There would have never been any Christian ministers, pastors, preachers, or priests.
   Drinking green beer on Saint Patrick's Day would have never been mentioned because Saint Patrick would have never been a Baptist preacher.
   The forty days of Lent and eating fish Fridays would have remained pagan rituals.
   There would have never been a question as to whether Jesus was crucified on Friday, or crucified on Wednesday; or whether He arose from death on Sunday, or whether it was Saturday;  or whether He was born in December, or was it in September.
   Had Jesus not arisen, He would have been a liar; but people would have never known of His lies since Jesus would have been just another dead man, killed by the Romans.
   And what about water baptism for the remission of sins?  Or absolution?  These rites and rituals could have been without Jesus' name.
   What would we do, then, without Christmas and Easter? 
   What would parents tell kids without Santa Claus and Easter Bunny?
   What would families do without green trees in living rooms?
   What would people do without presents to give and presents to get?
   What would we do without a Christmas Vacation or a Spring Break?
   What would people do without a Wake:  a time to get drunk after the death of a friend?
   The popes of Rome would have never stood up, nor the television ministers and such.
   Then there is the question of all that money that has been collected in Jesus' name for more than two thousand years.  Where would people have deposited their funds, or spent their money?
   What would have happened to retail stores without Christmas and Easter sales events over the past one hundred years?
   It is therefore impossible for us to know what would have happened had Jesus not arisen because we know that that is not true.  We know that Christ is alive.  The whole world, in fact, knows that Christ has arisen---even for those still living in a state of denial, or hiding in the cloak of religion.
  Most of all, we know Christ has arisen because the Bible tells us so:
      "Why seek ye the living among the dead?  He is not here, but is risen;"  (Luke 24: 6,7)
  

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