Please be seated. Our reading from the New Testament will be first Corinthians chapter 15. And we will just for reading sake from a previous message a few weeks ago, read verses 12 through 19. But our main focus today will be verses 29 to 34. Uh, so in 12 through 19, we have those, uh, arguments Paul made for the, uh, the resurrection of the dead. And then he says a little something else we looked at last week. And then, uh, in 29 to 34, which will be new verses for us.
He gives a couple more reasons why resurrection deniers should quit being resurrection deniers. So first Corinthians chapter 15. Our passage can be found on page 961. Before we read God’s word, let’s go to him one more time in prayer. Our blessed Lord, you have caused the holy scriptures to be written for our learning. And we pray now that we may hear and read and learn. And most of all, inwardly digest the holy scriptures so that through the comfort of your holy word, we may embrace and ever hold the blessed hope of everlasting life, which you have so graciously and freely given us in our savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.
From first Corinthians chapter 15, beginning at verse 12, we read, now, if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. And we are found to be misrepresenting God because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise, if it is true that the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins.
Then those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. And then for today’s consideration, verse 29, otherwise, what do people mean by being baptized on behalf of the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why are people baptized on their behalf?
Why are we in danger every hour? I protest, brothers, by my pride in you, which I have in Christ Jesus, our Lord. I die every day. What do I gain if, humanly speaking, I fought with wild beast at Ephesus? If the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. Do not be deceived. Bad company ruins good morals. Wake up from your drunken stupor as is right and do not go on sinning for some have no knowledge of God. I say this to your shame. Amen. This is God’s word for us.
R.C. Sproul, the famous theologian of the last century, many of you will know and have listened to his teachings. Sproul used to say very often that a minister is allowed to say in conclusion three times during one sermon. I try to avoid that statement, but the Apostle Paul here in verse 29. is going back round again and giving the Corinthians more reasons not to deny the resurrection of Jesus and importantly, the resurrection of the dead. And in verse 29, he says, furthermore, he says, and another thing, he says, otherwise, actually he has three more other things, not just one.
Uh, Paul is writing from Ephesus. It was mentioned in this verse that it’s at Ephesus where he fought with wild beast. Uh, but he has a three year ministry at Ephesus and it’s often from Ephesus where he writes his nasty grams. He writes his, uh, hard letters to the Corinthian church. He gets reports, he gets visitors from Corinth and they tell him at Ephesus what’s going on.
And so he sends a minister, he sends a letter, he sends an emissary over. Paul very often wrote using a secretary or the technical term in New Testament would be the amanuensis. And that secretary would sit and listen to Paul’s, I suppose to the Corinthians rather upset and energetic, uh, thoughts and commands and what ends up being by the Holy spirit, the word of the Lord.
And you can imagine these four letters. We have two of them, but these four letters that were written, uh, perhaps in anger, perhaps with tears, perhaps with, uh, sadness, Some parts with joy, other parts with other emotions. But you can imagine the secretary very often had to say to Paul, slow down. My hands hurt. You’re being verbose here. You’re writing lots. And perhaps it came to that secretary’s mind. Wish you had waited to write these letters when Siri was available. And you could dictate and AI could translate and we could email it. But you get the urgency here.
They are denying the resurrection of the dead. They are denying that the dead in Christ will one day rise again. They are persisting in this thought and this thought, this belief, this teaching, it strikes at the heart of the gospel. A couple of Wednesdays ago, the ladies in the Daily Doctrine Study looked at the idea of theological triage is a theological issue of first order of second order or of third order. A third order would be something like how cold does the water have to be for baptism? That’s sort of a joke, but it doesn’t strike at the heart of the gospel. It does not do anything to damage the witness of Jesus.
A second level issue might be, Are the Baptist right or the Presbyterians right? You know the answer to that. I do believe that that’s really a second order issue, though it has great importance. But a first order issue would be something like this, the doctrine of the resurrection.
If you deny the resurrection, you deny the gospel. And if you deny the gospel, you do not have Christianity at all. It’s that clear. It’s that crystal clear. And so the urgency in Paul’s pen, the urgency in his letters, the urgency in his labors is because it is of a first order issue that Christ died and rose again and that we one day will die and will rise again. You deny the resurrection. You deny the gospel, you deny the gospel, you have no Christianity. And so Paul is writing a letter to people who have converted from paganism, and their paganism, much like in our day, has allowed people to, what do we say, coexist. You have your beliefs, and that’s great, follow your heart. I have my beliefs, I follow my heart. You’re going to get there one day. I’m going to get there one day. Well, we know that is not true.
We know the only way to salvation is through faith in Jesus Christ. And so Paul is dealing with pagans in a deeply rooted paganism that is hard. to root out the gospel work at Corinth will go on for a really long time. In fact, we have some letters and other ancient works that go on a couple hundred years in the city of Corinth where the same problems continue to persist, not just in the first century, but well into the second century. It’s a long ways from paganism to being sanctified in Jesus Christ. Paul has spent 18 months there. Others had come and gone and ministered. He’s written them letters. And their progress in the faith has been arrested. It’s been stopped. Their growth has been stunted because of these false doctrines, these false beliefs.
And so what this shows us, I do believe, is that the perfect church didn’t even exist in the New Testament. I bumped into somebody this week that said, we’re doing church New Testament style. And my brain immediately said, Oh boy, this is probably a house church. Next thing out of the guy’s mouth, we’re doing a house church. And so, um, I wanted to say, are you doing it Corinth style? Are you doing it Galatian style? You know, most of these churches got, got yelled at, got fussed at. Uh, but the perfect church is elusive. Uh, but we are being perfected in Jesus Christ and it is slow. It is progressive. Sometimes it’s two or three steps forward and one or two steps backwards.
But what is Paul doing here? He is conjoling the resurrection deniers. He is, uh, jolting them in giving them more reasons that they’re wrong about denying the resurrection. Christ is raised. Your faith is true, your sins are forgiven, and your loved ones who are dead in Jesus Christ will rise again from the dead. But what about those three another things? What about his second round of saying in conclusion? Well, he gives three.
If the dead are not raised, why are some in the church being baptized on behalf of the dead? That’s the first one. If the dead are not raised, why does Paul, go through such physical danger daily? And then third, if the dead are not raised, why not eat and drink for tomorrow we will die? Well, let’s think about the first one. If the dead are not raised, then why in the church at Corinth are some being baptized on their behalf?
Now, this is a weird practice. We do not know much about it. Paul never condones it. It doesn’t come up in any other New Testament work, and it really doesn’t pop up much in church history’s writings. But there are some who obviously believe in the resurrection of the dead. And it’s so important to them that they’ll be baptized on behalf of the dead person who perhaps did not get baptized before their life was taken.
You see Paul’s logic. He’s not saying this is a good practice. He’s not saying a command in all the churches that you get baptized on behalf of people who died that didn’t get baptized yet. He’s not saying that at all, but he’s using their logic. If you’re going to get baptized on behalf of the dead, that must mean you believe in a resurrection.
So why do you do that? If you’re going to deny the resurrection, it’s this goofy practice. It’s this funky thing they are doing. Uh, it could be a lot of things. We don’t exactly understand what they’re doing and our best guesses are just that their best guesses, but they’re doing it and it’s not right, but they’re doing it based on the premise that there is a resurrection from the dead. You see his argument. Uh, Paul is a tricky dude. I am sure in his other letters or in some footnotes, he wrote to them about this practice.
But if the dead are not raised, then why are y’all doing baptisms by proxy? Why are you baptizing some people? Why are you baptizing some people on behalf of the dead in hopes of a resurrection? Okay, we don’t have that big problem, thank the Lord. Second thing to consider, if the dead are not raised, why does Paul face physical danger daily?
This is a really interesting argument that he makes. And you can look at the whole of Paul’s 13 epistles and find out some of the stuff that he goes through. You can read Hebrews chapter 11 where the people of faith, their way of life is described and it’s a hard way of life. And then you can read Luke’s account of missionary journeys where he tagged along with Paul and you can find out how hard and difficult it was for Paul, the apostle of the Lord Jesus. Well, remember in the book of Acts, Paul or Saul is on the way to Damascus with letters from Jerusalem to persecute and to imprison even to execute the followers of the way.
He was a zealous old Testament Israelite. He was a Pharisee and he did not like the Jesus movement. He did not like the identification or naming of a Messiah. And so those who believed in Jesus as savior, Jesus as Messiah, he wanted to snuff them out and stamp out their lot. And so on the way to Damascus, he meets the risen, and exalted Christ. And it was a traumatic event.
And what does Jesus say to him? He says, you will be my chosen instrument and you will carry my name before Gentiles. You will carry my name before the children of Israel. You will carry my name before the kings of the earth and you will suffer for my name.
Paul’s entire ministry is characterized by God and real events. as facing danger daily. And so Paul says, I face danger every hour. I die every day. I fought with wild beast at Ephesus. Some of you will remember that while at Ephesus, the apostle Paul, you could say desecrated the idea of the God Artemis, Ephesus, Chief God was Artemis and there was a silversmith named Demetrius and he and all his fellow tradesmen made silver idols to the God Artemis. And Paul went on to say that our God is not something that can be fashioned with hands, made with human hands, touched, looked at, all the rest. And what does that immediately do to the silversmith business?
It puts them out. You remember when he preached and the demons came out of those soothsayers and there was a riot then. Well, this riot in Ephesus was a riot of all riots. And it was so big, it was so loud, it was so riotous that the town officials feared that the occupying Romans would accuse them of sedition and wipe them all away. And so the crowd was quieted. Look here, people.
Do we want to lose our standing with Rome? And so Paul narrowly escapes this crowd that for sure wanted his death. His whole life, his whole ministry is characterized by trouble for Jesus. You compare today the traveling minister, the so-called apostle, they’ve got to have a private jet. They’ve got to stay in the nice boutique hotels of the world. They’ve got to wear the fancy suits and have an entourage. Compare that with the Apostle Paul, who preached the gospel, who believed in the resurrection of the dead.
And he says over and over in places of scripture, it’s worth the cold. It’s worth the exposure. It’s worth the homelessness. It’s worth the labors and the hunger and the thirst and the poor clothing. It’s worth the danger on the sea, the danger on the roadway, the danger in the wilderness.
It is worth being held in disrepute for Jesus. It is worth being oppressed by a fellow Jews and by Gentiles and by false brothers. It is worth being reviled and slandered and persecuted. And as Paul was beaten with rods three times, given the Jewish 40 lashes less one. It’s worth being imprisoned and afflicted and depressed and discouraged and anxious and facing daily pressures.
And so what is he saying to the crowd at Corinth? He’s saying, we, for the sake of the gospel are the scum of the earth. We are the refuse of all things. And our tireless labor is done simply because the gospel is true. If the gospel is not true and the dead are not raised, Paul is wasting his time. He’s wasting his energies. He may as well eat and drink and be merry. He may as well simply be a tent maker. He says to the Corinthians in another place, we are like men being sentenced to death.
We are a spectacle to the world and to angels and to men. but I’m a fool for Christ, says Paul. And I do not lose heart. And I do believe that we will rise again to a better life. I wouldn’t be doing this, Paul is saying, if Jesus wasn’t raised from the dead and I would not rise to a resurrection one day. And so that’s his second, another thing.
First of all, if there’s no resurrection, why are some of you being baptized on behalf of the dead? Second, if there is no resurrection, why do I die daily? And the third, if the dead are not raised, then why don’t we just eat and drink for tomorrow comes and we will die.
If the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink. If they’re dead or not raised, let’s raid the pantry. If the dead are not raised, let us crack open the wine cask. If the dead are not raised, let’s kill off the livestock and butcher it and cook it and eat it.
And he says to them, you need to wake up from your drunken stupor. You need to repent of your sins. You need to stop disbelieving in the resurrection. And we could fill in the blank, couldn’t we? There’s bad doctrine in all of us, perhaps because we’re untaught. Perhaps because we’ve been poorly taught or perhaps our minds have wandered and we’ve just enjoyed making up stuff that we think is true. And so Paul is saying to us, wake up from your stupor, whatever your false doctrine is, your unbelief is quit it, stop it.
Do not go on sinning. The Israelites lived with a Babylonian siege surrounding the city of Jerusalem. And they said, who cares? That’s not judgment. They won’t get through. Our walls are impenetrable. And instead they should have mourned over their sins. They should have repented of their sins. They should have stopped. They should have awakened from their stupor.
And so dear brothers and sisters, Paul is calling the Corinthians. Perhaps he is calling us today to wake up from where we have false beliefs. Wake up from the place where we believe all is okay when it really is not. And he goes on to press them and say, bad company corrupts good character. This is a quote from a Greek writer. This is a quote from a play. And now here it is in the scripture. Don’t be deceived, he is saying.
If you have people in your midst, if you have a company around you, and they are doing evil things, believing evil things, it will affect the church. You know how this would go when you’re a young person and you’re headed out and your parents say, who are you going to be with? And if it didn’t raise alarms, they’d say, okay, be good, have fun, you know, don’t do dumb things other people do. But maybe it’s an alarming name or alarming set of friends.
I don’t know about that. I’ll be picking you up from the jail later. Something like that. Bad company corrupts good morals. Bad company corrupts good character. Paul’s going to say this in other places. Chapter six, he says, the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom. And he gives a list of people who are immoral and all kinds of other things.
But isn’t it easy for us to become like those we are around? We get around other people or perhaps we begin to watch things on the television or on the movie screen and we conform to it, we become like it. And really uncritically and unthinking, our vocabulary changes, our behavior shift, even our beliefs shift and it doesn’t take long, it doesn’t take much. but we’ve got to be careful with our morals. And they are often shaped by those we are around.
And so Paul is warning the Corinthian church, wake up from your stupor and you may need better friends. Wake up from your stupor as is right. Do not go on sinning. And it gives a rather chastising, a rather ugly declaration for some in the church at Corinth have no knowledge of God. I say this, he says, to your shame. Brothers and sisters, this is a life and death issue. This is an everlasting matter for the people of God at Corinth.
And it is for us today. I know we live in a world, lots of voices calling for our attention, calling for our allegiance. And I know we’re all believers here. I know we all have faith in Jesus. But we’ve got to be careful for eternity is at stake to always remain steadfast in the scriptures, to always remain steadfast in our hope only and firmly rooted in Jesus Christ. The world continues to offer us much.
Satan would love to deceive us and deter us from walking with the Lord. And so we perhaps today may need to wake up from our stupor. to wake up from our sleep and our ease and to consider what is at stake if we do not follow the Lord more carefully and we do not live for him more deliberately. Proper beliefs will lead us to everlasting glory and improper ungodly beliefs will make us a heathen and we will fall short We will not measure up and God will say, I never knew you for you never knew me. These things greatly matter. And so today, may we consider what we believe about God and what we believe about salvation through faith in Jesus.
Let’s go to him now in prayer. Our great and mighty God, we ask that you would graciously Allow the word which we have heard to be inscribed in our hearts and that as we receive it, may we do so with meekness and with pure affection so that our hearts would be filled with love and reverence for you. And we ask that we would go from this place today and bear fruit of the spirit, that we would go from this place today and live in holiness, and that we would go from this place today diligently following your commandments May it please you to use us to lead those who are lost and wondering and confused into the way of truth. All of this, we pray, is for the honor and praise of your name through Jesus Christ, our Lord, and in the power of the Holy Spirit. And all God’s people said, Amen. We want to respond to God.