The Last Generation
“Revealing Truth to the Nation”
John 8:32
And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
Lesson 3
The Resurrection of Christ NOT on Sunday
Scripture Reading: John 19
Memory Verse Matthew 12:38-40
The Resurrection of Christ
1 After Christ was resurrected, when were visits made to the tomb?
Mark 16:1, 2.
2 Of what one thing in particular were they talking among themselves, as they went to the sepulcher?
verse 3.
3 What did they discover when they arrived at the tomb?
And when they looked, they saw that the stone was rolled away: for it was very great, verse 4.
4 Did they find the body of Jesus, or had He left the tomb some time before this?
He is risen; He is not here: behold the place where they laid Him, verse 6.
5 As the above verse says, Christ was gone from the tomb early the first day of the week. What does the other witness, Luke, say?
Luke 24:1-3.
6 The evidence according to both Mark and Luke, is that Christ was gone when these visits were made. What does John testify on this subject?
John 20:1-2.
7 As these three gospels, Mark, Luke and John, all agree that when the visitors came to the tomb early the first day of the week, the stone at the door of the sepulcher was already rolled away. Christ was then resurrected and gone. What evidence have we as to the time when this stone was rolled away, and when Christ was really resurrected?
Matthew 28:1-6.
8 The earthquake occurred, the angels descended, and the stone was rolled away in the end of the Sabbath.
The events of Christ's resurrection occurred at this time. Christ Himself tells us, in Matthew 12:40, that the only sign He would give the world that He was the Messiah, was that He would be in the earth three days and three nights. Upon what day of the week would the crucifixion and burial have taken place?
Note: Three days and three nights before the end of the Sabbath (which is the day before the first day of the week, and therefore Saturday) count backwards from Saturday night three days and three nights. This takes us to Wednesday.
9 When did the prophet Daniel say Christ would be crucified, or cut off?
Daniel 9:27.
Note: While the week here has a prophetical meaning, and application with the seventy weeks, it also has a literal significance, and to this prophecy is given a two-fold meaning, as is the case with the seven heads of the beast in Revelation 17:9, 10.
Note: Evidence From Astronomy - The next day after the full moon was always the Passover. It was the 14th day of the Jewish month Nisan. "It was coincident with the Passover," Smith's Bible Dictionary, Leviticus 23:5.This year, A.D. 31, it fell on Wednesday. On this day Christ was crucified and laid in the tomb. "It was the preparation of the passover," or "high day" festival sabbath, John 19:14, 31, which came on the 15th of Nisan, Leviticus 23:6, 7.Jesus was alive and the tomb empty "In the end of the Sabbath," Matthew 28:1-7. "Late on the Sabbath," Revised version, He was in the tomb "Three days and three nights," Matthew 12:40.Count back three days and three nights from "Late on the Sabbath" and we have Wednesday evening the time of his burial. Thus God's great time-piece, the Heavens, Genesis 1:14; Psalm 19:1, speaking through the unerring science of Astronomy, confirms the Bible record of the time of the death and resurrection of Jesus.
10 Isn't it a fact according to John 19:31, that Christ was crucified the day before a Sabbath? The text reads:
John 19:31.
11 Was this the weekly Sabbath, or the Passover Sabbath, which was called the high day Sabbath?
For that sabbath day was a high day, verse 31.And it was the preparation of the passover, verse 14.
12
In the fourteenth day of the first month at even is the Lord's Passover. And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast of unleavened bread unto the Lord, Leviticus 23:5, 6.
13
Seven days ye must eat unleavened bread, verse 6 last part of verse.
14
In the first day [first day of the feast], ye shall have an holy convocation: ye shall do no servile work therein, verse 7.
Note: This fifteenth day of the month is kept as a Sabbath. The day before was the passover, when the lamb without blemish was slain and offered as a sacrifice for the sins of the people, Exodus 12:3-6. This lamb was a true type of Christ who is so often mentioned as the lamb of God. Christ was also crucified on the passover, which was the fourteenth day of this month, the same day the lamb had for hundreds of years been slain. The day after Christ's crucifixion, therefore, would be the passover Sabbath, or the high day Sabbath.
