If He Had Not Risen
A Resurrection Sunday Message
1 Corinthians 15
Introduction:
Good morning and Happy Resurrection Sunday to you all! Today we celebrate the most important day of history, the day when the Lord Jesus Christ rose from the dead. It is a day that should be observed by all of us with great excitement and joy. In fact, I would like to encourage the entire congregation to consider making Easter a grand celebration. We celebrate Christmas with so much energy, but when it comes to Easter, we don't seem to really rejoice with the same energy. Both Christmas and Easter are important days of the Christian calendar. Christmas is the time we celebrate God coming in human flesh; Easter is the time we celebrate God the Son defeating death once and for all by rising from the dead. Both events have strong spiritual implications, thus, both should be equally celebrated with energy and passion.
This morning, as we look into the subject of Christ's resurrection, I would like for us to think of the resurrection of Jesus from a different standpoint so that we can better appreciate his rising from the dead. I would like for us to ask ourselves this question, “What if Jesus had not risen from the dead?” While the resurrection is a certainty, it is a truth, a fact, we sometimes take it for granted. That is why I would like to look at the subject matter from the viewpoint of what if it never happened at all? If you remember a few years back, during Christmas, I preached on a message entitled “If He Had Not Come” and I explored on what would happen if Jesus was never born. I based the title of that message from a story I read in the devotional booklet Our Daily Bread many years ago wherein everything would be so different if Jesus had not been born. Well, I would like to take us a step further and see how different our lives would be right now if the most important event in history never happened.
Today, we're going to look at a passage of Scripture that depicts for us what it would be like if Jesus never rose from the dead; however, this passage doesn't just depict for us what it would be like if Jesus never rose, but it also points us to the powerful and beautiful reality that Jesus is alive and a difference has been made in our lives.
Context:
1 Corinthians was written to the church in Corinth, a church filled with problems. Not only that, some members of the church were beginning to doubt the resurrection of the Lord Jesus and this was affecting their walk with God. This problem was so serious that the apostle Paul devoted an entire chapter just to answer their question and to help them see the truth of the resurrection and what it should mean for them. For Paul, the resurrection is important because the entire Gospel depends on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. If you read verses 3 to 11 of 1 Corinthians 15, you will see Paul summarizing the Gospel into the following points:
Christ died for our sins
He was buried
He was raised on the third day
He was Seen by many (Peter, the Twelve, 500 brothers, James, Paul)
Paul gives special mention to the witnesses of the risen Christ because they testify to the truth of the resurrection. He wants the Corinthian church to know that, without a doubt, Jesus did rose from the dead, and there are people still alive during that time who can attest to this glorious event.
After stating these important truths, Paul then tells the Corinthians believers what would happen if Jesus never rose from the dead. Let's look closely at what Paul had to say to them and for us, too.
If Christ Had Not Risen . . . The Gospel Would Be An Empty Message (v. 14)
If the Lord Jesus had not risen from the dead, then the Gospel story would be nothing more than an empty message. First of all, if the Gospel story being proclaimed contained the resurrection account but Jesus never really rose from the dead, then it would be nothing more than a myth, a feel-good story made up by men, sort of like when people make up stories about superheroes. They sound good and desirable, but alas, they are nothing more than fiction, a lie made into an attractive story.
Some have gone along this line by trying to explain away the stories of the resurrection as being inventions of the Gospel writers and have come up with various theories about the supposed resurrection of Jesus Christ. They came up with theories like the “Swoon theory” wherein Jesus was not completely dead but was mistakenly pronounced as dead and placed in the tomb. There, he recovered and was able to escape, and later on, make appearances to his disciples, claiming to have risen from the dead. Other “theories” included the stealing of body by the disciples, the “hallucination theory” wherein all the disciples saw Jesus but he was simply a vision and not in real flesh.
Furthermore, if we were to filter the Gospel story and remove the resurrection account, then it becomes nothing more than the biographical account of a good moral teacher who was a role model for an exemplary life, but was powerless against his enemies. His death on the cross being nothing more than an injustice done against an innocent man; his life simply being an example for us to follow. A proponent of this line of thinking was Mahatma Gandhi who mainly viewed Jesus as the embodiment of the principle of nonviolence, which he would use in his fight against British rule over India. Gandhi never acknowledged that Jesus was the Son of God who rose from the dead, just a model he could emulate in his struggle to give independence to India.
If Jesus had not risen from the dead, then Christianity would be no different than all the other religions in the world. If you look at the different religions of the world, they all teach us to do good. Many of the world's religions are exemplified by well-meaning people such as Gautama Buddha or Lao Tzu (Taoism) or Mohammed (Islam). A third thing that characterizes the religions of the world other than Christianity is the absence of real spiritual power, namely the power to save people from sin and the power to live a holy life. If Jesus did not rise from the dead, then Christianity is just the same as all the other religions. It teaches us to do good, it would appear to be founded by someone who is well-meaning, and it would be powerless to change lives. If Jesus is not viewed as the founder of a religious movement, then he will be viewed as being a Jewish philosopher. Whether as founder of a religion or as a philosopher-teacher, if Jesus did not rise from the dead, then the entire Gospel message is a lie, a deception.
If Christ Had Not Risen . . . We Would Be Holding On to An Empty Faith (v. 14)
If Christ had not risen from the dead, what would happen is that we would be holding on to an empty faith or to a faith that is useless. This is in a way related to our first point. If we believe in Jesus Christ and the resurrection account but it never really happened, then we are holding on to a lie. We are living in the sphere of self-deception.
Quite frankly, many people do live in the sphere of self-deception. Author Geoffrey Wolff, when he still a teenager, was told by his father that they suddenly had money because he had inherited his father's estate. Geoffrey readily believed his father. It was only quite later that he learned that his father was actually a con artist who lived off wealthy women. Geoffrey Wolff related that when he first learned the truth, he was somewhat in denial, because he preferred the fabulous story about their inheriting great wealth as compared to the hard truth that his father was conning wealthy women. We likewise hold on to lies and at times we refuse to let go of these because we have placed our security on these lies. One of the most successful TV and movie franchise is the Star Trek series. I myself enjoyed watching the series when it was still being aired on TV and I have watched most of the Star Trek movies. What I don't understand though is why some people go to the extent of dressing up like Captain James T. Kirk or Mr. Spock, and why some people even learned a fictional language called the Klingon language, the language of the Planet Klingon. Maybe it is because some people are beginning to think that Star Trek is true. For some, they like watching romantic movies, especially those with happy ending, and they begin to fantasize and think that they, too, will have a relationship which will surely have a happy ending.
If Jesus never rose from the dead and we still believe in the Gospel story of his resurrection, then we are believing in a lie. What is worse is that, according to Paul, we would still be in sin (v. 17). You see, when we put our faith in Jesus Christ, we are trusting that his death on the cross would take away our sins and that his resurrection would give us new life. If the resurrection never took place, then there is no forgiveness to talk about. There is no new life to talk about. There is no power from above to enable us to live victoriously against sin. Our faith in Jesus Christ would then be similar to having faith in the different religions of the world – full of empty promises and lies. We would be putting our faith in a good but powerless man who can't do anything to lift us up from the clutches of sin, who cannot solve the problems of the human condition.
If Christ Had Not Risen . . . We Would Be Holding On To An Empty Hope (v. 19)
If Christ had not risen, not only would the gospel being declared be nothing more than a fairy tale or myth, and not only would we be holding on to an empty faith, but we will also be holding on the empty hope.
What exactly is the Christian's hope? I have no doubt that we all hope for eternal life. In fact, many of us who trusted in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior came to faith because of the promise of eternal life with God in heaven. We are holding on to the promise that all who believe in Him will not perish but will have eternal life (John 3:16). Coupled with that is the promise that all who trust in Jesus will be spared from the penalty of sin, that the barrier that stands between God and us has been effectively removed because of Christ's death and resurrection. His resurrection should be the validation that what Jesus did for us on the cross has been accepted by God the Father. It is a validation that his claim to being the resurrection and the life (John 11:24 – 25) is true, that he has indeed defeated sin and death.
Another hope that we have as believers is the hope of Christ's second coming. In Titus 2:13, the hope that Jesus will soon appear or come again is called “the blessed hope.” It is a hope grounded on the promise of Jesus himself that he will come to redeem those who belong to Him. This blessed hope is also grounded in the resurrection of Jesus because when Jesus returns, the believers who have already died prior to his coming will be raised from the dead while those who are still alive will be transformed. Jesus' resurrection from the dead is the pattern by which all of us will follow.
As believers in Jesus Christ, what we hope for are eternal life in heaven with God, the payment for the penalty of our sins, and the Second Coming. Now, if Jesus Christ never rose from the dead, none of these things that we hope for will ever come true. There's no eternal life, there's no forgiveness for our sins, no one is coming to redeem us. If that is the case, then it would be sensible to do what the world preaches - “Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die (v. 32b, also Isaiah 22:13).” If there is no bright future to look forward to, then live your life for today. If Jesus did not rise from the dead, what is the point of coming to church and worshipping Him? The most logical and practical thing to do would be to live for yourself, to enjoy and indulge in vices. Why? Because there's nothing to look forward to. Without the resurrection, we would all be holding on to an empty and meaningless hope.
So, there you have it. Without the resurrection of Jesus Christ, there are three kinds of emptiness that are bound to happen – the proclaiming of an empty message, the holding on to an empty faith to an empty hope. If we believe in a Jesus who never really rose from the dead, then everything we trust in and do is meaningless.
However, thanks be to God, Jesus has indeed risen from the dead! The resurrection has indeed taken place as attested by the testimonies of many firsthand witnesses such as the women who visited the empty tomb, Peter, the other apostles, 500 other believers and by Paul himself on the road to Damascus. Many have tried to discredit the resurrection with their absurd theories but they all fail because they just cannot dispute the facts that are there – the huge stone that was rolled away, an empty tomb, the appearance of Jesus to the disciples with accompanying invitation to touch his wounds and know for themselves that it is truly Him, risen from the dead. The resurrection of Jesus also changed the lives of the disciples, from cowards to bold witnesses and martyrs, a change that would not have happened if the resurrection story was a lie.
In Colossians 1:18, Jesus is described as being the firstborn from among the dead. He is the very first to have conquered death, no more to die. Many more will follow in his footsteps, namely everyone who has repented of their sins and placed their trust in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. In 1 Corinthians 15:20, he is described as being the first fruits of those who are asleep. This phrase is significant because, the Sunday after the Passover was the start of the Feast of the First fruits, wherein the farmers would bring before God the first harvests from their fields. In referring to Jesus as the first fruit, Paul is saying that Jesus was the first to resurrect from the dead, no more to die, and many more will follow in his footsteps, just as the first fruit of the harvest means there's more crops to be harvested. The resurrection of Jesus is a sure promise that we will also experience resurrection when Jesus comes back again to claim us.
The resurrection also assures us that the life we live right now for Jesus Christ will never be in vain. When we serve and worship Him, it will be meaningful and fruitful. Finally, the resurrection assures us that our hope in Jesus Christ is secured. We can be assured that we will be spared from God's final wrath and that we will spend eternity in heaven with God.
Let us praise and thank God that Jesus is alive. Let us live a life that reflects that truth. In closing, I would like for us to listen to a song entitled, “See, What a Morning” and let the words of the song speak to our hearts, affirming once again the truth of the resurrection. Christ is risen! Risen indeed!
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