Down and take our Bibles up and turn to our Old Testament reading It's Job 19 Job 19 You can't find that table of contents is always a good place to look You probably know the context the book of Job. Job is going through horrific trials and tribulations and difficulties. He says to us in Job 19, beginning in verse 23, and just a reminder that this is God's Word. Oh, that my words were written. Oh, that they were inscribed in a book. Oh, that with an iron pen lead they were engraved in the rock forever for I know that my Redeemer lives at the last he will stand upon the earth and after my skin has been thus destroyed yet in my flesh I shall see God whom I shall see for myself and my eyes shall behold not another heart faints within me What an idea. It's got to be the work of the Holy Spirit. I will see him. So let's turn now to 1 Corinthians 15. It's the same spirit who inspired Job. It's the spirit who inspired Paul in 1 Corinthians 15. That reminder that all scripture is given by inspiration of God is therefore profitable. 1 Corinthians 15, we're looking at the first 11 verses in what we would call the resurrection chapter of the Bible. 1 Corinthians 15, beginning in verse 1. Again, this is God's Word. Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. for I delivered to you as of 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, that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve, then He appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles, Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy 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 was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. Whether then it was I or they, so we preach, and so you believe." Thus ends the reading of God's word. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you so much for your word. We do pray that you would bless us and give us eyes to see, ears to hear, hearts to receive, hands to apply, feet to walk it out. We pray these things in Christ's name. Amen. Please be seated. Well, this is kind of a softball question, kind of a slam dunk question, but I hope we all understand the answer, I hope we all can get this right on a written test. What's the most important event in human history? According to scripture, it's not a war, a revolution, not creation itself, but it's the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It's not just important, friends, it's essential. Absolutely essential. And so this is 1 Corinthians 15, the chapter on the resurrection. If you ever want to think about the resurrection, if you ever want to talk to somebody about the resurrection, and you're thinking, you know, what section of the Bible should I take people to? Where should I turn in my Bible? 1 Corinthians 15 is the chapter. 58 verses long, but it works all the way through the doctrine of the resurrection. terrific, it's a wonderful chapter on the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and then our resurrection because of His resurrection. And so this is the bedrock of our Christian hope, and we see with Paul, it's not only this gospel death, burial, resurrection that saves, it also transforms us. It also transforms our lives. J.B. Phillips has said that this is the most important chapter in the Bible. Why is it so important? Again, it's because of the doctrine of the resurrection. Tim Keller said, if Jesus rose from the dead, then you must accept everything that he said. He said, if he didn't rise from the dead, then don't worry about anything he said. You can write it off. Because He said, I'm the Savior. I'm here to die for your sins and rise again for your justification. And if He died on the cross, went through that horrific death, all the beatings, all those different things, and He didn't rise, bring it in. He'd be a good teacher. He's certainly not the Savior. In fact, the chapter goes on to say, if He didn't rise, eat, drink, and be merry. for tomorrow you die. If he didn't rise, we Christians, of all people, are the most to be pitied. We're pathetic, because we live as if he did rise, but he didn't rise. We pretend like it matters, and it actually doesn't. Another commentator, Yaroslav Pelikan, said, if Christ is risen, then nothing else matters. And he said, if Christ is not risen, then nothing else matters. You get that? If he's risen, then that's the thing that matters above everything. And if he hasn't risen, then nothing matters at all. Life is really meaningless. I don't know if we actually go to those places in our minds very often, but the argument that Paul makes in this chapter is really spectacular. It really is helpful, meaningful, insightful, And so these statements, if Jesus rose, listen to everything he said, if he didn't rise, forget everything he said, if he rose, this is what matters, if he didn't rise, nothing matters, like these kind of statements, they're not exaggeration, they're not hyperbole. Everything stands or falls with the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Everything. And so the whole book of 1 Corinthians, Paul is writing to a church in Corinth that had a ton of problems. Corinth was a terrible place. It was a really nasty city. And unfortunately, a lot of times, the habits of the city get into the church. And the habits of that city had kind of come into the church. And so Paul spends a lot of time in 1 Corinthians correcting them on the various struggles they were having. They were divided. In chapters 1 to 4, he addressed those things. They had moral and legal issues. And so in chapters 5 and 6, he addressed those things. issues related to marriage, Christian liberty, and idolatry, and so he addressed those in chapters 7-10. He talked about their worship and their church body in chapters 11-14, and now he comes around to this key doctrinal issue, the resurrection of the dead, in chapter 15. Really, the gospel undergirds everything he says in 1 Corinthians, but now it becomes something that's above ground, that he's dealing with out in the open. It's not just undergirding our Christian hope, it's the thing that he's addressing. And it really comes up because in verse 12, 1 Corinthians 15, 12, we have insight here because it says, if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you in Corinth say that there is no resurrection from the dead? Right? And so he's drawing that out. We know that's why this chapter comes up. And so in the first 11 verses that we're looking at here this afternoon, he's really talking about the resurrection of Jesus Christ that has these radical implications for our lives. And so I just want us to work our way through these realities quickly, beginning in verse 1-3a, it's the gospel received and delivered. And so, set your eyeballs on this, as one commentator says, the introduction to the introduction. Now I would remind you in verse one, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you receive in which you stand. And, he goes on to say in verse two, by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. Now there's a ton here, right? First of all, Paul was the guy who planted that church. Back in Acts 18, you can read about when he was first in Corinth, and he was ministering to those people. He brought the gospel to bear there. The Lord brought him there, and then the Lord spoke to him when the Lord was still speaking in that kind of way in that transitional period of time during the days of Acts. And he said, Paul, I want you to stay here because I have many people in that city. Now, when God said that to him, there were very few converted people in that city. But the point was, God said, I have people that I've chosen from before the foundations of the world. I have people that are my elect that belong to me. And they're going to come to believe in me, in Jesus Christ, because of what you're going to say. What is he going to say? He's going to say gospel words. He's going to give them good news. And so in verse one, he says, now I would remind you, right? What is remind? This is what I already said to you when I was there with you. When I planted the church, the thing that I always led with was the gospel. I'm gonna remind you, brethren, brothers, sisters, of the gospel, the good news that I previously preached to you. I proclaim to you in which you receive. Now, let's just start there. The preacher has a job. He has a role to perform. That's proclaiming the Good News. You ask the question, what is the Church for? What is the Church to do? What is the Church to be focused on? And one of the big things, the main thing, the central thing, Paul would say of first importance, verse 3, is preaching and proclaiming the Good News. What we need to understand is as Christians, what we need is the gospel preached into us again and again and again. We need the gospel preached into us week by week. There are some that would say, you know, we need to put away the pulpit. We just need to have like a, you know, like a coffee shop table. Just have an interaction. Just have a conversation. But that's not what the Bible lays out. The Bible lays out in a worship service, the minister is to proclaim, to preach Christ and Him crucified. Now, you have a responsibility as well, don't you? Because Paul says, he tells you what your responsibility is, it's to receive. The gospel is proclaimed, it is preached and proclaimed, and then it is, by you as Christians, received. It's received. Now, it's not just received, and then you move on to something else, you go do something else with your time, with your life, it is, next thing, stood upon. Maybe you never thought about that before. I remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preach to you, which you receive, in which you stand. This is where we place our feet. The gospel, dear friends, is to be the foundation of our lives. It is the bedrock that we build our lives upon. The gospel undergirds and informs everything in your life and in mine. At least that's the design. And I need you to hear me say that. because unfortunately I think that we've lost that. We've lost that in the church. The gospel sometimes becomes, you hear the gospel and then you move on to deeper things. No? Sometimes it becomes, the gospel is completely eclipsed, and it's just kind of practical teaching for practical living. No? Sometimes it's like, you know, some combination thereof. But the Gospel is to be rightly proclaimed and received every Lord's Day, and it's to be received and held onto and becomes the foundation so that everything we do the rest of the week is related to this foundation. The Gospel should have implications for every single thing that we think and say and do. Now, we're not going to do that perfectly, to be sure. But that's the direction we want to be going. How does what I do at work, how does what I do in my free time, how does what I do in my family, how does what I do when I choose a spouse, how does what I do when I rear my kids and raise them up How are these things informed by the Gospel? Everything. We stand upon this foundational Gospel reality. It doesn't mean we stand still, it means that every part of our lives is increasingly shaped by the Good News. We don't hear the Gospel and move on, we hear the Gospel and it goes on to say we hold fast We hold on to the truth of the message, and if we don't, we lose everything. Because Paul says here something that's really intriguing, something that's really interesting, unless you believed in vain. And I just think it's important for us to also understand these realities. There's a way to hear the gospel. We talk about knowledge, assent, and trust. Knowledge is, you hear what the gospel is. Ascent is, I believe that, as opposed to, I don't believe that. But a lot of people think that that's salvation. Salvation is, I trust in Jesus. It's the next step. What we call, if you hear the gospel and you say you believe the gospel, but it doesn't affect your life, that's called historical faith. It's not saving faith, and I hear that there are millions of people in our country that are right there, that would say they believe, but they're not converted, because it doesn't actually transform the way that they live their life. And we need to examine ourselves to make sure that we're in the faith. And we'll talk about Paul, how he shows that he didn't believe in vain at the end of our time together this afternoon. But think about the parable of the soils. Jesus himself tells the story of these four kinds of hearts. The wayside hearers, the hard path, the seed goes out and it just bounces off, and the birds come and eat it away. That's the word of God for certain hearts. We say, yeah, of course, they're not converted. But there's two kinds of hearts that Jesus talks about in that parable, the rocky ground and the thorny ground hearers. that actually there's some kind of evidence at some point of salvation, of kind of fruit bearing, at least initially. But there's only one there, right? The good heart, the good soil that actually produces a crop and perseveres. And it's just a reminder for us, isn't it, that Jesus is not just an add-on. He's not just something that we clip onto our lives for fire insurance. Say, oh yeah, I'm good, I'm going to heaven, now I can go do whatever I want to do. Jesus is fundamental, he's foundational for our lives. And we live in a society, don't we? Whether I preached this sermon in Orange County last week or here in Hawaii today, that there's a lot going on, it's very busy. There are a lot of things going on. And it's not ever simply that we don't have enough time for Jesus, because the things that matter in our lives, you will always make time for. You decide how your time is spent. And the things that matter most, the things that you prioritize in your life, you will make sure that you have time for. And if we don't have enough time for Jesus, we need to do some soul searching. we don't have enough time for worship, if we don't have enough time to spend thinking about him, spending time with him, we need to do some soul-searching. So the gospel, Paul says, is proclaimed, it's preached, it's received, it's stood upon, it's held fast to, and if we don't do those things, it could be very well that we have believed in vain, that we haven't genuinely believed good news. So it's a warning. So he continues on, he says, I delivered to you as of first importance, and it's just a reminder that the Gospel is the most important thing. This isn't just a chronological thing, this is a theological thing. The thing that's more important than anything else is the Good News. Elements of the good news and we talked about in Sunday school that we can preach and proclaim the whole counsel of God But these are the very basic tenets and the core truths of the gospel that we can never lose sight of and it's four things these four clauses that begin with the word in English that I Delivered to you as a first importance what I also receive by the way. I heard it. I believe believed it and And then as an apostle, as a minister, I passed it along. But also there's application for us as Christians. If we have heard the gospel and believed and received the gospel, it should be part of who we are to pass it along to other people. We certainly don't keep the greatest news we've ever heard or the world could ever hear to ourselves or for ourselves. If you hear it and it resonates with you, It's it's it doesn't make sense not to just continue to pass it along So Paul passes it along As a minister as an apostle and it's these elements and these are the things that we want to make sure that we understand and believe that we've rested in Christ for our salvation that we believe these realities and that we can share them with others. There's four things that I said, these four clauses that start with the word that. 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, and that he appeared to Cephas or Peter and then to twelve and then to all these others that eventually leads into Paul talking about him appearing to him as the least of the apostles. So let's think about these things for a little bit of time, each of them. That, now this is the Gospel fulfilled, verses 3b and 4, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures. I think it's interesting that every culture, everybody has some sense of every religion, like, what do we do with death? Because it comes for all of us. It happens to every single one. And there's a sense in which it seems very natural because it comes for all of us. And you'll hear people say things like, well, you know, if you don't respect death, then you're not respecting life because death is a part of life. You hear kind of things like that. Death seems, on some level, to be natural because it happens for everybody. But it also seems extremely, incredibly unnatural. Because when people die around us, people we love and we know, it breaks us up inside because we scream out and we say, this is not right. We know on some fundamental level that there's something horribly wrong with it. And that's the reality. The Bible says that death is an intruder. Death is a foe. And it must be defeated, and it must be overcome. Some people want to live forever, right? You have these different people that want to find the magic pill or the secret recipe and live on forever in their current state. That's not the answer. The answer is not dying. The answer is resurrection. The only answer is resurrection. It's that we die and rise again. Because Christ died and rose again, and we're tied to him, united to him. And so notice, it doesn't just say that Jesus died. It says Christ died. And he's dying as the Messiah. And we remember that his first and last name are not Jesus Christ, right? It's not like, Hey, Timmy, can you come up here and say hi to Mr. Christ? And then Jesus bends down and goes, oh, he can call me. Is it OK if he calls me Jesus? No, we want him to call you Mr. Christ. It's not his first and last name. Jesus' name, Christ, is his title. And as Christ, as Messiah, he died. It was the role that God gave to him. Christ died for our sins. That's why he came. It wasn't a failed project. wasn't something that got out of hand it wasn't like he came and he was gonna overthrow Rome you know and then oops they were we miscalculated they were more powerful and then he ended up dying on the cross that was the plan all along in fact it says that not only did Christ die for our sins but it says he died for our sins according to scripture Another great Old Testament reading would have been Isaiah 53, where it makes that point over and over again, that we sinned, and Jesus paid. We went astray, and Jesus paid. Over and over again. Places like Psalm 22, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Goes on to talk about the holiness of God. He died for his people. All over the Old Testament scripture. In fact, when Jesus appeared on the road to Emmaus to his disciples, Luke 24, before they believed in resurrection, he started unpacking and unfolding all the stories in the scriptures concerning himself. That would have been a great Bible study to be a part of, by the way. And then when he disappeared from them, and went back to his disciples in Jerusalem, he said the same kinds of things and showed himself all over the Old Testament Scriptures, and the volume of the book is written of him. So he died, by the way, the language in the Greek, it makes it very plain and clear, he died once and for all. You know, when Lazarus died, Jesus came and raised him up. You know that story in John's Gospel. Lazarus dies, and his sisters Mary and Martha are there, and Jesus finally comes, And Jesus says, hey, he's going to rise again. And they said, we know he's going to rise again in the resurrection. And Jesus goes, no, he's going to rise right now. And Jesus calls him out of the tomb. Lazarus, come forth. And Lazarus came out. He rose up. They took the grave clothes off him, right? He's alive again. But Lazarus, and by the way, I don't know if he was really that happy about that, actually, coming from heaven back to earth. Probably not so happy about it. His family was happy. But however long Lazarus lived, he died again. He rose and then died again. But when Jesus dies, he dies once. And then when he is buried, he's buried once. And by the way, why did he die? I mean, why was he buried? Remember, going back to the Garden of Eden, in the day that you eat of it, you'll surely die. And then God made that promise. From the dust you are, from the dust thou art, to the dust thou shalt return. You came from the dust, you'll go back to the dust. You came out of the ground, you'll go back into the ground. He's fulfilling that imagery. Adam failed and failed. Jesus succeeds. He dies to death. We deserve to die. And then rose again, overcoming death. And so when he rises, he rises once and for all in this abiding state. raised never to die. What a glorious reality. Death could not hold him down. He quenched the wrath of God. He exhausted the curse of God. And that means all that's left for his people is God's blessing. God's blessing. He overcame and conquered that which was seemingly inconquerable. and then he ascended back to heaven. One commentator points out, and I think it's really a helpful reminder, look to Christ now and see your future. He lived a difficult life, brothers and sisters. He was a man of sorrows acquainted with grief. His life was difficult and hard. He faced much opposition, and after living a perfect life, never sinning in thought, word, or deed. His reward, in one sense, was what? Horrible beatings, terrible mockery, great shame being hung naked upon a cross, and horrific pain and agony as everyone looked on, and he sucked. He died. He was buried. But He rose again. And He's in glory. And He's in glory, and you in some way, shape, or form are connected to Him even now. And as difficult as this life is, friends, His resurrection should inform. His resurrection should give hope. through everything we go through. Because our suffering is temporary. Because our hardship is limited. And even in our suffering, in our hardship, in our difficulty, God is working all those things together for our good and his good. Look to him and see your future sitting exalted at the right hand of God. Sometimes life seems so long, sometimes it seems really brief, but it will not be that long until we are there with Him. Life is but a vapor, she would say. Glory is what comes. It's coming. And she would cry. Christ died. He was buried. He rose again, according the Scriptures, all these things were pre-calculated and pre-ordained. And so I think it's also important, as we move on to the third thing, and this will be brief, I just want to make a couple quick points here, as the Gospel is confirmed and verified. Sometimes there's this confusion, and people will say, you know, you guys are asking me to kind of believe the unbelievable. Kind of this blind faith, kind of step out and believe in something that there's no verifiable evidence that it actually took place. Actually, the resurrection of Jesus Christ is one of the most verifiable events in human history. Jesus rose from the dead, and then he just started appearing to people left and right. And so you see that here, verse 5, that he appeared to Cephas, that's Peter, then to the Twelve, then he appeared to more than 500 brethren, brothers at one time. Most are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then to James, his brother. Then to all the apostles, which the idea is a bigger group of those that were a part of his traveling party. And then last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to Neapolitans. I just think it's great, because a couple of thoughts, and for the sake of time, just to say that Peter Peter told Jesus that he wasn't gonna die, right? Like, Jesus announces that he's gonna die, and Peter rebukes him. And Jesus says, what? Get behind me, Satan. Like, this is the plan of God, and you're trying to stand in the way of the plan of God. And then, once he finally gets on board with that, Jesus tells him more stuff, and Peter says, you know what? I'll die with you, man. I'll never deny you. They all might. I never will. What did he do? Worst night of Jesus's life, he's going through trials, this, that, and the other, these horrible things that he's going through. And a little girl says, don't you know this guy over here? Peter starts calling down curses upon himself. I don't know this guy. I don't know this guy at all. he goes out and weeps bitterly this guy's broken because he was such a fail but if you turn to mark 16 when the ladies come to the tomb on resurrection Sunday morning and Jesus is not in the tomb and one of the angels is there and the angel says for women hey go tell the disciples and Peter Christ is risen So go single him out make sure Peter knows and This guy that had failed Jesus so dismal is restored by Jesus So wonderful so much so that on the day of Pentecost who preaches the gospel when three thousand are converted Peter does So much so that as you go to, that's Acts 2, Acts 3, you go to the temple courts and it says that 5,000 are converted. Who preaches that sermon? Peter does. And it just really speaks to the grace of God, to someone who actually receives it, stands upon it, and holds fast. And we see also with Paul here, and we're almost done, I just wanna wrap up and show you that theme once again. It doesn't matter where you've been. It doesn't matter what you've done. The grace of God is greater than all of our sins. But the question is, have you embraced, have you received, have you stood upon, have you held fast to gospel grace? And if you have, then it should look something like what happens with Paul. Look down with me at verse nine. There's a humility, for I am the least of the apostles. I'm unworthy to be called an apostle because I persecuted the Church of God. Remember that story in the book of Acts? He's on the road to Damascus to persecute Christians and arrest Christians and Jesus reveals himself from heaven and arrests Paul and he's blind for those days and he doesn't eat or drink and Jesus sends a disciple to him and gets him back on his feet again and he's converted. But he understands, I'm the least, I'm unworthy. But, verse 10, notice, by the grace of God, I am what I am. Like, he was holding coats in Acts 7, Paul was, when Stephen was stoned for his faith. He was consenting to death, he was consenting to go arrest Christians to foreign cities, but by the grace of God, Paul was what he was. And notice verse 10, God's grace toward Paul was not in vain. How do we know? How do we know His grace was not in vain? On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them. Though it was not I, but the grace of God that did it. You understand that people don't understand grace. When people say, yeah, I believe that, and nothing in their life changes. They continue to live selfish lives for themselves. But you understand and know that the grace of God has truly affected them when everything begins to change. And they begin to not only spend their time differently, but labor in the work of the Lord. Not his own labor, not in his own flesh, but by the grace of God, he was transformed. And you can go through the New Testament and see verse after verse after verse that talk about, by the grace of God, doing this, that, and the other. Working hard, laboring, serving, laying down our lives. And we don't do these different things to be saved, or even to stay saved. But it gives evidence to the fact that we have been saved. It gives evidence to the resurrection power of Jesus Christ. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. Whether then it was I or they, so we preach, and so you believe. By the grace of God, I am what I am. What are you? By God's grace. And what are you doing for His kingdom, for His glory? By His grace. It's worth remembering that you're here for a reason. As a Christian believer, as someone who's heard the gospel and responded, you're here to further his kingdom in the way that you spend your life. Your life is not your own, Paul says to the Corinthians. You've been bought with a price. Therefore, glorify God in your body, which is his. Now, if the gospel isn't true and Christ isn't raised, then go do whatever you want to do. Live however you want to live. It doesn't matter. Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die. Nothing ultimately matters. But if Christ is risen, and he is, then what you do matters. Then what you do has purpose, significance, and value, both now and throughout eternity. I love how this chapter ends. Sting of death is sin and the power of sin is a law but thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ therefore my beloved brothers be steadfast immovable and always abounding in the work of the Lord knowing That in the Lord your labor is not Weary Christian you can know That late your labor that your work is never in vain Self-righteous Christian, you need to remember that all you do is a gift of God's grace. Though the resurrection is not just a doctrine, it's the linchpin of our hope. It's the heartbeat of our faith. It is essential to Christianity. We do believe the gospel. Romans 10, 9, if we confess with our mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in our hearts that God raised him from the dead, we'll be saved. That's true, we do believe. But we don't just believe or even believe differently, we live differently by the grace of God. Jesus rose and one day you will rise too. So hold fast, stand firm, don't let go of the gospel because it's not just news, it's good news. It's the greatest news, and it's true. Father, thank you so much for the gospel. Thank you so much for the grace of God, the mercy of God that are ours in Christ. Thank you that you sent your son to live the perfect life and to die the sinner's death, that we might live forevermore in your presence. Oh, Lord, help us to work out our salvation, to labor for your glory, for the furtherance of your kingdom. We love you and praise you in Christ's name.