“Cross Currents: Who’s the Biggest Loser?”
1Cor. 15:1-8, 20-28
Most of us do not think of losing as a good thing. Losing is the last thing we want to do. Just ask the 62 teams who are no longer in the NCAA tournament. Yet sometimes losing can be good. One of the popular reality series on television in recent years focuses on the biggest loser; it helps people who have become extremely overweight lose weight – and then celebrates who loses the most weight. On that show being the biggest loser is being the biggest winner. With this backdrop, as I read the Resurrection passages I wondered “Who’s the biggest loser because of Easter?” And is it a title worth celebrating or not?
In 1st Corinthians 15 Paul introduces us to the first big loser. (3) “For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures…” At his death Jesus DUMPED OUR SIN. Isaiah had prophesied (53:3-6 NLT) “He was despised and rejected— a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief… But he was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins. He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed. All of us, like sheep, have strayed away. We have left God’s paths to follow our own. Yet the LORD laid on him the sins of us all.” Peter put it this way (1 Pt. 2:24) “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree…” Paul added that Jesus not only bore and carried our sins but (2 Cor. 5:21) “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us…” Is it any wonder Jesus spent time in agony in Gethsemane? He was facing not only the torture of crucifixion but also of becoming sin. JESUS TOOK INTO HIMSELF EVERY SIN ever committed up to that point, and every sin committed since that time. We cannot even imagine the weight burden. Jesus became the repository for all the garbage of our lives.
So, as believers, we are big losers – we have lost all our sin and guilt. In Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, the main character Christian follows the road to the foot of the cross. Bunyan wrote, “So I saw in my dream, that just as Christian came up to the Cross, his burden loosed from off his shoulders, and fell from off his back and began to tumble, and so continued to do till it came to the mouth of the sepulcher, where it fell in, and I saw it no more.” So after His death Jesus went to the great abyss of hell, took all our sins off from Himself and DUMPED THEM INTO THE DEPTHS, never to be seen again. He looked up and proclaimed, “Your sins are forgiven. You have been washed in the blood of the Lamb. You are clean.”
Remember what happened when the women went to anoint Jesus’ body? The angel told them to “Go, tell His disciples and Peter, He is going ahead of you into Galilee.” Why single out Peter? Because Jesus knew that the impetuous Peter was still beating himself up for denying he knew Jesus, still aching over abandoning Jesus at the most crucial hour of his life. Jesus knew that Peter might not dare meet with him because of his guilt - and Jesus wanted to restore him. So Jesus made sure he had a special invitation to experience grace and forgiveness. And Jesus extends the same invitation to you today. No matter what your sins, no matter how heavy the guilt, you are forgiven. Listen to the promises of God from his Word. (Ps. 103:8-13) “The Lord is compassionate and merciful, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love. He will not constantly accuse us nor remain angry forever. He does not punish us for all our sins; he does not deal harshly with us, as we deserve. For his unfailing love toward those who fear him is as great as the height of the heavens above the earth. He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west.” (Is. 1:18) “…though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be like snow; thought they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.” (Is. 44:22) “I have swept away your transgression like a cloud, and your sins like mist.” (Rom. 8:1) “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Col. 2:13-14) “God made you alive together with Christ, when he forgave us all our trespasses, erasing the record that stood against us…He set this aside, nailing it to the cross.” (1Jn. 1:7) “…the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin.”
No matter what your sins, no matter how heavy the guilt, you are forgiven. You are a big loser! Take comfort in the assurance that even those things that are hidden from memory, or are too deep for your words, are not beyond God’s forgiving love. In the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus you are assured that there is no sin so terrible that God cannot forgive. Even if, as Paul wrote, you do the very things you do not want to do and do not do the things you want to do, GOD ACCEPTS, GOD FORGIVES, AND GOD SETS FREE. So hear the good news of Jesus from the very abyss of hell: “While you were still a sinner, I died for you. You are forgiven.” Because of Easter believers are big losers.
Paul introduces a second loser in verse 4-5: “…that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 5 and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve…” Jesus moved from the abyss and went straight to the very gates of hell where he DECLARED HIS VICTORY. Jesus’ whole life pointed to his moment. The Psalmist, in Ps. 107: 15-16, prophesied, “Let them give thanks to the Lord for his unfailing love and his wonderful deeds for men, for he breaks down gates of bronze and cuts through bars of iron.” Jesus, while on earth, declared (Mt. 16:18) “And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell will not prove stronger than it.” John, in his Spirit-filled vision of the end of times (Rev. 1:18) heard Jesus proclaim “I am the Living One; I was dead, and behold I am alive for ever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and Hades.” JESUS HAS ABSOLUTE CONTROL AND AUTHORITY OVER THE DOMAINS OF HEAVEN AND HELL. (1Jn. 3:8) “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work.” Satan is a big loser.
So Jesus marched straight to the gates of hell, not with a cross on His back but with a scepter in His hand, and, like a herald, shouted out, “Satan, you gave it your best shot! And I took it! And here I am. You’re done, finished, through. You’ll win a few more skirmishes but I have overcome. You cannot win I have the keys to your house!” He did not preach, “Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand.” He did not plead, “I have laid down my life for you.” Rather He appeared as King and said, “THE KINGDOMS OF THIS WORLD HAVE BECOME THE KINGDOMS OF OUR GOD, AND OF HIS CHRIST, AND I SHALL REIGN FOREVER!”
Julian ascended the throne as Caesar in 360. He was the nephew of Constantine who had “Christianized” the Roman world. But he was not a Christian and in fact persecuted them. Yet he appointed a dear Friend, Agaton, who was a Christian, to serve in his court. He frequently teased Agaton in public. One day, in front of a large crowd, he queried, “Agaton, how is your carpenter of Nazareth? Is he finding work these days?” Agaton smiled and answered, “He is perhaps taking time away from building mansions for the faithful to build a coffin for your Empire.” Less than two years later Julian lay dying with an arrow in his chest. Grasping a handful of dust, red with his own blood, he flung the dirt heavenward, uttering his last words, “You have conquered Galilean.”
The day is coming when (Phil 2:10-11) “…at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” In the meantime, because of the Holy Spirit, GREATER IS HE THAT IS IN US THAN HE THAT IS IN THE WORLD. Satan cannot beat you or overcome you. You share in the victory of Jesus. When confronted with evil, when Satan attacks, you
can shout, as the cheerleaders did when I was in high school, “Victory, victory is our cry - V-I-C-T-O-R-Y.” As Martin Luther penned in his great hymn A Mighty Fortress, "And though this world, with devils filled, should threaten to undo us, we will not fear, for God has willed His truth to triumph through us, the Prince of darkness grim, we tremble not for him, his rage we can endure, for lo, below, his doom is sure. One little word shall fell him." That word is ‘Jesus.’ Because of Easter, Satan is a big loser.
In verses 20-21 Paul mentions another loser: “But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man.” When Jesus left the gates of hell, He rose up, and walked right out of the tomb of death and announced that He had DELIVERED OUR LIVES. Death was now a big loser! The fear, sting, and pain of death, at some time or other, grip each of us. That’s why Hebrews 2:14-15 (NLT) reminds us “Because God’s children are human beings—made of flesh and blood—the Son also became flesh and blood. For only as a human being could he die, and only by dying could he break the power of the devil, who had the power of death. Only in this way could he set free all who have lived their lives as slaves to the fear of dying.” JESUS DELIVERED US FROM DEATH. Andrew Kuyvenhoven paints the glorious truth in these words: “‘You must not worry about going into that place,’ (Jesus) says. ‘I was there, and I came back. And I have the key. That place is in my power…I am alive, and you are mine. And I won’t let you out of my sight…’(So) DEATH HAS NO FINAL SAY-SO OVER US. The last power we’ll meet is not death but Christ.” In Paul’s words (Rom. 8:37-39), “…despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Death has lost.
When he wrote the Corinthian Church Paul said that Jesus rose as the first fruits of those who have died. The farmer offered his first fruits to God, knowing that God would produce many more. Therefore, Paul assures us that SINCE JESUS HAS RISEN, SO SHALL WE. We sang it earlier: “Soar we now where Christ has led, Following our exalted Head, Made like Him, like Him we rise, Ours the cross, the grave, the skies, Alleluia!”
So death is not the end – it is but a highway to life forever in the presence of God, with all those who have gone before. It is the entry into the new Paradise, where there is no sorrow, no dying, and no pain anymore. In the seventh of his famous Chronicles of Narnia, entitled The Last Battle, C. S. Lewis has Aslan, the great Christ figure, speak these words of certainty concerning eternal life in Jesus Christ: “…you are –as you used to call it in the Shadow-Lands – dead. The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream is ended: this is the morning.” Then the narrator closes the Chronicles with this observation: “…the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page; now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story, which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.” “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” But thank God! He gives us victory over sin and death through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1Cor. 15:55, 57 NLT)
Jesus announced that He had not only delivered us from death but that in its place He has given us life. (22) “But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.” WE CAN LIVE WITH FREEDOM AND POWER NOW It’s great news that we have life after death. However, that’s not all. We have new life now! As you leave here today, the comforting thought is that you will live forever with Jesus. Nevertheless, the empowering news is that you can live with freedom and power now. To the Romans Paul explained it this way(Rom 6:4-7, 7:6, 8:9-11 MSG): “Our old way of life was nailed to the cross with Christ, a decisive end to that sin-miserable life—no longer at sin's every beck and call! … If we get included in Christ's sin-conquering death, we also get included in his life-saving resurrection. … When Jesus died, he took sin down with him, but alive he brings God down to us. From now on, think of it this way: Sin speaks a dead language that means nothing to you; God speaks your mother tongue, and you hang on every word. You are dead to sin and alive to God. That's what Jesus did.”“…now … we're free to live a new life in the freedom of God. It stands to reason, doesn't it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he'll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus, bringing you alive to himself? When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ's!” Death has lost its sting and power. Death is a mighty big loser.
So we can live by a power greater than that of Satan, sin, and death. Paul prayed that the Ephesian Christians (1:20) would come to know the “incomparably great power…That power is like the working of (God’s) mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead…” THE POWER THAT RAISED JESUS FROM THE DEAD IS WITHIN YOU! Later Paul exclaimed (3:20) “Now unto him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us…” Just think what God can do through you! In fact, what can He not do through you? You can make every day an Easter day. Live in the power of the risen Lord Jesus Christ.
So who’s the biggest loser? Believers lost their sin and guilt – and celebrate. Their loss is a win! Satan lost his power and kingdom – and though he stills fights he is not celebrating. He cannot win. Death has lost its sting and power – and though it still threatens us, it cannot win. I believe the biggest loser, however, is none of these. The biggest losers are persons who refuse to believe in the living, reigning Lord Jesus Christ – for they are losing life without salvation and life in Jesus Christ. There is no greater loss than that. The truth of Easter is that Jesus has dumped our sins, won the victory over Satan’s power and influence, and has delivered us from death to new life. The choice is yours – you choose what you will lose. Choose to believe in Jesus and lose your guilt, lose Satan’s power over your life, and lose the sting of death – and receive new life. Or choose not to believe in Jesus and lose forgiveness for your sin, lose freedom from Satan’s power, and lose release from death. Which kind of big loser do you choose to be?
