“The Resurrection: Fact or Fiction” (1 Corinthians 15:1-11) Easter Sunrise—Series A ‘11
1. Sanctify us by the Truth, O Lord, Your Word is Truth. In the name of our crucified and risen Lord and Savior Jesus. Christ is risen! He’s risen indeed! Alleluia! Buying us back from sin, death, and the devil was a costly process, a painful process for God's innocent Son. So that we might be saved, Jesus Christ was sacrificed; so we might be forgiven, He was declared guilty; so we might live, He was murdered. There were no shortcuts to this blood-bought gift which God holds out to you today. Dear Lord, grant this Gift be received by us all. Amen. The message from God’s Word this glorious Day of our Lord’s Resurrection from the dead is taken from 1 Cor. 15:1-11 and is entitled, “The Resurrection: Fact or Fiction,” dear brothers and sisters in Christ.
2. Betsy Childs’ great-grandmother never believed that man had landed on the moon. She thought the whole thing was a hoax perpetrated by the U.S. government. She’d lived through more technological advances in her lifetime than Betsy had ever hope to see (electric lights, telephones, automobiles, airplanes, television). No doubt that there’s a limit to how much a person's idea of the world can adapt. Betsy’s great-grandmother simply didn't have a mental category for "moon landing," so while the rest of the country cheered at the "giant leap for mankind," she shook her head and went about her day's work.
3. I suppose to someone who’d never taken a physics class, who never went up in an airplane, the idea that a whole country could get taken in by such a hoax would be more believable than to believe that man had--by some sort of magic--made it to the moon. But sustaining such a complex hoax would surely have been as incredible as a moon landing, considering the number of people involved and the U.S.'s very real adversary, the Soviet Union. There is no question that if anything about the Apollo 11 mission had seemed suspicious; the Soviets would have quickly rooted out the truth.
4. Adversaries are notoriously effective at uncovering hidden truths. We see this all the time in the political world; if a person running for office has any secrets, they are sure to come out. Jesus and his followers didn’t suffer from lack of opposition. Prior to his death, the Pharisees opposed him because he clearly had great power, yet chose to associate with those who were unclean. The Romans distrusted him because they were always wary of those who might try to rise up against them. After Jesus's death, another Jewish group called the Sadducees actively opposed his followers, because the Sadducees' theology was built around a disbelief in resurrection, and the word on the street was that Jesus had risen from the dead.
5. You can rest assured that these groups were unsettled by the many people claiming that they had seen the risen Jesus. But, it wasn’t just a handful of disciples that made the claim. The Apostle Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 these words about our risen Lord, “1Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, 2and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. 3For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, 5and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. 6Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. 7Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. 8Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. 9For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10But 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. 11Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.”
6. Did you notice how the Apostle Paul says in our text that at one point Jesus appeared to over 500 people at one time (1 Corinthians 15:6). If a person were perpetrating a hoax, it would be difficult to get so many to agree upon a story and stick with it, especially once they began to be persecuted for it.
7. The Apostle Paul wrote 1 Corinthians 15, which is the most detailed account of our Lord’s resurrection from the dead, about 20 years after the resurrection. It’s here that we encounter the apostolic proclamation, based on the experiences of the apostles during the 40 days when Jesus appeared to them and spoke about the kingdom of God. Here in this chapter the Apostle Paul begins with a reminder of what he calls the main point of Christianity—that Jesus died, was buried, and rose again on the third day. He mentions the most important appearances very briefly: to Peter, then to His disciples. Then he mentions an appearance before more than 500 brothers at once, possibly an appearance in Galilee that Matthew mentions but isn’t described anywhere else. He further mentions an appearance to James, the brother of Jesus, who once wasn’t a believer but became one of the leaders of the Early Church. And finally Paul adds “all the apostles). This is clearly a reference to the appearance one week after the resurrection that John speaks about.
8. All this Paul says that he received, which was a standard term for a fixed learning tradition, something was taught in elementary instruction. This might explain why he’s so brief. After this Paul declares that the resurrection is beyond all doubt. There were people in Corinth who said there wasn’t a resurrection. But Paul answers that because Christ has risen, there is a resurrection. Christ is the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. And that He has risen is beyond all doubt.
9. Paul doesn’t hesitate to list all the horrible consequences of a mistake on this point. If Christ hasn’t risen, then Paul’s witness is a false witness and he has borne false witness against God. In fact, Paul says that if Jesus hasn’t been raised from the dead, he and his fellow Christians are the most wretched of all creatures. And then all of humanity remains in its sin and has only one justifiable sentence to expect. That we still remain dead in our transgressions and sins and are damned to eternal death and damnation in hell. Many people would hardly dare to think such thoughts. But, the Apostle Paul wants to address them openly, without beating around the bush. He wants to show us that the resurrection of our Lord Jesus is a fact that we can stake our lives on.
10. Remember that the Apostle Paul was once a doubter, denier and persecutor of the Christian church. He was a Pharisee of Pharisees. But, now he can say as the other apostles said, “This Jesus God raised up, and of that we are all witnesses.” Or as the Apostle Peter said before the Jewish Council, “We cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard” in Acts 4:20.
11. It’s true that when some event comes along that does not fit neatly into any of our mental categories; it is natural for us to suspect that it isn’t real. But it is also reasonable to suspect that the mental categories we already have are not exhaustive; perhaps there is something new under the sun. Betsy Child’s great-grandmother could have chosen to believe that the whole world had fallen for a hoax, or she could have adjusted her thinking to include space travel in the realm of the possible.
12. Those confronted with the claim that Jesus had risen from the dead were faced with a choice. They could believe that this was an elaborate hoax, or they could adjust their thinking to the idea that resurrection might be possible. Thousands chose the latter option, and they became so convinced that Jesus had risen that they willingly went to their deaths for the belief.
13. You may not have a category for the supernatural. If not, take a moment to ask yourself why you rule out the possibility of the supernatural and how you can be so sure that it doesn't exist. It could be that the Christian faith is based on an elaborate hoax; or it could be that, in a world where a man can overcome the pull of gravity and walk on the moon, people actually do rise from the dead. And since we believe our Lord Jesus did rise from the dead, well that my friends changes everything. For we too will pass from death to everlasting life. The resurrection is a fact that changes everything for us. Amen.
14. Please pray with me. Dear Lord Jesus, you are the first fruits of those who fell asleep, the first God raised from the dead. You are the first flower on the tree of a new life. And you have made us shoots on that tree so we, too, will blossom like You. It was for our sake that You went from death to life. You didn’t have to do it; You already had eternal life. You lived with Your Father in boundless joy. Yet You became man, suffered and died to obtain a life that You could give to us. When I finally fall asleep in death, I will know that You are my Brother, who also died a physical death, and You shall lead me on the same path You took from death to life. I thank You because I, too, can be present in the multitude where You are the firstfruits among many. Amen.
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