Untitled Sermon (2)
We cannot make too much of the death of Christ, but we can make too little of His resurrection. Our hearts and minds cannot meditate too frequently upon the cross, but in pondering the sufferings of the Savior, let us not forget the glories which followed. Calvary does not exhaust the Gospel message. The Christian evangel is not only that Christ died for our sins, but also that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures (1 Cor. 15:1–4). He was delivered for our offenses and raised again for our justification (Rom. 4:25). Had Christ remained in the sepulcher it had been the grave of all our hopes; “If Christ be not raised,” said the apostle, “then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain” (1 Cor. 15:14). To be a witness of His resurrection was a fundamental qualification for an apostle (Acts 1:22). That God raised up the One whom the Jews had crucified, was the central truth pressed by Peter in his pentecostal sermon (Acts 2:24–36). The same fact was urged again by the apostles in Solomon’s porch (Acts 3:15), and before the Sanhedrin (Acts 4:10; Acts 5:30). This foundation-truth was proclaimed also to the Gentiles (Acts 10:40; Acts 13:34). Its prominence in the Epistles is too well-known to require quotations.
