I want to take my text from 1 Corinthians 15 and verse 20. But now is Christ risen from the dead. So this morning we just want to be reminded of some of the implications of an empty tomb. And by implication, I mean some conclusions we'll draw from what it means that Christ is risen from the dead. This chapter is probably the most famous concerning the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and Paul is confronting a church who's been deceived into thinking that Christ is not risen. And Paul is using several arguments to open their eyes to the reality and the implication if he's not risen, And so as we look at some of the negative aspects, we will turn that to what that means positively for us today. So I'll begin reading in verse one, and we'll just hit some of the highlights of the chapter. Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also you have received, and wherein you stand. by which also you are being saved, if you keep in memory or hold fast what I preached unto you, unless you 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. So implication number one is that the resurrection of Christ vindicates God. vindicate, I mean to prove something is true or right. Paul said he was crucified, buried, and rose the third day according to the Scriptures." Now Scripture is the voice of God. Romans 9 tells us, "...and the Scripture saith unto Pharaoh." But the Scripture didn't say that to Pharaoh, God did. God and Scripture are synonymous. This is the voice of God. So God's voice has been vindicated because Jesus has been raised from the dead just as God has said by His holy prophets and apostles, which they foretold over and over again in the Old Testament that Christ would indeed die, be buried, and be raised again the third day. In fact, according to Psalm 2, verse 5 through 7, resurrection day is the laughter of God. It's God's laughter. In that psalm, the psalmist notes, why doth the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the people, or the rulers of the earth, took counsel together against the Lord, and against his anointed, saying, let us break their bands asunder, and cast their cords from us. He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh. And what way is God going to laugh? Yet have I set my king on my holy hill of Zion. I will declare the decree the Lord has said unto me, thou art my son this day have I begotten thee. Now Paul uses that in Acts 13 to speak of the resurrection and Christ being raised to sit at the right hand of God. God's laughter on Resurrection Sunday is not that he just took a tragedy and made something good out of it. It's not what he did. He planned the whole event. He planned to overrule the rage of the heathen, the imagination of the people, the opposition of kings, and the secret council of rulers. And every Resurrection Sunday that we celebrate is the laughter of God. It's the vindication of God. that Christ is risen from the dead and God's scriptures, everything He said, showing His faithfulness to do what He said, has been vindicated. But Christ has been vindicated. What did He say over and over again? That He would die, be buried, and raise again the third day. And then when He hung on the cross, He was mocked for those very words. He was mocked because he said he was a son of God. He was mocked because he said, I and my father are one, which they understood that to mean Jesus was saying he was equal with God. The Jews understood that Jesus Christ directly, emphatically declared that he was God manifest in the flesh. So when he hung on the cross, they mocked him. and said, if you're the Son of God, come down, and we'll believe you. If you're the King of Israel, come down. If God will have you because you trusted in Him, well then come down from the cross, because you said you were the Son of God. They knew that Jesus said those words, and they thought of Jesus as an imposter, an impersonator, and a deceiver. But the resurrection of Jesus, according to Paul in Romans 1, declares Jesus to be the Son of God. Concerning the Son Jesus Christ, which was promised in the Holy Scripture, Paul would say, He was made of the seed of David according to the flesh, that speaks of His humanity. If you read the Gospel of Matthew chapter 1, the lineage will start with Abraham through David all the way to Joseph and Mary. To prove the Scriptures were right, that Jesus would be born as a human being of the lineage of David, that was the prophecy of the Old Testament. But then also Paul said he was declared to be the Son of God with power. With power. The word declare means to be openly decreed or appointed. Now Jesus Christ has always been the Son of God. He was the Son of God pre-incarnate. He's the eternal Son of God. He was the Son of God at His birth. He was the Son of God in His life. He was the Son of God at His death. But Paul says he was declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead. Jesus Christ has been vindicated. When He raised Himself from the dead, He was declared with power. The power whereby He laid His own life down and the power, he said in John 10, whereby He took it again, that's power. He was declared to be exactly who He said He was and who He is. He's been vindicated by Scripture, by the resurrection. But beloved, you will be vindicated one day. You will be proven to be right. In all the mockery, in all the slander about you being a bigot and unloving and wrong, one day, Your righteousness will be like the light and your judgment like the noonday, the psalmist says. So commit your way unto the Lord, trust in Him and He will bring it to pass. What? Your vindication will be brought to pass. Now sometimes in this life it's brought to pass. Sometimes Christians are shown to be on the right path by their persecutors that persecute them and malign them. God shows it, but ultimately because God has been vindicated and Christ has been vindicated by the resurrection, you will be vindicated and your righteousness is going to shine like the new day sun and everybody will acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father and you will be shown to be right. That is if you have not believed in vain. That's the first implication. of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The second implication is, as Paul will say, preaching is not in vain and therefore your faith is not in vain. Verse 11, therefore whether I or they, whether it were I or they, so we preach and so you believe. Now if Christ be preached that He rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen? And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Now that would be pretty depressing, to know you've been coming here for however long you have been, coming to hear preaching, believing in Jesus Christ and His resurrection, to only find out it was all a waste of your life, a waste of time, all vain. Well, according to verse 20, now is Christ risen from the dead. So Paul is speaking hypothetically, which means preaching is not in vain and your faith is not in vain. This is not a waste of time. This is not an effort in futility. This is not a waste of your life. Because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, Paul's preaching was not in vain, but it was effectual. and faith is not in vain. That is, if preaching is really preaching, if preaching is really what it's supposed to be and not like what it often is, which we must be careful that it's not, nothing more than anecdotal, humorous, laid-back, casual, personal, enveloped in emotional healing and human need, fixed on man-centered preaching. That's not real preaching. But when preaching is really what it's designed to be, we take our message from the text and take our points from the text and expose the text to the people. Preaching is not in vain by the Holy Spirit and preaching is aiming at the faith of God's people because preaching awakens faith and it awakens worship. Why? Because Jesus is raised from the dead, and He said in the Gospel of John, He would send forth His Holy Spirit, which He has done, upon His exaltation. And so therefore, when preaching is right, when preaching is empowered, and people are believing, faith in worship is awakened, or it should be awakened. Paul would say in Acts 26 concerning his own preaching and the design of it. When Jesus, after his resurrection, appeared unto Paul and said, I have delivered you from the Gentiles and will deliver you to whom now I send you. Acts 26, 18. To do what? To open their eyes. Deuteronomy 29, 4, God says to Israel, yet the Lord hath not given you a heart to perceive or eyes to see into this day. In the New Testament ministry of the Holy Spirit, God, by and large, to all New Covenant members, He's giving them eyes to see. So what's the relationship of God giving eyes to see and Paul opening those eyes? Because preaching opens the eyes to see something. The very eyes that God gives by sovereign grace that he says he will do in circumcising the heart. Now preaching awakens those eyes and opens them to something. That's why it's not vain. First of all, because God gives the new set of eyes. If it weren't for that, preaching would be in vain and there would be no such thing as faith. So Paul says to open their eyes, to bring them from darkness to light. From not being able to see, to being able to see. From the power of Satan, which is the power of darkness, to the power of God, which is the power of light. What is it that we see in preaching that is designed to awaken faith and awaken worship? We see the light of the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ, who is the image of God. We see the glory of the resurrected, exalted Savior. We see His love. We see His mercy. We see what He is. And we see that through preaching. We see that through the Word of God. We see it through the Gospel. If Jesus said, I am the bread of life, he that cometh unto me shall never hunger, and he that believeth on me shall never thirst, so believing is having your hunger satisfied, and coming by faith is having your thirst quenched, then what is preaching? Awakening that faith. in the bread of life so that your soul is not hungering but being satisfied, so that your soul is not parched but being quenched with the bread of life. Preaching is not in vain because Jesus has been raised and He is the bread of life. So when you come Through the Word, where we see this bread, we handle this bread spiritually. We even eat symbolically this bread in our communion. The aim of preaching that is not vain is when it's done correctly and rightly from Scripture, by the Holy Spirit, it awakens faith, it awakens worship in the Son of God, and that's what God's aim is in preaching. So that our eyes would be fixed and God-centered on the Son of the Living God. So when Paul says if Christ is not risen, your preaching is vain and your faith is vain, and then he says but now is Christ risen, he means preaching is not vain and your faith is not vain. Because your faith is awakened by the glories of the resurrected Christ as we see him and know him through the Bible. That means what we do is important, not because we're important. In fact, we're just not so special, are we? You need to tell yourself that every now and then. The world makes you think you're so special. No, He is. He is special. And so we come here, the aim is that our faith would be awakened and awakened again and again through preaching so that our souls would be satisfied with the bread of life and our hearts would be quenched as we drink from the fountains of living water again and again and again. No, preaching is not in vain when it's done the way God aims for it to be, and your faith and you being here is not vanity. It has purpose, it has meaning, and it is real and important because Jesus died so that through the preaching of foolishness, sinners would be saved. They would be saved. Implication number three. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is for our justification. Verse 17. Let me start at verse 16. For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised? And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain, and ye are yet in your sins. So Paul says if Christ is not raised, preaching is vain, faith is in vain, and if faith is in vain, you are in your sins. But now is Christ risen, which means your faith is not in vain, which means you are not in your sins. Now that connects faith with the forgiveness of sins. Because if faith is vain, you're condemned and guilty. But if faith is not vain, which it's not, then by faith you have a right standing with God and you're not condemned. Your sins have been expiated. They've been removed. which is our justification. God declares us righteous by our connection and attachment to Jesus Christ called faith. So if there's no such thing as faith, because Christ is not risen, then there's no attachment with Jesus Christ and His righteousness, which means you're not right with God, you're condemned, and you're yet in your sins. But gloriously, Christ is risen indeed. And if we go back to Acts 28.18, Paul made this connection again when he said, Jesus, he's recounting what Jesus said to him. We only learn that in Acts 26. open their eyes to turn them from darkness to light, the power of Satan, the power of God, for what? That they may receive the forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among all those who are sanctified by faith in me, Jesus told Paul. How do you receive the forgiveness of sins? The word is proclaimed, the eyes are opened, it's believed, you receive forgiveness. If the eyes stay closed to the gospel, It's not received, you're not forgiven. You're still in your sins. Paul would make this point concerning the connection with justification and the resurrection in Romans chapter 4, where he recounts the faith of Abraham, how he staggered not that the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving glory to God. And being fully persuaded that what he had promised, that is God, he was also able to perform. And therefore, it was imputed to him for righteousness. Now that's not the first moment where Abraham believed. That's in Genesis 17. In Genesis 12, he believed when he left Ur of the Chaldees. In Genesis 15, six, he believed God and it was imputed to him for righteousness. And then the occasion with the birth of Isaac. He trusted God and it was imputed to him for righteousness. That doesn't mean we're justified again and again and again. It's a one-time act completed and totally done forever. But the ongoing result of being justified is we keep believing. And so at any point in time on the continuum of your faith, when you're believing and that faith produces fruit, it can be said. At that moment, you are still in a state of right standing with God. You are justified. And that's the point Paul is making with Abraham. But then he says this, it was not written for his sake alone. that it was imputed to him for righteousness, but also for all those who believe on him that raised Jesus Christ from the dead, who was delivered for our offenses and raised again for our justification. Matthew Henry says, on these two hinges, the door of salvation swings. The first one, he was delivered for our offenses, our sins, or our trespasses. He endured the penalty of sin on our behalf. The wages of sin is death. Our wages were put on him and he experienced the penalty that we should have experienced, which is eternal death. He went into the tomb, he was under the penalty of the executioner and the penalty of the law, which is death. Not because of his sin, but because our sin was charged to him. He knew no sin. But is death enough? It's not. If He is not raised from the dead, He's an unrighteous man. Because the wages of sin is death forever. If He doesn't come out of that grave, you and I are not justified. That's how important the resurrection is. The resurrection is not a point or an article of faith in the Christian faith. It is Christianity. It is the whole sum of Christianity. If the wages of sin is death, what's the reward of righteousness? You live forever. If he doesn't come out of that grave and live forever, he is not a right man. I was talking to a man years ago who claimed to be Christian and said to me, I just can't grasp the resurrection. I just can't believe in that. He was an engineer, and I think that was the first problem. He was trying to work through it with his logic. You can't logically work through the resurrection. I don't remember all I said to that man. But today I think I would say, if you don't believe in the resurrection, you don't go to heaven. This is not a point that you can be wrong on and still make it to the end. You're justified if you believe on Him that raised Jesus from the dead. And gloriously, He was raised for our justification. God cannot rightly declare you righteous if Jesus is still in the tomb. But He was raised, so Paul says in Romans 5, verse 1, Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God. Which means what? He's not in the tomb. The angel rolled the stone away so that we could see in and see. He's not there. He is risen just as he said. And go and tell Peter and all the apostles to meet me in Galilee. And so they did and so they saw. And you have the apostolic witness and even 500 more people that saw him. to give us a firm foundation from Scripture that Jesus, although we have not seen it with our own eyes, we've seen it with faith, and no, for sure He is not in the grave, therefore we are justified if we believe on Jesus Christ. Even Paul in Romans 34 speaks of the resurrection as the higher grounds than even the death of Christ like this. Who is He that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea, rather, is risen again. The death was important. There is no atonement without death. But if He's not risen, yea rather, then the whole plan of salvation has been thwarted. No matter what accomplished He did in His death, without the resurrection, there's no salvation. There's no justification. We are in our sins. In Romans 10, Paul would say that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. Why does he use the word heart if you believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead? You can believe in your mind in the resurrection. That's not a hard thing to do. If you start with the God of the Bible who created all things by the word of His power, and He holds all things together by the word of His power, To believe that He could bring life to a man in the grave is not a big stretch, is it? Even some scholars have to admit that are not Christian. All the evidence historically point to the reality that that was an empty tomb. But they don't believe it, even though they might believe it. No, to believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead is to treasure it. It's to treasure that you've been forgiven. It's to love that you've been forgiven. It's to cherish the fact that Jesus has been raised from the dead and he's sitting at the right hand of God on high. It's to love that. That's what it means to believe under righteousness, not just to believe the facts of the resurrection, to believe in a way that exalts God. in a way that magnifies God, in a way that treasures the glory of God, the person of God, in His plan, in His redemption, and in His grace that is brought to us through Jesus Christ alone. Have you believed in Jesus Christ? Have you been justified from all things as Paul would say in the book of Acts? Have you been justified and declared right by your Father so that now you are no longer in your sins? No one can condemn you. No one can accuse you. No one can lay anything to the charge of God's elect. Why? Because it's God that justifies and declares right. And when He declares you right, No devil of hell can ever take it away. That's something to be cherished. All the more so because it's by grace. Paul said in this chapter, I am what I am by the grace of God. How much more to cherish the reality of a forgiveness that comes free and sovereign by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Next implication. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is what gives us hope. It gives us hope in a fallen world. Verse 17 again. And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain, you are yet in your sins. Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ, which means they're dead in Christ, are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable. But now is Christ risen. which means we're not miserable, which means we have hope in the life to come, right? The resurrection of Jesus Christ has secured for us a living hope. Where is your hope today? And why? Would that mean that we are to be pitied or miserable if it's in this life only we have hope in Christ? To be miserable means to be wretchedly unhappy. Or to be pitied means you feel compassion and sorrow for someone because of their unhappiness or their bad situation. You just feel terrible for them. Why would that be so? Well, the first reason is because of what hope is. Hope involves four words in this order. If you look up the word, it just means a confident expectation. So hope means you believe something is gonna happen in the future. You expect something to happen. An event, a thing, something's gonna happen, whether it's tomorrow, next week, or next year. That's hope. But then secondly, there's an object. There's this thing or person or event that you expect to happen in the future. So hope has to have an object that you expect something to happen. But then there's a desire. Because you desire or you want this object to deliver, to do something for you that's in the future that you expect to happen. And then the clincher in my thinking is the word happiness. because you want this object to deliver on your expectation to be happy. And happy is just a broad term that has a number of words we could put under that canopy too. Joy, enjoyment, pleasure, satisfaction, peace, rest, contentment, convenience, and just a whole host of words that we may all choose different ones under that canopy, but all of them point to one thing. I just wanna be happy. And I expect this object to deliver what I want, and that's what I'm expecting in the future. The reason that would make us, of all men, wretchedly miserable is because it's never gonna happen. Isn't that depressing? Everything you hope in in this life only is gonna perish. and you're going to be the most miserable, wretched person there is. The problem is we don't see it that way. And so we hope in the promotion. We hope in the weekend. We hope in the next event. We're hoping, hoping, hoping constantly. We can't help but hope, right? You say, is it wrong to hope I have a good vacation? No. But that can't be ultimate. See, if our life, if our hope is in this life only, everything is all about here, we are going to be miserable and to be pitied. Because it's ultimately not going to happen. Whatever small measure of happiness that we get is all going to be done away in Christ or in the end when we die. Now another thing this means about hope concerning this life only, this can only be true if hope transforms us in some way. Now these people at Corinth were continuing to be Christian and yet denying the resurrection. And Paul's saying, if you're a Christian and your hope is in this life only, that's a wretched condition. Which seems to indicate that it would only be wretched if you're living the life of a Christian. If you're living life of the world, then that would make sense if there's no resurrection. In fact, Paul would say later in this chapter, you know, if it's not, if there's no resurrection, it's not to his advantage to be a Christian. I take that to mean he wouldn't be. See, this only makes sense if Living the life of a Christian means something. For example, some of you may have heard of the late Harold Camping. He was an evangelist. He died at 92 years old. And he probably had the most predictions of when the world would end. And of course, he's dead, so he was wrong on every account. At least 12 times, he predicted the end of the world. Now, suppose you caught wind of Harold Camping's prediction maybe two months out. And as I heard some people do, as it got closer, they started giving away more money. I heard of one person that sold their house and gave everything away like a week before. And then on that morning, the sun rose and the person looked at their arms and said, I'm still here. Don't you feel bad for that person? Don't you pity their wretched unhappiness and bad situation because they live like that thinking something was going to happen? You see the point? Now the problem with Harold Camping's prediction was the error of timing. It was just timing. It's going to happen, but he just got the timing wrong. But the point is, if we're hoping in the life to come, what's it doing? It's transforming us because of the gain that's coming. If we put our hope in this life only, what's that going to do to you? How are you going to spend your money? You're probably going to get into a lot of debt. Right? And if I weren't a Christian, why not? I mean, my life is just about 80 years and it's over. Get as much as you can as fast as you can. See, if we want to know what we hope in, we just listen to the thoughts in our head and listen to the words that come out of your mouth and you will determine real quick what you hope in. I'm not saying you can't hope that something happens Hope you have a good vacation. But what we hope in begins to transform the way we live, either in a bad way or in a way that honors Christ. Imagine if Paul had gotten the word when he was in the Mamertine prison. He's writing one of the prison epistles and Timothy runs to the opening and the Mamertine prison says, Paul, I got bad news. They found Jesus' body. You don't understand, they've got all this forensic testing and laboratory, they confirmed it, it's real, it's really his body. I think Paul would almost faint. Why am I in these chains? And that'd be a good question. Why am I about to have my head cut off if my hope is in this life only? That would be a fool, Paul, you'd be a fool to do that. And you would too. Think about his suffering, his service, and his sacrifices, all for nothing. Wouldn't you pity Paul and say, goodness, Paul, I wouldn't want to be in your shoes. But now is Christ risen from the dead. So Paul's suffering, his sacrifices, and his service were all because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It transformed him. And it'll transform you and me today. Peter says in 1 Peter 1, 3, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of all mercies, who hath begotten us again into a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Living hope. A living hope is the opposite of a dead hope. A living hope is an active hope, a hope that is being sustained and bearing fruit. When in suffering, verse Peter, Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their soul unto Him in well-doing. How are they going to do that? They have a living hope. They know their hope is not in this life only. If it is, you don't suffer, you don't sacrifice, and you don't serve anybody. And I mean no one but yourself. And how many people are serving self all because they don't believe in the resurrection of the dead? They're not Christian. So a living hope is going to sustain them to do what when they're suffering? Obey. Verse 13, as obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to your former lust and your ignorance, but as he which is holy has called you to be holy, be holy in all manner of conversation. How can you be holy when you're suffering? There's a resurrection coming. The resurrection transforms us. on the pathway of holiness because He's risen. If He's not risen, don't be holy and don't suffer. Now, I mean that. Without service, 1 Peter 1.22, seeing you have purified your souls and obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that you love one another with a fervent heart. Love one another with a fervent heart. So you're suffering, but you're obeying, and you keep loving. Why? You have a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. It's alive. He's alive. So you keep obeying because hope sustains you. And you keep loving because your labor is not in vain in the Lord. Why? There's a resurrection coming. And then sacrifice. Verse 5 of chapter 2. Ye also, as lively stones as living stones, are built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, able to offer spiritual sacrifices. You're suffering, you're serving, and you're sacrificing just like Paul. Why? You have a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. You know that when Christ comes and He bursts out on the scene again, He's gonna take his people home. And everything you gave up in suffering, in service, and in sacrifice will be infinitesimal to the gain of the resurrection. Only when we hope can we be transformed because hoping in Christ and serving is gonna mean losses. We're going to lose something. Peter tried to be all pitiful one time with Jesus when Jesus talked about self-denial and giving up. And Peter said to Jesus, we've given up everything to serve you, Lord. And as if Jesus was going to rebuke him a little bit and says, wait a minute, Peter, nobody gives up anything but what their gain is 100 fold. In other words, Peter, stop all this pity stuff. You give up nothing but what you gain 100 times in this life and in the life to come, eternal life. You can't lose, Christian. There's no way you can lose. No way you could ever lose if you hope in Jesus Christ. You just need to look to the future, and that's our problem, isn't it? Perhaps we've had it so easy, so comfortable, so convenient, that our eyes have drifted down to this life only and we have become functional deniers of the resurrection. Meaning the resurrection is not functioning in our lives like it should to produce transformation. So let us fix our eyes again and again on the reality of what's coming and what it means that truly there's going to be an amazing gain. It'll be worth it all when we see Jesus Christ. Next implication, and this is probably the last one I'll get to. I think I had eight or 10, knowing I wouldn't get them all. But the last one is the resurrection gives rise to mission. Mission, what is a mission? A mission is an important assignment to be carried out for a purpose. So Paul says in verse 20, and I'll read a few verses. But now is Christ risen from the dead and become the firstfruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, afterward they that are Christ at His coming. Then cometh the end. So Christ is the firstfruits, which means His resurrection is like a forerunner to something that's gonna follow, like the firstfruits of your garden or of a harvest. Those first little buds are a pledge that something great is coming. So the order, that's a military word there of succession, or like military units marching in order, Christ first, Then those that follow at His coming will be those that are dead, rise out of the grave first. Then those that are alive, next order, will be called up into the air to meet the Lord there. And then, of course, the order will include the resurrection of the unjust, according to John 5. For they shall be raised, too, at some order. So Paul is unpacking the order in which we will rise in Christ. And then he says, the end, the goal. The purpose. This is all happening at the same time. What happens at the end? When he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father, when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. To put down means to disarm them. There will be a total disarmament of all influence, all power and all rule of every kind. King Jesus is going to make that happen. Verse 25, For he must reign till he put all enemies under his feet. These enemies will not come under his feet voluntarily. It is necessary that he reign to bring everything to a final end. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin, the strength of sin is the law, but thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Death will ultimately be put down forever. There will be no more death. That's a glorious thing to think about. Verse 27, for he hath put all things under his feet. So they will be put under his feet in the future when he puts down all rule and authority, but they are under his feet today, which means he's moving everything to the climactic cosmic reconciliation of Colossians 1 of everything, where Christ will be shown to be the great master and potentate and king that he is. It will be visible now. We don't see it. Looks like rule and authority are having their day, but they're not. They're under his feet now. Now here's what I wanna make the connection with mission. You say, what's that got to do with our mission? Everything. Where this is moving according to verse 28 is that God may be all in all. Now those two statements, He hath put all things under His feet, and that God may be all in all can be found in Ephesians chapter one, where Paul is praying that the church, us, would know what is the power to usward who believe, which is according to the working of His mighty power, which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead. And He set Him at His own right hand, far above all principality, power, and dominion, and has given Him a name which is above every name. whether in heaven or earth. And then he says this, he has made him or given him to be head over all things to the church. And then you find that statement. I think it's actually right before that. He hath put all things under his feet. So he raised him, set him at his own right hand, put all things under his feet. Just like it says here in 1 Corinthians 15. He put all things under His feet, gave Him to be head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him that is filling all in all. So there's a second statement there, all right, to make the connection. All things are under His feet, in Ephesians 1, all things are under His feet, verse 27 of chapter 15. That He may fill all in all, Ephesians 1, that God may be all in all, 1 Corinthians 15. Now the question is, How is Jesus going to rule in such a way that that takes place? Well, Paul says in Ephesians 1, through his body, which is the church, the fullness that is filling all in all. He aims to do it, to put enemies under his feet through you. Now I know that's pretty shocking for a, Motley crew like us, I get it. But that's what the text says. His redemptive rule on behalf of the church so that everything that touches our life, everything that happens in our life is under his authoritative rule. And the aim is that the aroma of God's presence and knowledge would fill the universe. Remember 2 Corinthians 2. Paul said we are an aroma of life or death. Like a smell of life, to some it's the gospels, aroma of life to life, some to death and to death. The church is moving out on mission and we are either an aroma of life and to life or an aroma of death and to death. And you can see that in our culture today. A lot of death and to death right now, right? What is the mission of the church as it relates to Jesus having all things under His feet to fill the universe with the aroma that God is all in all? He's doing it, at least in part, through the church. How would that work? How do we subdue enemies? Not with weapons. Not with politics. With the gospel. Romans, or Psalm 110. And I'm closing here. Psalm 110, which is a Messianic Psalm that's quoted by Peter and other times concerning the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Lord has said unto my Lord, sit thou here until I put thine enemies under thy footstool. To have your foot on the neck of an enemy or have your foot over an enemy in Joshua means you've conquered them. You're victorious. Joshua told the leaders of Israel when they captured the five kings, put your foot on their neck. They've been vanquished. Sit here, God says to his son, and I'm going to make your enemies your footstool. How is he going to do it? Psalm 110, verse 2. The Lord shall send the rod of your strength out of Zion. Rule thou in the midst of your enemies. Rod is a symbol of power and authority. It's like a scepter. The Lord, while you're sitting in His right hand, what He's gonna do, He's gonna send out, He's going to extend, is also the word, the rule of your power and your strength right in the midst of your enemies, out of Zion. Now, Zion, Old Testament Zion, Israel, prefiguring, New Testament Zion, church. So God's aim is to put the enemies under Christ out of Zion, right in the midst or the middle of His enemies. How is he gonna do it? Thy people shall be made willing in the day of thy power, in the beauties of holiness. Put your weapons away. In other words, that's not gonna advance the mission. It's the gospel that the church brings about right in the midst of the enemies, and then the enemies become friends of Christ. They're made willing in the day of the power of the light of the glorious gospel of Christ. And they turn from being at enmity with Christ to being His friend. And He's ruling right in the midst of His enemies. So in part, God aims to use us and churches. As we move toward this glorious end, all things under His feet, God is going to be all in all. And we're moving there. When the church is remembering, resting, hoping in the resurrection, and remembering the resurrected Savior said, all authority and powers given unto Me in heaven and in earth, on that basis, go. Now that going there doesn't mean all of us are missionaries, not at all. It just means we're going out into the workplace, we're going on vacation, we're doing our leisure with this reality. We are ambassadors of Christ. We've been given a mission to be an aroma that fills all in all. And if we don't hope in Christ, if we don't remember this mission, then we get taken up into life here only. Our hope becomes only as far as the horizon of our life, and we're moved away from the mission, and everyone goes to his own house doing his own thing, hearing a sermon once a week, but never really being transformed by the power of the resurrected Christ. Beloved, I don't want to live that way. Do you? I don't want to get to the end of life and say, I lived a wretched, miserable life. I hoped in Christ, but my hope really was just in this world and what I could get out of it. Christ is risen indeed. We have a real hope and a real faith indeed. Preaching is not in vain. God has vindicated His Word and His Son. He's going to vindicate you in the future. And He calls us to understand with eyes that have been enlightened what our hope is, what the riches of the glory is, what the power is, and that the Resurrected Christ is with us to the end of the ages and the age we now live in. And he's moving triumphantly as a conquering warrior to the end where he will deliver up the kingdom of God. And he will say, behold, I and the children which you gave to me, they're all secure. Not one of them is lost, not a single one. And there we'll be with Christ forever. And we keep our hope fixed on that. We keep coming back together as a crucified band of soldiers seeking to fulfill the mission that is going to be fulfilled. It's going to happen. but participating in the glorious joy of the resurrected Savior who loved you and gave himself for you that we could be part of such a grand and glorious mission. May the Lord make it so more and more in our lives as we rest in his resurrection. Let's pray. Father, you're a great God. We thank you for the hope we have in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And we pray that that hope would transform us like it did Paul as he endured such great hardships because he knew of the advantage and the gain that was to come at the resurrection. He would even say, if I fought after manner of men with beast at Ephesus and the dead rise not, what advantage is it? Let us eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we just meet death. But Lord, there is gain, there is advantage. You even said we'll be repaid at the resurrection of the just. So Lord, help us to see our hope more clearly in you. Help us to be transformed in this week just a little more. in knowing what's coming in the future. And as the days get darker and the times get more difficult, may our hope shine brighter and may it produce in us what it did in the early church, a band of followers that were committed, that were sold out and were loving one another all because of your love for them and us. We pray that you make this so in Jesus' name, amen.