Conspiracy theory: OBL and Jesus Christ

I have a friend who does not trust the government. At all. Power corrupts, the adage goes, and absolute power nudges it over the precipice.

So now the government--in fact its chief executive--announces that public enemy #1, Osama bin Laden, is fish food.  My friend wants proof.

Why now?

Where's the body?

Where are the pictures?

You get the idea. While not a fan of much that the current administration has done domestically or internationally over the past couple years, I have no reason to doubt the veracity of their comments about this. Two reasons.

First, if he's not dead, all he needs to do is strike the pose to a couple Vogue photographers and the US of A looks like a bunch of dopes. Nothing dispels a rumored death quite so quickly as a pulse.

Second, if there's been a cover-up or some deception, time will erode the camouflage. As Chuck Colson and the rest of the rabble involved in Watergate learned, keeping a lie secret for very long proves next to impossible. Someone's going to blow the whistle; there's just too much money and too much temptation floating about the stratosphere.

Me?  I think Herr bin Laden has joined company with Herrs Hitler, Stalin, tse-Tung (yeah, I'm old school), Amin, and Pot just to name a few.

As this whole "where's-the-body?" thing played out Monday morning, I couldn't help but think of Jesus' resurrection because the same two reasons to believe the Obama Administration work equally well for the first century witnesses who said Jesus rose from the dead. Either he did or he didn't. Pretty hard to fathom an in-between.

So, what happened to Jesus' body? Despite the dizzying array of conspiracy theorists, no evidence has come to bear against the resurrection as reported in the earliest manuscripts from that era (1 Corinthians 15:3-4).  Paul, the author of the Corinthian letter, has the boldness to tell them that there are many eyewitnesses to the resurrected Christ still alive at that time. You want to squash a resurrection story faster than a bullet through a Muslim terrorist's brain, all you need to do is show the body. Not something anyone ever did.

If the resurrection was a lie, a fabrication, someone would have talked.  Judas couldn't hack the pressure while Jesus was still alive, imagine any of the yellow-spined disciples when their amigos started losing their heads.  Someone's gonna turn states evidence.

"Well, the disciples stole the body."  Come now. What power would there be behind a made-up story about a dude we saw brutally butchered if he were nothing but a cold, grotesque corpse? You want a religion based upon that? You want to suffer a life of persecution and being ostracized from family and friends for that? You want to be martyred for that? Of all the silly theories, the disciples stealing the body is perhaps the silliest.

Paul goes on to argue how absolutely absurd Christianity would be if in fact Christ did not rise from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:12-19). Paul had a dizzying intellect and was a brilliant man. He understood quite well that if Jesus did not rise from the dead, he was a fool at best and a liar from the pit of hell at worst. "But," he declares, "in fact Christ has been raised from the dead" (15:20).

Conspiracy? What did Paul have to gain? He was executed for this conviction. He died penniless and alone. What did Peter have to gain? He suffered the same fate as did all of his apostolic compatriots save John. No conspiracy. They all saw the risen Christ and upon that fact and in that joy they lived the rest of their lives understanding that any pain in this life would pale in comparison to life with Christ here and in the next.

"For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us."

~ Romans 8:18

Bin Laden is dead. If our government has falsified that in any way, either someone will show a body, living or dead, or time will erode away any veneer and bring the truth to light. The conspiracy theories will be manifest as true or fade away for lack of evidence.  In time.

Neither time nor twenty-first century hubris has dented the evidence for the resurrected Messiah. It is because of the fact that God the Son has been raised to eternal life confirming his sacrifice on the cross as payment for my (our) sin that we can be restored in his relationship to God.

OBL. A dead zealot. Many will hail him as a martyr for their cause and do horrifying things in his name, just as he did in life. Many will be enlisted to follow his path to destruction.

Jesus Christ. A living King. Many have laid down their life for him that others might have life through him.  Today, many can come to know Him and follow him to eternal life.

That's a big difference.