His Resurection
CHRISTOS • Sermon • Submitted
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Introduction
All right, you knew it was going to happen so let’s hear it...Christ Is Risen…He is Risen Indeed!!!
Yes He has and this is the foundational message of our faith. Did you know that? With everything else that Christianity is and has come to be - this one truth is central to any hope that we have. That Christ Is Risen…He is Risen Indeed!!
Paul the Apostle, Missionary and Evangelist said to his friends in the Church in Corinth...
14 And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain.
Did you know this? That is how important this thing is that we are celebrating today. That is how central it is to all that we are and do. With out it I am up here wasting your time and you are wasting your own time on anything that you do that is “Christian”.
This is true not just for us, but for every person who calls themselves a Christian on the face of the earth. That is why I love this responsive greeting because in some small way it connects us to so many gatherings around the world that are declaring and celebrating the same life-giving truth this morning.
But even more than that, it also travels through time as the this is the primary truth that was proclaimed by the Apostles and all the early Christians. That is why Paul said that without the resurrection...our faith is in vain. He continues later in the same chapter to say..
17 And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. 18 Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. 19 If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.
Did you hear that? If Christ has not been raised then we have no hope because our sins are still on us. We are still sinners and anyone who was here on Friday night knows how bad that is. The “Wrath of God” is poured out on those who remain in their Sin.
And then Paul says, not only is this bad news for us but what about all our loved ones who have already passed away. Where are they then, without the hope of the resurrection. We don’t want to even think about it.
Don’t miss this guys, because it is so important for the Christian Church in our day. With the Christian Church being under attack as it is right now, there are many Churches who are feeling pressure to make adjustments to this key doctrinal stance. They still want to call themselves “Christians”, just not the kind that believes in things like the atonement where Jesus had to die and rise again to pay for our sins. Instead they are emphasizing the moral example that Jesus set as His biggest contribution to our lives.
This is exactly the lie that Paul is exposing here, if this is all Jesus is then our faith in Him is a joke. If in Christ we have only a temporary hope, something that will end when this life ends, then we have nothing worth celebrating, nothing worth living for, nothing worth sharing with others.
We have to hold tightly to the resurrection of Jesus Christ, because everything we are, believe and live for as followers of Jesus Christ is built on this one truth: Christ Is Risen!
Tension
So my expectation is that you all came here this morning to celebrate and hear more about the significance behind the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Truth is, you should be coming in here every week with that same desire, but especially on Easter Sunday my hope is that the significance of the resurrection is on both your heart and mind.
Let me say that again, my hope is that the significance of the resurrection is on both your heart and mind this morning.
The reason for that extra emphasis...is that we are going to do something a little bit different today. My typically style is to preach through the narratives of Scripture that capture the heart, only to see the principles of Scripture reveal themselves in such a way as to engage the mind. This morning we are going to switch those two things around.
I have heard it said, and believe it to be true that “The heart cannot rejoice in what the mind cannot accept”. In other words, there are times when the deepest parts of us long to believe something but are slow to do so by the fact that our mind cannot conceive it. We may still accept it to be true, but it is hard to rejoice in it when our mind struggles to connect with how it can be true.
Thankfully, we have a God who created our hearts and minds and desires us to engage them both to His glory, so this morning we are going to look at a passage that is a robust intellectual argument for the Resurrection of Jesus. In this way, we will clear the way for all of us to rejoice together in this beautiful Biblical truth.
So is you will, open up your Bibles with me to 1 Corinthians 15, page 961 in the Bibles in the chairs. I will pray and we will together work to be mindful over the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Truth
By way of introduction, 1 Corinthians was a letter from the Apostle Paul to the Church in Corinth. Even the most skeptical New Testament scholars unanimously agree that this particular letter was written by the Apostle Paul to this Church right around AD 55.
In this letter, Paul references both a previous letter and the time when he first arrived in Corinth to preach Gospel and plant their Church. This brings Paul first time preaching the Gospel to these to the Corinthians to about AD 51, less than 20 years after the resurrection of Jesus. In other words, this is one of the earliest written proclamations of the resurrection of Jesus Christ that we have.
Hopefully the students who are in our Wed night Apologetics class are making some connections here, as this is one of the favorite passages of Christian Apologists, especially in reference to the resurrection.
But besides this letter being valuable to us as as early document, it is also valuable in that Paul is writing to people who in some ways are very much like us. The people of this Corinthian Church were true believers, but the influence of the Corinthian culture around them was so strong that they often tried to reconcile the teachings of Jesus with the ideas and practices of their pagan friends and neighbors. And one of the biggest sticking points of disagreement, especially with their Greek friends and neighbors, was this idea of the bodily resurrection of the dead. And since their friends and neighbors just couldn’t wrap their minds around it, the Church started to wonder how important that part of following Jesus really was.
That is why Paul lays out such a clear defense of the resurrection here in chapter 15, which starts out by saying..
1 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, 2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.
So Paul’s first argument for the primary Christian doctrine of the resurrection is our own salvation, because...
1. Our salvation depends on the resurrection of Jesus. (1 Cor 15:1-2)
1. Our salvation depends on the resurrection of Jesus. (1 Cor 15:1-2)
It is incredible how quickly we can forget the foundation of something when it grows into other areas of our lives. Sometimes we forget how important it is to “get back to basics” as is often said.
This chapter is near the end of the letter and there are a lot of topics that Paul has already covered. Many of these things are common issues for Christians even today: How does a Christian handle Divisions in the Church, or leadership issues, or Confront Sexual immorality, or handle law suits, or marriage or divorce and the list keeps going. These are all issues that Paul knew the Corinthian Christians needed answers for…but he spilled the most ink handling this foundational issue because he new that standing in the truth of the Gospel is standing in the truth of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
In preparation for Easter this year I have been reading this book called The Cross in Four Words. One of the contributors, Kevin DeYoung, offers this great personal story to illustrate how Jesus’ resurrection works to not just be a pleasant end to the story, but essential to our salvation. He says:
“I have eight kids. Suppose that one weekend, the eldest is being very good and doing his homework. But the other seven don’t want to do their homework. They’re bored. Mom and Dad aren’t around- or they don’t think we’re around. So they’re wandering around the house looking for something to cause mischeif with. Then one of them finds some fireworks, the fireworks that we’ve put away ready or Thanksgiving and that the kids are not supposed to know about. Soon they’re all in the garden exploding things: sending rockets into the sky, lighting fuse after fuse, blowing it all up.
“But suppose Mom and Dad …are actually in the house after all. We come out and we confront the seven children who have participated in this crime. And when they see us, all seven of them are absolutely terrified. But just as the younger siblings are about to get what is their due, just as we are about to go ballistic, the eldest brother comes outside too. He steps forwad and even though he had no part in his siblings’ actions, he offers to be punished in their place. And so we send him to his room: You are going to stay there, you are not going to have any supper, and you are not going to come out until we tell you to.
“As long as the brother is up in his room, the seven wayward children are a bit nervous. Is this actually going to work? Are Mom and Dad serious about this? As long as the room is occupied, they are not confident that parental justice has been satisfied. But as soon as the door opens and big brother comes out, and we tell him he is free to go, that empty room indicates the satisfaction of parental justice. It did work. The debt has been paid for. The guild has been cleared. The punishment has been completed.”
Of course as we said Friday night, anytime we work to try and understand God we are left with only imperfect examples, but this does at least aim us in the right direction.
If Jesus’ story ended with only his tragic death then how would we know if the debt had been paid for us? I mean for Him to just die would be the same thing that every other person before him did. How would that be different? We would be left with these same kinds of questions: Is this actually going to work? Is God serious about punishing Jesus in our place? If the tomb was still occupied, then how would We know that God’s justice has been satisfied?
We only know the answers to these questions because Christ raised from the dead.
Romans 4:25 says that ...Jesus our Lord...was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.”
and in Peter’s sermon in Acts 2 he says:
24 God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it.
Our salvation is dependent on the resurrection of Jesus, without it then we are all just wasting our time. The just judgement for sin is death, so our salvation hinges on Jesus’ sacrifice being sufficient to defeat death. The only way we would know that it was is if He was no longer held by it. If He rose from the dead just as He said He would.
That was Paul’s first proof, the second piece of evidence that Paul throws at them is the testimony of Scripture itself. For
2. The Old Testament promised the resurrection of Jesus (1 Cor 15:3-4)
2. The Old Testament promised the resurrection of Jesus (1 Cor 15:3-4)
Paul continues
3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,
In order to understand what we are dealing with here we have to take a moment to unpack this introductory statement. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received:
What did Paul mean by “delivering” what he “received”. Sounds like he is some sort of middle man working for Fed Ex or something. That is what it might bring to our minds, but in Paul’s day this would have been quickly recognized as “Rabbinic language” or the kind of language that a Rabbi would use when speaking about “passing on words of authority”. Paul is reminding this congregation how the next words that he shares did not originate with Him, but they were passed on to him by someone with authority.
What this really introduces is what has long been established as one of the earliest creeds of the Christian Church. A “creed” is a formal statement of belief. These words were established, memorized and then passed on verbatim as the doctrinal position of the Christian Church. So one of Paul’s arguments for the resurrection is this established creed that he passed on to them that was of “first importance”. And what did it say?
That Christ died for our sins. That he was buried, that he was raised on the third day. That all this happened in accordance with the Scriptures.
The word for “Scripture” here is the Greek word γραφή (graphe) which means “writing”. At this point the only established written “Scripture” was the Old Testament. So this early Christian creed recognized these truths of Jesus’ resurrection to be “in accordance with what was already written in the Old Testament.
Where might we find these things? Several places, but the most prominent place is the chapter from the prophet Isaiah that is treated in most Jewish synagogues as the “forbidden chapter”. The rest of the book of Isaiah is cherished and often studied in Jewish synagogues, but not chapter 53, that is how clearly Isaiah’s prophecy lines up with what happened to Jesus. It is dangerously condemning to those who would read it.
Listen to these words written hundreds of years before Jesus’ crucifixion:
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. 6 All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
Can’t you just picture the crucifixion in these words? And Roman Crucifixion had not even been invented yet, but still Isaiah say the servant of the Lord being “pierced” and “crushed” for our iniquities. Iniquities is another word for sin.
And there are many other clear connections with Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection that we don’t have time to go into this morning. Let me just encourage you to read through the whole “forbidden chapter” sometime this week and see what other connections you can find. Because this passage many be treated as “forbidden” in the synagogue, but we see it as it really is…a clear message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Speaking of Jesus, He referred to the Old Testament Scriptures when arguing with some religious leaders about who he was and what He was here to accomplish. In Matthew 12:38-40 we read...
38 Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him, saying, “Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.” 39 But he answered them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. 40 For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
Jesus died for our sins, was buried and was raised again 3 days later all “according to the Scriptures”. We can see similar connections in the Levitical sacrificial systems, the instructions on the day of atonement and the festival of the first fruits, and even many of David’s Psalms that are shown to be all aimed at declaring at a part of Jesus resurrection story.
Our Salvation depends on the Resurrection, the Old Testament Scripture promised it, and lastly on this beautiful Easter morning…
3. Eye Witnesses testify to the resurrection of Jesus (1 Cor 15:5-11)
3. Eye Witnesses testify to the resurrection of Jesus (1 Cor 15:5-11)
Christian Churches around the world are talking about the story of the those who first encountered the empty tomb this morning. They were the first eye witnesses and then they invited others to see what God had done.
We see this in this early Christian creed as well. It says that Christ died, was buried, and rose again three days later according to the Scriptures…AND
5 and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. 6 Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. 7 Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.
So this early Christian creed is basically saying, “Do you want to know if Jesus really raised from the dead? Go talk to someone who saw him in his resurrected body.” There were literally hundreds of eye witnesses still available to talk to, and this creed was all but baiting them to do so. Some of them have passed away, but most of them would be glad to testify of their personal experience with the resurrected Jesus.
And while this was a true statement for the early Church, it is no longer true for us today. At this point all the eyewitnesses of the resurrected Jesus have “fallen asleep”. They have all since died, but not without leaving us their testimony. That is why we are so passionate about the Bible here at Friendship Church, for it tells us of our resurrected Jesus from eye witnesses or close acquaintances of these eyewitnesses and we believe their testimony to be true.
Now you might wonder, what about the Apostle Paul? I mean he wrote most of the books of the New Testament…was he an eyewitness to the resurrected Jesus? He was, but not in the same way as the others. Listen to how he goes on to describe it in 1 Corinthians 15:
8 Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. 9 For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10 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, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.
This is not Paul bragging on his hard work ethic, this is him confessing that he was once a persecutor of the early Christian Church. He was trying to destroy the message of the Resurrected Jesus, right up until the moment Jesus showed up and literally knocked him off his high horse. That is when he began to show Paul “how much he would suffer” for the message that he tried to destroy.
Gospel Application
Then Paul takes them full circle with this closing thought...
11 Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.
And this is what the Christian Church has always been centered around. The preaching of the Good News of the resurrected Jesus Christ and the response of the people to believe in it.
Without the resurrection, we would be no more than a group of well-intentioned, religious people who placed their faith in the moral teachings of an unusually fine man. The resurrection is proof that Jesus is who he said he was, and that He has done what He came to do. That he has saved us from the wrath of God because of our sins. In Jesus Christ we find our only hope, both in this life and for all eternity.
This is why was say CHRIST IS RISEN!
Landing
Along with our responsive cry today we are going to celebrate another Christian tradition that Paul mentions in this same book. We take our instructions for the Lord’s Supper from a few chapters later in 1 Corinthians chapter 11. This also begins with the authoritative words “recieved” and “delivered”so from the book of 1 Corinthians...
Communion
23 For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” 25 In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” 26 For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
