The End is Not The End

Introduction

What is Your Good News? (1 Cor. 15:1-11)

1 Corinthians 15:1–11 CSB

Now I want to make clear for you, brothers and sisters, the gospel I preached to you, which you received, on which you have taken your stand and by which you are being saved, if you hold to the message I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. For I passed on to you as most important what I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the Twelve. Then he appeared to over five hundred brothers and sisters at one time; most of them are still alive, but some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one born at the wrong time, he also appeared to me. For I am the least of the apostles, not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. Whether, then, it is I or they, so we proclaim and so you have believed.

Before Paul jumps into the the main issue going on, he reminds them of the message that brings them all there in the first place. The New Testament authors called this message “the gospel.” In Greek this is the word euangelion, eu meaning “good” or “beneficial” and angelion meaning “announcement” or “proclamation.” The gospel is a message, sent from someone with authority, that good life is here. In the ancient world, you might receive a gospel when there is long war between two nations, and the king has gone out to fight, and then a messenger shows up in town and gives word that the King has won and he is returning to bring about peace and prosperity for his people. That would be a good word, right?

I found a few newspaper headlines from the end of World War II, the largest and most violent conflict in human history. Over 50 million people were killed; 15 million combatants, 38 million civilians. Some even estimate the death toll to be closer to 75 million overall. War is not good. It breeds cynicism, despair, hopeless. So imagine its 1945 and you open the newspaper and you see this headline:

WAR IS OVER

VICTORY!

PEACE

The heaviness in your shoulders is lightened. You exhale deeply for the first time in years. Finally, no more death. No more suffering. No more injustice. There is hope for the future. There is peace among man.

When Paul talks about good news, and when we talk about good news, this is the kind of good news we are talking about. That is the message of the gospel. Jesus Christ, the anointed God King, left his throne to go to war against spiritual forces that brought sin, injustice, pain, suffering, despair, and death to mankind. We were a people in slavery and bondage, and despite our best efforts to overcome, we were being crushed by a mountain of our own making. But this king stepped in and stood between us and death, and Jesus took the sting of sin’s consequence and bore it on the cross. He was buried, he was in the ground for three days, and then, suddenly, he appeared, alive, death defeated, the chains of sin broken, and humanity set free under his rule and reign. The resurrected Jesus appeared to Peter and the Apostles, then to hundreds, and in a remarkable vision, he appeared to a man named Saul, a Jewish zealot who had made it his life’s work to persecute and terrorize Christian followers. In an act of unimaginable grace toward one who did not deserve it, Jesus freed Saul, renamed him Paul, and sent him as a messenger of good news.

This, church, is why we are here. We are here because God came to earth and conquered sin and death so that we might hear the amazing news that the war between man and God is over. He has won the victory, and there is now peace, reconciliation between God and man. Rest easy, breathe, and enjoy life in this new kingdom. This church, is our identity. We are formed by this truth. We are shaken out of our bonds and set free to love unconditionally and die every day to ourselves for the sake of others, for this reason alone.

I wonder if this is the gospel we proclaim and the gospel we live.

Moralistic Therapeutic Deism: Each replaces the good news of Jesus with some sort of humanist version that takes Jesus out of the center and replaces him with us.

The “good news” is that I can be a good person by following the rules of the Bible.

The “good news” is that I can feel good about myself and find good relationships and be the best version of myself.

The “good news” is that there is a spiritual force out there that I can wield and use to my own advantage, and this spiritual force favors me because of my birthplace, or my ideals, or my own hard work and success.

Let me ask you this. Is it good news if sin still rules your heart? Is it good news if you are still looking for that human rescuer? Is it good news if you need constant reinforcement be happy and well? These are conditional gospels, and it is these gospels that have crippled the institution of the church, the gathering of God’s freed people.

We need to unite under one gospel, the gospel of the God-King, Jesus Christ. And the resurrection is 100% essential to that news.

What’s the Point? (1 Cor. 15:12-19)

1 Corinthians 15:12–19 CSB

Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say, “There is no resurrection of the dead”? If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation is in vain, and so is your faith. Moreover, we are found to be false witnesses about God, because we have testified wrongly about God that he raised up Christ—whom he did not raise up, if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. Those, then, who have fallen asleep in Christ have also perished. If we have put our hope in Christ for this life only, we should be pitied more than anyone.

So here’s the problem Paul is addressing in Corinth. The church has allowed some outside voices to speak into the church and influence their theology and question basic tenets of Christianity to make it more palatable, more accessible, and less “foolish.” One of the questions that was being asked in the church was this:

How important is this idea of resurrection, really? Do we actually need to believe that Jesus rose from death? I have good morals, good community, I’m a spiritual person. What’s the big deal with resurrection anyway? It’s just a little “out there” for me.

Before we go back to Paul’s argument, I want to take this question seriously for a moment. Do you actually need to believe in a physical resurrection to be a Christian?

Can you claim to follow Jesus and deny the resurrection of Jesus? The thing is, many today actually do. Jesus taught a lot of powerful truths. He led an exemplary life, full of compassion and humility. People admire much about the things Jesus said and did. And we are called to pattern our lives after his. But you can follow the way of Jesus without following Jesus.

And that is the point Paul makes here. Yes, it is one of the strangest, otherworldly things that we as Christians believe, but it is the otherworldly nature of resurrection that we need, because hope is hard to find among the things of this world. We need an otherworldly answer for the hopelessness of our world.

Are you trying to follow the way of Jesus without following Jesus? In other words, is your plan to live like him and model his morals? When I was a kid, there was this huge fad that was big among Christians and non Christians alike, where everybody had these rubber bracelets that had the letters WWJD—What Would Jesus Do. The premise was that Jesus was a good person who taught amazing things and started a movement of charity and service and compassion around the world, and humans make the world a better place when they treat each other the way Jesus treated people. And that is a fine idea, and I get that people meant well. But it’s kind of a dangerous idea. Because it cements Jesus as an historical figure, and our goal is to live in memoriam. To be sure, we practice the way of Jesus in our church, that is something vital to the nature of what we do. But what if we are not meant to simply follow the way of Jesus—what if we were to follow Jesus himself?

When Jesus commands his disciples to follow him, does he say, act like I do? Does he say, listen to my teachings and do them? Or, does he tell them to leave behind their former lives and walk with him, side by side? To talk with him, to eat with him, to sit with him in his presence? Does Jesus want idolizers? Does he crave celebrity? Or does he desire relationship?

This a line that you accept and cross to become real life follower of Jesus. You have to acknowledge the truth that Jesus is not merely an historical figure who was an important person back then. You have to walk in the truth that Jesus is alive, in body and in spirit, that he overcome death and that he reigns and rules from the throne of heaven today. AND you must hold on to the truth that one day, Jesus will return and put an end to death, once and for all.

If you don’t, then like Paul says, what’s the point? The gospel message is useless to you. It’s a made up story. Faith is silly, sin still runs rampant through you, and death is the the end for all. You believed in Christ—so what? You put your hope in Christ? Why? Even if Jesus said and did lots of amazing things, if death conquered him, than what hope is there for us? Like Paul says, we should be pitied more than anyone for wasting our time here.

Thankfully, that is not the end of the story. Let’s read on.

The Death of Death (1 Cor. 15:20-28)

1 Corinthians 15:20–28 CSB

But as it is, Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead also comes through a man. For just as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ, the firstfruits; afterward, at his coming, those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father, when he abolishes all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign until he puts all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be abolished is death. For God has put everything under his feet. Now when it says “everything” is put under him, it is obvious that he who puts everything under him is the exception. When everything is subject to Christ, then the Son himself will also be subject to the one who subjected everything to him, so that God may be all in all.

The resurrection affirms that sin and death do not have the last word. At the cross the finest religion of the ancient world, and the finest system of justice of the ancient world, joined to torture this good man to death. These were not evil forces. There were the best institutions the ancient world had to offer, and yet together they produced the cross. But that was not the end. After the cross, no form of evil surprises us, no institutional brutality amazes us, because we have been to the cross and we know that beyond it is the resurrection. We have stood at the cross and have witnessed the empty tomb!

Talk about first fruits, talk about his return; In God’s timing and in God’s way, we will all be made alive

Death was introduced by Adam, conquered through resurrection by Christ, and will finally be destroyed in the ultimate victory of Christ at the end of history. The reign of Christ that began at the resurrection will eventually put all enemies under his feet. But more than that, as Scripture has affirmed, all things will be in subjection under his feet.

The range of the Messiah’s rule is displayed in Psalm 110:1, where God is going to overcome kings, nations and chiefs for the Messiah. The image of “under the feet” that projects the extent of this victory is a powerful Middle Eastern metaphor.

In the Cairo Museum of Antiquity the contents of the tomb of Tutankhamen are on display. One of the striking exhibits is a life-size wooden statue of Pharaoh seated on his throne with his feet elevated on a stool. The surface of the stool is filled with carefully carved bass relief images of the enemies of the king, all with their hands tied behind their backs. The enemies are “under the feet” of Pharaoh.

Without resurrection, we put our faith in human powers. Emperors, Kings, Presidents. CEOs, Sports Heroes, Celebrities, Pastors. Men and women of enormous influence, people who wield the strength and authority to bend others to their will and define good and evil for themselves. Resurrection means Jesus is on his throne, and he is working now to place all of these powers under his feet.

For Paul, all things will be under the feet of Christ. The language carries with it the image of total surrender and the impossibility of the enemies over contemplating a comeback.

When we live in fear of death, in fear of human rulers and authorities, in fear of whatever personal successes or failures, we are beholden to them. We are ruled by them. Like Pauls says, it is silly to live this way. As if Christ did not humble these powers by rising from death. To continue to live as if these things had any real power over us.

This is easy for me to say up here. And yet the powers still hold sway. We feed them. But we don’t have to. Instead, the church exists to declare victory in Christ over all of this. Not by own strength; we are just the messengers. But is the truth, and we must believe it. We must stand in it. And we must still have hope that Christ is even now subjecting all things under his feet, and when he returns, the whole universe will bow before God in worship and awe, and we will experience the absolute fullness of his reign and rule. God will be all in all. He will be everything, to everyone.

What Does this Mean for Us? (1 Cor. 15:29-34)

1 Corinthians 15:29–34 CSB

Otherwise what will they do who are being baptized for the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, then why are people baptized for them? Why are we in danger every hour? I face death every day, as surely as I may boast about you, brothers and sisters, in Christ Jesus our Lord. If I fought wild beasts in Ephesus as a mere man, what good did that do me? If the dead are not raised, Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. Do not be deceived: “Bad company corrupts good morals.” Come to your senses and stop sinning; for some people are ignorant about God. I say this to your shame.

Baptism, not on behalf of the dead, but for the sake of the dead

Anthony Thiselton: Baptism for the sake of the dead refers to the decision of a person or persons to ask for, and to receive, baptism as a result of the desire to be united with their believing relatives who have died. This presupposes that they would share the radiant confidence that they would meet again in and through Christ at the resurrection of the dead.

David Garland: Resurrection means endless hope, but no resurrection means a hopeless end—and hopelessness breeds dissipation.

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