INTRODUCTION
„X This is a joyous occasion we celebrate today! Today is Resurrection Sunday! On this day we celebrate the greatest moment in the history of mankind! It is the time in which we celebrate God raising His Son Jesus from the dead.
„X The Resurrection of Jesus is the most important event in human history. The resurrection of Jesus is the most important event in history because this one event still impacts us today. Because of this event, we can have the opportunity to spend eternity with the God who created us and who loves us with all He has.
„X ROMANS 5:8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
„X JOHN 3:16 "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.
„X The resurrection of Jesus puts a stamp of authenticity on Jesus as being the one and only Son of God, the one and only truth and the one and only way to God.
„X When you go to the tombs of Confucius, it is occupied, when you go to the tomb of Mohammed, it is occupied, when you go to the tomb of Buddha it is occupied, when you go to the tomb of Jesus, it is EMPTY!
„X The resurrection of Jesus is also one of the most attacked events in the Bible. Hat is understandable, the event is incredible in itself and if you are a follower of another religion, if Jesus was raised from the dead, it does not bode well for your religion. If you are a person who does not want to believe in God or is a god unto themselves, if the resurrection is true, it would not bode well for you either.
„X Once you understand that God raised Jesus on the third day, you have a quite a predicament if you have not given your life to Jesus yet.
„X The resurrection of Christ is attacked so much because it is the very foundation of the Christian faith. If what we are celebrating today is not the truth, then we have some problems here today.
„X Today I want us to focus our thoughts on why the resurrection is the foundation of the Gospel of Jesus.
„X We are going to take a look at some of the proofs of the resurrection and we will look at six implications that would result if Jesus has not been raised from the dead.
„X I hope that as you listen to the message today that your hearts and minds are open to the message. Sometimes for those of us who belong to Jesus, we become apathetic in our faith; I hope that today¡¦s message will help you to get your mind and energy focused in the right direction. I hope that today will help you to see how important it is for you to share Jesus with anyone you know who is without Him.
„X I hope for those of you who are here and have not made Jesus the lord of your life that today will be the day that you make that choice or that today gets you on the path to inquiry that will lead you to Jesus.
SERMON
I. WITNESSES OF THE RESURRECTED CHRIST (VERSES 5-11)
„X READ 1 Corinthians 15:3-11
„X Why did Paul go to the trouble of listing those who witnessed the risen Jesus?
„X This letter was written around 57 Ad, Jesus died and was raised in 30 AD, it had been over 25 years since the resurrection by this time. Some of the people for whatever reasons, most likely societal pressures were starting to doubt the possibility of resurrection.
„X Paul wanted to the people to remember concerning Jesus, there were many people who saw Him after the resurrection!
„X These were objective appearances; they were not the figment of someone¡¦s imagination. Paul is giving a list of those who would have been known to the Corinthian church, and these are not all who saw Jesus, but a fraction of the appearances. Acts 1:3 says, ¡§To these He also presented Himself alive after His suffering, by many convincing proofs, appearing to them over a period of forty days and speaking of the things concerning the kingdom of God.
„X He appeared to Peter (Cephas was the Hebrew name), then to the 12 (which was the early church name for the Apostles). We need to realize that the disciples were hiding in fear of their lives when Jesus was crucified (John 20:19). They did not expect Jesus to be alive after He was crucified, even though He told them on several occasions He would be raised on the third day.
„X All these men (the Apostles) went from fearing their lives to fearlessly proclaiming Jesus in the streets of Jerusalem. Peter was so afraid he denied Jesus 3 times on the night He was betrayed.
„X Paul mentions the appearance to over 500 at once (probably at the ascension) and he says that many of them are still alive at he time but some have died. Paul seems to know these people.
„X He appeared to James, the brother of Jesus who was one who did not believe in Jesus. JOHN 7:5 says, ¡§For not even His brothers were believing in Him.¡¨
„X After this event, James becomes one of the leaders in the church in Jerusalem; he later dies for his faith in his brother, Jesus.
„X These are not all the appearances there were 12 specifically reported ones in the New Testament.
„X Paul speaks of himself last. Paul was a man who persecuted the church; he was there when Stephen was stoned to death for his faith. Jesus appeared to Paul on the road to Damascus in Acts 9:3-6, 17; 22:14; 26:16. Paul¡¦s life was never the same.
„X The word that Paul uses for ¡§appeared¡¨ in verse 8 is the same word that is used in verse 5 and 7 to indicate he had the same type of bodily appearance as the others had. Paul went from persecutor to proclaimer of the faith.
„X Look at verse 9. READ
„X Paul was so changed by what he experienced seeing Jesus that he dedicated his life to preaching the gospel to the point of exhaustion.
„X He was very thankful for the chance to serve Jesus, he felt unworthy of the honor and he was humbled by it.
„X In verse 11 he points out that that he and the other apostles agreed on what they preached and the people believed.
„X If Jesus had not been raised, if His body was taken by His followers, they would not have died for what they knew was a lie. If the opponents of the gospel had taken Him, they would have produced the body to stop Christianity in its¡¦ tracks.
„X As we look at verse 12, Paul gets right to the heart of why he is writing this part of the letter. READ VERSE 12
„X The issue at hand is the people are starting to not believe that a bodily resurrection is possible. In the next few verses, Paul is going to share with us the implications of the being no bodily resurrection.
II. WHY THE RESURRECTION MUST BE THE FOUNDATION OF THE GOSPEL MESSAGE. (VERSES 12-10)
Paul list six implications if the resurrection of the body was not possible. As we look at these 6 implications, we will see why the resurrection is the foundation of the Christian faith.
1. If there is no resurrection, then Christ has not been raised. (13, 16)
„X READ VERSES 13, 16
„X Jesus was killed, buried and left in the tomb for three days. His soul left the body, the body had no blood flow, and it was cold and lifeless. These things would make resurrecting Jesus as difficult as it would any other dead body. Jesus had the same body that we possess. Jesus ate and drank after He was resurrected.
„X Verse 16 tells us the same thing. After 25 years, there was no evidence presented to suggest Jesus was not resurrected.
„X The second implication¡K.
2. If Christ has not been raised, then the message is not true and the messengers are false messengers. (14, 15)
„X Paul tells us if Jesus was not raised from the dead, then the preaching of the apostles was in vain. The word ¡§in vain¡¨ means, empty, hollow, devoid of reality, meaningless.
„X If Christ had not been raised, the message of the gospel has no power, there is nothing to it, and we would be just another false religion offering false hope.
„X Without the resurrection being true, the Bible itself would be false.
„X READ VERSES 14-15
„X Paul says if we are proclaiming that God did something He did not do; then we (Christians) are false witnesses.
„X No resurrection, no power.
„X In verse 14 and in the first part of verse 17 we are told the third implication
3. If Christ has not been raised, then our faith is in vain. (14,17a)
„X READ 14, 17a
„X Our faith is based on nothing. The whole gospel is based on nothing.
„X In verse 17 Paul uses a different word for ¡§vain¡¨ than he uses in verse 14. The word he uses in verse 17 says our faith is USELESS without the resurrection.
„X God¡¦s love, God¡¦s promises, God¡¦s plan of salvation is all worthless, useless if Jesus was not raised.
„X All of Christianity rises and falls with the resurrection. Without it our faith in God, His church, eternal life have no foundation. We are just another group of people who are following some cleverly devised tales; we might as well have had a holy salamander give us the gospel.
„X If Jesus is not the Son of God who was raised on the third day, we better shut the church down and do something else with our time. You cannot be a Christian and not believe in the resurrection of Jesus.
„X Verse 17b gives us the 4th implication.
4. If Christ has not been raised, we are still dead in our sins. (17b)
„X What cleanses us from our sins? The blood of Jesus, the sinless Son of God.
„X HEB 10:4 For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.
„X HEB 13:12 Therefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people through His own blood, suffered outside the gate.
„X ROMANS 6:4-7 Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin.
„X The 5th implication is a very depressing thought for those who have lost loved one who were Christians. READ 18
5. If Christ has not been raised, then those who have died before us are condemned (18)
„X When The Bible uses the word ¡§perished¡¨, it means a person has died without salvation, it denotes a person who will spend eternity in hell apart from the loving God who made them.
„X JOHN 3:16 ¡§For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.
„X The perishing being spoken of here is not physical death, it is dying lost.
„X If Jesus has not been raised, then your lived one will not be either, they along with ALL of us will be eternally separated from God.
„X The 6th implication is a sad one also. READ VERSE 19.
6. If Christ has not been raised, then we are to be pitied. (19)
„X We are to be pitied most of all because all of our hopes and dreams of heaven will end in disappointment.
„X How depressing, you live and you die and that is all, what a waste.
„X Everything we believed in meant nothing if there is no resurrection. We all wasted our time and our money for something that was not true.
CONCLUSION
„X As we look at the implications that Paul lays out for is, it is very apparent that the resurrection of Jesus is indeed the foundation of the gospel.
„X If you believe that God sent His Son to die redeem us from the curse of sin, if you believe there is a God in heaven and that Jesus was His one and only Son, then you only have one logical choice to make today, that is to give your life to Him!
„X The good news is that Jesus was raised from the tomb! The good news is that we do not have to suffer an eternity away from Him.
„X Because He lives, we can claim all the promises in the Bible if we belong to Him and live for Him.
„X The resurrection of Jesus makes it possible for you to enjoy the bounties of heaven. It allows you the opportunity to have a new start, to start all over again with a clean slate.
„X For those who have been immersed into the kingdom of God, are you living like you believe it?
„X If you have not accepted Jesus as your lord and savoir, what are you waiting for? The 11th hour? I just buried a 26 year old man the other day; you never know when your time is up.
„X Praise God that He loves us so much that He gave us His Son!
„X SALVATION PLAN.
