What if ... ?

1 Corinthians 15:12 But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? ¹³ If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. ¹⁴ And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. ¹⁵ More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. ¹⁶ For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. ¹⁷ And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. ¹⁸ Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. ¹⁹ If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men. ²⁰ But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. ²¹ For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. ²² For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.

Our world is filled with uncertainty. Lots of “what if” questions. What if Iran attacks Israel? What if Mit Romney becomes president? What if Barak Obama remains president? What if gas prices continue to soar? What if the racial tensions continue to escalate in the Trayvon Martin case? What if the test results come back positive? What if Mom can’t live alone any longer? What if the Brewers could play the Cubs all season?

Lots of “what ifs.” But none of them as important as the “what if” question the apostle Paul asks the Christians in Corinth. He asks, “What if Christ did not rise from the dead? Then what?” He offers some disturbing scenarios as answers.

Paul begins, “But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised.” If the Corinthians wanted to believe that their fellow Christians were dead and in the grave, and that’s where they were going to stay, then they had to believe that Jesus was still dead and in the grave. What kind of Savior is that? One who is still dead, still in the grave. If He’s still dead, He’s not much of a God, not much of a Savior.

“And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless…” The Bible makes the resurrection a central doctrine. If you take the preaching of the resurrection out of the Bible – and it’s in the Old Testament, too – then you have gutted the main message of the Bible. Then the Bible is not God’s love letter to a fallen race that He wants close to Himself, but it is a weapon of mass destruction in the hands of religious terrorists. Building churches, training pastors, sending out missionaries, telling children about Jesus – all of this means nothing if Christ has not been raised. If Christ has not been raised, then we might as well sell our church, close our school, take our money out of the offering plate and throw away the Bible because without Christ’s resurrection, they mean nothing.

“If Christ has not been raised … your faith is useless.” We believe that Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. He is the Healer and Comforter. He blesses those who are poor and hungry and who weep and who are hated by men. We confess that we look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. But Paul argues that if Christ has not been raised, your faith is meaningless. You have nothing to hold on to during difficult times or even death. Then you had better invest in your 401(k) and increase your insurance policy because “Mayhem” is coming. If there is no security in Christ, then you have to find your security elsewhere.

“If Christ has not been raised … we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead.” We began our worship today singing, “Come, you faithful, raise the strain of triumphant gladness” (CW: 142). We light the Paschal Candle because it connects dying to sin and being raise to a new life in Christ in our baptismal waters to Christ’s death and resurrection. We partake in the Lord’s Supper where we believe that Christ actually comes to us with His body and blood in the bread and wine. But if Christ is still dead and in the grave, then you and I are a bunch of liars. We are bunch of losers. We are believing a lie. Every Sunday we are perpetuating that lie. And then Jesus is a big, fat liar, too.

“If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins.” Sin is the virus that corrupts relationships and kills dreams. Guilt is the driving force behind our attempts to do good. Shame stares at us in the mirror every morning and we spend the day trying to cover it up. Inferiority chases us so that we fill our schedules with busyness that makes us feel important but in the end it burns us out. The comforting message of the Bible is the assurance that God forgives our sins, removes our guilt, cancels our shame and makes us victors in Christ. But Paul argues that if God the Father did not accept the work of Jesus Christ and left Him to rot in the grave, then you and I are still in our sins. We are unforgiven, guilty, shame-filled, and inferior. We are condemned to eternal destruction in hell.

“If Christ has not been raised, then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost.” Our fellow believers who died believing in Christ are still in their graves. There is no hope of us ever seeing them again.

“If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.” Most of you probably remember the A-Team’s B.A. Baracus whose trademark phrase was “I pity the fool!” If Christ is still dead, why not “eat, drink, and be merry?” Why not live like animals who have no morality and no sense of right or wrong?  Why bother coming to church, taking time out of our busy schedules to read our Bibles, give our hard earned money to the church, if everything is a lie? And if it is a lie, you and I are fools for believing it. Paul could be the first century B.A. Baracus, “I pity the fool if Christ is still dead!”

That’s Paul’s argument for Christianity and Christ’s resurrection. All the other world religions are filled with “what ifs”. “What if you live a good life?” like in Mormonism. “What if you live at peace with nature?” like Buddhism. “What if you kill the infidels?” like Islam. “What if your ancestors or the animals are spirits watching over or haunting you?” like Shinto in Japan or the spiritism among the Native Americans. However, Christianity has no “what ifs.” It is a religion of certainty – a certainty based on a Sunday morning when the Savior walked out of a Jerusalem grave.  Christ’s resurrection removes all uncertainty, all ambiguity, all indecision.

Paul makes a major shift in his discussion of the resurrection. He turns away from the tragic implications there would be for people if there were no resurrection by emphatically stating: “But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.”

I have heard that opossums are smart animals. You wouldn’t think so because you hardly ever see one except when it’s dead on the road. There’s a joke that goes, “Why did the chicken cross the road? To prove to the opossum that it could be done!” But opossums, it turns out, are smart. They won’t enter a hole if there’s just one set of tracks going into it. They know there’s something in there. But if there are two sets of tracks, the opossum will enter and not be afraid. The message of Easter is that we can enter the grave – we don’t have to fear death because there are tracks leading out of the tomb.

That’s what Paul means when He calls Jesus the “firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.” Soon you will be planting your peppers, tomatoes and cucumbers in your garden. The best part of those vegetables is that once you pick the first ones and wait a little while, you’ll be able to pick more. Jesus is the firstfruits from the dead. He is the first of the resurrection crop. You and I and all believers will come later.

“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.” The inevitable has been reversed. Adam, our first father, became the originator of sinfulness and death for all humanity – no exceptions, no exclusions! What a fate! However, Jesus Christ, our firstfruits, became the originator of salvation and life for all humanity. It applies to everyone! “For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.” What is true of the One is true of all. Your forgiveness and eternal life are activated by Jesus, not you, as guaranteed in His payment for sin received when His Father raised Him from the dead.

Christ arose with a glorious body, no longer bruised and bloody, but complete and perfect and no longer confined to space and time. And when He shall appear on that glorious morning to unlock our caskets, He shall raise us from the dead. Then we will be like Jesus. All deafness will be gone. All blindness will disappear. All weakness in our arms and legs will vanish. Death will no longer have any hold over us. Then we will sit at the Lamb’s High Feast (CW: 141) for it is the Feast of Victory (CW: 265). All this is possible because Jesus was raised from the dead.

What does all this mean for you now? It means that because Jesus finished His Father’s work, your life has worth. Because He was forsaken, you will never be alone. Because He was buried, you can be raised. Because He lives, you don’t have to be afraid. Because He was raised, you can be strong. Because He has reached down to you, you don’t have to work your way up to Him. Because His promises are always true, you can hope!

Paul gives a detailed, rational argument why Jesus had to rise from the dead because the “what ifs” are too terrible to imagine. Christian author and activist Chuck Colson bases the proof of the resurrection on personal experience. Colson was a part of the Nixon Whitehouse during the Watergate scandal of the seventies. He writes:  

“Watergate involved a conspiracy to cover up, perpetuated by the closest aides to the President of the United States and the most powerful men in America, who were intensely loyal to their president. But one of them, John Dean, turned state’s evidence, that is, testified against Nixon, as he put it, ‘to save his own skin’ and he did so only two weeks after informing the president about what was really going on! The real cover-up, the lie, could only be held together for two weeks, and then everybody else jumped ship in order to save themselves.

“Now, the fact is that all that those around the President were facing was embarrassment, maybe prison. Nobody’s life was at stake.”

“But what about the disciples? Twelve powerless men, peasants really, were facing not just embarrassment or political disgrace, but beatings, stonings, execution. Every single one of the disciples insisted, to their dying breaths, that they had physically seen Jesus bodily raised from the dead.

“Don’t you think that one of those apostles would have cracked before being beheaded or stoned? That one of them would have made a deal with the authorities? None did.”

The disciples saw the risen Jesus. They could put their finger in the nail holes and their hand into His side. They heard His voice. They received His Holy Spirit. And from that moment on, they stopped cowering in fear and began preaching boldly in Christ’s name – no longer doubting, but proclaiming in the synagogues and street corners; no longer denying Christ to servant girls but defying political authority; no longer hiding behind locked doors but being will to be thrown into locked jails.

People will give their lives for something they believe to be true, but they will never give their lives for something they know to be false. Paul’s persuasive arguments and the apostles’ boldness proves that there are no “what ifs” when it comes to Christ’s resurrection. Look at all the evidence. Jesus Christ is alive. And that means you and I will live, too. Amen.

We have witnesses of Christ’s resurrection, the testimony of the apostles and even Jesus’ own words to prove the resurrection: “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.” Amen. (Revelation 1:18)