Read a well-spoken response by a Christian historian to the “sensational discovery” by James Cameron (of “Titanic” fame) of Jesus’ bones: A Boring Box of Bones. Here’s an excerpt …

We are being asked to believe that a Christian movement – shaped from beginning to end by the claim of both resurrection and ascension (no bones, therefore no ossuary) – was started by a family dynasty of the same faith (Jesus, Mary Magdalene, Judah), and carried on the secret of actually having the bones of Jesus buried in an extravagant and public place while they encouraged early Christians to go to death because of their faith in Jesus’ resurrection and ascension.

There are several ways a believer might respond to Cameron’s claims.

1. I believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus and there is no evidence that could ever be produced to convince me otherwise … The weakness of this kind of response is its “head-in-the-sand” attitude and its abandonment of any reasonable basis for dialogue with its critics. Its strength is the confidence it reveals in the authenticity of a believer’s experience of the real presence of the living Christ through faith: “I know what I know, I know whom I know, and I put my unwavering trust in him.”
2. I believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus, and because I do, I am confident that any evidence offered to the contrary can be shown to be faulty … This is the point of view of the article cited above, and mine.
3. I believe in the resurrection of Jesus, but there is nothing to suggest it must be understood as a physical resurrection, a resurrection of Jesus’ body … This is a common view among Christians and has the advantage of making any claims like Cameron’s irrelevant. In my view, however, this response has much in common with the first! We secure our faith by taking any possible avenue of dispute off the table. It is a belief more in resurrection faith than in resurrection.
4. Oh, no! James Cameron has found Jesus’ bones. Jesus is dead. My faith is meaningless … Sad, very sad …

The bodily resurrection of Jesus is important because it reveals a God who has a healing agenda for this world, a God who cares about bodies as well as souls, a God who can and will bring shalom to this broken world. As a believer in the resurrection, I feel called to do the same, to do God’s will by caring about bodies as well as souls, by doing my best not just to prepare for some afterlife, but to make this life as God intends it to be, because it is this life, this life of body and spirit inseparably intertwined that God cares about and that God brings to fullness in Jesus.