“Jesus’ resurrection lies at the very center of the historic Christian faith. It stands both as the faith’s central doctrinal belief and the religion’s primary evidence in terms of truth claims. It is what makes Easter Sunday of critical significance for Christians. The resurrection is so important that, in 1 Corinthians 15:14-15a, Paul declares, ‘If Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God.’” This is a key quote from Samples’ book.
And we are blessed in our time that as promised, Jesus sent the Holy Spirit upon his resurrection to indwell repentant believers to restore the intimate, personal, two-way communion always desired by God for mankind but lost at the Fall.