Defining the Gospel 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 (Easter Message)

 

WELCOME 

It is great to have you here. If you are visiting, thank you. I hope you find this a welcoming place. Worship team, thank you as well. I love this time of year. We get to sing songs like “Christ the Lord is Risen Today.”

NOT BUNNY 

I want to invite the kids up front for a children’s message. If you are in grade school, why don’t you come up now? I know the younger children have gone to the children’s church, but please join me and help me answer a few questions for those a bit older. When you think of Easter, what comes to mind? Shout them out:

• Easter Bunnies [grab it from home]

• Easter Eggs [Grab it from home]

• Easter Candy 

• Easter Baskets

• Easter Lunch [ham]

• Family [paper cutout]

• Easter outfits [Hat? Ask Faith if I can use it. ]

• Easter Pictures [Camera]

But all of that is extra. What is most important is Jesus. 

• What happened to him 2000 years ago? He died and then rose from the dead! 

• Do you know anyone else who rose from the dead? I don’t. Can you imagine it? That is amazing! 

• What would that be like? He defeated death. He has a body now that can’t ever die, get sick, or get hurt. 

• Why do you think that is important? Well, if we trust in Jesus dying on the cross for our sins, one day after we die, God will bring our bodies back, and we will never die again, never get sick again, and never hurt again. And right now, we can experience God’s love and forgiveness. Jesus’s death and resurrection defeated sin and its effects. He is the reason for Easter. The rest of the Peeps, Cadbury eggs, hams, and family gatherings are meaningless without him. I will teach this idea of resurrection from a book in the Bible called 1 Corinthians. Listen for what is the most important thing. Will you bow your heads with me as I pray? 

PRAYER 

Heavenly Father, thank you for sending your one and only Son, Jesus, to live a perfect life, die a death we deserve, and come back to life to show us the power, truth, and hope we have in you. Help us to believe. Help us receive this good news, remember it, and keep it the most important thing. Be with us now as we look deeply into the book of Corinthians. In Jesus’s name, we pray, amen. You can return to your seats, but you can have one piece of candy before you leave.

TEXT 

This morning’s text is a classic: 1 Corinthians 15. I am going to have D.S. read for us. Would you please stand with me in honor of God’s Word? (If you are able.) 

Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. 

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed. (1 Corinthians 15:1–11, ESV)

Thank you. You may be seated. If you are visiting or new here, you will discover that we like to sing and dig into the Bible at our church. We tend not just to pick a topic and talk about it. Instead, we find a part of the Bible and explore what it says. Whether it is Pastor Mike, Pastor Joe, I, or a guest preacher, we want the Bible to be the foundation of teaching. Last week, we wrapped up the Old Testament with the book of Malachi. Today, we are exploring part of 1 Corinthians, Chapter 15.

CONTEXT: PAUL

Let me give you some background. The book of Corinthians was written by the apostle Paul around AD 55 to the church in Corinth. We have two of his letters to this church in our Bible. This is the first. We only hear half of the conversation. What someone writes about tells you about the occasion or reason for writing. We know from other sources that Rome was the superpower at the time, and Corinth was a bustling cosmopolitan city in Greece. Here are a couple of pictures. 

https://www.worldhistory.org/uploads/images/14624.png?v=1742558657-0 

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Isthmus_of_Corinth_in_ancient_Greece.svg 

Corinth was a trade city with wealth rivaling that of Athens and Sparta. It was a melting pot of culture, language, and religion. I read that some 700,000 people lived in the city, like the current populations of Seattle, Denver, Nashville, and Oklahoma City.  

AUTHORSHIP

The author, Paul, studied under an eminent Jewish scholar named Gamaliel. Paul was passionate and a strict keeper of the Jewish Law. He held a rare citizenship from Rome. That gave him some protections and privileges. Before writing, he was a Jewish leader, called a Pharisee, and he opposed Christianity; however, God changed his perspective and made him a spokesperson promoting it, especially to people who didn’t consider themselves Jewish. He traveled extensively on three different missionary journeys, helping to establish the church in significant cities around the Middle East and Europe near the Mediterranean. On each trip, he self-funded, working as a tanner or tent maker. God used his religious background as a platform to speak into people’s lives. He did that by going to the local religious community centers, called synagogues, and talking about what the Old Testament said about Jesus. 

BIRTH OF THE CHURCH

In Acts Chapter 18, we read that he went to the city of Corinth. He met a dynamic duo of husband and wife, Pricilla and Aquilla, who also had faith in Jesus. With their help, he established the first church in the Jewish synagogue. Paul continued to minister for over a year and a half. At some point, Timothy and Silas joined the mission. In the beginning, things were going well. The Jewish people heard, received, and believed the gospel, and the church grew; however, the ground swell of support eventually flipped and flopped. Some people didn’t want him in the synagogue. Paul moved his teaching next door to a non-Jewish person’s home named Titius Justus. This man must have had significant power and wealth to house the burgeoning church. Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue, came to faith. Paul’s teaching was garnering more and more support as well as opposition. The Jewish leadership brought a cease and desist order against him. Hearing it, the tribunal threw out the charge, seeing it as an intra-religious debate, not a matter of civil criminality. The nascent church had grown enough to be self-sufficient, and Paul felt led to continue his missionary journey.

LETTER 

After some time passed, word traveled back to Paul that the church at Corinth was not doing well. 

• They were splintering over which leader they followed: Peter, Apollos, or Christ.

• They were fighting between those who had resources and those who did not, 

• They were arguing about spiritual gifts. 

• And the church supported a deviant sexual lifestyle that was unacceptable to even the non-Jewish population. 

Paul’s letter responded to these issues, offering a stern correction. Near the end of his letter, he circled back to where he had begun and what he considered to be of first importance. And this relates to Easter and the resurrection.

Structure 

The passage seems to have two sections: 

Section 1  15:1-2 Reminder of the gospel

Section 2  15:3-11 Definition of the gospel 

In a nutshell, Paul wanted people to recognize the gospel, remember the gospel, and keep the gospel of first importance. If you remember my question, there is your answer, kids. 

REMEMBER 

Let’s dive into the text and see this for ourselves. Turn to 1 Corinthians, Chapter 15, starting at verse 1 (If you have a Bible). We will read the first few verses, and the words will be projected behind me. 

Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. (1 Corinthians 15:1–2, ESV)

It is easy to forget. 

• We have work projects we need to complete. 

• Some have school assignments due. 

• House projects can pile up. 

• And sports fill schedules. 

When so many plates are spinning, no wonder we drop the ball and forget. 

FORGOTTEN

I tend to forget things: my keys, phone, wallet, you name it. I forget names. Sorry about that in advance. (I try to use the names immediately and write them down so as not to forget them, but even then, I mess up.) When we married, my wife realized how forgetful I was and that it was not the end of the world, even if I acted like it. On any (and every) given day, she will see me looking with a furrowed brow under couches, cushions, and drawers. I am on a mission to retrace my steps and try to find whatever I have lost. One of the great things she taught me was to have a place for things. I have a place for my keys [basket. I'd better put this back!] Another trick I have is I taught myself to put my wallet in the same pocket every time and my phone in the other. Before I leave the house, I say wallet, keys, phone. One funny YouTuber adds his glasses with a song. Glasses, wallet, keys, and phone. Glasses, wallet, keys, and phone. Make sure you have them all before you go. Glasses, wallet, keys, and phone, keys and phone. On a serious note and back to our text, Paul reminded the church of something they should never forget here in 1 Corinthians 15: the gospel.

FIRST IMPORTANCE

In verse 3, Paul calls it of first importance. This gospel was and is central to Christianity. If we forget it or deny it, we are in horrible danger. 

FIRST IMPORTANCE TO YOU

What is most important to you?

• Your family,

• Your home, 

• Your vehicles, 

• Your health, 

• Your free time, 

• Your friends,

• Or your stuff? 

For Paul, it wasn’t those things- spiritual gifts, justice, or morality—all topics he addresses in his letter. What was most important to him was the gospel. 

DEFINING THE GOSPEL

What did he mean by the gospel? How would you answer if the closest nine-year-old asked you about the gospel after church? [PAUSE] Let’s ponder that. What is the gospel? 

• Is it a style of Christian music with African American roots? Paul was not talking about that; it would be anachronistic. 

• Is it the first four books of the New Testament, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John? Those are gospels. But that was not what Paul was talking about. 

Well, let me help you. Gospel is the word for “good news.” You may have known that. But what good news? It is not a blanket label for all good news. Paul gave a hint. In verse 2, he said that the church is being saved. But what did that mean? Let’s look at the second section for an answer. 

FORGIVENESS

Look at verses 3 through the first part of verse 5 if you have a Bible:

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared. (1 Corinthians 15:3–5a, ESV)

We will stop there. The gospel involves what? [PAUSE] Jesus dying for our sins. So what? How important is that? Vital. All of us need it. Why? What did we do wrong? God has a code of ethics written on every human’s heart. It involves things like don’t murder, don’t steal, don’t lie, and don’t commit adultery. If we stop there, we might conclude that we don’t need Jesus to die for us. We don’t need salvation. However, Jesus took it further in his teaching. He said if we lust after someone, we have committed adultery in our hearts and risk the fire of hell. In the same sermon, he taught that if we get angry with one another and call them names, we have murdered them in our hearts, which also incurs a damnable judgment. Who here has never called someone a name? Raise your hands. Wow. So, all of us are murderers in a sense. You see, we all need Jesus’s death. Those are just a few of the commands related to Bible prohibitions. Other commands call us to action. For example, 

• God calls us to love our spiritual and biological brothers and sisters. 

• He calls us to love our neighbors, not just those we can throw a ball at from our front door, but those who live around us. 

• He also calls us to love our enemies. How many of us love our enemies perfectly? Raise your hands if you do. [PAUSE]

It looks like we need Jesus to die for us. One person asked Jesus what the most important command was. What did he say? [PAUSE][Love God]. That is right. He said we must love God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength. We are to make him the priority. How many of us have done that? Raise your hands. Again, it looks like we need Jesus’s death for our sins. Hmm?🤔 

FIX

Sin is so strong in us that we hide. We lie about our failures. We airbrush our reality and downplay our part. We self-medicate our conscience to rid ourselves of guilt with alcohol, busyness, work, video games, sports, shopping, or other things. We excuse our behavior, words, and thoughts. Jesus came to break the hold it has on us. We don’t have to be shackled to the embarrassing reality we want to deny. He loosens its grip. We are free like Jesus was freed from the grave. We are born again into a living hope, like Jesus, up from the grave with a new lease on life. The Bible says that he does that not because he sees the potential in us but because of his mercy. He sees we are lost, far off, dead in the water. He makes us alive. So the gospel goes on: he forgives us by dying for our sins, being buried, and then rising victoriously. He defeated the curse that we deserve. His death paid the debt we owed. 

He saves us from the penalty of rebellion. Jesus’s resurrection demonstrated the power God has to fix what is broken. One day, all the dead will be raised, some to everlasting life with perfected physical bodies and others to everlasting death. 

TEXT 

Let us keep reading the text for this morning. 

He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. (1 Corinthians 15:5b-8, ESV)

PODCASTS 

I have been enjoying some Canadian podcasts recently. And they invariably bring up evidence and court cases. In Canada and America, an accusation must have rock-solid evidence for a guilty verdict. Circumstantial evidence won’t cut it. So, prosecutors build their cases by identifying, 

• Motives, 

• Means,

• Weapons, 

• Ballistics,

• Witnesses, 

• DNA, 

• Pings off cell phone towers, 

• Surveillance Video,  

• And other corroborating evidence. 

They want to be certain beyond a shadow of a doubt that the accused committed the crime. In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul builds a case of person after person who saw Jesus conquer death. 

• You have twelve apostles in groups and individually, 

• Cephas is another name for Peter 

• The twelve represent the eleven apostles with Judas’s replacement, Matthias. 

• You also have Jesus’s half-brother, James,  

• And then there were over 500 individuals at one time. The part about being asleep is a euphemism for being dead. 

 

The end result is the case for a resurrection, which means that at least 513 people over multiple days saw Jesus after he died. We know there were more witnesses than that. The Bible records that Jesus first appeared to several women. With all these witnesses, there is beyond a shadow of doubt in Paul’s mind and mine that Jesus rose from the dead. 

MIRACLE OF SEEING JESUS 

Let’s go back to our text. 1 Corinthians 15:9. 

For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed. (1 Corinthians 15:9–11, ESV)

So, not only was Paul another witness to Jesus’s living presence. How he saw Jesus and the fact that he was a witness lend credibility to the claim that Jesus rose from the dead. The first miraculous thing was that Jesus spoke to Paul in a vision. The second, and maybe even more crazily, Paul was so far away from being a Christian that he was a persecutor of the faith. He oversaw the killing of a deacon of the church named Stephen. Stephen was a godly man, full of the Holy Spirit, and took care of the poor. But the leadership didn’t like him and his message. So they stoned him to death. Paul looked on and approved. He threatened, insulted, and imprisoned many Christians. He was not a safe guy to be around if you were a follower of Jesus. If he had a yearbook in high school, he would be the student least likely to be a Christian. Yet, one day, God stopped him in his tracks. Paul saw a bright light and went blind for a time. He heard a voice from heaven asking why he persecuted me. That voice was Jesus. And through another Christian, Paul began a journey of following Christ. He received the message, believed it, and then started communicating it. Paul ended up writing much of the New Testament. At the time of this letter, the skeptical or people wanting proof could find some of these witnesses and get their testimony. The resurrection proves the good news is trustworthy, accurate, and real. 

MESSAGE FOR YOU

In conclusion, I want to talk to four types of people here. First, to those who haven’t received this message. Will you receive this message? Will you? Some of you have never received this message of God’s forgiveness. You need it. You have broken God’s Law, and you know it. You need to turn from that sin, tell God you are sorry, and believe Jesus came, lived, died, and rose. If you do, he will forgive you of your sins, as in Paul’s day, and you will be saved. Receive it. 

RECEIEVED 

Some of you have received this. But, like the Corinthians, you have strayed. You have been playing with fire. You have forgotten the Word of God. You need to remember. Is that you? Have you forgotten the main thing? The Corinthians were Christians. They needed to hear this reminder. There are a few of us who are forgetful. Remember, Jesus came, lived, died, and rose for the forgiveness of sins. He came to give us abundant life by expending his life. He loved us that much! He died for us. He has power and authority. The sign of that power and authority was his resurrection from the dead. He can do what none of us can do. Don’t you forget it. Remember it. 

FIRST IMPORTANCE 

Thirdly, some here have received this truth and remembered it. However, it is not of first importance right now in your life. Is the good news about Jesus of first importance to you? You may have put other things in front of it. What would it look like to make the gospel primary? [Pause] What does that even mean? If it is primary, then our lives will be oriented in a way that allows us to have God's interests in mind. We prioritize our sexuality, we mediate our conflicts, and we surrender our unhealthy attachments to God. We put God first and love him with grateful hearts. How we spend our money, time, and energy reflects our priorities. What is "of the first importance" in your calendar and bank records? How can we keep the gospel of first importance? Consider J. D., who leaves for two weeks to invest in others in Central Asia (when other people are relaxing in retirement) to teach people how to study the Bible, seeking God's heart. Or D.H. and S.H., who, instead of making more money as doctors, are seeking to help equip medical people in a developing country with far fewer resources and in desperate need of medical help to care for the body as a platform to also care for the soul. Neither of these wants to get glory. I highlight them because they are making much of the gospel. What would it look like for you to make the remarkable gospel of first importance? 

PREACHED 

Finally, some of you have received, remembered, and kept this of first importance. Way to go! I love that. Keep going. Share it like Paul. We all have circles we are in. We have groups we connect with. Each week, I gather stories about how we are impacting our community for good to share the love of Jesus. We have challenged each other at this church to pray daily for those in our circles. We are challenging each other to be caring for those in our circles weekly and share monthly. Even if that sharing, caring, and praying is for those who already know God’s grace, mercy, and forgiveness. Paul seemed to think we can all use reminders from time to time. If that is where you are, how can you impact your circle with this gospel this week? Try it and let me know how it goes. 

PRAYER 

Let’s pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for sending your Son Jesus Christ and letting him rise from the dead. We love you. You are amazing. Help us remember and keep that in perspective as we go about our days. In Jesus’s name, we pray, amen. 

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