With all of the coming and going, I know that this Update reaches folks who haven't been around the ABF in some time. While I'm interested in sharing the current events of Life Answers ABF with all who are interested, I also don't want to be spamming someone's e-mail box. If you've been away from the ABF, but want to continue to receive our Updates, please send me an e-mail to let me know this. I'm going to edit the list-serve according the recent attendance in the coming weeks and the Update will begin recirculating with regularity in September. Notices about the Men's and Women's events, and the International Student Ministry (of which Mary and Emmanuel Agbovi informed us this past week) will be sent out when appropriate. Thanks for your participation. (rg)

Meanwhile, the guards had scattered, but a few of them went into the city and told the high priests everything that had happened. They called a meeting of the religious leaders and came up with a plan: They took a large sum of money and gave it to the soldiers, bribing them to say, "His disciples came in the night and stole the body while we were sleeping." They assured them, "If the governor hears about your sleeping on duty, we will make sure you don't get blamed." The soldiers took the bribe and did as they were told. That story, cooked up in the Jewish High Council, is still going around. Matthew 28:11-15 (The Message)

Last Sunday's ABF Recap:
rg

Not necessarily intuitive, but extremely appropriate was the subject of our last ABF gathering of the season: evidence supporting the Resurrection of Jesus. It was simply a faith-affirming lesson that Matt delivered. It stands to reason that many doubt Jesus' resurrection... it's not every millennia that we get to experience a dead man coming back to life. But that's what Jesus predicted He would do, that's what the disciples claimed He did, and it's the event upon which all of human history hinges. An empty tomb is at the root of our faith. So what are the objections?

The characters in the story went to the wrong tomb?

Even Jesus' adversaries knew that the tomb in which Jesus had been buried was empty. We know this from Matthew 28:11-15.

Additionally, the Apostles didn't make an attempt to fool people who were removed from the area in which Jesus ministered, was crucified and then burried. They preached and witnessed right where Jesus was burried. If the wrong tomb was the problem initially, it could have been corrected very easily.

The body was stolen?

It was Passover weekend and Jerusalem was FULL of people. It's not feasible that a man or a group of men could have been able to adequately get past the guards and the stone, then sneak a naked, rotting corpse out of the city. And handling a dead body to the extent that stealing one would require violates Jewish custom in a big way. Further, what's the motive? Only someone who cared about Jesus and his ministry would have gone to such lengths, and all but one of the remaining apostles died awful deaths for holding fast to the Resurrection account.

Matt recounted experiences at CVCA when multiple students would be in trouble, and tell identical stories to the authorities... and then one would break down and get everyone else in trouble to save his own skin. This did not happen with the Apostles. They stuck to their story... because it was the truth. (As an aside, I've come across some blogs in my research describing how dieing for a cause doesn't make the cause true. These particular blogs refer to the 9/11 hijackers. I trust that a serious conversation wouldn't equate the Apostles with the 9/11 hijackers, either with their message or with their manner of death.)

Jesus wasn't really dead (a.k.a. The Swoon Theory)?

The Apostles were hallucinating?

Paul's account in I Corinthians 15:3-8 makes this hard to believe.

For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.

We're all Christians, and the Resurrection is something that we believe, but it's hard to put answers to all of the questions that we may get about it, and I, for one, was grateful to spend some time reviewing the evidence for Jesus' Resurrection.

Life Answers Men's Event: Night Golf @ Leisure Time Wednesday, June 10, 8:30pm (Sunset is just before 9:00)

~ALSO~

Women's Event in June - TBA

Life Answers Olympics - August... Keep an eye on your mailbox for info to come!

Some requests shared this past Sunday:

• Koons Family in adoption process
• Jessica Kiel's brother's marriage is in need of God's help
• Mary & Emmanuel Agbovi's baby, and a healthy pregnancy for Mary
• Michael & Annie King (and all teachers) are busy and stressed with the end of school approaching

Heroes of Hope: Lives Worth Emulating
Chuck Colson

Yesterday I talked about a Christian ethic of hope-a hope not based on wishful thinking, but on the reality of God's promises. It's this Christian hope that gives us the joy, the self-sacrificial love, the boldness, and the endurance to carry on-even in tough times. You often see these fruits in the lives of devout believers.

For example: Justin Martyr, born around 100 AD to pagan parents; he grew up studying philosophy. But while in Ephesus he was impressed by the steadfastness of Christians under persecution and converted to Christianity. He is known for his "Apologies," defenses of the faith addressed to those in highest power: the Roman Emperor and the Roman Senate.

Justin boldly defended the lives of his persecuted fellow Christians. For publically debating and defending the Christian beliefs in public, he was tried before a Roman prefect. When he refused to deny his faith, he was beheaded. But it was Justin's hope in Christ that enabled him to boldly and sacrificially defend the truth.

Centuries later, Nien Cheng would stand up to the authorities of her day. Cheng was arrested in 1966 by

click here for more info about Christian Persecution from Voice of the Martyrs

Chinese Red Guards. Six years in prison she was pressured to make a false confession that she had been a spy for the imperialists. Despite torture, Cheng would not admit to something that wasn't true.

Cheng was a Christian and although she couldn't let the guards see her praying, she secretly turned to God and found solace for her grief and hope to face each day. Cheng was released under the pretense that her behavior had improved. But it was her hope in God that enabled her to endure her brutal treatment.

In a prison cell on the other side of the world, Armando Valladares spent 22 years because of his refusal to bend the knee to a communist regime. Valladares counseled and pled with other inmates to stay true to the faith over the 8,000 days of hard labor and solitary confinement.

He resisted communist indoctrination, saying "For me that would've meant spiritual suicide." He says, "All the time I was in jail, I never gave up my freedom. My freedom is not the space where you can walk around in. There are lots of people in Cuba who have space to walk, and yet they are not free."

For Vallardes, true freedom was "8,000 days of testing my religious convictions, my faith, of fighting the hate my atheist jailers were trying to instill in me with each bayonet thrust, fighting so that hate would not flourish in my heart." When he was finally released with French intervention in 1982, he published his classic book Against All Hope.

For Justin Martyr, Cheng, and Vallardes, hope was not a flimsy optimism that everything would somehow work out alright. Hope was understanding that the reward for holding fast to God was a weight of glory that exceeded the pain of any momentary affliction.

For each of them, hope yielded joy, sacrificial love, boldness, and endurance. As we imitate them in their hope, these are fruits which not only would change us, but the world in which we live.

The Life Answers ABF is on a ~3+ month break. Don't excommunicate yourself, though! Stay in touch via facebook, via the events we'll be planning and letting you know about, via volunteering for Children's Ministry during the usual ABF time, via Supper Six, and via getting on the phone and simply scheduling a get-together with some friends.

Finally, from the Gates Family, and from many other families with whom we've spoken over the past few months, on whose behalf I'm comfortable speaking here, a public THANK YOU is in order to Matt Koons for providing Godly leadership, gifted teaching and wonderful insight during the past months. Life Answers was in a time of need last fall, and Matt, you were an answer to prayer. For the Death By Suburb series, for the Tending 2 Marriage series, for the Knowing Jesus series from Mark, and for challenging us all along the way, thank you very much.

To all of us (you, specifically, who is reading this right now): Enjoy your summer. Send an encouraging e-mail to a friend.

RG