What does Matthew 28:15 mean?

The chief priests and elders began the first day after Jesus' resurrection bribing Roman soldiers to lie (Matthew 28:1–14). The men are instructed to say Jesus was still dead. In truth, Messiah had come and died and come back to life, yet Israel's religious leaders were working hard to keep people from believing it.

They bribed the Roman soldiers who saw the angel from heaven open the tomb to say that Jesus' followers had caught them napping in the night and had stolen the body. They promised to bribe Pilate, as well, if the story of their sleeping on the job reached his ears so that he wouldn't have them killed. The soldiers took the cash and started the story. It was still circulating when Matthew wrote this book, some decades later (Matthew 28:11–14).

The dividing line between hope of eternity and hopelessness of the grave lies in deciding between those two stories. Either Jesus was raised from the dead or Jesus never breathed again (1 Corinthians 15:14–20). Those who trust in Christ and those who refuse to believe are eternally and entirely separated by which they choose to believe (John 3:16–18).