Easter

God spoke to me on Easter.

I'm serious... here's the story.

So we had our gig on good friday (which i will write about later) and after that, we went to supper in serangoo gardens... we must have hopped locations 6 - 7 times looking for a decent (read: airconditioned) place to chill out. We failed, so we settled for Cafe Cartel, our motley crew of 14 people. In the middle of dinner I asked Uma a question (seeing how she's the only one of our bunch with a real theological degree) about the ressurection. The conversation ended without me reaching my answers... and on Sunday, those very questions were answered through the pastor. It's simply amazing when God decides to show up and assure you that He's still real and relevant in our lives today.

See, if we are to believe that Christ is the Son of God AND that he has redeemed us from our sins. One very important conclusion must be reached - He resurrected and lives today! If not, then Christ is just a good man, not unlike Muhammed or Buddha or Confucious.

Read here for a simplified (not simple!!) explanation: http://www.bcbsr.com/topics/ans4.html

But something still bugged me. in Matthew, Jesus himself said that he'd spend 3 days and 3 nights in the belly of the earth (in a comparison to Jonah). But if this was true, then supposing he died on a friday, His ressurrection would have been on Monday (and give us 1 more public holiday!) But we all believe he rose on Sunday.

The inconsistency is not derived from the actual days and nights but in the semantics of Jewish speech. In Jewish, they describe 1 day (24 hours) as a day and night. What was intended to describe was instead to say that he would spend a spend of time that would stretch over 3 days. So... he died on Friday afternoon (Friday night & day), remained dead on Saturday (Sat night and day), and rose on Sunday before dawn (Sunday night and day).

So while he didn't spend 96 hours in the tomb, he did spend 3 days in the earth...

Oh but what a cop out? Did you say? You must understand that the passage of time is hard to track... anyone who has gone about a day without a watch or handphone will have difficulty telling time. This is no different from those times. Which accounts for the 'vague' time passage.

There's evidence of this in Genesis when the writer describes creation: " There was day and night, the first day" Also there's precedence in early writings of this 3 day issue. In the book Esther, it is written that she asked the Jews to fast for 3 days and nights and after, she would present herself to the king. But a few verses down, it reads that she went to the king on the 3rd day.

At the end of the day, we are looking at eyewitness accounts from almost 2000 years ago. There will bound to be errors. But that doesn't mean the event didn't occur. But that is what faith is all about.

Jam