The Resurrection - 1 Cor. 15

Good afternoon. I'd like to turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 15, please. 1 Corinthians chapter 15.

I completely concur regarding the nerves, but I had this passage on my mind for this conference. This has been my burden, and when Brother John turned to Luke chapter 24 and reminded us that the Lord is risen, I thought it would be an opportune moment to share what is on my mind as well. 1 Corinthians chapter 15, and we'll read from verse number one.

I would like to just read a short section and then make the comments over it, and then perhaps continue with the reading. And just a note to begin with, this chapter, the entire chapter deals with resurrection. And of course, it divides nicely into two portions.

Verses 1 to 34, the apostle is dealing primarily with the false teachers that would teach that there was no resurrection. And then in the second portion, he is dealing primarily with the resurrection body. And so today we're going to try to look at some of the sections in the first half of this chapter.

1 Corinthians chapter number 15 and verse number one. Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, wherein ye stand, by which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. For I delivered unto you, first of all, that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures.

And that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures, and that he was seen of Cephas and of the twelve. After that, he was seen above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto this present. But some are fallen asleep.

After that, he was seen of James, and of all the apostles. And last of all, he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time. For I am the least of the apostles, that I am not meet 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, which was bestowed upon me, was not in vain, but I labored more abundantly than they all. Yet not I, but the grace of God, which was with me.

Therefore, whether it were I or they, so we preached, and so ye believed. I just want to pause there for a minute and examine a little bit in those first few verses. Just to give you a quick outline of the first half of this chapter, first in the first 11 verses, I would like to notice the preaching of the resurrection.

Not only the preaching of the resurrection, but the power of the resurrection. So the preaching and the power of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And then from verses 12 down to about verse number 19, if we have time, we'll notice that there are problems that present themselves if Christ did not rise from the dead.

That is what he's anticipating, he's contemplating, and he's following out to the logical conclusion of what these teachers were teaching regarding resurrection. And he's saying, well, if Christ is not risen, then these are the implications, these are the ramifications. And so we'd find those problems presented in that particular section.

From verse 20 to about verse 28, you would find the program of resurrection. And he, in miniature, he summarizes the program that God has concerning resurrection. And then in verses, oh, about 29 to the end of that section, verses 23, we have some practical implications if there is no resurrection.

Some practical implications if the resurrection does not exist. I would have to confess that resurrection is one of the doctrines that is awe-inspiring, that is encouraging, that is soul-thrilling. It is one of those doctrines that you just can't wrap your mind around.

And I know that all doctrine and study of doctrine is really awe-inspiring and is very soul-thrilling. You think of justification and redemption and reconciliation, propitiation, sanctification, and all those doctrines. But really, for me, there are two that just stand out that just leave me in awe.

And the first one would be the incarnation, the incarnation of the Lord Jesus. And the second one would be this doctrine, the doctrine of resurrection. And being Easter, I'm also a day early, Brother John, but being Easter, I had this doctrine and specifically this passage in mind.

And so hopefully some of these points that we can study together will be of encouragement to us. I think resurrection has to be one of the most encouraging doctrines as we would face the future and as we would grow older and just in all different aspects of our life, the doctrine of resurrection. So first of all, the preaching of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, the preaching of the resurrection.

He says in verse number three that he delivered unto them which he had received. I just want to say a very brief word regarding preaching. He's reminding them of the gospel that he had preached to them.

As Paul thinks of these Corinthians and the gospel that he had prepared and the gospel that he had presented to them and the gospel that they had believed. And now he is here writing them and he's reminding them of that gospel. And he says it is a gospel that I delivered to you, but first I received it.

And I would just like to lift a practical point for those of us that would attempt to preach the gospel. And that would be to receive our message from the Lord himself. I'm not speaking of divine revelation, but sometimes younger men have asked on different occasions, not too often, but at different occasions for practical points and for help in preparing a gospel message.

And I would say there are a lot of helps out there. There are wonderful articles that were written years ago in truth and tidings about preaching the gospel from men of experience. There are different articles and books that you can read, but I would say point number one, the most important for me would be to get your Bible, get alone with God, and get your message from God.

Get your message from God. Get a burden from the Lord. And then, yes, you can receive help in other matters, but get your message from the Lord.

Paul says here, I delivered to you what I received from the Lord. But then just very briefly, look at his different components of that message. First of all, he said, I preached and I delivered unto you that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures.

Now, you would know that Paul is referring to the Old Testament at this point. The New Testament is not yet written, and so he's referring, when he says according to the scriptures, he's referring to the Old Testament. We would have no difficulty with that.

We would have no problem coming up with some of the texts that Paul had in mind. Most likely, Psalm 22, that psalm that begins, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou so far from the words of my roaring? In the psalmist, David, he would go down and outline the sufferings of the Lord Jesus, and most definitely, Paul would have Psalm 22 in mind. Isaiah 53 as well.

He was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities, and the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripe, we are healed, and we could dig through the Old Testament, beginning at Moses and through the prophets, and think of those different scriptures that Paul has in mind. Lesson number two, perhaps, in the preaching of the gospel is the employment of the scriptures. Preaching the scriptures and using the scriptures to present Christ, and he's presenting Christ here, and he says, Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures.

You're right, there is no clock. So then he says as well that he was buried, and again, that would be in accordance with the scriptures, Isaiah 53 specifically, but I want to come quickly to that he rose again, and I would like to ask you, where would you find the resurrection of Christ in the Old Testament? Now, you would find resurrection. You would find that from the very first pages almost of the Bible, that those patriarchs, those Old Testament saints, they believe firmly in the resurrection.

That is, we have heard of Abraham. That is why Abraham was so confident. God had promised that through Isaac, the blessings would flow, that Isaac was the promised son, and therefore, he knew that if Isaac were to die, God would raise him up again from the dead.

Hebrews tells us that. So Abraham was confident in the resurrection. Job was confident in the resurrection.

Daniel wrote of resurrection, but specifically here, he's talking about the Lord Jesus. Well, some of the passages that he might have in mind, first of all, might be Psalm number 16 and verse number 10. That thou will not leave my soul in hell, neither suffer thine holy one to see corruption.

A scripture that is applied in multiple times in the New Testament to the Lord Jesus, referring to his resurrection. You would come to Psalm 22 again, and you would know that as you read through the first, what is it, 21-22 verses. I think Mr. Flanagan in his commentary calls it the sob, where the psalmist is sobbing as he's suffering, and then you come to this latter part, and it converts into a song where he's singing, and you can see the resurrection.

You come to Isaiah 53, and you see the same, the first verses through verse 10, the sufferings of the Lord Jesus, and then you see his exaltation, and again, an indication of his resurrection. But here he says that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures, the third day. Would there be a scripture, a prophecy, a writing in the Old Testament that would indicate that the Lord Jesus would rise again on the third day? Well, there might not be a clear reference, as we would perhaps think, but consider what the Lord Jesus himself said about Jonah.

What did he say about Jonah? That as Jonah was in the bale, the belly of the fish three days and three nights, so shall the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights. And he uses that as a symbol or an illustration, a picture of his resurrection. And so the preaching, the preaching, maybe we're too guilty, and I would include myself in this, that we are very strong on preaching the death of Christ, that he died for our sins, that he bore our sins in his own body on the tree.

But let us not forget to preach that he is alive, to preach his resurrection, and to preach that he rose from the dead, that he conquered death and sin and hell. Let me come quickly to the power, the power of his resurrection. We read in here in verse number 10 that the Apostle Paul says, I labored more abundantly than they all.

He's speaking of his apostleship, of what he has done in the preaching of the gospel. He refers earlier in verse number eight to the fact that he was the last one to see the risen Lord, that last of all he was seen of me also as one born out of due time. And I just want to place over this section the power that the resurrection had in the lives of the apostles.

Yes, I know here that the Apostle Paul speaks of the grace of God toward him. I know that the scriptures speak of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, and that they were to wait there in Jerusalem for the coming of the Holy Spirit, that they would be indwelt with power. But I also want to include with that the power that is given to them for having seen Christ, having contemplated and understood that he is risen, that he is alive.

Brother John mentioned that there they were cowering in the upper room, and I would be right there with them, cowering in the upper room. Christ had been crucified, he had been placed in the grave, and there they are with the doors closed and barred and bolted, and they're shaking in fear, the fear of the Jews. We turn over a few pages, we come to the book of the Acts, and here are the same men that were so fearful, and now they're going out boldly and proclaiming the gospel.

There they are, they're suffering, and they're being beaten, and they're rejoicing, and they're counting it an honor to suffer for Christ. What has transpired? What has changed? Well, we have already heard those appearings of the Lord Jesus, and then in the book of the Acts, in the beginning, in the first chapter, we read of 40 days spent in his presence, listening to his teaching regarding the kingdom of God, and now you have men that are emboldened by the risen Lord, and they understand that he is alive, and they go out with power, and you would have to read perhaps more in history than in the scriptures to see how those men ended their lives, or their lives were terminated. The apostle Paul, beheaded, according to tradition, Peter, crucified, but actually asking to be crucified upside down with his head facing the ground because he didn't feel worthy to be crucified or to suffer the same death as his Lord, and you could read through the other ones, some were speared, some were stoned to death, some were beaten according to tradition.

What was it that gave them such power, such zeal? They understood that Christ was risen. They saw him. They got that glimpse of Christ.

I'm not saying that we need a physical glimpse of the Savior today, the risen Lord, but if we had, if we had a glimpse of the risen Christ, if we could just understand that he is risen, it would certainly affect our priorities and our purposes, and we would live with more purpose and more power in our lives as we understood that he is risen. Come now quickly to verse number 12. This is the beginning of the next section.

Now, if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection from the dead? There's likely the problem that Paul is dealing with in these first 34 verses. Now, if Christ be preached from, preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you, imagine that, some in the assembly there in Corinth, whether they were assembly members that had been received or those that were coming to visit and they were being received and allowed to teach and to sow this doctrine, they were saying that there is no resurrection from the dead. Now, that is understood in a couple of different ways.

There are some commentators that would say, for example, that these people very likely believed that when a person died that the spirit and soul continued on, but that the body went on to decay and would never be resurrected. That's one possibility. Other possibility is that they flatly denied that there is any afterlife and resurrection, be what it may.

The idea they were going to work with is that they were denying resurrection in whatever capacity. Now, watch closely verse number 13, because they were not denying the resurrection of Christ. It doesn't say that they denied that Christ rose from the dead.

They were just denying, generally speaking, resurrection. And the point I'm trying to make is this, when we come to verse number 13, we're going to see that this erroneous doctrine that they held regarding resurrection in general terms, whatever that might have been, that false doctrine had implications regarding doctrine concerning the person of Christ. They may not have put that together.

They may not have realized that. And I mention it because of this, because it is possible for similar things to happen. And what I mean by that is that there could be false doctrines or erroneous doctrines that we begin to listen to and we begin to maybe ascribe to, and we don't realize if we don't work it all out and don't think it out, we might not realize that sometimes those doctrines affect the person of Christ and doctrines concerning Christ.

So just look at verse number 13. He says, but they're saying there's no resurrection. He says, but if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen.

You see the implications? You see where the logical conclusion of their false teaching? And they might not have put it together because they weren't denying the resurrection of Christ. And so I just want to use that those two particular verses as a caution that we weigh doctrine, that we study doctrine, that we think it out because it is possible to listen to erroneous doctrine and not realize that sometimes those doctrines can affect vital doctrines that have to do with a person of the Lord Jesus. Now let's follow his arguments through here.

And there are at least six things, problems that are presented if there is no resurrection of Christ. There are at least six of those. Verse number 14, and if Christ be not risen, then our preaching is vain.

Then is our preaching vain? Powerless preaching. If Christ is not risen, if the Savior is actually dead, Paul says, then our preaching, they preached Christ. He has told us that he preached the death of Christ.

He preached the burial of Christ. He preached the resurrection of Christ. He says, but if we follow at your conclusion that there is no resurrection, then Christ is not risen.

And if Christ has not risen, then our preaching is vain. It's empty. It's hollow.

We have no message to preach. It's powerless. And he's told them at the very beginning of this book in chapter one that the gospel is the power of God.

He tells the Romans that in chapter one, in verse 16 as well, that he is not ashamed of the gospel of Christ because it's the power of God unto salvation. He tells the Corinthians that the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but unto us who are saved, it is the power of God. And he says, but if Christ has died, there is no power.

Perhaps this is merely speculation, but perhaps some of our limited power in our preaching is because we don't preach Christ enough. We don't exalt Christ enough and present Christ enough. He says there's no power.

It's powerless preaching. Verse number 14, he also says, your faith is also vain. There's a profession that is empty.

They profess to trust in Christ, but if Christ has died and not risen, then their faith is empty. Their faith is in vain. Again, going back to gospel preaching, we preach Christ and Christ crucified.

We preach the death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And we implore sinners to trust Christ, to put their faith in Christ, not to put their faith in works or in an experience or anything else. It's to place your faith in a person.

But if that person is dead, it is impossible to place your faith in him. And so if there is somebody here that's not saved today, if you are in your sins, we present to you Christ, the son of God, who died for our sins. He was buried.

He was sealed in that tomb. He rose again, and he ascended to heaven, and he's alive. And you can place your faith in him for your salvation.

Continuing on, he says in verse 15 that he and the others that preached, they were perjured preachers. He says, we are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ, whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. He said, we preach Christ.

Again, belaboring the point, we preach Christ. We present a person, and we preach that he's alive. But if he hasn't risen, then we're perjuring ourselves.

We're lying. We're false witnesses of God. Continue quickly down to verse 16 and 17, and he says, for if the dead rise not, then he is, is, then is not Christ raised.

And if Christ be not raised, your faith is in vain. Ye are yet in your sins. Notice that phrase, ye are yet in your sins.

If Christ is dead, there is no present pardon. There's no present pardon. Those are the living individuals that had placed their faith in Christ, and he says, but if Christ is dead, you don't have forgiveness.

He was raised again for our justification. Our forgiveness, our justification, our salvation depends upon a living Savior that is exalted. And finally, a little bit further, he says, they also which have, are fallen asleep in Christ are perished.

So those that died having trusted Christ, he says, if Christ is not alive, then they have perished in their sins. And finally, in verse 19, he says, if in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable. There's no present prospect, or no hope for the future, in other words.

He says, if Christ is dead, we're just sharing this message, and it's only valid during our lifetime, and then in the future, then in eternity it's of no value. He says, what a misery, what a waste of time to only have hope here and now. And so he presents to these individuals these problems that arise if they deny the resurrection of Christ.

Come quickly to verses number 20, and we'll go into a couple verses here, and I'll do it as quickly as possible to leave a good 25 minutes for another brother. But now, this is the conclusion, but now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept. Since by man came death, by man also came the resurrection of the dead, for all in all, in Adam all die, even so in Christ all are made alive.

But every man in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, afterwards they that are Christ's is coming, then come at the end when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God. Let's very, very quickly look at those verses. One man brought death, Adam.

By Christ comes the resurrection. He could say, I am the resurrection and the life. He that believeth in me will not die eternally.

Adam brought death. Christ brings life and resurrection. But there is an order, verse number 23, and we don't have time to really unpack this, but I want you to notice something quickly in a private conversation.

We can maybe discuss this if you have questions, but notice every man in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, afterward they that are Christ's it is coming. I want to ask you a question, maybe more for the younger ones there. Christ the firstfruits, so Christ risen after his crucifixion and burial, he is the firstfruits of those that will rise to never die again.

Then it says afterwards, they that are Christ's at his coming. That is giving a time element, afterward. They that, and it's identifying who, it's being specific.

They that are Christ's, it's telling us when, at his coming, and the coming is parousia, his coming. I want to ask you this, the question is, where it says Christ the firstfruits and afterward they that are Christ's it is coming, how many years do you fit in there after the word firstfruits? How many years have passed? Almost 2,000 up to this point, right? Christ was raised and then we're waiting and waiting for his coming, and at the rapture there will be the resurrection, and I'll leave the comments regarding Old Testament and tribulation saints, but at least by his manifestation, by his coming to set up his kingdom, Old Testament saints, the church age, and tribulation saints will all be raised. Then notice verse number 24, then cometh the end when he shall have delivered up the kingdom.

That launches us, takes us all the way into the end of the millennium, the thousand-year reign of Christ, and it says further on, for he must reign till all enemies are put down. I need to sit down, but let me just notice one thing in the very practical point in the later verses, because doctrine should always have an impact on our lives, and that's Paul's conclusion here, that there is something very practical about this. He basically says this, well if there's no resurrection, let's eat and drink and enjoy life because tomorrow we die, and my point is this, he's showing us that resurrection does exist, that Christ is raised, and so the point is this, doctrine should always have an impact on our practice and our daily life, and this doctrine of resurrection should impact our life, the fact that we know that Christ is risen.

Let me just conclude with verse 20, now is Christ risen from the dead.