No Doubts in the Resurrection! - 1 Corinthians 15: 1-20

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

I want you to know that as a Christian, as a baptized child of God, the resurrection of Jesus impacts you in ways you probably don’t even realize.

Author Paul Maier – no relation – wrote a novel, a fictional account, of a Christian archaeologist who discovered bones while digging in Israel. That, in and of itself, was not that big of a surprise – bones are all over in that part of the world – but the other things discovered with the bones were earth-shattering. In the grave with the skeleton was evidence that the bones, in fact, belonged to Jesus. Realizing how devastating this could be to Christians and, in fact, the entire history of the world, the team of scientists conducted multiple studies that all seemed to support the likelihood that this was, in fact, Jesus of Nazareth. A piece of a manuscript is found, saying that Jesus died and, when he didn’t rise from the dead on the third day, the disciples squirreled his body away to perpetuate the lie. Suddenly, the ending of Mark 16, “and they were very afraid,” took on a new meaning.

Again, this is a work of fiction, but play “what if” for a moment – what if that was, in fact, the truth? What if that all happened and, suddenly, every news station, website, and podcast declared Jesus to be a liar. By extension, then, everything that the Church had proclaimed for 2000 years was a lie and every Christian sermon was a perpetuation of the lie, every Christian pastor nothing but a con man who had himself been conned, and every Christian was nothing more than a rube that fell for the worst and greatest fable ever concocted: God became flesh to die and rise from the dead for the sins of the world. In the novel, Easter comes, and churches were nearly empty. The Easter declaration, “Christ is risen!” was met with question marks instead of exclamation points – people didn’t know what to say. Joy and hope – the Christian hope, the Christian confidence – were left behind like flotsam and jetsam bobbing on the sea of uncertainty.

What if that were true? What would you do? What would you believe? Don’t be too quick to assume you would stand fast. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the Bible says, and the evidence of things not seen, remember? If faith in the unseen, resurrected Christ is suddenly left shaking because of the seen, buried body of the one who seems to be Jesus, I suspect many of us – and, yes, I say “us,” me included – might be sorely tempted to surrender the faith for what seems to be fait accompli. How would that impact your life? The resurrection would suddenly be meaningless. Even Christ’s death as a redemptive and atoning sacrifice for the sins of the world would be called into question. Am I forgiven child of God? For that matter, am I even a child of God? What of my baptism? You see the dominoes start to fall – was Jesus the sinless Son of God? Were any of His words true? What can we trust? Were His promises of a three-day resurrection, the sign of Jonah, the rebuilding of the Temple just pep talks for the disciples?

Paul began chapter 15 with this statement: “For I delivered to you as first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures…”  Of first importance – everything else is secondary to this redemptive act of Jesus. The Church confesses it in our creeds: crucified, died, buried, raised – in that order. That is what drove Paul to preach and teach, so that others might also believe and also be saved through Christ Jesus.

These young Corinthian Christians, still wrestling with what it is to be a child of God in a heathen culture, to receive His Word and to live according to it, must have been questioning the truth or the necessity of believing the death and resurrection of Jesus for Paul to have addressed it so powerfully and thoroughly.

You know what “if-then” statements are. We use them all the time. You tell your kids and grandkids, “If you have cookies after school, then you don’t get dessert tonight.” You tell your spouse, “If you remember to take your vitamins, then you’ll feel better.” Your kids ask you, “If I clean my room, then I can go to the movies?” If this, then that.

Paul uses this a rhetorical device to show how the resurrection is no mere myth, a figment of their congregational imagination. He begins with the simple absolute about resurrection in general: there must be a resurrection, because if there was no such thing, then it would be impossible for Jesus to have been raised. And, if Christ was not raised, then our preaching of the resurrection was a waste of our time and your faith, grounded in the preaching of the resurrected Christ, was also a waste. This is so paramount, so important, that he repeats it. If there is no resurrection of the dead, then the crucified Lord isn’t raised either, and if He isn’t raised, then we are still trapped in our sins. And, if all that is true, then all who die, die into eternity. If the only reason for believing in the resurrection is to fill the life with some kind of hollow hope, a nebulous “maybe,” a holy “who know’s,” then, Paul says, we are to be the most pitied because we wasted time, energy, and in fact our very lives in pursuit of the proclamation of the resurrected Jesus who didn’t rise.

I cannot count the number of times I have been with a family or with friends at a funeral home or at the graveside when I heard someone say something like this: I do not understand how people can get through this without the hope we have in Jesus of the resurrection. For the Corinthians, that is what they were facing if the resurrection was not true.

But! Paul interjects a powerful contradiction, breaking the if-then pattern. If this, then that, but now! The whole predicated argument about if there is no resurrection is cast aside as Paul begins the affirmative argument.

But, in fact – notice, no “if” - Christ has been raised from the dead, Paul says. How can he be so sure? He was one of the last eyewitnesses of the resurrected and glorified Christ on the road to Damascus. He had intended to hunt and persecute Christians; instead, Jesus called Paul into apostolic ministry. An eyewitness to Jesus, Paul’s preaching has authority.

Jesus is the firstruits, Paul says. Firstfruits are exactly that – the very first fruit that is produced in the spring. Firstfruits are anticipated, yearned for, longed for. It means the winter season of death-like rest is over and new life begins. And, where there are firstfruits, there is more to come. Because Jesus is the firstfruits, because He rose first, the promise extends to those who come after. The death-rest of the tomb is now but a brief time while the Christian rests from his or her labors, awaiting their own resurrection moment.

But what of the forgiveness of sins? Paul speaks to that as well. The fruit image hangs rich in Paul’s words. Adam and Eve’s forbidden bite of fruit from the Tree in the Garden. Through one man came death and sin, Paul says, continuing to pass down generation to generation. We call this “original sin,” inborn sin, concupiscence if you want the ten dollar theological word for the week. You cannot undo it; you cannot cleanse yourself from it; you cannot out-good the sin that is within you. People get this confused, thinking people are good until they sin, that suddenly by sinning they become a sinner. Nope. The opposite is true. WE are sinful from birth. We sin because we are sinners. And, because the wages of sin is death, death awaits all who sin. That’s what it means when Paul says sin and death came through one man. It’s the terrible consequence that befalls all mankind for the failure to obey God’s Garden command.

But in Christ, this is no longer the end, for the Son of God and the Son of Man, having been raised, has also conquered death and the grave. One man brought death; this Man – who is God in flesh – this Man brought life and in Him, through Him, all who believe in Him shall have life eternal: Christ the firstfruits, then all others who have fallen asleep in Him.

This is our Christian life: you are already alive in Christ. You died with Him in your baptism; you were raised with Him in your baptism. Your old adam and old eve, that is the sinful nature within you, drowned. Satan’s grasp over you and death’s hold over you have been destroyed. When Christ rose, satan was crushed; when his grave opened, death lost its terrible power.

Yes, death is still scary. It’s OK for the Christian to say that. After all, none of us have done it before. But we do not need to fear the grave because Christ is the firstfuit, remember? He opened the grave so that yours, too, will be opened.

This, then, frees your everyday life to live in the joy and certitude of the resurrection.  There are no “what ifs.” The what ifs – what if my sins aren’t forgiven, what if Jesus didn’t rise, what if I am not good enough, what if I am not sorry enough, what if I die mid-sin, all the what-ifs satan throws at you to tempt you to take your eyes off of the resurrection – all what-ifs are silenced in the resurrection of Jesus from the grave. Every day, then, is resurrection day. We might only celebrate Easter on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the first day of spring – and, yes, that is the literal formula to determine where Easter falls on the calendar – but every day is resurrection day because you are already and always risen through Christ your Lord.

In this morning’s Gospel reading, Jesus offered four blessings. They seem quite backwards, don’t they? Blessed are the poor, the hungry, the weeping, and the hated. Even if those are your place, now, you are already blessed. Remember: God’s Word delivers exactly what it says. You live that right now; you are blessed because Christ was poor and hungry, He wept and was hated for you. The culmination, the consummation of those blessings will be realized in the resurrection. But the gifts are yours, now, because of the power of the resurrection.

In a moment you’ll say it again: I look for – I yearn for, I trust in, I believe in, - the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Not just today, in this place, but every day, looking for resurrection to come. Amen.