TUESDAY February 13th
1 Corinthians 15:12-19
‘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. We are even 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 also 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.’
Now, just as we all have a birthday, (it happens to be mine today) should the Lord Jesus tarry, we will all one day have a death day! We cannot escape it, because death is the consequence of Adams sin, which has been passed onto all who are born, for we are all born in sin and shaped in iniquity.
We celebrate our birthday, but I guess we don’t even want to think about what will be our death day, nor even when it will be, but the good news of this gospel that Paul is writing about here in these verses is that the sting of death has been dealt with—or as it? See, in the verses for today, Paul is referring to those who say that there is no resurrection of the dead, and he then continues to list all the negative outcomes if this were to be so.
- Christ has not been raised—he couldn’t be if there was no such thing as resurrection from dead.
- All of Paul’s preaching, the other apostles preaching and those who have since then preached the gospel will have been in vain.
- For all who have believed what was preached, then their faith has all been in vain and we are still in our sin.
- We will also have been liars if we have preached about something that has not happened.
- Those who have already had their death day will have perished.
- We who at this moment are still living will also one day die and perish.
- Because we have believed we are to be pitied, how stupid of you to believe such nonsense.
Wouldn’t it be a terrible thing if those who say there is no resurrection were right! And what if all these points I have highlighted were right! But thank God they are not right, therefore for those of us who have believed we are not to be pitied, we are not stupid, we are not still in our sins, our faith has not been in vain, all the preaching has not been pointless, and we do not need to fear our death day because it will not be the end, the sting of death has been dealt with, it will be the moment when should Jesus tarry that we will leave this world and enter into that which is already being prepared for us in the presence of God.
And Paul after listing all these things, gives a message to all the doomsayers who deny the resurrection of the dead by continuing with verse 20 ‘But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.’ We will take this up in our next devotion, for today, rejoice in the wonderful truth that Jesus is alive, and because of his resurrection we who have come to believe in him, will also share in his resurrection life.