If you will remain standing and take your Bibles and go to the book of 1 Corinthians. 1 Corinthians chapter 15. 1 Corinthians chapter 15 verses 20 through 28 this morning. 1 Corinthians 15 verses 20 through 28. This is the word of the Lord. But in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead. the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order. Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For God has put all things in subjection under his feet. But when it says all things are put in subjection, it is plain that he is expected who put all things in subjection under him. When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him, who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all. This is God's word. Let us pray. Our Father in heaven, we thank you for this day and for the gift of your scripture and the gathering of your people. And now, Father, we ask that you stamp with your own seal of approval and blessing on the reading and the preaching of your infallible word. Amen. Please be seated. Dwight Lyman Moody, known as D.L. Moody, was born in Massachusetts in 1837, one of nine children. Moody's father died when he was four years old. He worked as a shoe salesman when he was 16. He was a hard worker and he had aspirations of becoming a wealthy businessman. When he was 18, two things happened to Moody that had a great impact on his life. He moved to Chicago. That would impact anybody, wouldn't it? He moved to Chicago and he became a Christian. Moody still had a goal of amassing a fortune, but little by little his Christian calling was supplanting his commercial ambition. He started by conducting Bible studies in Chicago's slums. By 1860, he was engaged in full-time ministry as an evangelist. He married and eventually had three children and served as the president of the Chicago YMCA for four years. And he began to travel outside of Chicago to the major cities in the United States and then to Europe, always with the same message, the Christian gospel. D.L. Moody was the pioneer of evangelistic campaigns that later in the 20th century would be popularized by Billy Graham. Moody maintained a tireless schedule for the rest of his life. One month before he died in 1899, D. L. Moody was preaching six sermons each day. Now, folks, we could not say that D. L. Moody was reformed in his theology, but he was a loyal soldier of the cross and he believed in the power of the resurrection. Near the end of his life, he said this. Someday you will read in the papers that D.L. Moody of East Northfield, Massachusetts is dead. Don't you believe a word of it. At that moment, I shall be more alive than I am right now. I shall have gone up higher. That is all. Gone out of this old clay tenement into a house that is immortal. A body that death cannot touch. that sin cannot taint, a body like unto Christ's own glorious body. We Christians will all get better bodies, and I am going to make something out of death and journey toward life from this time on. And away into eternity, beyond the grave, I will see life." He may not have been reformed, but D.L. Moody had an understanding. of belief in the power and the reality of the resurrection. And the resurrection, the bodily resurrection, is our subject again this morning. As you know, the entire 15th chapter of 1 Corinthians is dedicated to the doctrine, the ideals and the ethics of the resurrection. I want to recap the first 19 verses we've gone through so far in the last couple of weeks. The Apostle Paul has dedicated, as I said, this entire chapter, all 58 verses, to the subject of the resurrection of Jesus Christ and what that means for our resurrection. Two weeks ago, in verses 1 through 11, Paul set the stage for us by relating the basics of the gospel message that he preached wherever he went, and that included the church in Corinth. It is the gospel which they received, in which they stand, and by which they are being saved, if they hold fast to the message that he preached to them. For he had delivered to them what was of first importance, that he also received. that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures. And that then Jesus appeared to Cephas, James, and all the apostles, and then to more than 500 brothers at one time, most of whom were still alive at that time, just in case you wanted to go and verify. And then lastly, he appeared to Paul. And then last Sunday in verses 12 through 20, Paul challenges the notion in the Corinthian church that some had been promoting that there was no resurrection, certainly no bodily resurrection. And if such a teaching were true, we Christians would be in really sad shape. But since Christ was bodily resurrected and his resurrection was witnessed by hundreds of people, The resurrection is true. Not only that, but the resurrection ensures our regeneration, as we saw, and our justification, and that we will receive perfect resurrection bodies. And Jesus has gone before the dead and the living as the first fruits of the harvest at the end of the age. And so we pick up in our passage for today, and I begin in verse 20. We talked about verse 20 quite a bit last week. I want to talk a little bit more about it briefly and recover some of the things we mentioned. Paul references the book of Leviticus to make this point, and the reason I labor this is because it's so very important. He looks at Leviticus to make this point, and he speaks of the annual rites of the first fruits. which occurred one week after Passover, the ceremony went like this. A representative sheaf of the first grain to be harvested was to be brought to the priest for him to wave it before the Lord so that the people might be accepted. This was called the wave offering, a presentation of the first fruits. Four weeks later an offering of the new grain was to be presented. This was a token of the harvest that was to come and thanksgiving to the Lord for his faithfulness in providing another year's crop. Paul is making the comparison that in the resurrection of Christ is the first fruits of the resurrection of all of his redeemed people. Those who have died, those who were alive, and those who were yet to come. The first ritual was a celebration and a guarantee of the full harvest yet to come and was an expression of the faithfulness of God to all the believers. And by the way, this just happens to be the last mention of Christ's resurrection in chapter 15, though there's much more that follows, considering the resurrection of the believers. So let's look at verses 21 to 23. Here's what it says. For as by a man came death, by a man has also come the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, than at his coming those who belong to Christ. Adam and Jesus are without question the most important and consequential human beings in the history of humanity. Adam is the first man, a man who had libertarian free will, meaning that as the first human representing the race, the race, the human race that is, he had the freedom to sin, and the freedom not to sin. And he's the only one, he and Eve, that had such an opportunity. And how did they do? They blew it. Adam was also this representative of us, of all of humanity. What he did and the choices he would make would profoundly affect the human race. For now, the human race would be infected with a sin nature. A sin nature that would be in constant rebellion against God. And the price to be paid for sin would be death. All of humanity would have to pay the price. That is, every human except for one, the Lord Jesus Christ. Only a man who was sinless and so not subject to the penalty of sin would be able to deal with the problem of sin's curse. If there is to be life out of death and beyond the grave, then it must be that, as verse 21 says, by a man who has come also the resurrection from the dead. In verse 22, it spells out the logic Paul used to explain the situation. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. Now the two categories of human being in this verse must be carefully distinguished. Every human being is in Adam and therefore subject to death. Let me say that again. Every human being is in Adam and therefore subject to death. This is the gravity. of the first sin. But it only is for those in Christ to have life. Now, if you were doing some sort of Venn diagram, you'd have a big circle and the big circle would say in Adam. And then within that big circle, there'd be a smaller circle and it would say what? In Christ. These people have been transformed. They not only have moved from a big circle to a little circle, everything has changed. Paul is not speaking here of the general resurrection of the dead at the final judgment, the day of the Lord, when every individual will appear before God. That is an awesome reality, but all who are in Christ will not be subject to God's condemnation on that final day. As John 5.24 says, they have already passed from death to life through faith in Christ and therefore share in all the benefits of being united to him, including the eternal life of the resurrection. And so the inevitable death curse initiated by Adam's rebellion and carried on by our own rebellion in sin is now reversed. And it is replaced by the inevitability of the eternal life through Christ's perfect, active, and passive obedience. Verse 23 says, But each in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, Then at his coming, those who belong to Christ. Here, Paul reminds his Corinthian readers that this is a process, a process that has certainly begun in the resurrection of Jesus and is proceeding as planned in the heavenly places, but is by no means complete. It is not yet time for Christians to receive their resurrection bodies. Christ the first fruits has started the process and nothing will undo that. But it's fulfillment in resurrection will be for those who belong to Christ and then only at his coming. Not all the details are given to us here in this passage. But in Paul's earlier letter to the Thessalonians, the timing is made very clear. At his second coming, Christ will bring with him those who have fallen asleep, and they will be reunited with their resurrection bodies, since the dead in Christ will arise first. Those believers still alive on earth will then be transformed and caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. This is the moment when the church in heaven and the church on earth will be given their resurrection bodies and raised with Christ. Now, look, at this point, I understand that many of you have different views of the millennium and the way all of this will be done and a number of things at the end times. And that's OK, because this is not a first tier doctrine. And scripture doesn't teach dogmatically which one of those views carries more weight than any other. We're working with what we have. So there should be no reason for any sort of division within this church body or any other for that matter. About what's right and what's not. It's not a critical doctrine. It's an interesting doctrine. We need to think about it and discuss it, but we should never divide over it. All right. We know what we know, and that's all that we know. To verses 24 and 26, then comes the end when he delivers the kingdom to God, the father, after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. With Christ's people resurrected and secure in his presence, Jesus is revealed and crowned as the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, and establishing his power to reign in sovereign authority forever. This is described in verse 24. And it's described as destroying every rule and every authority and power. And by this, Paul means that the Lord Jesus absolutely and completely dominates all the powers, human and spiritual, which are hostile to God's rule and opposed to his sovereignty. Every opposition to Christ's total rule is to be destroyed, because as verse 25 says, he must reign until he has put all enemies under his feet. This is a reference to Psalm 110, verse 1, in which the Lord God promises his anointed ones, the Messiah, that is, total sovereignty and victory over all his foes. Verse 26 tells us that the last enemy to be destroyed is death. This is so because death continues throughout history until Christ appears at his second coming. And at that moment, death itself will be destroyed. Then the first fruits will culminate in the complete harvest of all of his people who have been raised in their resurrection bodies to live eternally in the heavenly kingdom. When death is destroyed, then life has no further enemies, and nothing else exists that can hinder God's eternal plan for complete fulfillment. Time will be made complete, and God's great plan will reach its culmination. This is what Paul means in Ephesians 1, verses 9 and 10. when it says that the Father was making known to us the mystery of his will according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. Another pertinent Old Testament promise as was read this morning is Psalm 8 verse 6. You have given him dominion over the works of your hands. You have put all things under his feet. In context, this refers to man. And in its fulfillment, it refers to what is known as the proper man, Jesus Christ, who assumes that role and regains any lost authority. Now, the last two verses in this section, because we're an expository church, we're going to read them. But boy, are they confusing unless you slow down and are careful. The he's in the hymns. These personal pronouns have a tough way of jumbling things up. So I'm going to read the verses, the two verses and with parentheses, whether it's the father or the son. OK. I'm not inserting anything in scripture. I'm trying to make it clear. OK, verses 27 through 28. This is what it says. For God has put all things in subjection under his feet. But when it says all things are put in subjection, it is plain that he, the father. Is accepted. Who put all things in subjection under him, the son. In other words, the father is not subjected to the son. When all things are subjected to him, the father, then the son himself will also be subjected to him, the father, who put all things in subjection under him, the son, that God may be all in all. I hope that makes some sense to you. I certainly had to stop and go back through there several times to make sure. That's what I think the text is saying. Within this passage, the final victory over all the hostile powers and the establishment of God's eternal rule is being attributed to both the Father and the Son. Jesus destroys all enemies, but the Father puts all things under his feet. Now, we should not see this as any division of the Trinity. or to suggest that one person of the Godhead is superior or subordinate to another person of the Godhead. We have said many times from this pulpit, as rooted and substantiated in scripture, that the three divine persons of the Triune God are each fully equal in nature and being. There is, however, in fact, a differentiation of function or role among the three in the accomplishment of God's salvation plan. And with that plan complete, the kingdom will then have come in all of its fullness so that the son will be able to present to the father his finished work, the great completed task. At this point, as verse 28 says, the son himself will also be subjected to him, the father, who put all things in subjection under him, the son, that God may be all in all. This is the end point, isn't it? The end of all things like this, that God may be all in all. We may not be able to fathom completely what this means, that God may be all in all. There's a bit of mystery here. But it is safe to say that there will be no place in all of creation where God's will is anything other than totally sovereign. The result will be perfect unity, perfect unity of the Divine Trinity expressed by their sovereign rule of love over a perfectly united resurrected people in a new heavens and in a new earth. Now, by way of application of this, I want to pass on to you just some almost random thoughts, but ones that sprung up during this past week's preparation. The first one is this. I love the powerful words of Jesus. So direct and so penetrating, so consequential and so unique. His words about his own resurrection and that of his elect are remarkable. One day, as related in the seventh chapter of John's gospel account, the Jewish leaders were seeking to arrest him. So they sent a cohort of officers and soldiers from the Temple Guard to bring Jesus in for questioning. Probably more than questioning, but they'll start with the questions. But later, this cohort returned empty-handed. We pick up the scene beginning in John 7, verse 37. It says this, On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive. For as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified." When they heard these words, some of the people said, this really is the prophet. Others said, this is the Christ. But some said, is the Christ to come from Galilee? Has not the scripture said that the Christ comes from the offspring of David and comes from Bethlehem, the village where David was? So there was a division among the people over him. Some of them wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him. The officers then came to the chief priest and the Pharisees who said to them, Why did you not bring him? And this is just as honest an answer as could ever be given. The officers answered, no one ever spoke like this man. And Jesus spoke directly about his own resurrection, didn't he? And the resurrection of the believers. In John 2, he makes an incredible statement. Beginning in John 2, 13, here's the way it goes. The Passover of the Jews was at hand and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple, he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons and the money changer sitting there and making a whip of cords. He drove them all out of the temple with the sheep and the oxen, and he poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. And he told those who sold the pigeons, take these things away. Do not make my father's house a house of trade." His disciples remembered that it was written, zeal for your house will consume me. So the Jews said to him, what sign do you show us for doing these things? And Jesus answered them, destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up. And the Jews then said, it has taken 46 years to build this temple. And will you raise it up in three days? But he was speaking about the temple of his body. When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken. And then another instance in Matthew 22, Jesus speaks about the resurrection. Beginning in verse 23, it says this. The same day Sadducees came to him. The Sadducees who say that there is no resurrection. Remember, this is the great division between the Pharisees and the Sadducees. Sadducees reject many things that the Pharisees are teaching. One of those is the resurrection of the dead. And they asked him a question, saying, Teacher, Moses says, if a man man dies having no children his brother must marry the widow and raise up offspring for his brother now there were seven brothers among us the first married and died and having no offspring left his wife to his brother so to the second third and all the way down to the seventh after them all the woman died in the resurrection which they don't believe in in the resurrection therefore of the seven Whose wife will she be? For they all had her. But Jesus answered them, you are wrong. You are quite wrong. The original text says, you're quite wrong because you know neither the scriptures nor the power of God. For in the resurrection, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. And as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was said to you by God? I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. And when the crowd heard it, they were astonished at his teaching. And we all ought to be we ought to be established and astonished in Jesus's words. Sometimes I think we take things far too casually with all this reference material and all these access nodes that we have to scripture. It's too easy sometimes, isn't it? No one ever spoke like he did this side of heaven. That is the new heavens and the new earth. The second item I want to bring to your attention this morning is a comment made by Dr. Gordon Fee. Now, I think Dr. Gordon Fee is one of the best commentators of New Testament scripture there is. He is a professor of New Testament studies at Regents College in Vancouver, British Columbia. But many people don't really take him seriously because he happens to be a member of the Assemblies of God. And because of that, he gets a little audience to his work. But he says some wonderful things and explains scripture quite well. Here's what he says about the 15th chapter of First Corinthians. This 15th chapter is one of the great passages of the New Testament, not only in terms of Paul's own argumentation, but especially in terms of the great significance it gives to Easter. Just out of nowhere, here we are, past Easter, a couple of three months, and I want to bring it up again. And Dr. Fee helped me do it. It says, it is therefore unfortunate that at times this powerful demonstration of the certainty of our own resurrection is overlooked in favor of an apologetic of trying to prove the resurrection to unbelievers. In other words, we miss our focus. Our focus is not on ourselves and what Christ has done for us. It's for sharing the message. It's not wrong to share the message, but that should not be the focus necessarily. It's to bring glory to God, isn't it? That's the first thing we're obligated to do as believers. First of all, he says that it is not what Paul is trying to do, to talk to unbelievers. What he is going for him is the common ground of their common faith in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. There is a place for apologetics, that is, the defense of Christianity to the unconverted. But Easter is not that place. Easter, which should be celebrated more frequently in the church, and not just at Easter season, calls for our reaffirming the faith to the converted family of believers. The resurrection of Christ has determined our existence for all time and eternity. We do not merely live out our length of days and then have the hope of resurrection as an addendum. Rather, as Paul makes plain in this passage, Christ's resurrection has set in motion a chain of inexorable events that absolutely determines our present and our future. Christ is the firstfruits of those who are his, who will be raised at his coming. That ought both to reform the way we currently live and reshape our worship into seasons of unbridled rejoicing. Good counsel indeed for us and from a great study of the scriptures. Let me say this, when man was made by God, And he placed him and the woman in the garden. He made them both to be perfect, righteous, good and subservient. But they both rebelled. And at this great fall, this supreme creature of God, the height of his creation, along with the rest of creation, they were corrupted and ruined. But the new men and women that God creates through his Son, like you and me and all of the redeemed, will never be corrupted or ruined. They will be raised up to live and reign forever in his eternal kingdom with his eternal Son. Now I want to conclude by referring to a couple of things from the past. I can't help but going back. One of the oldest books in the Bible, Some people say the oldest is the book of Job. And it addresses the ultimate resurrection, whether you know it or not. I found this to be fascinating, Job chapter 19, you got to write this down, Job chapter 19, verses 23 through 27. Here's what Job says after the counsel of his friends. Oh, that my words were written! Oh, that they were inscribed in a book! Oh, that with an iron pen and lead they were engraved in the rock forever! For I know that my Redeemer lives, and 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, and not another." That is an amazing statement made by Job so many thousands of years ago. He says that in his physical body, though it be destroyed, and yet in his fleshly body that he has, he himself will see God. It's amazing, but it is completely consistent with what Paul has been trying to explain to the Corinthian church. I conclude with a part of a eulogy preached at a funeral by a Puritan some 400 years ago. Here's what he said. Thou art gone to the grave, but we will not deplore thee. Through sorrow and darkness encompass the tomb. Thy Savior has passed through its portals before thee. And the lamp of his love is thy guide through the gloom. Thou art gone to the grave. We no longer behold thee, nor tread the rough paths of the world by thy side. But the wide arms of mercy are spread to enfold thee. The sinners may go since the sinless has died. Let's pray. Our Lord and our God, you have honored us by calling us through the proclamation of the gospel, not by human wisdom or reasoning, but by your consummate power. Remind us that all that we are and will be is tied to the reality and truth of the crucified and resurrected Christ, the first fruits of our own resurrection. Help us to run our race that is set before us. that we might somehow be able to claim the prize that is imperishable, our resurrection from the dead. We ask that you make us more like Jesus. Give us courage for what comes our way and mold us and make us into the people and the church that you intend us to be. Be our sword and our shield in the authority of Christ we pray. Amen.