Hi, I'm Matt Henry, and I'm the pastor at Missio Dei Fellowship in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Very thankful that you found our sermons, and I hope that they are a way of encouragement to you in your Christian walk. However, it's important for you to understand that this sermon was given in my church's context and for the people that God has entrusted for me to shepherd. So if you're in the Kenosha area, I would encourage you to come on a Sunday and worship with the body of Christ here. And if you're not in this area, these sermons are a great tool for supplementing your walk, but they are by no means a substitute for the local church. So you need to submit yourself to a faithful Bible teaching church and shepherd in your area. Thank you. I'll read now in Acts chapter 10. We will only be there for about a moment and then we'll be in 1 Corinthians 15. But in Acts 10, we have Peter speaking to the house of Cornelius, who is a Roman centurion. He has invited friends and family to hear what Peter has to say, and Peter is now in the process of preaching Jesus Christ to him. And so the household is hearing a very simple and yet extremely dense small sermon lesson. and it's all about Jesus Christ, hence the series, who is Jesus. We're on the fourth part. You may have downloaded notes yesterday and it had part three. That was just my error. It now says part four and been updated thanks to Kindle. So we've been taking our time through this. We have 14 different qualities of Jesus Christ that Peter gives, and today we're gonna see another key one, a critical one. Without it, nothing else matters, in fact. So here now, the word of the Lord, as I read verses 39 to 41. So Peter says, and we are witnesses of all things he did, both in the land of the Jews and Jerusalem, They also put him to death by hanging him on a tree. God raised him up on the third day and granted that he appear not to all the people, but to witnesses who were chosen beforehand by God, that is, to us, who ate and drank with him after he arose from the dead." Now in this, we have a very critical statement about the substitutionary atonement of Jesus Christ. The sacrificial substitutionary death. We dealt with this all in detail last week, and I would strongly encourage you, if you have not heard that, to go back and hear it, because it is foundational to everything a Christian holds dear. That Christ functioned both as our perfect sacrifice, bearing our sin on His body, and He functioned as our perfect and eternal High Priest, who is seated in the heavenly places at the right hand of His Father, where He always gives intercession for us. So we have those two facts built into this idea of Him dying on the tree, or on the cross. But in no way can that stand on its own. And you need to understand that, that the death of Christ has no value, no purpose, no saving work if it stands by itself. It's not designed to stand on its own. So as wonderful as it is for you and I to consider Jesus dying for us, the reality is, without the resurrection, it means nothing. It would be an act of futility. And so the Christian must never be shy of declaring Jesus' resurrection as well. And this is exactly what you see here with Peter. And so we're going to use him as our example. Because no sooner does he speak about the death of Jesus Christ that he immediately then switches to, and God, raised him up. No hesitancy, no embarrassment, no fanfare, he just simply makes this declaration. I would remind you of the same. You'll find that when you speak to people about the gospel, or what do you believe, or maybe you, this is common how I will ask a person, I'm like, what is your background? Did you go to church? Were you raised in anything? And whatever they say, I'll just say, so tell me what you know about Jesus Christ. And if you don't know anything, just tell me that. But I will invariably get very rapidly to the issue of the resurrection. There's no need for us to be embarrassed by it. There's no need for us to reduce it or simplify it in some way that makes it softer or easier. We need to jar the people with that fact. Jesus was raised from the dead. And what you'll find is as your fear comes in, what you'll start to do is soften that. You'll soften the death, you'll soften the resurrection. And neither of those can you because it's in those two aspects, his death and his resurrection, that we find the good news. And so Peter doesn't play games, he just goes straight at it and declares, and God raised him up. Now, because of the absolute necessity of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and the absolute necessity to believe in that resurrection, I've decided that we'll devote the entire hour just talking about that resurrection. So, we're on 14 qualities of Jesus Christ, and this one is paramount. Without it, everything else goes away, and that is that he was raised up by God. Now, notice in verse 40, the basics of the resurrection. The one raising Jesus was not himself, but the Father. And in fact, this is the normal event, the way the event is described. So you can see up on the screen, I just grabbed several for time's sake. In Acts 2, you're gonna see the early church, this is what they pressed. In Acts 2, 22 to 24, men of Israel, Peter is preaching here, Listen to these words, Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs, which God did through him, in your midst, just as you yourselves know." So first of all, notice he's appealing to the historicity of this event. He is telling these people in Jerusalem, you know what happened, you were there, you saw these things, you listened to people who saw these things. This man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, meaning for all of their machinations and their planning and plotting to kill Jesus, in fact, this was the purpose that God had ordained, you nailed to a cross by the hands of lawless men, put him to death, but God raised him up again. In Acts 3, verses 14 and 15, but you denied the Holy and Righteous One, and you asked for a murderer to be granted to you. But put to death the author of life, whom God raised from the dead, a fact to which we are witnesses. Notice, the death and immediately shifting to the resurrection. In Acts 4, then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, rulers and elders of the people. Now he's speaking to the religious leaders. If we are being examined today for a good deed done to a sick man, let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of the Nazarene, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, by this name, this man stands here before you in good health. And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven which has been given among men by which we must be saved. You crucified, God raised him up. Acts chapter 5. 27 and 31, and when they had brought them, they stood then before the Sanhedrin, they're the major religious ruling council for the Jews, and the high priest questioned them, saying, we strictly commanded you not to continue teaching in this name, the name of Jesus. And yet you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and intend to bring this man's blood upon us. But Peter and the apostles answered and said, we must obey God rather than man. The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom you put to death by hanging him on a tree. This one God exalted to his right hand as leader and a savior to grant repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sin." So time after time, in the beginning of the explosion of the gospel in the church, They drove home the fact, you crucified him, and God raised him up on the third day. And that's exactly what we have. We have the third day here in verse 40 that is emphasized. Now you may think that's a small detail, But it's not, and that's simply not a small detail, because it speaks to the veracity of Jesus Christ. Is He who He says He is? Does He lie, or is He truth, a man of truth, a God? Is He our, yeah, truth. That's all I want to say. It's his trustworthiness. Over and over again, he declared that he would suffer, die, rise again, but he would not just vaguely rise again, he would rise on the third day. And so if anything happened other than that, he would be a liar, and we would be deceit. Notice also, it says that God made him visible. that God made him visible. This has caused some to think that the resurrection was spiritual in nature. And some have thought that maybe it was just his spirit that was raised up, and that God would at times make him show up so we could see some apparition. And it's simply based off of this scripture. However, the spirit and that this Yeah, he's functioning more like a specter, and guards were ordered to guard the tomb of Christ because of the very reason they had heard he would be raised on the third day. Now, they didn't believe he would, but they thought that people might try to steal the body and then claim that he rose again. But all of the Gospels then speak of the fact that Jesus did, in fact, rise again. And this was to the point that in the Gospel of John, we read of the disciples actually touching his wounds. It's kind of gnarly to think about, but he says to Thomas, literally, place your fingers in my wound upon the side. that they ate with him, they drank with him, they saw him sleep, they saw him speak, they handled him, that this was not just simply a specter, but it was a bodily resurrection. And all of this simply speaks to the historicity of the event. Now, why do I say that? And I've said that for a few weeks, because it's consistent that you'll find people saying, well, I don't even know if Jesus existed. I don't even know if he ever lived. And you'll hear this very common, and it's almost a simple way of defending themselves. They say, well, I can't be held accountable by God. for anything, if there is a God, because I'm not even sure He exists, I'm not sure Jesus existed. And so they immediately just jump to that and think that ignorance is bliss, that ignorance will get them through. So if they're wrong, their simple appeal will be, I never knew. But the scripture is very clear with the details, and this is one of them. All of what Peter is saying was able to be examined by all who were listening at that time. Remember, he is in the house of a centurion soldier. A centurion would be a man of honor, a man of power and influence, and a man who knew all the other centurions. This is something that was not difficult for them. They all had heard these stories. They had all perhaps even witnessed some of the things. And so one commentator said it this way, Jesus's resurrection was a space-time event which happened in a specific place, Jerusalem, on a specific day, on the third day, and was observed by eyewitnesses, as the next comment insists. And that comment is that Jesus was made visible. So he is simply appealing to them that this is what is true, and you all know it. You know it. Now, you and I, we're separated by a couple of thousand years from this event, but not Cornelius. As a centurion, as I said, it would be very simple for him to inquire in depth into the whole event. He would have known all about this, because as a Roman soldier, he would be able to be in contact with the other Roman soldiers. He would be able to send messengers. He would have all the information flowing to him. And so he would know all about the crucifixion. He would know all about the burial. He would also know many of the troops who were stationed in Jerusalem at the time. He would have known the troops who were stationed at the foot of the cross. He would have been in close companionship with these various soldiers. who put him in the grave, stood guard, and so on and so forth. So Peter is not trying to pull the wool over his eyes. He is just looking at a man who would know, and he says, this is in fact what happened. And so he is able to say to these people, I was a witness to that fact. He and the other disciples ate and drank with Jesus. And the point is that this is not an ecstatic vision or some sort of a glimpse in a darkened room with some sketchy lighting and maybe a little fog and the little mirrors going on to deceive you. It was done in the fullness of daylight where many people interacted with him, talked with him, felt him, ate with him, drank with him, and so on. It was an extensive time of fellowship with literally hundreds of people. Now behind all of this is the fact that he did not merely rise again by himself, but it was done by the Father. Why is that important? Why, as God the Son, he died, why couldn't he just raise himself? Why does the Bible keep insisting that it was the Father who raised him? Well, it's very important. You need to understand that Jesus had made many very bold, big statements about himself. Perhaps one of the biggest ones was, before Abraham was, I am. Now, if you don't know why that's such a big statement, it is he is declaring that before Abraham even existed, he already has been and was and is. It's not before Abraham was, I was, it's before Abraham was, I am. And when he says that, he is actually invoking the burning bush with Moses. And when Moses looks at the burning bush and says, who is it that is sending me to have the people rescued out of Egypt? And God gives him his name and he says, I am sent you. This is why the people were furious with Jesus when he made that declaration. When he called himself the way, the truth, and the light, and that no man shall see the Father but through me, that infuriated the people. When he sat there and said that God the Father has given him people whom he is to redeem, and he will raise them all up on the last day, that is an absolute big statement. In John chapter five, over and over again, he refers to himself as the Son, and God the Father as his Father. infuriating them, making them wanting to kill him. All of this is very powerful and very troubling if he's a liar. Remember that he claimed to do all of his works of power and miracles by the power of the Holy Spirit. He claimed to do nothing but what God the Father commanded him to do. He claimed to be God repeatedly, so often that the religious leaders made it their goal to kill him. So we have Jesus making the claim of divinity and an intimacy with God that is of the highest of sorts. He is claiming to be sent by God. He claims to be the promised Messiah. He claims that in him and only in him will salvation from eternal damnation and the forgiveness of sins be found. All of these are things that only God can claim. And so if these were false, would he have been raised by God? That's the question. if God, who is so concerned about his glory, that he says, I will not share my glory with any other, and here is Jesus taking that glory, claiming that glory as his own. In fact, he even says that the vision you saw, or Isaiah saw, in Isaiah 6, where he saw the Lord high and lifted up in heaven, and he was surrounded by the angels, and they're crying out, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, and the glory was flashing forth. He says, that was me. That was me. And yet God will not share his glory with any. The logic is very simple then to follow. God alone can raise the dead. God would not tolerate another who claims to be God, much less his son. And yet Jesus claimed to be both. And then he went to the cross and he died. And if he was a liar, if he was a deceiver, if he was a charlatan, he would still be there to this day. But instead, God raised him from the dead. And so the simple conclusion is this, that he is who he said he is. So we have now the basics of what Peter proclaims about Jesus. That's essentially the fullness of what Peter said. Not only did he die, but he was raised again by God the Father. But why does that matter? That's the more pressing question. Why does it matter to understand and believe the resurrection? Why is it so critical to the Christian message? Can we not remove it and still have the Christian message? And the answer is no. And so what I want to do is spend the rest of our time together in 1 Corinthians chapter 15, which is a chapter devoted exclusively to the resurrection of not just of Christ, but of our resurrection. 1 Corinthians chapter 15. Now, this is a major chapter, and we have a lot of material to go through, so I'll be touching on this rather rapidly. But I want to give you a high flyover, if you will, of the chapter where we can see why the resurrection is the central part of the good news of Jesus Christ. So, in 1 Corinthians 15, one through 11, it breaks down into these very neat categories, and it's actually put together in a very specific way by Paul. And he starts out in verses 1 through 11, and he just gives the foundational facts about the resurrection. So he says, I make known to you, brothers, the gospel which I proclaimed as good news to you, which also you received, in which also you stand. So notice there's already, if I were preaching this, this would just be my first sermon of part 10. And it would break down to three points. The gospel that I preach, the gospel that you must receive, and then the gospel in which you must stand. It's very simple, and yet it's critical, by which also you are saved. If, notice, if you hold fast the word which I proclaim to you as good news, unless you believe for nothing. So you can see, he's giving some warnings here, isn't he? He's a little concerned with these people. For I delivered to you, as of first importance, what I also received. What is that? That Christ died for our sins according to the scripture, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, that's Peter, then to the twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep, meaning died. And after that he appeared to James, and then to all the apostles, and last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared to me also. For I am the least of the apostles, and 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 did not prove vain, but I labored even more than all of them. Yet not I, but the grace of God with me. Whether then it was I or they, so we preach, and so you believed. Now, he has just finished. This is an interesting thing to take note of. In chapters 12, 13, and 14, Paul is dealing with the nature of spiritual gifts. And this is a church that has many spiritual gifts. For those of you who are unaware of this, when you come to faith, the Spirit grants you and gives you a unique gifting. And that gifting is not necessarily yours forever. It may be, but it also might shift as you grow and as the needs of the church change as well. But the whole point of this gifting is so that you might strengthen the other believers. It's got nothing to do with you and whether you like the gift or you think that it blesses you having this kind of a gifting. It can be the gift of administration, the gift of teaching, the wisdom, and there's several other ways it describes it. but it's always for the betterment of the church. And whether you know it or not, it's there, and you possess it, and it works itself out naturally in your life. And so I always talk about my wife and I. I do have the gift, I would say, of teaching. And my wife is a wife full of mercy, and I would say that that would be part of her gifting. And if you put us together in a room with the same person and give us a little bit of time, invariably, Kim will begin to express that mercy. and I will invariably begin to express that teaching. It just is part of what we are. And this is what Paul is having to deal with. In Corinth, they have many, many gifts, and yet they are at odds with one another. Instead of the church being built up in the faith, they're literally hating each other. And the reason is really simple. There are two groups, both of them are claiming that they're the spiritual ones. They're the spirituals. Literally, in the Greek, it would be rendered, they are the spirituals. Who are they? Well, they're the people who speak in tongues, which is just simply another human language they don't know. And the others had the gift of prophecy, so that they would hear and give a word from the Lord. And they were at odds with each other as to who was more spiritual, who was greater, who had more authority, who had more power. And there was so much hate and ridicule taking place in this church that he has to deal three whole chapters with that. And what's interesting is at the end of that, he comes to the resurrection. Why does he switch this? And what is the connection? Well, it is because those people who are there are making claims of things that God is telling them. Very similar to what you see in many charismatic churches today, where they say that they have a word from the Lord, and you'll hear them in a church service, and they'll say, thus saith the Lord. The Lord showed me, the Lord spoke to me, the Lord has impressed me, and they'll go on and on like this, and they'll make declarations, but they're not necessarily valid or true. And that's what's going on here in the Church of Corinth. There are those who actually hate Paul, and they're resentful of Paul and his influence in this church, and so they're in the process of undercutting everything he's teaching them and all of his authority. So by the time he gets to 2 Corinthians, a later letter, he has to deal with this in a very blunt and hard way. Why? Because there is false teaching going on. And the most important of that would be about the nature of the resurrection. And so most likely what's happening is that there are people who are claiming that what God is doing is he has spoken to them and told them that the resurrection was not a bodily resurrection. It was just a spiritual resurrection of some sort. And so having dealt for three chapters with spiritual gifts now, he drills down really hard, and you'll see that in this chapter, very hard about the necessity to believe in the physical, bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ. Now note that if the resurrection is removed or adjusted for so-called modern ideas, the consequence is the loss of the gospel. The gospel is Christ died for our sins, was buried, and rose again. That's the gospel. You take any one of those things away, and you don't have the gospel anymore. It's a non-negotiable. So it is the gospel where we find our salvation, right? It's in the gospel that every one of you who is a Christian found forgiveness. It's the gospel where we must remain, or as Paul says, he says, in which we must stand. We must stand there. We can't budge at all. There is no discussion. There is no way that we can nuance our way out of that. We either believe that he died for our sin, buried and was raised again on the third day, or we don't. Nothing in between. It is that black and white. But the gospel is the means by which we're saved. This was the gospel Paul preached to these people. They know that. And the real question that he has in his mind is, will they remain fast in the gospel? Or are they those who are then led to deny it over time? This is always the burden of any faithful pastor. It is genuinely my burden for you that you be steadfast in the gospel, that you not budge from the gospel, that you not find the gospel boring. When I was raised in my early days, the gospel was something that you believed so that you could be saved and then you moved on to deeper things. That was just how I was taught. And I did not realize how bad that was or how much that affected me for years. It was in fact about five years into my pastorate here that it all began to click. Isn't that strange? 10 years of theological training and that still five years after all of that, it began to click that, no, I need the gospel every day, and you need the gospel every day, and you can get a lot of things wrong, but you can't get the gospel wrong. You gotta stay right there. If in doubt, go back to the gospel and figure out where you went wrong, and every one of us will do that. Our doctrine will get skewed, and our thinking will get broken, but all we have to do is go back to the gospel and say, this is where I'm at, I know this is true. Let's figure out where I went wrong. What's the error I've allowed to come in? And invariably, that error, whatever it is, is designed to go backwards and begin to move your eyes off of the gospel. And so his question is, will they remain fast in the gospel? My question to you is, will you remain fast? For over 100 times in the New Testament, this resurrection is stated. And for one to be an apostle, it was required that you had to have seen the risen Lord. And therefore, Paul tells us in Romans 10, 9 and 10, that you must confess Jesus as Lord with your mouth, and you must believe in your heart that he raised him from the dead. Now, second thing we see in these 11 verses is in verses 3 and 4. that Christ died for our sins, having been buried, was then raised on the third day. But all of this is in accordance to Scripture. Notice that. It was all done according to Scripture. And so we see also the centrality of the biblical record as being the source of Paul's message. He's not pulling this out of air. He is looking at the scripture and saying, this is what it says. The good news is not some kind of a hidden knowledge. None of you in this room will ever be able to say you didn't know because you literally have a Bible on your lap or in a seat right in front of you. And any of you that I find out that you don't have a Bible, I always tell you, take one. take one. It's yours. You must know the Word. The Word tells you what has happened. And so all you have to do is open the Scripture and read. What makes this wonderful is it's not some hidden, higher, esoteric knowledge. Paul is confident that the people can go into the scripture and find out for themselves if this is true. He can point, this is what the Bible says. This is why over the years, whether it's been me or Matt Miller or Grayson and soon to be Taylor, we will tell you all the time, look down, notice, see that, see how this construct, I want you always in the word. That's all that matters. I'll never be a great preacher. You'll never be a great church. We're just people. We're just people. The only thing that's great is God and his word. And we settle ourselves under that and receive that and embrace it. We don't become embarrassed over it. We don't try to apologize for it. We simply state what is true. And then third, notice that he says that there's this listing of many people who saw our risen Lord. And it's rather impressive because it shows again that this event was not hidden. where one person claimed to be a witness in some smoke-filled room, holding hands with a candle in the middle of the table, calling up the dead somehow. Hundreds of people saw him, spoke, ate, drank with him. And at the very end of the list, we find him with all of his humility, that though he is an apostle, he is still blown away by the sheer grace of it all. This is Paul, the apostle, who at the very end of his life says, I am still the chief of sinners. A man broken by his own sin and lifted up high because of the fullness of God's sheer grace upon him, that he is forgiven so that he can entrust his soul to the one in whom he believed, right? because he is confident not in his strength, not in his wisdom, not in his sinlessness. Oh goodness, he would die in a moment. You would die in a moment. He is convinced that it was sufficient and bound up fully and only in the person of Jesus Christ. He was a persecutor of the church, but now a man who can only testify of God's grace that abounds over sinners. So I say to you, are you a sinner? Then rejoice, for in Christ you find forgiveness. You say, I don't think I'm a sinner. Then you should fear. You should fear. The fourth thing is that the gospel message does not change. So in verse 11, We see that you pick any true Christian, ask them what is the gospel, and they will all give the same basic facts. Whether it was I or they, so we preach, and so you believed. Then in verses 12 to 19, he describes the consequences of denying the resurrection. Now here's how this works. What if you claim to be a person of logic or science? You'll get that all the time. The more you share Christ with people, the more you venture into it, you'll hear the way that they will shift it. They'll say, well, I don't know. I'm not really an atheist. Some will say that. The popular one is, I'm an agnostic. I don't know. I'm not fighting it. I'm not disagreeing. I just don't know. You're like, OK. What, if you don't know, would you like to learn? Well, I don't know if I want to learn. Okay, so you don't. You're not an agnostic. You're an atheist. You're literally denying and suppressing what is true, because I'll sit and teach you. I'll come to your house. I'll go at the worst time of the day or night for you if I have to, but I will bring you the gospel if you want to hear it. But then they'll say, well, I don't know, it's just, I can't believe this, or I can't accept that. I'm a person of logic, as if somehow the Bible is written in some weird code. Or I'm a man or woman of science, as if somehow science is infallible. We've heard enough about trusting the science over the years to have questions, surely by now. You claim to be a skeptic, and so for you, you find the physical resurrection a bit much, and so you'll hear people do it this way. Well, I guess I accept that he was raised, but I think what he was is a spiritual resurrection. I mean, he was a physical man, but then God raised him spiritually, and so too we will be raised spiritually. Or they'll say, well, he's alive in our hearts. Have you ever heard that one? Yeah, he's risen again in our hearts. Like, what? I don't even know what that means. His teachings. His teachings, Pastor, that's what lives on. Almost as if he was still alive. This is the way unbelief talks. It's willing to give you a little bit. It's willing to grant and say, okay, I'll grant you this or that, but it can't be what the Bible says. And you as a Christian must always drive it back to the Bible says that he died on the cross for our sin, and he was raised again on the third day by his father. It's that simple. So in verse 12, we see that even at that early point in the history of the church, false teachers are present. They're not overtly denying Jesus's resurrection. Rather, they're going about it in a tangential way. So he says, now that Christ is preached, that he has been risen from the dead, how do some among you Notice that some among you say there is no resurrection of the dead. Now, they're not saying that Christ didn't rise from the dead. They're merely postulating that they received a word from the Lord and that there is no resurrection for us. We would never deny Christ's resurrection. No, no, no. We're just saying that there is no resurrection for us. And now they're being held as super spiritual people, hearing wonderful, strange teachings from God, and he goes right at them with no pity. So he doesn't want to be subtle. He goes hard, and he goes fast, because it's a hellish doctrine that these sort of people are teaching. And so he makes six observations, and you can look down and follow and see them. The first one is that if there is no resurrection from the dead for us, then there has to have been none for Christ. If there is no resurrection, then Christ gets lumped into that. That's his first consequence. So he wipes away their attempt, perhaps, to go about it in a roundabout, saying, well, we are not denying Christ's resurrection. We're just saying there is no resurrection for us. He's like, no, he was human. And if we don't rise, then he never rose. In verse 14, then, If Jesus Christ wasn't raised, then we are all wasting our time. He says, our preaching is vain, and your faith is vain. Those who preach the gospel and those who believe it are simply sad jokes. Now, if you want to know what many people see on the outside when they look at you as a Christian, that's exactly what they see. I speak to you who are Christians. They just see you as a sad joke. wasting your time because they don't believe. So why are you living the way you live? Why do you not do the things you don't do? Why do you do the things you do? How do they square that? They just simply look with eyes of unbelief and they say, you live in vain. Third, in verse 15, this then makes all of the apostles, he says, to be liars. Moreover, we are even found to be false witnesses of God because we bore witness before God. So every apostle was a liar. Now, can you imagine how uncomfortable this letter is at this point? He has just ripped them to shreds for three chapters about how to deal with spiritual gifts the right way. And then he switches to the resurrection now, and there's somebody up there reading this letter to the whole congregation, and part of them are the you who are denying the resurrection. And he says, and you're calling me a liar. And you can imagine how uncomfortable things got, because everyone's like, I think he's talking about Joe. Yeah, yeah, Joe's always saying that. How frightening it is. You can imagine that discomfort. They realize that in their high-minded, modern thinking about the resurrection, what they're actually doing is taking on the apostles and rejecting them. In verse 17 then, we have a fourth point. No resurrection then means that all who claim to believe in Jesus are still dead in their sins. We just sang so many beautiful songs today about life in Christ, right? My sin is gone, not in part, but in the whole. It's all gone. And yet, if there is no resurrection, you and I are still dead in your sins and my sin. This is the folly of liberal Christianity, by the way. For they always deny the gospel and then want to still worship God. And you're like, why? Why are you worshiping a God who will not save and cannot save? In verse 18 we have the fifth point, all of your relatives also who believe the gospel are really in hell if there is no resurrection. That's what that word perish means in verse 18. Then those who have fallen asleep, which is a reference to dying in Christ, that as a Christian when you die it's like your body simply falls asleep because it will be raised again. But he says, those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. That word perish is a very specific word. It doesn't mean to die. It speaks of eternal damnation. It's used of going to hell. And then six, if there is no resurrection, then we should stop pitying those who are not Christians. Surely you do that. Please tell me you do. Please tell me that when you're around relatives who do not know Christ, when you're around neighbors and friends and coworkers, that your heart breaks for them. Surely you're not that hard-hearted yet, that you think that the grace shown to you is not for them. Surely you would want to bring them the gospel. Surely you should see all of their pursuits as not anything of value, but something to pity, because in the end, they all suffer the same end, the judgment. For as a true Christian, you are turning from sin. If you are a true Christian in this room, you are actively turning from sin. You are actively denying yourself. You are actively learning to follow Jesus Christ, if you're a true Christian. But why, if it never happened? If Christ never rose again, why? Why do you do that? You should be pitied. They should look at you and pity you because you have wasted your life pursuing something that never brings you hope. Verses 20 to 28 then is the next section. shows why Christ's resurrection is so critical for all believers. In 20 to 22, he says that Paul shows that the first Adam brought death, so the second Adam was to undo this whole mess. And we've talked about that lengthened over time. The first Adam, our father, brought sin and death into the world in the very beginning. Christ came to undo all that Adam put into place. And so he is called the second Adam as well. So where Adam brought death, the second Adam brings life. And everything that was destroyed by the first Adam and the world that we live in that's so broken and evil and constantly evolving and changing in every sort of foolishness, Christ came to undo. And so he says that this is part of it, that the resurrection is important because Adam brought death, but Christ brings life through his resurrection. That's what makes it so critical, because every other resurrection flows from him. His resurrection is called what the Bible calls the first fruits. Now, if you know your Old Testament, you're comfortable with this. If you don't, this is maybe strange sounding. But you were, when you had your harvests as an Israelite, you were commanded to give the first part of that harvest to the temple. and it was an offering to the Lord. You had to. And it required you to believe that God would bring the rest of the harvest in. That's a very scary moment. A farmer has labored his whole year to plant the crop, care for the crop, raise the crop, and when he gets that harvest in, he needs to get it in so he doesn't starve, but he also needs the seeds so he can plant for the next year. And instead, what God says is, no, you won't do it that way. You will give me the first part of your harvest, because it is I who brings in the full harvest. And that was known as the first fruits. And it came to become an image of those things that were promises of something greater to come. And so Christ is our first fruit of the resurrection. And it's because He was raised that we have the confidence that we will be raised. That's all that is going in, but it's a wonderful thing. It has to do with God's faithfulness. As such, Well, here's the point. Without Christ's resurrection, you won't be raised. But because he was raised, then we can rest in the knowledge that though death may take our bodies in time, it's not the end. So in verse 23, each in his own order will be raised or made alive. Christ of firstfruits, after that, those who are Christ at his coming. that he functions as our perfect sacrifice and our perfect high priest, and he is our life, and we are in Christ, and so we will co-reign with him. According to verses 24 to 28, we will co-reign with him as he subjugates the whole of earth under his feet. Then in verses 29 to 34, he gives some practical observations about the resurrection. Now, whenever you deny a doctrine that's explicitly taught in the scripture, invariably, there's always a slow trickle of unintended consequences. At first, a person can come across as merely nuanced. That's the popular word today. And there's a place for being nuanced. When you're doing theology, it's not always black and white. There's twists and turns and little valleys and wrinkles that you have to work out. And so a good theologian is careful with that. But there are certain things that it is not that way. It is absolute black and white and very clean and clear. Christ died on the cross for our sin. You cannot make that anything less nuanced or more nuanced. It is that. And he rose again on the third day. And so in verse 29, we have this weird verse. And everyone, when they read this chapter, wants to know about what this verse means. Otherwise, what will those do who are baptized for the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why then are they baptized for them? Have you ever read that and wonder, what is this? Over 40 different views. You know why there's 40 different views? Because we don't know what it is. Do you know why? Because this is the only time it occurs, and he is not instructing us to do it. All he is saying is the church at Corinth would do this. It was something that they did. And it does tell us a few things. It tells us that in the church, in our church and other churches, you will do certain things that are not overtly commanded, but you'll do them in light of other truths. And so you'll notice we stand for all of our singing. There's not a scriptural basis for that. We just stand for our singing. And we bow our heads when we pray. There are just certain things that we do, and that's how our church does it. Well, that church apparently, in Corinth, They were different, and they apparently had this act or rite where they would have some who would be baptised for the dead. And the best guess, and this is all it is, is the guess, is that there were those who died before they had been baptised. And because of that, they had died in their faith, but had never been baptized. And so this was a way for them to publicly declare that their friend, their relative, whoever it was, had, in fact, died in Christ. And that's all it was. That's the best guess. Whether that's right or not, I don't know. And the reason I don't care is because he's not instructing us to do it, and nowhere does the Bible ever command it. This is just simply a statement of what they do. So he's showing them from their own life, it's spiritual life as a church, he's like, then why are you baptizing people who are dead? Or baptizing for those who are died? If no one's raised up, they're dead, they're gone. move on. And so he's trying to show them some of the consequences of not believing the testimony of the scripture that he has raised. In verse 30, he brings the next consequence of rejecting the resurrection. He says, why would anyone put themselves in danger over their testimony of Jesus Christ who was crucified and raised up. Why would you do that if you know it's not true? Why would you go if you know the lives of the apostles, almost every one of them was tortured and killed for their faith? Why? Because they would not back down from their eyewitness account that Christ died and rose again. He would not, they would not deny that. Why, if they know it's a lie? Why would they do that? Why would anyone suffer? And so he says, Why are we also in danger every hour? This was the life of an apostle. And beloved, it's really your life too, the more serious you become about walking in your faith. And you will only do that, I tell you the truth, you will only do it when you are convinced he was raised from the dead. If he was raised from the dead, you cannot lose. The worst they can do is take your life, And then you're with Christ. That's the worst that can happen. And in fact, it's the heartbeat of missions. Why would anyone go to a mission field where they have every possibility of being murdered? Think of their family. I remember a man who used to go to our church. Years ago, we did a book study through the life of Jay Hudson Taylor in China. And he buried untold number of his children there. They all died in their childbirth and early childhood. And he called me, he's like, Pastor, I've got a real problem with this book we're reading. I'm like, okay, what's your problem? I'm thinking, it's the story of J. Hudson Taylor. How can this be a bad story? He's like, we are preaching bad things to our, or teaching bad things to our people. J. Hudson Taylor was a sinner who had no right to go to China because he put his children at risk. I'm like, what? He's like, no, this is sin, this is evil. I'm like, he went out there with the gospel. It doesn't matter, he has no right to put his children at risk, he says. And then I realized where this, I knew there was something off, and I realized what it was, his idolatry was his children and their safety. Some of you, I have no doubt, have this in your own heart, that it's gotta be, your child must be safe and happy, and therefore, I will refuse to do anything that could put either one of those at risk. But the gospel trumps everything. It always must be supreme. The glory of Christ must be supreme. The call to sinners to repent must be supreme. And it may cost you or your family's life. And that's not worth it unless Christ was raised from the dead. And then it's totally worth it. Paul says in verse 31, he dies daily. Each day, what does he mean by that? He intentionally asserts that his life was given to serve his risen Lord. But why? Why? Because Jesus rose again, and he conquered death. So death no longer has a hold over Paul. How often do you make your decisions because it could hurt you or someone you love, and you're always afraid All you do when you do that is that you deny that Christ has conquered death. And don't send me an email, because you won't like my response. But pastor, we don't want to be presumptuous. That's always the excuse, isn't it? We don't wanna give too much, we don't wanna presume. We don't wanna live too hard for Christ, we don't wanna presume. We don't wanna put too much risk, we don't wanna presume. But that's never any of our problems. None of us are running with a little bucket of ice water into hell, are we? We're all sitting there in padded chairs, air-conditioned houses, self-driving cars, talking about how life is. Paul says, no, I die daily. And beloved, you are to do. I am to do it. Every day we rise up. Who is my Lord? It is Jesus Christ. How then might I serve him today? How might I serve him today? And if you go to your grave that day because you were serving him, you will be raised from the dead. It does not matter. So in verse 32, he states that only because of the promise of the resurrection do we live as we're commanded to live. What is the value of suffering or denying yourself if at the end you just die and that's the end? Instead, we should do whatever we want for death is the end, regardless. If there is no resurrection, then just go live. And I mean that sincerely. If you just go, if you're gonna deny Christ and you're gonna deny his resurrection, why listen to me? You've got surely better things to do. Why deny yourself anything? Go for it all if he did not rise from the dead. But if he did, then everything changes. And so in verse 33, he rebukes those who are allowing these false teachers into their lives. And so he uses this thing that we parents love to quote to our children, and they love to roll their eyes. Do not be deceived. Bad company corrupts good morals, and it's true. But in the context here, who are the bad company? It's the ones denying the gospel. He's like, you're allowing these false teachers in. You're allowing them to postulate. Well, the word of the Lord came to me in a dream. And he said this about the resurrection, and that about the resurrection, and this about the apostle Paul, and on, and on, and on. He's like, why do you allow it? Bad company will always corrupt. And he sees it. He sees that there is this leaven, if you will, this yeast in the church. And it's taking it over. And he says, you must get rid of this. In 35 to 58, then he closes this out. Don't despair, because he's using an illustration, so this part goes rather quickly. We see the sort of questions the false teachers are teaching in verse 35. So what he wants to do is show the folly of rejecting the resurrection. And so in verse 35, but someone will say, how are the dead raised? And with what kind of body do they come? You can almost hear the tone, right? It's the skeptic. OK, fine, Paul. But I mean, like, how are they raised? Can you tell me how? And his answer will be, I don't know. Well, that's not much of an answer, Paul. I mean, what kind of body do they come back in? I don't know. And he gives us an answer, but it's not an answer that will satisfy you. I'm just going to tell you. And if you want to not believe it, you'll continue to say, well, I got questions. Well, have questions all you want. I am ready and willing to just settle that this is what it says, and it's enough. It's enough. And don't think that these are innocent questions, because notice how he reacts in verse 36. You fool. No question now that he's not impressed with that, right? He knows what they're saying. Well, what kind of body? And he doesn't give them the time of day. And sometimes you guys fall into that trap, perhaps, where people are asking a question they have no interest in learning. They just want to try to trip you up. Call them what they are. You're acting like a fool. You fool. Are you an idiot? Are you that dumb or what? That's what he's saying to these people. And so then he gives an illustration, like about a seed, and he says, look, the seed goes in the ground, it's planted, and it dies, but out of that death comes true life, more life than the seed had. So too, he says, our bodies are like seeds. They die and yet bring forth life through the resurrection, a greater life. And he's like, so stop worrying about it. Think about how God shows us every year with the seeds as they're planted. He says, our bodies are fit for this age. They're earthy, or earthly. That's what he means by that. They're a natural body, an earthly body. But what he's talking about is in this age that we live in, it's a fallen age of sin. And our bodies are part of that. And therefore, they are not fit for eternity. And so if we are going to be raised again, we can't be raised exactly the same as we are now, because this body cannot stand in his presence. This body cannot be eternal. But through the resurrection, we are raised to immortality. And he calls that body a spiritual body. And so then people say, oh, so the body isn't a physical body. It's a spiritual body. No, spiritual has nothing to do with being a test for the friendly ghost. It's not something that we have no feeling. It is that it is by its essence spiritual in nature, meaning it belongs to the new world, the new age, the new heavens and earth. No longer does sin and death rule over it like your body does. And so in the end, the mocker will not be death, he says, at the very end here. Oh, death, where is your victory, right? He's like, the mocker will not be death. Rather, you will mock death. Isn't that cool? You will mock death. Where's your victory? It's swallowed up. It's swallowed up in the resurrection. Where's your sting? It got nailed to the tree with Jesus Christ. It was taken as far away as the West is to the East. What can you do to me? The enemies we talk about here all the time of sin, Satan, and death are gone, gone in Christ. And so we're given victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. And therefore, he says at the very end, what? be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. Why? Because your labor is not in vain. Some of you, you wonder, as you're a mom or a dad, and you're going through just the drudgery of life, and you're trying to be faithful, and you make a lot of mistakes, and everyone's pointing them out, and you're trying to serve this way and do that, and you start to wonder. And usually, that's where that midlife crisis hits, right? About 40, and you start to realize that most of my life is past, what have I done? Oh my gosh, I need to buy that Mustang. I've got to. All of a sudden you start running when you never ran before, you take up sports, and on and on, because you're starting to think that things are vain. I'd rather that you and I literally labor hard for the Lord with absolute confidence that nothing is in vain, and then just drop dead. I'm serious. That's just what I want to do. Surely you do too in your heart of hearts. Surely that's your desire to just run. Run with reckless abandon after the Lord. Be a fool. Let the world mock you, laugh you, trip you, beat you, despise you, ignore you, and let yourself fall dead as a seed planted in the ground waiting for the great day of the resurrection. Is that not worth it? rather than counting your money and playing it safe and talking all about the here and now and building up treasures on earth where the thieves and the moths and the rust destroy." He says, keep pressing on because it's not in vain. So let me bring it all to a close. We cannot play games then with the gospel. The foundation, the structure of the good news centers around Christ's death and resurrection. And so my only question to you is this, is it enough? Is it enough that Christ died for you and your sin, in accordance to scripture, was buried and was raised on the third day? Is that enough? Is Christ enough? The resurrection is said to be the basis of our living hope in 1 Peter 1. The resurrection is the reason that in suffering and persecution we can give a blessing rather than a curse, according to Romans 12. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the basis for our ability to say no to sin and to walk in a manner worthy of our calling, according to Romans 6. The resurrection of Jesus Christ brings us the ability to not be swept away in the fears of this age, for he will return and make all things new, according to Revelation 20 and 21. The resurrection of Jesus Christ makes it possible for us to echo the words of the apostle when he says that he gladly suffers the loss of all things for the sake of gaining Christ in Philippians 3. And so my call to you today is simply to reflect on how much and how well you're resting in His resurrection, and then press on the next day for your labor is not in vain. Let's pray. So Father, help us to this task. Help us to see that we never should apologize or run from the gospel for in it life and breath, the joy, the hope, that we're made new every day, Though our body is being torn down, we're being renewed in the Spirit, and that one day our bodies shall be raised and reunited with the Spirit, and all will be right and good. Help us to know that, trust in that, run hard after that by faith. Care for us, Father, for we are weak nonetheless, but thank you for a high priest who knows our weakness and sympathizes with us. Help us to this task in your Son's holy name. Amen.