Sermon Tone Analysis

*1 Corinthians 15:29…* Otherwise, what will those do who are baptized for the dead?

If the dead are not raised at all, why then are they baptized for them?

*Commentary*

*            *Verse 29 is among the most difficult in the Bible to understand.

The passage has baffled scholars for years.

The Mormon church uses this passage to justify their practice of baptizing people on behalf of deceased family members who did not know God.

They are attempting to save them through their own baptisms and good works.

A straightforward reading seems to promote the practice of baptism for the dead.

But this is found nowhere else in Scripture, and in fact it is contradicted throughout the whole of Scripture.

Salvation does not come to anyone as a result of works but by God’s grace alone (Rom.

4:5; Eph.

2:8-9).

So being baptized for someone who has long since perished is worthless to bring them salvation for their sins.

Each person must make that choice on their own after God compels them to do so (John 1:12; 6:44).

The entire context of 1 Cor.

15 deals with resurrection – the resurrection of Jesus Christ and of those who place their faith in him who will one day also experience resurrection from the dead.

Paul has already proven the fact of Christ’s resurrection (vv.

1-11) and shown the importance of believing in it (vv.

12-28).

Now in v. 29 he asks the question about those who are baptized on behalf of the dead.

Apparently those who took part in that practice were the very ones who denied the bodily resurrection of the dead prompting the resurrection topic in 1 Cor.

15.

There are at least three possibilities that I will list (over 40 have been proposed!).

First, when Paul says, “What will those do who are baptized for the dead” he could be using “baptized” the same way Jesus used it in Mark 10:38 and Luke 12:50 (referring to Christ’s enduring God’s wrath).

This interpretation means that v. 29 should read, “What will those do who are dying the deaths of martyrs and joining the ranks of the dead?”

The answer to those people would be that those dying as martyrs were dying in vain if there was no resurrection.

Though their motives were pure in dying for the Christian cause they would be deluded people for doing so.

A second possibility is that those who are “baptized” simply refers to Christians, and the “dead” refers to deceased believers.

The Greek preposition “for” is then rendered “because of,” and the passage reads, “Otherwise, what will Christians do who come to know Christ because of the testimony of saints gone before?”

This refers to people who were being saved as a result of the lives of the faithful Christian martyrs.

With no resurrection and no hope of life after death, then why are people coming to Christ through of the witness of dead saints?

The third possibility is that Paul was sarcastically referring to the cultic practice of baptisms for the dead (i.e., “If you don’t believe in the resurrection, then why engage in the practice of baptizing people for the dead?”).

The pagans might have been outwardly ridiculing the concept of resurrection, but inwardly they didn’t want to take any chances.

So they baptized themselves for the dead.

Paul’s sarcasm reveals that the practice was so twisted it needed no comment.

Furthermore, he does not say “we” practice such a baptism but “they” as he refers to the pagans who did such.

This possibility is likely because it does no injustice to the text, AND throughout 1 Corinthians Paul emphasizes his familiarity with the readers by using first person pronouns (“I” & “we”), but in v. 29 he switches to the third person plural pronoun “they.”

*Food for Thought*

            Any way you slice it the Bible never teaches that baptism saves a person.

Water baptism always follows one’s conversion in the Bible, but it isn’t necessary for salvation.

Salvation comes by God’s grace, through faith in Christ, apart from works.

Baptism inevitably follows.

*1 Corinthians 15:30-34…* Why are we also in danger every hour?

31 I protest, brethren, by the boasting in you, which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily.

32 If from human motives I fought with wild beasts at Ephesus, what does it profit me?

If the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.

33 Do not be deceived: “Bad company corrupts good morals.”

34 Become sober-minded as you ought, and stop sinning; for some have no knowledge of God.

I speak this to your shame.

*Commentary*

            In verse 30 the main issue Paul addresses is this: If there was no resurrection of the dead then why would he and the other apostles and prophets put themselves in danger every hour of every day?

In v. 31 he passionately says, “I protest!”

He protests against those who shunned the truth of the resurrection because nothing makes sense without it.

His “dying daily” is a reference to the persecution he received each day for preaching about Christ’s resurrection.

He was as proud of the lives of the converted Corinthians as he was about Christ’s resurrection from the dead.

Their lives had been changed as a result of that truth, a truth he first preached to them, and that same truth was the very truth that brought him death on a daily basis.

He boasted of that.

In v. 32 Paul continues his logic on why his life was based upon the truth of Christ’s resurrection from the dead.

He speaks of fighting with “wild beasts” in Ephesus.

This is a reference to the people who persecuted him for teaching as he did.

He says in 2 Cor.

1:8 that he “despaired even of life itself” while in Asia (Ephesus).

Christianity was radical in that it was based on a man who was dead but who came back to life.

It brought great persecution in Ephesus because they were such pagans.

They worshipped Artemis a goddess statue they believed fell from the sky (Acts 19).

Ironically they believed in miraculous ideas that were un-provable (statues falling from the sky), but they rejected the proof of Christ’s appearing to so many in the flesh after his death.

The great persecution that Paul received for believing and preaching as he did would be nothing if it weren’t based upon truth.

He wasn’t suffering for the sake of suffering; he was enduring pain and persecution for the sake of truth – a truth he ended up willingly dying for.

Then he sarcastically quotes Isaiah 22:13 for emphasis saying, “Hey, let’s have a party!

We might as well enjoy everything about life today because tomorrow we will die.”

In v. 33 Paul quotes a well-known poet (Menander) who had written the Greek comedy /Thais/.

No doubt the Corinthians knew this quote (“Be not deceived; bad company corrupts good morals”).

He uses it to show them that those who taught that there was no resurrection were corrupting the Christians who had been converted on such a belief.

The believers who associated with these naysayers were like a barrel of good apples among one rotten one, and their good morals were being corrupted.

So it is when Christians regularly associate with skeptics.

Paul’s clear command in v. 34 was for the orthodox Christians to separate themselves from the troublemakers and to stop sinning through their denial of the resurrection.

Those believers who had fallen into the trap of skepticism were preventing the pagans from coming to a knowledge of God.

And Paul brought this truth to light to “shame” these backslidden Christians.

*Food for Thought*

            Christ’s resurrection is /sine qua non/ of the Christian faith.

Those who deny it, no matter how noble their lives are (or were), are hopeless.

As Christians we must not only believe in the truth of Christ’s resurrection, we must also live it and preach it.

Regularly associating with those who deny that truth will inevitably corrupt us.

Moral decadence comes as a direct result of those who deny the resurrection.

Why?

Because the pleasures of this life are all the hope they have.

*1 Corinthians 15:35-38…* But someone will say, “How are the dead raised?

And with what kind of body do they come?”

36 You fool!

That which you sow does not come to life unless it dies; 37 and that which you sow, you do not sow the body which is to be, but a bare grain, perhaps of wheat or of something else.

38 But God gives it a body just as He wished, and to each of the seeds a body of its own.

*Commentary*

            In v. 35 Paul anticipates the logical question that follows belief in a resurrection of a dead body.

How exactly are they raised?

And what kind of body do they receive when they’re raised?

In first-century Corinth the prevailing philosophy was that the physical body was evil while only the spirit was good.

Because of this belief (known as Gnosticism – today’s New Age movement) it was difficult for many to see how a resurrection body could be called good, and for that matter, how the feat could be pulled off in the first place.

They believed that the spirit needed to be set free from the body, so they asked, “How can this be, and what kind of body do they get?”

Of course it’s all supernaturally done by the Creator God who created the universe and mankind to begin with.

If Genesis 1:1 is firmly believed then how can the resurrection be questioned?

Paul’s answer to such questions in v. 36 is harsh.

He calls people who ask such questions “fools.”

But he wasn’t responding to people who were legitimately confused over the issue, rather he was responding to those who mockingly questioned the Christian faith based upon Christ’s resurrection from the dead and the resurrection of those who subsequently believe in such a truth.