From the evidence we find in the Bible, the extra-biblical sources written so close in time to the events of the four Gospels, and the rapid growth of the Christian faith after the resurrection, Christians can proclaim with confidence that Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God who was born in the flesh, was crucified, and was resurrected from the dead, and he is the firstfruits of all who belong to him.

1. If Jesus wasn’t raised from the dead, then Christianity isn’t true.
The apostle Paul states the following in his first letter to the Corinthians:

And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. (1 Cor. 15:14-15)

2. The gospel writers included embarrassing facts about the apostles.
The fact that the gospels include embarrassing accounts of the apostles, such as the fact that Peter denied Jesus three times and all the apostles abandoned Jesus when he was arrested, points to their authenticity. It is unlikely that people would fabricate an account that places themselves in a poor light (Matt. 27:57-60; Mark 15:42-46; Luke 23:50-56; John 19:38-42).
3. The marble tablet known as the Nazareth Inscription points to Rome’s concerns about the upheaval caused by Jesus’ resurrection in the first century.
While we don’t know exactly when and where the tablet was discovered, it became part of a private collection in France in 1878 and has resided in the National Library of France, (Bibliothèque nationale, Paris) since 1925. According to Wikipedia,

The Nazareth Inscription or Nazareth decree is a marble tablet inscribed in Greek with an edict from an unnamed Caesar ordering capital punishment for anyone caught disturbing graves or tombs. It is dated on the basis of epigraphy to the first half of the 1st century AD. Its provenance is unknown, but a French collector acquired the stone from Nazareth. It is now in the collections of the Louvre.

The upheaval in the Roman Empire caused by the rapid growth of the Christian religion could well have been the underlying cause of this Roman edict that forbid grave-robbing.
4. Women were the first witnesses to see Jesus after his resurrection.
The testimony of women was not accepted in court in the first century in Israel. If someone were to fabricate an account of Jesus appearing to people after his death, the choice of women being the first to see him would be a very odd choice and serve only to reduce the credibility of the story (Matt. 28:1-10; Luke 23:55-24:11; Mark 16:1-11; John 20:11-18).
5. Every one of the twelve apostles died a martyr’s death except for John, who was exiled to the island of Patmos, and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus and hung himself.
While people have been known to die for a lie because they believed it to be true, it is almost impossible to find someone who would die for a lie with the full knowledge that it was false. It is highly unlikely that the disciples would have given their lives for a claim they had themselves fabricated.
6. Written testimony of Jesus’ resurrection dates back to within approximately 20 years of the event.
According to New Testament scholars D. A. Carson and Douglas Moo in their book An Introduction to the New Testament, historical evidence indicates that the apostle Paul’s letter to the Corinthians in which he writes about Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection was written sometime during the early to mid 50s.[1]
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The Regulative Principle of Worship has been a part of the worshiping community of the Lord from the beginning.  It defines our worship and regulates it to the glory and pleasure of God.  Traditionally, the principle identifies elements of worship that should be included in the Church’s offerings whether of the Old Covenant or the New.  It guides us so that we might offer the Lord His due…It covers the elements of the ministry of the Word of the Lord, prayer, offerings, music, etc. but might it also address our dress?

It was a few minutes before the start of our worship service and I was trying to personally greet as many people as I could.  A young man came in and took a seat.  He was a first-time visitor and I especially wanted to speak to him.  I found that he had recently moved to our city to take a position as a musician with our local symphony orchestra. What I remember most about him was the way he was dressed.  I don’t usually notice such things but his clothing was striking.  He was wearing pretty ratty denim shorts, a wrinkled t-shirt and flip flops.  I’m sure he was comfortable but I found myself being otherwise.  As the morning went along, I realized I was thinking about his clothing a lot and I was becoming more and more…perturbed.  I knew he didn’t, he couldn’t, dress that way for an orchestral performance that likely required him to wear a black-tie tuxedo.  Why, I thought, would he, then, dress so casually for church?  It was as though he intentionally, with forethought, dressed as slovenly as he could for worship.  He couldn’t have appeared more discourteous for coming into the presence of the Lord.  Why?  And why did it bother me so?
The Regulative Principle of Worship has been a part of the worshiping community of the Lord from the beginning.  It defines our worship and regulates it to the glory and pleasure of God.  Traditionally, the principle identifies elements of worship that should be included in the Church’s offerings whether of the Old Covenant or the New.  It guides us so that we might offer the Lord His due.  How else could we know how to worship except for God’s own direction and instruction.  But how far does such direction go?  It covers the elements of the ministry of the Word of the Lord, prayer, offerings, music, etc. but might it also address our dress?
God in His Scriptures tells us what the teaching and preaching of His Word should look like (Matt. 4:17; Acts 15:35; 2 Tim. 2:1-2; 4:1-4).  He teaches us how to pray to Him (Matt. 6:5-13; 1 Thess. 5:17-18), directs us how to give to Him (Matt. 6:2-4; 2 Cor. 8:1-5; 9:7), shows, even models for us how to sing His praises (Zeph. 3:17 NIV).  He regulates these but does He also regulate how we should be clothed before Him in worship?  Spiritually speaking, absolutely!
We can only appear in the presence of God clothed in the righteousness of Christ.  This is a cardinal truth of the gospel.  Our natural, spiritual condition is one of depravity, guilt and unrighteousness.  The Lord, however, dwells in holiness and possesses only purity and righteousness.  Never the twain shall meet!  But once we are in Christ by repentance and faith through the gospel of Jesus, we’re covered in His righteousness imputed and gifted to us in grace.  Notice the language the Bible uses for this.  “I will rejoice greatly in the Lord, my soul will exult in my God; for He has clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels” (Isa. 61:10). “For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ” (Gal. 3:27). “…and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth” (Eph. 4:24).  Clearly, we cannot enter into the presence of Him whose “eyes are too pure to approve evil [nor] look on wickedness with favor” (Hab. 1:13) without having our sin covered by the righteousness of Christ.
We must be clothed in Him under His gospel.  That’s the covering of the soul but what about the covering of the body?  Does worship before the Lord affect this covering?  Does the Scripture in any way regulate this?
This isn’t even a question often asked within broad evangelicalism but should it be?  Isn’t it a bit trivial?  Where would we go to even begin to find an answer?  Perhaps the worship found in Genesis 4 can give us a starting point.
Brothers Cain and Abel were involved in the first recorded act of worship in the Scripture presumably having been taught this by their father.  In verses four and five we’re told that the Lord found Abel’s worship acceptable but not Cain’s.  The difference in God’s response surely has to do with the distinction made concerning their respective sacrifices which was indicative of the spiritual condition of their hearts.  Cain is said to have brought an offering of the fruit of the ground with no further characterization made about it (v. 3).  On the other hand, Abel sacrificed to the Lord from his flock what was designated to be “of the firstlings…and of their fat portions” (v. 4).  The “firstlings” is simply the first from the flock; off the top as we could say.  The “fat portions” of the sacrifice under the Old Covenant were considered to be the best part of the animal that could be offered as an honor to the Lord  (See Gen. 45:18; Lev. 3:14-16; Ezek. 34:3).   Abel offered God the first and the best he had.  Shouldn’t this truth guide our worship of the Lord even today?  How would it work?
On a personal level, I have followed the monthly practice of making the first check I write be our tithe to the church.  My wife and I want to give the Lord from the first of His blessings to us right off the top.  Is this required?  No, but we desire to do it this way from hearts that are thankful to Him.  In our congregation some years ago, we changed the Sunday morning schedule from Sunday School first to corporate worship being first.  We found that people were a bit tired in worship after spending time in a study class and we wanted to offer the Lord in worship the first and the best of our time.  Don’t we all do this naturally in our churches?  In worship we use the best musicians from our congregations, we’re led by the elders who can best guide us to honor Christ, we have the best preaching available.  But what about how we dress?  Shouldn’t we come before the Lord in the best clothing we have?
For me that means a suit and tie; I don’t own anything better so that’s what I wear.  Doesn’t dressing in the best we have as we come into the Lord’s presence honor Him and show our respect by following Abel’s example of giving Him our first and best?  Then what about my young musician friend?  If his clothing that morning in church was the best he had to wear, I would have no problem with it.  None.  In fact, I would thank God that he had come to worship with the saints spiritually clothed in the righteousness of Christ and physically clothed in his best.
So, does the Bible require us to dress up when we go to church?  Not necessarily.  But why wouldn’t we?
Dr. Randy L. Steele is a Minister in the Bible Presbyterian Church and serves as Pastor of Providence BPC in Albuquerque, NM.
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Policymakers should do everything in their power to legally prevent the promotion of a harmful ideology, especially as directed to children. Just as citizens have rightly pushed back on critical race theory being mandated in K-12 schools, so, too, should we push back on the various transgender-ideology mandates taking place in public schools.

Last week a school district in Virginia passed a controversial policy mandating teachers use “transgender pronouns” in the classroom while the state of Texas moved to declare sex-reassignment surgeries for minors be treated as child abuse. This all comes on the heels of a federal court moving to block the Biden administration’s transgender mandate, protecting the rights of millions of doctors and nurses who are faced with violating their consciences. As the traditional family and our faith come under attack, it has become increasingly clear that we, as Catholics, must engage in war with these ideologies that are invading our homes and wreaking havoc on the minds of our children grappling with discerning the truth.
Catholic husband and father Ryan Anderson, the president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, has been a leading advocate for biology and the truth of such matters, especially as it pertains to male and female, with his highly acclaimed, and recently banned, book, When Harry Became Sally. In an email interview, Anderson discussed with the Register the recent federal court blocking of the transgender mandate, the need for conscience protections, and how Catholics can be best equipped to take on the nonstop onslaught of gender ideology. He also discusses several projects of the Ethics and Public Policy Center that are in place to help promote and protect the traditional family from secular assault.
With the news last week of a federal court blocking the transgender mandate — it’s now the second court ruling blocking the mandate — what are your thoughts, and what role is the EPPC’s HHS Accountability Project playing in shedding light on these violations of conscience? 
There should be no transgender mandate. And thank God for [law group] Becket’s work in litigating these cases. They’ve now successfully stopped both the Obama transgender mandate and the Biden transgender mandate. Of course, in between, there was no Trump transgender mandate, thanks to the hard work of Roger Severino, who was the head of the Office for Civil Rights at HHS throughout the Trump administration. He rightfully saw that the transgender mandate was unlawful — because the word “sex” does not mean “gender identity”; that it was bad medicine — because gender dysphoria should be treated without radically transforming the body with puberty-blocking drugs, cross-sex hormones, and surgery; and that it would violate the civil rights of conscientious medical doctors who sought to follow the Hippocratic Oath.
And I was proud to bring Roger Severino to EPPC as my first hire as president to head up EPPC’s new HHS Accountability Project. EPPC’s HHS Accountability Project monitors the largest federal agency (by budget) to ensure its actions further the common good under law. Particular attention is given to respect for conscience, religious freedom, the family and human life from conception to natural death. Roger was instrumental in rolling back the original transgender mandate imposed under Obama, and he and his team at EPPC have exposed the Biden administration’s abandonment of conscience protections regarding transgender treatments and abortion as both bad law and bad policy through scholarship, advocacy in the media, coalition building and collaboration with members of Congress. They’re keeping tabs on various other violations coming from HHS, including most recently the Biden administration’s refusal to penalize a hospital that forced a pro-life nurse to assist in performing an abortion.
Your book, When Harry Became Sally, took on gender dysphoria in a compassionate way, but also called out gender ideology. As you succinctly state in your book: “Biology isn’t bigotry.” Why should we as Catholics be concerned about this full court press of the “LGBT” movement, and what can families do who are concerned about this infiltrating their own homes? 
All of us, and Catholics in particular, should be concerned with transgender ideology because it isn’t true, and it causes harm to those who get caught up in it. All of us, and Catholics in particular, have a duty to bear witness to the truth and to promote the common good in all of its aspects. That includes a sound understanding of sex and gender. My book was one contribution to that discussion, a discussion that Amazon and others would rather we not have. But it is vital that we refuse to be silenced. If we don’t speak up, who will?
Parents in particular need to educate themselves about what activists are promoting through the schools, media, entertainment — the teen world, especially social media, is saturated with messages and images promoting “trans” identity and “gender diversity” as normal and healthy, which means kids are consuming those messages all day long. It will have an effect on how they think about themselves, the body and relationships in ways incompatible with both science (reason) and faith.
In addition to my book, my EPPC colleague Mary Hasson has created an entire set of wonderful resources to help parents, pastors and educators better understand and respond to “trans” ideology. The Person and Identity Project at EPPC has exactly what Catholics need — Q&As, “toolkits” and recommended resources — to understand the Christian vision of the person and counter the lies of gender ideology.
Beyond educating themselves, parents need to realize that “LGBT” content is flooding the public schools, not just in coursework, but in the school culture. And there’s no “opting out” of school culture the way you might be able to opt out of a given sex-ed class. One public-school principal in Atlanta recently told a Catholic family, “It doesn’t matter what class or teacher your kids have, ‘LGBT-inclusive’ materials will be in every classroom.” Parents need to realize their kids need a Catholic education more than ever — whether at home, in a Catholic classical school or the parish school — which means we need public policy making educational choice a reality, something EPPC Fellow Patrick Brown wrote on just last week.
The American Association of Pediatrics recently told the Society for Evidence-Based Gender Medicine, comprised of more than 100 clinicians and researchers who doubt so-called transgender science and ideology, that they couldn’t set up an information booth at the association’s national conference. We have also heard from many voices who have transitioned regretting their decision. Why is the debate on transgenderism stifled on such a grand scale, it seems? Of course, this follows after the digital book burning you experienced with Amazon and other outlets. 
The silencing, shaming and censoring that we see on this issue is a sign of weakness from the left, not strength. Sure, it’s strength in one sense, that they control so many powerful institutions of American life — from the news media, to entertainment, to big business and big tech, to the major medical associations. But it’s a sign of weakness because they know their ideology can’t stand up to scrutiny, and that’s why they have to use their power to shut down discussion. We’re on the side of the truth, and we need to be faithful in bearing witness to it, and in using legal mechanisms to reduce the power of various “woke” forces in our culture.
For example, legislation is needed to prevent adults from interfering with a child’s normal, natural bodily development. As I’ve argued before, “gender affirmation” procedures violate sound medical ethics. It is profoundly unethical to intervene in the normal physical development of a child as part of “affirming” a “gender identity” at odds with bodily sex.
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