Welcome to Defenders, the teaching class of Dr. William Lane Craig.

Today, the Doctrine of Christ, part 25.

For more information and resources from Dr. Craig, go to reasonable faith.org.

Having discussed the atonement of Christ for several months, we now turn today to a second aspect of Christ's work,

which is His resurrection from the dead.

The resurrection of Christ from the dead is tightly connected with His atoning work on the cross.

Indeed, the cross and resurrection are like two sides of the same coin. In Romans 425, Paul says that Jesus Christ was put to death for our trespasses and raised for our justification.

The resurrection of Jesus is a consequence and a ratification of Christ's satisfaction of divine justice on the cross.

On the one hand, it is a consequence of the satisfaction of divine justice.

Because divine justice has been fully satisfied by the substitutionary punishment and death

of Christ, Christ can no longer be held by death. The punishment cannot continue. The price has been

paid and therefore a consequence of the satisfaction of divine justice is Christ's rising

from the dead and breaking the bonds of death and hell and sin.

On the other hand, it's also a ratification of Christ's satisfaction of divine justice.

It shows us that the cross was not ultimately a pointless tragedy of history, but that

this was indeed God's great redemptive act in human history,

and the resurrection of Christ from the dead shows us clearly that the price has been paid,

that justice has been satisfied, and our redemption has been completed by Christ's work on the cross.

So the resurrection is not some independent and separate appendage to Christ's

atoning work, it is a consequence and ratification of it.

Now we want to first look at the scriptural data, or some of it anyway, concerning Jesus' resurrection.

And as we do so, we will first look at one of the earliest historical testimonies

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