Today I want to preach on the subject, “I have proof there is life after death.” I am standing at the bedside of the dearest person in the world. She is fading away very quickly. A nurse rushes into the room and takes her pulse and says there is no pulse. Then she checks the vital signs and says all the vital signs are gone. She leaves the room and she returns in five minutes. She feels the forehead of my friend and then she pulls the sheet up over the body as she closes the eyelids. She turns to me and says “she is gone.” Where has she gone? The atheist took a match and struck that match and just held it up and said to the chaplain at the university, “this is life.” Then he blew the match out and said that is the way it is with the life. It burns for just a jiffy and then it is snuffed out forever. That is all there is to a life. Is it true? Is there life after death? A gallant man by the name of Job, 3000 years ago in Job 14:14 asks, “If a man dies, shall he live again?” That has been the question on the lips of all man for all time. It will be the question on your lips one day if it has not already been on your lips as you face death or as your loved ones face death. If a person dies, is there life after death? Today, I want us to summon to the stand the most brilliant witnesses on the subject and see what they say.
I summon the Scientist
I say, “Mr. Scientist, you have more facts in your head than anybody in our society. With all your knowledge certainly you can give us some comfort on this question, ‘Is there life after death?’” The scientist looks at me and says, “With all the knowledge I have, all I can say is there may be, but I am not sure.” So I dismiss Mr. Scientist.
I summon the Philosopher
I say, “Mr. Philosopher, you are the authority on beauty and justice and logic and that which is right. Is there life after death?” He says, “You know it would be a pity if there was not. A man so endowed to be snuffed out at death, there ought to be life after death, but I cannot honestly tell you whether there is or not.” I dismiss the philosopher and say, “You don’t help me, you don’t answer my question.”
I summon the Historian
I say, “Mr. Historian, you know more about the human race than anybody. You studied the races through the ages. Is there life after death?” He says, “You know, every segment of humanity has desired that there be life after death. He desires it. Every man desires it, but I have no definite conclusive proof that there is life after death.”
So I say, “Mr. Scientist, Mr. Philosopher, and Mr. Historian, you have not helped my feelings much today so I am going to bring a fourth witness to the stand.”
I summon the world’s greatest evangelist, Billy Graham
I say, “Billy is there life after death?” He says, “I believe there is with all my heart.” I ask, “What is your proof?” He says, “Just a few days ago, I sat at the bedside of my dying mother in Charlotte and as she was dying she said, ‘Bill, I see the face of your father, Frank, who has been dead 20 years and I am talking to him right now. I sense that I can feel his hand and I promised him that I would meet him in heaven in just a few days.” I say, “Thank you Billy. That encourages my heart, but how do you know that your mother was not undergoing hallucinations or maybe she was delirious with fever?” Thank you Billy, but that does not satisfy me completely.
I summon the greatest preacher in the century, Dr. R. G. Lee (died 1978)
I say, “Dr. Lee is there life after death?” Dr. Lee says, “I believe there is with all my heart.” “Why do you believe it, Dr. Lee?” “Because when I was dying, I saw heaven open and I saw my mother who had been dead for 60 years, and I saw Lady Lee my wife who had been dead for eight years, and I just believe that there is life after death.” “Thank you, Dr. Lee for sharing this with me, but are you sure that you were not out of your mind and this was a subjective experience rather than an objective reality? Thank you, Dr. Lee, but this doesn’t fully satisfy my heart. I have got to know more than this.”
I summon the great men of the Old and New Covenant
I turn to a man by the name of David
I say, “David is there life after death?” He says, “Haven’t you read the 23rd Psalm?”
I turn to a man by the name of Isaiah
I say, “Isaiah is there life after death?” He says, “Haven’t you read Isaiah 25:8.
I turn to a gallant man by the name of Job
I say, “Job is there life after death? He says, “Haven’t you read my victorious words in Job 19:25? I know that my redeemer liveth and that he shall stand on the earth at the latter day and though the skin worms destroy this body yet in my flesh shall I see God.” “Thank you, Job for that wonderful word.”
I turn to the apostle John in the New Testament
I say, “John, you lived with Jesus 3 ½ years and He taught you about the mysteries of the hereafter, is there life after death?” He says, “Did you ever read 1 John 2:17?” “Thank you John that is a word of reassurance.”
I bring Simon Peter to the stand I say, “Simon Peter is there life after death?” Simon answers, “Have you read 1 Peter 1:3-5?” Thank you Peter for that word of assurance.
I turn to Paul I say, “Paul, is there life after death?” Paul says, “I cannot do any better than to quote to you what I wrote in 1 Corinthians 15:53, 57.”
So I thank the Psalmist, I thank Isaiah, I thank Job, I thank John, I thank Peter, I thank Paul, but I have to say to all of them, it is not totally convincing. Did you notice that there is something really missing in every testimony? Not one of these men has died and been buried in a grave and come back to life to tell us indeed, there is life after death. So that moves me to my final ultimate witness.
I call Jesus of Nazareth to the stand
I say, “Jesus, you are the world’s authority on resurrection. Is there life after death?” Jesus says, “I am glad you asked me. That is the reason I came here in the first place. Do you remember reading Revelation 1:17-18 and John 11:25? I don’t just teach the resurrection and ask you to believe in the resurrection, but I stand before you to say, I literally died, I was literally in the grave three days and three nights but I rose and walked out of the grave and I am the resurrection and the life. You are looking at the resurrection. I have defeated death and am alive forevermore.” What a claim!
What a claim that is! No one has ever said this in the history of the world. The great religious leaders say nothing about this. Only Jesus of Nazareth. Did He prove it? Let me answer by an illustration.
Mark Whitman was the first man to explore the Oregon Trail. He took a wagon through the Oregon Trail. He went to Washington to talk to President Tyler and He said, “Mr. President, will you give me some troops, and some money? I want to go through the Oregon Trail so all of our people can use it to get into the great Northwest of our land.” The president looked at him and said, “Mark, it is impossible for you to go through the Oregon Trail. I have reports of blizzards and boulders etc, and no one has ever gone through there and come back alive.” Mark Whitman looked at the president and said, “Mr. President, I beg to disagree with you. I have been through – I took a wagon through the Oregon Trail, Mr. President, and I am here as proof that I went through the trail and I came back alive.” The President said, “If you went through the Oregon Trail, and you came back alive, that settles it.” That is exactly what Jesus of Nazareth has done and that is the only perfect proof of life hereafter, and it’s the only proof that we need.
When John was on the Isle of Patmos, (Revelation 1:17-18) he was afraid that he was going to be killed by the cruel emperor. Jesus in His resurrected body appears to John and lays His right hand upon him and says, “John, I am the first, I am the last, you don’t need to fear. I am He that liveth, but I was dead. John, I am the one who was dead – I have been in death, and I come back to say to you that I have conquered death. I am alive forevermore.” That is the proof. Jesus went on to say, “Whosoever liveth and beliveth in me shall never die.” You say, “that can’t be true. My mama believed in Jesus and we buried her just a few years ago. My child believed in Jesus and was taken in an accident. We buried his body. My sister died of a malignancy and she believed in Jesus. We buried her. Yes, you did bury her body, but you didn’t bury mama, or son or sister or your brother. All you buried was their body and they are more alive today than ever. “Whosoever lives and believes in Him shall never die (John 8:51). Jesus didn’t even recognize death because of His triumphant victory over death.
There is one question that you and I need to ask today. How can I in this present life know that when I die that I will be living forever with God? If you are not a Christian today, you are going to live on, but you will only exist if you die without Christ. So horrible is that state of existence that the Bible doesn’t call it life but death. You will be in a place of outer darkness. You will be in a place of separation from God forever. Every soul is immortal. You are going to live or exist somewhere forever. The question on Easter that every single person ought to ask is, “Have I in this life made that decision which has given me a life that will survive this life? What kind of life is that? Eternal life. That is exactly what Jesus offers to you today. You will die one day even if you have eternal life, but eternal life will never die. It can’t die. Do you know why? It is the same life that Jesus had when He was buried. It is God’s kind of life. Do you have eternal life today? You can’t earn it, you cannot deserve it, you can’t be religious enough to get it, baptism won’t do it, confirmation won’t do it, and the sacraments won’t do it. Where do you get it? You get it only from the source – from Jesus. How did He bring it to you and me? Through His death, His burial and His resurrection.
You can have this Eternal Life today provided you do three things:
- Be willing to turn from your sins. Notice I said willing. All God wants is our willingness. If you are willing today to turn over a new leaf and live a new life, God will give you the power to turn from anything that holds you, any habit. If you just say Lord, I am willing. As Billy Graham has said so many times, you take the first step and He takes the next ten.
- Receive Jesus by a simple act of faith. By faith, not by feeling, not by understanding, but by trusting in your heart.
- Get up from where you are and don’t be ashamed of it. Go public. Jesus even made Zacchaeus jump down a tree to make his confession. We always ask people to make their decision public. When you receive Jesus as your savior, you get eternal life and you are going to live forever with God and Jesus in the new Jerusalem. The beautiful part is that you start living today. You find a new life, a new joy, a new purpose, a new power and a new excitement.