So, your argument is that because he was murdered, he must have been telling the truth. And because people believed him, he must not have been crazy. Couldn't the same two things be said of Osama bin Laden? The "Lord, lunatic, or liar" argument can be said of every martyr in history. That Jesus is the most famous of them does not mean he is the most correct.
(Hi - Just picked your statement to reply to, although it's essentially the same as several others noted)
No, it's definitely not the same for every other martyr in history. No one else has credible eyewitness accounts of them returning from the dead. None of the others has credible eyewitness accounts of them performing numerous miracles. None of the others had the influence that Jesus did, by a long shot. Even his detractors recognized his impact and the wisdom and knowledge he possessed that rivaled lifelong religious scholars, even though he was a poor layperson -- perhaps a carpenter in popular lore -- without access to any formal education. Jesus' "fame" did not just happen for no reason -- it happened because of the inexplicable, miraculous things he was doing and saying that awed people and threatened the controlling powers.
The David Koresh's or Promise Keepers or other bizarre, self-proclaimed saviors are recognized as loony by all but a few deluded followers. There's nothing special about them, they don't do miracles, and they only have a veneer of charisma because they say things crazy or desperate people latch onto.
It's not just that Jesus died for his beliefs like your random, fanatical suicide bomber Islamist might do. He preached a gospel and performed miraculous acts that transformed the entire world. He was given the chance to renounce his claims of being the son of God, and he refused (at the penalty of torture and death). So did others who witnessed his acts. These were not people at war or a religious jihad on suicidal missions -- they were peaceful people who chose death (on this earth) over renouncing what they witnessed.
On the other hand, the way I heard the Bin Laden story and the others like him, after murdering a few thousand people, he hid like a coward until he was eventually found and shot to death.
So I would say all of you are right that "dying for one's beliefs" is not, in itself, enough to convince anyone. People die all the time for all kinds of ridiculous beliefs. Combined with everything else we have though -- a non-fanatic dying and backing up his claims, the historical record, the archaeological evidence, the fulfilled prophecies, the message delivered, the fact that we all want to know 'is there something else beyond this life on earth?', and the notion that all of creation either came from something or inexplicably just came to be -- well then, we seek an answer that plausibly explains all that.
Heck, even on just the creation question itself, I could honestly flip a coin as to which answer is more plausible, since on face value and with no explaining evidence they both could sound a bit outrageous: God created it all, or it just sprang up out of nothing for no reason whatsoever. But adding in all the other evidence and witnesses dying for their claim of seeing Jesus resurrected, the overwhelmingly more plausible answer seems pretty obvious to my science/engineering mind.
