Sermon Tone Analysis

A recent study from Lifeway Research titled the 2020 State of Theology discovered that two-thirds of American adults (66%) believe the biblical accounts of Jesus’ resurrection.

That is a significant number of people who claim to believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus from the dead.

Yet consider this.

The percentage of Americans who regularly attend church, meaning at least once or twice a month, is reported to be around 30%.

This means that of the 66% who believe Jesus rose from the dead, only half are impacted by this belief to the point that they actually participate in the life of Jesus’ Church.

In other words, for half of those who believe in the resurrection, their belief has not changed their behavior to align with what the scriptures teach.

For the expectation is clear.

According to author and apologist Rebecca McLaughlin, the idea that someone would believe in the resurrection and yet that belief would have so little impact on their lives “...exposes the danger of ‘cultural Christianity’—the vague assent to Christian beliefs without any evidence of actual faith in Christ.”

As we continue along the tenants of our faith as found in the Apostles’ Creed, today we arrive to the key event that separates the Christian faith from all other religions: the resurrection.

"The third day He rose from the dead.”

If we turn to 1 Corinthians 15, part of which we heard read this morning, we find the Apostle Paul responding to an alarming reality among some in the Corinthian church.

Paul had received word that there were those within the church who did not believe in the resurrection.

On the surface, this doubt is somewhat understandable.

Only the Jews at that time had a belief in dead bodies coming back to life one day - and not all Jews held this belief.

For example, the Sadduccees were a group who did not, while the Pharisees did.

Resurrection is specifically referring to bodily resurrection - it is not about souls going to heaven or the presence of an afterlife - both of which we can infer from the scriptures.

It is about dead bodies coming back to life.

The famous philosophers at that time, like Plato and Pythagoras, thought that the souls of the virtuous continued to exist after death.

However, the body was not something to be restored - most philosophers, according to Kenneth Schenck, thought of death as “the liberation of your soul to a better reality.”

Many people today still imagine that death comes, your soul departs and if you are a good person, your spirit goes to heaven for eternity.

Seldom we do speak of the future resurrection of the body as taught in the Bible.

In response to this unbelief among some in Corinth, Paul concisely, in one chapter, lays out the most detailed argument for the resurrection found in the scriptures.

According to Paul, the central, distinguishing feature of the Christian faith is Jesus’ death and resurrection.

Listen to his argument:

Paul starts right off reminding them that there are things we must believe and trust if we are going to be saved from God’s wrath when the final day comes.

Core truths that we need to hold onto.

Paul delivered what he himself received.

This is not a man made tale.

The gospel is not something that we are free to adapt, modify, change to make more palatable or add on our own take.

What Paul received from Christ and the Apostles he passes on the Corinthians.

One of the roles of the Church is to pass on to every generation what we ourselves have received.

From there, Paul makes some key arguments.

First, Christ died for our sins as foretold in the scriptures.

This is the fulfillment of God’s plan as communicated to the prophets of old.

Paul was likely thinking of Old Testament passages like Isaiah 53:5

Paul continues on with his argument:

Again, Paul points them back to the scriptures - what has happened in our day was the fulfillment of what God spoke of in times past.

This is God’s plan of salvation, a plan He put in place from the very beginning.

The resurrection was the fulfillment of passages like Psalm 16:10

We can trust the resurrection happened not only because it had to in order to fulfill scripture - but also because of all the eye-witness accounts.

It would be one thing if only a handful of people witnessed Jesus alive - one could argue that it was a conspiracy.

That is hard to do when you have hundreds of people stating that he was indeed alive and they had personally witnessed it.

For the Corinthians, Paul is telling them - there are many who are still alive today who can verify what they saw - including Peter and the Apostles whom you know.

And, Paul himself - as one untimely born as he states it, since he experienced the risen Christ after Pentecost while he was busy persecuting Christians, saw with his own eyes the Lord.

Having established the veracity of the Resurrection, Paul then turns to the futility of their thinking - those who doubted the resurrection.

It is precisely because Jesus walked out the tomb alive that we have the hope that God has given us.

If Jesus was still in the grave, then it is death that would have had the final say.

All his claims of being the bread of life, being one with the Father, the good Shepherd who will lead his sheep, the light of the world, and the resurrection and the life - would have been lies.

But He lives!

God vindicated Jesus, his whole ministry, by raising him from the dead.

Those who labeled him a blasphemer, a criminal, a fraud - after the resurrection could only hang their heads in shame - or live in denial.

His atoning death of behalf of sinful humanity was validated.

Hope was restored to all who had put their faith in HIm.

Because He lives, we will live also.

The resurrection of Jesus shows us what will happen to us one day in the future.

Through faith in Jesus, we can receive, right now, new life.

We are a new creation.

New thinking, new behavior, new spirit, new status with God as his children…but our bodies continue to die.

Upon the return of Christ, the dead will rise and we will all receive our new, imperishable, immortal bodies.

This is why the resurrection is central to our faith.

Jesus’ resurrection secured our hope - and calls us to respond.

How one can believe that a man rose from the dead and not listen to what that man says and allow it to change them is a mystery.

But at least it presents us with an opportunity to share the rest to the story and invite people into the life of the Church.

Amen.