life and strength of His followers. “And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and brake it; and He gave to the disciples, and said, ‘Take, eat; this is My body.’ And He took a cup, and gave thanks, and gave to them, saying, ‘Drink ye all of it; for this is My blood of the covenant, which is shed for many unto remission of sins.”[280] The teaching of Jesus is an organic whole, and is incomplete without this, His own interpretation of His death of shame. Jesus, then, gave Himself up to death as the sacrifice for the sins of men. Our Christian documents go on to declare that _He rose from the dead on the third day_, and that this resurrection of His was God’s confirmation of the sacrifice of His Son. That men should at first sight disbelieve the astounding assertion, that the crucified Jesus rose from the dead, is not to be wondered at; but _the fact remains_. Sceptical scholars have laboured for centuries to explain away this extraordinary occurrence, but no one of these scholars themselves will venture to say that any explanation hitherto given is satisfactory. The latest attempt, that made by Schmiedel in the _Encyclopædia Biblica_, is a farcical failure. The following are the adamantine facts which no rationalism has ever yet succeeded in crushing or melting:—(_a_) the Christians declared that they had seen Christ and spoken with Him after His resurrection; (_b_) they were absolutely sincere in this belief[281]; (_c_) the Christian Church arose as a result of this conviction; (_d_) the grave was empty. The account of Christ’s appearances given in the fifteenth chapter of our Epistle is well worth study. Those who wish to look into this question further may consult Ballard’s _Miracles of Unbelief_, pp. 135 ff. We have thus, by a serious historical inquiry, reached the conclusion, that Jesus of Nazareth, the founder of the Christian religion, declared, before His crucifixion, that He was about to die for the sins of men, and that this assertion of His was sealed with the divine approval by the unique miracle of the resurrection. We have also seen that this was _the Good News_, which Paul and all the other Apostles preached, and on which the early Church was founded. It is this that has won for Jesus the love of myriads; it is this that has been the magnet to draw them away from sin. It is the source of the joy and vital power of the Christian life. Now let us recollect the poem upon _The Servant of Jehovah_, which we considered in our third chapter. How marvellously Jesus corresponds to the extraordinary idea which that poem discloses, the despised and oppressed prisoner who endures in uncomplaining meekness the uttermost shame of a violent death, and is finally recognized as having been “pierced because of our trangressions, and crushed because of our iniquities.” That anyone should write such a poem, seems strange in the extreme; that Jesus should have fulfilled it, is infinitely more wonderful.