The Verdict: He Is Risen!
I Corinthians 15:1-10
Preached by Pastor Tony Miano
Pico Canyon Community Church
April 15, 2001
Easter Sunday Message
Introduction: I love the last song we sang together—“My Redeemer Lives.” I not only sing that song. I believe that song. I know that my Redeemer, Jesus Christ, lives today. I know in the end He will stand on the earth. I know in the end He will reign on the earth and for all eternity. And I know, as sure as I see you sitting before me, that I will one day see Him face to face. I know that my Redeemer lives.
There may be some of you here this morning that hear me say these things, and wonder, “How does he know? He’s never seen Jesus. Boy, I hope I haven’t visited a church where the pastor claims to have seen Jesus. And, whether or not he’s sure that Jesus lives today, why should I believe? What difference does it make in my life?” Well, let me assure you of two things. No, I’ve never actually seen Jesus. And, as you’ll see this morning, Whether or not you believe in the resurrection of Christ makes all of the difference in your life and your future.
Strong words, I know. Now, let’s see if I can back them up. Go ahead and turn in your Bibles to I Corinthians 15. The first ten verses will be the basis of our study this morning.
The central doctrine, the cornerstone of the Christian faith, is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. So essential to genuine Christian faith is the resurrection of Jesus Christ that “without the resurrection salvation could not have been provided, and without belief in the resurrection salvation cannot be received” (MacArthur, p. 398). Paul wrote these words to the church in Rome. “If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved” (Romans 10:9).
Jesus Himself taught that belief in His resurrection was a key ingredient to an authentic faith. “Jesus said, I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies” (John 11:25). In order for a person to be assured of eternal life, or in order for a person to claim to be a Christian with any voracity, they must believe that Jesus rose from the grave. Without this foundational belief, without believing that Jesus was raised from the dead and sits enthroned in heaven, then how can we believe that we will one day be with Him?
Over the last few weeks, for those of you who haven’t been with us, we’ve been studying the section of the Book of James that talks about the differences and relationships between faith and good works. In doing so, we discovered that James presents his teaching much the same way we might see a court trial unfold.
Well, we have a similar presentation here in I Corinthians 15. In the first eleven verses of this chapter, a chapter that is known as the most definitive in the entire Bible regarding the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the apostle Paul presents a series of facts in support of his case that the Redeemer lives.
In making his case for the validity of Christ’s resurrection, Paul presents physical evidence (vv. 1-2), a written statement (vv. 3-4), eyewitness testimony (vv. 5-7), and a star witness (vv. 8-10).
The Physical Evidence
When I worked as a gang investigator at the Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station, we loved to gather physical evidence. Gang cases were difficult to prosecute because most of the witnesses were usually gang members themselves and didn’t always make for reliable courtroom testimony, if you could convince them to testify in the first place. Physical evidence never changed its story and it never refused to testify.
I remember one case my partner and I worked where the physical evidence proved critical to the case. It was a drive-by shooting in which a shotgun was used. We knew who was involved. We had people in custody. But we didn’t have a gun. My partner and I literally chased the shotgun all over town, as it was moved from place to place. For a couple of weeks, it seemed that we were just a step or two behind it.
After the shooting, it was placed in the trunk of a car. It was buried in a residential development, in Canyon Country. It spent some time in an apartment in Newhall. It was given to a habitual drug user for safekeeping. And, eventually, it wound up in the hands of a poor guy who thought he got a really good deal at $100, on a target practice gun. He even bought clay pigeons to use with his new toy. Needless to say, he gladly gave us the weapon when he found out what it was used for.
Defense attorneys can get pretty cocky when they think your case is weak against their client. It was beautiful to watch the demeanor of the suspects’ attorneys change dramatically when we told them we found the gun. They realized that our case just gained a truckload of credibility because we now had physical evidence linking their clients to a very serious crime. Where the attorneys once talked about false arrest and harassment, they were now saying things like “plea bargain.”
Paul presents his most compelling physical evidence to his readers. It was the church itself—the changed lives of the people who comprised the body of Christ.
Paul begins verse fifteen by saying, “Now I make known to you, brethren” (v. 1a). Paul’s use of the word “brethren” shows his deep concern for the people to whom he was writing. He recognized that they were fellow believers in Jesus Christ. Since Paul was acknowledging that his readers were Christians, what he’s about to say to them is not new information.
What he’s actually saying is that he is about to remind them of something because they were acting as if they had never heard it before. The problem in the Corinthian church was not that they were denying the resurrection of Christ, but that they were denying the future, physical resurrection of believers. In order to address the error in their thinking, Paul reminds them of what we see in the second half of verse one, and the first part of verse two, that their faith is physical evidence of Christ’s resurrection—“the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, by which also you are saved” (v. 1b-2a).
The Corinthians’ faith in Christ was based on the validity of Paul’s message. That message—not a gospel, but the gospel—Paul will summarize in verses 3-4. In these few short phrases, Paul expresses that the physical evidence for Christ’s resurrection is seen in the past, present, and future impact that the entire gospel of Jesus Christ has had, is having, and will have on their lives.
Paul first reminds the Corinthians that they had “received” the gospel from him. The Greek word that Paul uses here does not simply mean that they received his teaching and rationalized it in their minds. It means that they had already accepted Paul’s teaching as authoritative, recognizing that it had been passed on to him directly from the Lord.
Paul then reminds the Corinthians that they were presently standing on the gospel he had preached to them. We find the word “stand” in the perfect tense. Paul’s wording reminds his readers that not only did they receive the gospel and began to stand on it from that moment, but they will continue to stand upon the gospel of God’s grace. Paul used similar words when he said to the Romans, “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand; and we exult in hope of the glory of God” (Romans 5:1-2).
Having reminded the Corinthians of how they had come to faith in Christ, after hearing the gospel, in their past, and reminding them of how they continue to stand on that faith in their present situation, Paul reminds them of what impact their faith in Christ’s resurrection would have on their future. Paul tells the Corinthians that it is the gospel “by which also you are saved.”
Although his readers were already saved, already assured of their place in heaven by the grace of God, the completion of their salvation was also something to look forward to. Although a Christian receives his or her salvation the moment they respond to God’s call upon their heart and acknowledges Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, the full and complete realization of salvation will occur when Christ returns to take his children home.
Paul wrote to the Romans, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him” (Romans 5:8-9). The believer can look to the future with confidence and joy because their salvation not only unites them with Christ today, but they will be united with Him for all eternity and spared God’s future judgment of the world.
Paul ends verse two by qualifying what he had just said with the words—“if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believe in vain.” Now, some have looked at this part of verse two and assume it’s saying that unless you hold on to the gospel, hold on to your faith, you run the risk of losing it. That’s not what Paul is saying here.
Paul is not saying that the Christian can lose their salvation, their place with Christ for eternity. What we see here is consistent with what we’ve been studying in James for the last few weeks.
Paul is saying that if you profess a faith in Christ, but do not hold to the non-negotiable truths of the gospel, then the faith you claim to have is vain, to no purpose, useless. It’s not that you’ve lost salvation. It’s that you’ve never truly possessed it to begin with.
The physical evidence for the resurrection is seen in the physical evidence of the authentic faith of Christ’s people. As believers, we can only hold on to that faith because Christ has promised to hold on to us. “Our holding onto Him is [physical] evidence that He is holding onto us” (MacArthur, p. 399). And Jesus Christ can only do that because He is alive today.
The Written Statement
Having explained that the Corinthian believers, by the way they held fast to the gospel message, were physical evidence of Christ’s resurrection, Paul gives a short, but specific synopsis of the gospel in verses 3-4.
As he gives the details of the gospel, Paul continues to build his case in support of Jesus’ resurrection by showing how the gospel message is consistent with the Old Testament Scriptures. It’s as if Paul was bringing a written statement or confession into court.
My partner in the gang unit and I prided ourselves in obtaining confessions from our suspects. No, we didn’t use rubber hoses or Chinese water torture. The interview and interrogation techniques of today look nothing like what you might see in an old black and white movie.
Sometimes the process took hours. Sometimes all it took was leaving the suspect alone in a cold interview room, staring at the walls and listening to himself breathe, for just a few minutes. When we came back into the room, he was ready to tell us anything we wanted to know.
Whenever I would testify in court about a confession a suspect had made, the defense attorney always challenged it. He or she would always try to make it look like the confession had been coerced out of their client. They would try to argue that their client didn’t understand their right to remain silent or that I failed to advise them of their rights. Remember, the majority of jurors think police officers lie all the time. So just this line of questioning could prove harmful to our case.
But the jury’s demeanor seemed to change in my favor when the district attorney would produce a handwritten confession from the suspect. A sworn statement was always a powerful piece of evidence.
In the case a shared with you earlier, my partner and I obtained several written statements from suspects and witnesses. When I took a written statement from someone, especially a suspect, I made sure that they wrote every detail in their own words. I would leave the room so that they wouldn’t feel any added pressure.
Once they finished writing their story, I would have them fill out a questionnaire that described the interview process. I would ask them questions about how they felt about the interview, how they felt they were treated by me, and how they felt now that they had told the truth.
Handwritten statements always proved to be powerful in court. They bolstered the credibility of the witness, especially when the statement was consistent with and helped to explain the physical evidence. They helped to bolster my own credibility in the eyes of the jury and the court. And they made it very difficult for the defense attorney to punch holes in the case. With that in mind, let’s take a look and see how Paul’s message is consistent with the written statement of God’s Word.
Paul begins verse three with the words, “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received.” By beginning with the word “for,” Paul is telling his readers that he is not only about to explain how the physical evidence of the church came to be, but he is also going to defend the evidence as reliable and authentic.
The word “delivered” is also important here. You see—Paul, by using the word “delivered,” is letting his readers know that what he had brought to them, namely the gospel, was not something of his own making.
Paul didn’t decide one day to start a religious movement and create his own version of god or his own way for salvation, as we see in so many cults today. By using the word “delivered,” Paul was emphasizing the fact that he was not the creator of the message, only the messenger. And the message he brought was “as of first importance what [he] also received.”
In the Book of Acts, chapter nine, we’re given the account of Paul’s conversion. The Lord Jesus Christ confronted Paul, who had been one of the chief persecutors of the early church. The Lord called Paul to Himself and commissioned him for service. Shortly thereafter, the Lord appeared to a godly man by the name of Ananias, in a vision.
In a somewhat humorous scene, the Lord tells Ananias to go to the house of Judas and to lay hands on Paul so he could regain his sight. Ananias, with a certain level of reasonable hesitancy answered the Lord with these words. “Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much harm he did to Your saints at Jerusalem; and here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who call on Your name” (Acts 9:13-14).
Ananias knew that Paul was on his way to Damascus to round up Christians and arrest them. And now the Lord was telling him to go and lay hands on the man who was coming to put the “habiuas grabbus” on him and his friends. But the Lord comforted, if not reassured, Ananias with the words we find in verse fifteen. “Go for he is a chosen instrument of Mine, to bear My name before the Gentiles and kings and the sons of Israel.” The message Paul delivered was the message he had received directly from the Lord Jesus Christ. He had been appointed by the Lord to spread the gospel across the Gentile world.
And the message is this—“that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures” (vv. 3b-4).
The first point that Paul makes is that Jesus died. Paul said this, in part to refute a group of religious people known as the Docetists. The Docetists “believed that Christ only seemed to be human (because they also believed that matter was inherently evil)” (Blomberg, p. 296).
Most of us are probably familiar with the verse that says, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). In this verse we see the reason God in the flesh, Jesus Christ, had to die—to satisfy the love God has for His people. But we shouldn’t stop there when we consider the reasons Jesus had to die.
Christ died for our sins. “The justice of God also required that God find a way that the penalty due to us for our sins would be paid (for [God] could not accept us into fellowship with Himself unless the penalty was paid)” (Grudem, p. 568). Did Christ have to die for our sins? Yes and no. I knew that statement would cause some heads to tilt. Let me explain what I mean before you brand me as a heretic.
Yes. Jesus Christ had to die as He did to pay the penalty for our sins. Hebrews 2:17 says, “Therefore, He [Jesus] had to be made like His brethren in all things, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation [which is an offering or atoning sacrifice that turns away the wrath of God] for the sins of the people.”
Since the wages of sin is death, the only way for God to save man from his sins was to come to earth in the form of man and die in our place. That’s why “He [God] made Him [Jesus] who knew no sin to be sin in our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (II Corinthians 5:21).
Remember Jesus’ prayer to the Father in the garden of Gethsemane? What did He pray? Listen to the words of Matthew 26:39. “And He went a little beyond them, and fell on His face and prayed, saying, ‘Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will.’”
Jesus Christ, God’s only son, God in the flesh, in His moment of deepest despair, asked the Father if there was any other way for Him to fulfill His great plan for man’s salvation. The fact that God the Father allowed God the Son to suffer such a horrible death on the cross, even after Jesus’ impassioned plea, confirms the fact that there was no other way for man to receive forgiveness for his sins and be saved from the just penalty of death than through Christ’s death, His finished and atoning work on the cross.
Now, a few moments ago, when I posed the question whether or not Jesus had to die for our sins, I gave you a “yes and no” answer. One of the most difficult truths about God for man to comprehend is the fact that God is not required to do anything for us. II Peter 2:4 tells us, “For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment.”
When Satan and a third of the host of heaven rebelled against God, He did not spare any of them. They were all cast out of heaven. So just as God chose not to save any of them, He could have also chose not to save any of us. God is sovereign. He owes man nothing. Our salvation is not a result of God’s obligation to us. Our salvation, through the sacrifice of His Son, is entirely a result of God’s grace. It is this special act of God, not man (for our good works and will are completely insufficient); it is this special act of God that brings about the true salvation of a person.
In verse four of I Corinthians 15, we read that Jesus was buried. Paul mentions the burial of Jesus to emphasize the fact that Jesus’ death was a literal and historical event. The verb tense that Paul uses tells us that the death of Christ was a completed act. He was not partially or sort of dead. The fact that Jesus was buried indicates that He was indeed dead.
“One lady wrote in to a question and answer forum.
‘Dear Sirs,
Our preacher said on Easter, that Jesus just swooned [or passed out] on the cross and that the disciples nursed Him back to health. What do you think?
Sincerely, Bewildered’
‘Dear Bewildered,
Beat your preacher with a cat-of-nine-tails with 39 heavy strokes, nail him to a cross; hang him in the sun for 6 hours; run a spear thru his side...put him in an airless tomb for 36 hours and see what happens."
Sincerely, Charles’”
(Taken from a sermon by Royce Hendry)
Verse four also tells us that “[Jesus] was raised on the third day.” Paul changes the tense of the words here. Where He speaks of Jesus’ death as a completed act, he speaks of Christ’s resurrection as something that has occurred in the past and continues today without end. Jesus was raised from the dead and continues to be raised, to live today.
Not only was Jesus raised, but it was God who raised him. Acts 2:23-24 says, “this Man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death. But God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for Him to be held in its power.”
The resurrection of Jesus Christ insures our regeneration, justification, and the future resurrection of believers. Through Christ’s resurrection we receive regeneration, the believer is born again, “even when we were dead in our transgressions, [God] made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:5-6).
The resurrection of Christ insures the justification of the believer. Justification is the gracious act of God in which He makes sinful human beings, who are worthy of condemnation, acceptable before a holy and righteous God. The justification of the believer is by the grace of God alone through faith alone. We cannot earn our justification.
A criminal cannot earn a pardon. He has already been found guilty and has received his sentence. A pardon is granted to a criminal as a result of a gracious act of mercy on the part of the governor or the president. A criminal cannot earn a pardon through his good works. Neither can man be pardoned for his sins through his good works.
The resurrection of Christ insures the future resurrection of believers. Paul wrote, “Now God has not only raised the Lord, but will also raise us up through His Power” (I Corinthians 6:14). And he wrote, “knowing that He who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and will present us with you” (II Corinthians 4:14). Our future hope of eternal citizenship in heaven is only possible through the resurrection of Christ. Paul made all of these assertions “according to the Scriptures.” He even repeats the phrase to show how important this truth is. Paul had documentation from the Old Testament that supported the reality of the resurrection.
Many people would like to discount the prophesies of the Old Testament as little more than lucky predictions, similar to that of Nostradamus or Jeane Dixon. But the truth is that the prophecies are given in such detail that it would be impossible for the Old Testament prophets to conjure them up by pure chance; and even less possible for a group of men, Jesus and His disciples, to orchestrate the times, places, events, and even the words people spoke to match prophecies uttered by men as many as 1,000 years before the events actually took place.
There are many Old Testament prophecies that were fulfilled by Jesus Christ. There are others that will be fulfilled when He returns to establish His kingdom on earth. For the sake of time, we’re only going to look at eight. Then we’ll talk about the probability of Jesus fulfilling those eight prophecies.
We know that Jesus was crucified between two thieves as a common criminal or transgressor. Isaiah 53:12 says, “Therefore, I will allot Him a portion with the great, and He will divide the booty with the strong; because He poured out Himself to death, and was numbered with the transgressors; yet He Himself bore the sin of many, and interceded for the transgressors.”
We know that Jesus’ hands and feet were pierced as He was nailed to the cross. In Zechariah 12:10b we read, “so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced; and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son.”
We know that before Jesus died on the cross He cried out to God the Father with the words, “My God, my God why have You forsaken me?” In Psalm 22:1 King David wrote, “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me? Far from my deliverance are the words of my groaning.”
We know that Jesus, while on the cross, commended His Spirit to the Father. In Psalm 31:5 we read, “Into Your hand I commit my spirit; You have ransomed me, O Lord, God of truth.”
We know that the legs of the two thieves crucified alongside Christ were broken to expedite their death. But Jesus was already dead when the soldiers came to Him. So Jesus’ legs were not broken. Psalm 34:19-20 says, “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all. He keeps all his bones, not one of them is broken.”
We know that Jesus was buried in a rich man’s tomb. Isaiah 53:9 says, “His grave was assigned with wicked men, yet He was with the rich man in His death, because He had done no violence, nor was there any deceit in His mouth.”
We know that Jesus was raised from the dead. In a few minutes we’re going to look at the eyewitness accounts. Psalm 16:10 says, “For You will not abandon my soul to Sheol; nor will You allow Your Holy One to undergo decay.”
We know that Jesus gloriously ascended and entered into heaven after His resurrection. Psalm 24:7-10 says, “Lift up your heads, O gates, and be lifted up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in! Who is the King of glory? The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, O gates, and lift them up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in! Who is the King of glory? The Lord of hosts, He is the King of glory!” And in Isaiah 52:13 says, “Behold, My servant will prosper, He will be high and lifted up and greatly exalted.”
If there is anyone here who still thinks that the fulfillment of these prophecies is purely coincidental, let’s consider the probability of these eight prophecies being fulfilled as a result of random chance. In 1963, mathematician Peter Stoner calculated the chances of Jesus fulfilling eight of the Old Testament prophecies concerning His life, death, and resurrection are:
1 chance in 100 million billion
or
1 in 100,000,000,000,000,000
I shared this analogy at Christmas. 1 in 100 million billion would be equivalent to covering the state of Texas two feet deep in silver dollars. When this is done, you mark one of the silver dollars and mix it in with the other silver dollars covering the state. Then you blindfold a man, send him into the state and tell him he has only one chance to bend down and pick up the marked silver dollar. The likelihood of the man finding the silver dollar on the first try is the same likelihood of Jesus coincidentally fulfilling eight prophecies.
The written statements Paul presents should be compelling evidence, even to the staunchest skeptic if they are sincere about wanting to know the truth, that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is real and He lives today.
The Eyewitness Testimony
Going back to the gang-related case I’ve been sharing with you this morning, an important part of our case at trial was eyewitness testimony. There something very compelling about having a person, such as a victim, take the stand, point at the defendant, and say, “He did it.”
This is what Paul presents next in his case for the resurrection—eyewitness testimony. In verses 5-7 we read, “and that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of who remain until now, but some have fallen asleep; then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles.”
“Cephas,” of course, is another name for Peter. The Scripture doesn’t tell us why Jesus appeared to Peter first. I believe what we are seeing here is yet another act of Christ’s awesome and unmerited grace. Remember, it was Peter who vehemently denied he even knew Jesus, let alone followed Him, on the night Jesus was betrayed.
It’s possible that Jesus appeared to Peter first because of Peter’s great sorrow and repentance over his sin. “Peter had forsaken the Lord, but the Lord had not forsaken him. Christ did not appear to Peter because Peter deserved to see Him most, but perhaps Peter needed to see Him most” (MacArthur, p. 403).
Over a forty-day period after His resurrection, Jesus appeared to more than five hundred people, including all of the remaining apostles and his younger half-brother, James. James like the rest of his brothers and sisters spent their life, up to that point, scoffing at Jesus and denying that He was, in fact, the Christ.
I wish I had just one case when I worked as a gang investigator where I could march over five hundred eyewitnesses into a courtroom that were ready to point their fingers at the suspects. It never happened. Can you imagine serving on a jury and sitting through the testimony and cross-examination of five hundred witnesses? How could one sit through a case like that and not consider the evidence to be compelling?
But we’ve seen a strange phenomenon in recent years involving the jury system. We’ve seen juries acquit criminals who were obviously guilty, guilty of heinous crimes, even in the face of overwhelming evidence.
When questioned by the media after some very noteworthy trials—and I’m sure we’re thinking of some of the same ones—the jurors have justified their poor decisions, not just based on what they felt was unreliable evidence, but based on the fact that they didn’t believe the testimony of the witnesses. They contrive outlandish conspiracy theories in their own mind, believing that the witnesses all got together to fabricate their testimonies.
We’ve seen the same thing happen regarding the evidence for the resurrection of Christ. The skeptics try to make the argument that the testimony of even a group as large as the 500+ people who saw the resurrected Lord cannot be reliable because they were all followers of Jesus.
Well a very good case can be made that James did not become a believer until after he saw the resurrected Lord. But the skeptic would argue that evidence away by saying, “Yeh, but James was Jesus’ half brother. Even though he never followed Jesus during his time of ministry on earth, James may still have lied to try to protect or boost the family name.”
The Star Witness
One of the most compelling testimonies of the drive-by shooting trial I was involved in was from what can be described as a “star witness.” One of the best ways to overcome the hostility of a jury toward witnesses who are sympathetic to your side of the case, probably the best way to overcome the notion that witnesses for the prosecution can’t be trusted because of their bias against the defendant, is to find a witness who can be seen as sympathetic to the suspect.
In a gang case, having a gang member testify against another member of the same gang can be very compelling. Even civilian juries understand the risk involved when a gang member turns on their own. To stand up for what is right at the expense of your friendships and your status among those friends, and to do so at the cost of your own physical safety gives the witness a greater level of credibility.
The “star witness” in the drive-by shooting case was the girlfriend of the shooter. She was a known associate of the gang who had intimate knowledge about the gang’s activity and the circumstances surrounding the shooting. She was not a suspect in the case, so she wasn’t testifying in order to receive any kind of immunity. She testified because it was the right thing to do.
Our “star witness” was the last one to testify. In similar fashion, Paul saves his star witness for the last. And the star witness is none other than Paul himself.
In verses 8-10 we read, “and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also. For I am the least of the apostles, and not fit 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 did not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me.”
Paul was not among the 500+ people who saw Jesus Christ during the forty days following His resurrection. He was busy preparing to be the chief persecutor of the church. He did not believe that Jesus Christ was the risen Savior. Jesus did not appear to Paul until after His ascension, and not until Paul had led the mob that killed Stephen, the first Christian martyr.
Paul was violent, hateful, and ran around Jerusalem like a common street thug, like a gangbanger if I can be so bold as to paint that picture, harassing and persecuting the young Christian church. But all of that changed the day the Lord called him and saved him from his sins on that dusty road to Damascus.
Paul went from being a well-educated, influential leader in the Jewish community that hated Christ, to an apostle of Jesus Christ. The fact that he actually saw and spoke to the Lord after His resurrection, and was called by Jesus to be His voice to the Gentile world, qualified Him as an apostle.
Paul speaks of himself as one “untimely born.” The Greek word used here literally means, “abortion, miscarriage, or premature birth.” Paul realized that before Jesus saved him, there was nothing he could do to sustain his own life, not in a physical sense and certainly not spiritually.
Like the child born prematurely, who is utterly incapable of diagnosing his or her medical condition, or prescribing the appropriate treatment, or carrying out the therapy that leads to sustainable life, Paul was unable to save himself. Without Christ’s indwelling Spirit, provided solely by the grace of God, Paul was spiritually dead. He was incapable of diagnosing his own sinful condition. He was unable to prescribe his own treatment for that condition. And he, as is every other human being, was unable to treat himself and cure himself of his sin.
Although Paul had been completely forgiven for his sins, he carried around in his memory the torment he brought to Christ’s people. When he writes that he was “not fit to be called an apostle,” Paul was not communicating a sense of guilt, but a sense of humility. Paul understood that he didn’t deserve God’s appointment as an apostle or the forgiveness of his sins.
He also understood that he could not acquire that forgiveness on demand or by his own choosing. It was completely “by the grace of God.” And it was because of the grace of God that his genuine faith in Christ, and the humility it produced, resulted in a working faith. He “labored even more than all” of his contemporaries—not to earn his salvation, but as a result of his salvation.
If I were sitting in the jury box as Paul presented his case, my verdict would be the words with which I began this morning’s message. . I know that my Redeemer, Jesus Christ, lives today. I know in the end He will stand on the earth. I know in the end He will reign on the earth and for all eternity. And I know, as sure as I see you sitting before me, that I will one day see Him face to face. I know that my Redeemer lives.
How about you this morning? You’ve seen the physical evidence through the life of the church. You’ve seen the written statements, the Scriptural support. You’ve heard the eyewitness accounts and you’ve heard from the “star witness.” Have you reached a verdict? When the case was presented to me I could not reach any other verdict than this one.
Jesus Christ has risen and is alive today, and there is no other way for me to receive eternal life than by the grace of God alone, through faith alone, in Jesus Christ alone.
To reach any other verdict is to deny that Jesus Christ is God. To reach any other verdict is to deny that He rose from the dead. To reach any other verdict is to deny that His death and resurrection was completely sufficient and the only way to pay the full penalty for your sins.
Just as in the high profile cases we’ve seen over the last several years, the verdict you reach today does not change or refute the facts of the case. Jesus is still risen and He is still Lord. The question is not with the reliability of the evidence. The question is what are you going to do with the evidence that has been presented to you. And as we consider that, let’s pray.
