Now I declare to you, brothers, the Good News which I preached to you, which also you received, in which you also stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold firmly the word which I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to over five hundred brothers at once, most of whom remain until now, but some have also fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all, as to the child born at the wrong time, he appeared to me also. For I am the least of the apostles, who is not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the assembly of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am. His grace which was given to me was not futile, but I worked more than all of them; yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. Whether then it is I or they, so we preach, and so you believed.
Now if Christ is preached, that he has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, neither has Christ been raised. If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain, and your faith also is in vain. Yes, we are also found false witnesses of God, because we testified about God that he raised up Christ, whom he didn’t raise up, if it is so that the dead are not raised. For if the dead aren’t raised, neither has Christ been raised. If Christ has not been raised, your faith is vain; you are still in your sins. Then they also who are fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If we have only hoped in Christ in this life, we are of all men most pitiable.
But now Christ has been raised from the dead. He became the first fruits of those who are asleep. For since death came by man, the resurrection of the dead also came by man. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then those who are Christ’s, at his coming. Then the end comes, when he will deliver up the Kingdom to God, even the Father, when he will have abolished all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy that will be abolished is death. For, “He put all things in subjection under his feet.” But when he says, “All things are put in subjection”, it is evident that he is excepted who subjected all things to him. When all things have been subjected to him, then the Son will also himself be subjected to him who subjected all things to him, that God may be all in all.
Or else what will they do who are baptized for the dead? If the dead aren’t raised at all, why then are they baptized for the dead? Why do we also stand in jeopardy every hour? I affirm, by the boasting in you which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily. If I fought with animals at Ephesus for human purposes, what does it profit me? If the dead are not raised, then “let’s eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.”
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 5, 6, 8, 12, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 The sixth treatise of this Epistle, concerning the resurrection:…
The sixth treatise of this Epistle, concerning the resurrection: and he useth a transition, or passing over from one matter to another, showing first that he bringeth no new thing, to the end that the Corinthians might understand that they had begun to swerve from the right course: and next that he goeth not about to entreat of a trifling matter, but of another chief point of the Gospel, which if it be taken away, their faith must needs come to nought. And so at the length he beginneth this treatise at Christ’s resurrection, which is the ground and foundation of ours, and confirmeth it first by the testimony of the Scriptures, and by the witness of the Apostles, and of more than five hundred brethren, and last of all his own.
In the profession whereof you continue yet.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv1–32 1 Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel…
1 Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand;
Ver. 1. And wherein ye stand] εστηκατε, a military term, as Martyr noteth. Satan overthroweth the faith of some, 2Ti 2:18, and by this very engine wherewith he assaulted these Corinthians, ibid. So that the apostle was fain to make apology, 1Co 15:19, to make a barricado.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 The apostle, towards the conclusion of his Epistle, comes…
The apostle, towards the conclusion of his Epistle, comes to reprove the Corinthians for an error in the doctrine of the resurrection from the dead; an error, though last mentioned, yet of all the most momentous. The resurrection of the body in the last day is an article of faith, to the firm belief of which reason speaketh not sufficiently, and therefore it was denied by many philosophers and worldly wise men, Act 17:18. It should seem, that some in the church of Corinth had sucked in some of their notions; the apostle, therefore, in this chapter setteth himself to confirm that article of the Christian faith. To this purpose he begins, telling them, that that which he declared unto them was
the gospel, that is, that doctrine of the gospel which he had before preached to them, and which they had heard, and believed, and embraced as the truth of God, and wherein the greatest part yet stood firm to their former profession, though some of them had been seduced and warped.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 8, 9, 12, 20, 21, 23, 26, 27, 29, 30, 32 Observe here, 1. The subject-matter of St. Paul’s preaching…
Observe here, 1. The subject-matter of St. Paul’s preaching to the Corinthians: it was the gospel. I declare unto you the gospel which I preached; and particularly the doctrine of the body’s resurrection, which was a great point of that gospel which he had preached and delivered to them.
Observe, 2. The obedience which many, if not most of the Corinthians, had given to the doctrine of the gospel; they heard it, believed it, and embraced it as the truth of God. Which gospel ye received, and wherein ye stand; that is, the best and greatest part of you are firm to your former profession, though some are fallen away.
Read full note →
Observe, 3. The blessed effect which the gospel had upon those that did believe and receive it: By it they were saved; that is, put into a salvable state, brought into the right and only way that leads to salvation. The gospel reveals the object, salvation; it directs lost man which way to arrive at it, assures him that it is attainable, and inclines and encourages him seriously to endeavour after the attainment of it.
Observe, 4. The condition annexed and required on our part, in order to the attaining that salvation which the gospel discovers unto us, and that is, perseverance; for that is implied in our keeping in memory what we have received: Ye are saved, if ye keep in memory. If we do not stedfastly cleave to the gospel, and to this grand doctrine of it, the resurrection, our hearing is vain, our believing is vain, our hopes of salvation are vain: By the gospel we are saved, if we keep it in memory, and practise it; otherwise we have believed in vain.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On vv1, 12, 20 It is the apostle's business in this chapter to…
It is the apostle's business in this chapter to assert and establish the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead, which some of the Corinthians flatly denied, Co1 15:12. Whether they turned this doctrine into allegory, as did Hymeneus and Philetus, by saying it was already past (Ti2 2:17, Ti2 2:18), and several of the ancient heretics, by making it mean no more than a changing of their course of life; or whether they rejected it as absurd, upon principles of reason and science; it seems they denied it in the proper sense. And they disowned a future state of recompences, by denying the resurrection of the dead. Now that heathens and infidels should deny this truth does not seem so strange; but that Christians, who had their religion by revelation, should deny a truth so plainly discovered is surprising, especially when it is a truth of such importance. It was time for the apostle to confirm them in this truth, when the staggering of their faith in this point was likely to shake their Christianity; and they were yet in great danger of having their faith staggered. He begins with an epitome or summary of the gospel, what he had preached among them, namely, the death and resurrection of Christ. Upon this foundation the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead is built. Note, Divine truths appear with greatest evidence when they are looked upon in their mutual connection. The foundation may be strengthened, that the superstructure may be secured. Now concerning the gospel observe,
I. What a stress he lays upon it (Co1 15:1, Co1 15:2): Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached to you. 1. It was what he constantly preached. His word was not yea and nay: he always preached the same gospel, and taught the same truth. He could appeal to his hearers for this. Truth is in its own nature invariable; and the infallible teachers of divine truth could never be at variance with themselves or one another. The doctrine which Paul had heretofore taught, he still taught. 2. It was what they had received; they had been convinced of the faith, believed it in their hearts, or at least made profession of doing so with their mouths. It was no strange doctrine. It was that very gospel in which, or by which, they had hitherto stood, and must continue to stand. If they gave up this truth, they left themselves no ground to stand upon, no footing in religion. Note, The doctrine of Christ's death and resurrection is at the foundation of Christianity. Remove this foundation, and the whole fabric falls, all our hopes for eternity sink at once. And it is by holding this truth firmly that Christians are made to stand in a day of trial, and kept faithful to God. 3. It was that alone by which they could hope for salvation (Co1 15:2), for there is no salvation in any other name; no name given under heaven by which we may be saved, but by the name of Christ. And there is no salvation in his name, but upon supposition of his death and resurrection. These are the saving truths of our holy religion. The crucifixion of our Redeemer and his conquest over death are the very source of our spiritual life and hopes. Now concerning these saving truths observe, (1.) They must be retained in mind, they must be held fast (so the word is translated, Heb 10:23): Let us hold fast the profession of our faith. Note, The saving truths of the gospel must be fixed in our mind, revolved much in our thoughts, and maintained and held fast to the end, if we would be saved. They will not save us, if we do not attend to them, and yield to their power, and continue to do so to the end. He only that endureth to the end shall be saved, Mat 10:22. (2.) We believe in vain, unless we continue and persevere in the faith of the gospel. We shall be never the better for a temporary faith; nay, we shall aggravate our guilt by relapsing into infidelity. And in vain is it to profess Christianity, or our faith in Christ, if we deny the resurrection; for this must imply and involve the denial of his resurrection; and, take away this, you make nothing of Christianity, you leave nothing for faith or hope to fix upon.
Read full note →
II. Observe what this gospel is, on which the apostle lays such stress. It was that doctrine which he had received, and delivered to them, en prōtois - among the first, the principal. It was a doctrine of the first rank, a most necessary truth, That Christ died for our sins, and was buried, and rose again: or, in other words, that he was delivered for our offences and rose again for our justification (Rom 4:25), that he was offered in sacrifice for our sins, and rose again, to show that he had procured forgiveness for them, and was accepted of God in this offering. Note, Christ's death and resurrection are the very sum and substance of evangelical truth. Hence we derive our spiritual life now, and here we must found our hopes of everlasting life hereafter.
III. Observe how this truth is confirmed,
1. By Old Testament predictions. He died for our sins, according to the scriptures; he was buried, and rose from the dead, according to the scriptures, according to the scripture-prophecies, and scripture-types. Such prophecies as Psa 16:10; Isa 53:4-6; Dan 9:26, Dan 9:27; Hos 6:2. Such scripture-types as Jonah (Mat 12:4), as Isaac, who is expressly said by the apostle to have been received from the dead in a figure, Heb 11:19. Note, It is a great confirmation of our faith of the gospel to see how it corresponds with ancient types and prophecies.
2. By the testimony of many eye-witnesses, who saw Christ after he had risen from the dead. He reckons up five several appearances, beside that to himself. He was seen of Cephas, or Peter, then of the twelve, called so, though Judas was no longer among them, because this was their usual number; then he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once, many of whom were living when the apostle wrote this epistle, though some had fallen asleep. This was in Galilee, Mat 28:10. After that, he was seen of James singly, and then by all the apostles when he was taken up into heaven. This was on mount Olivet, Luk 24:50. Compare Act 1:2, Act 1:5-7. Note, How uncontrollably evident was Christ's resurrection from the dead, when so many eyes saw him at so many different times alive, and when he indulged the weakness of one disciple so far as to let him handle him, to put his resurrection out of doubt! And what reason have we to believe those who were so steady in maintaining this truth, though they hazarded all that was dear to them in this world, by endeavouring to assert and propagate it! Even Paul himself was last of all favoured with the sight of him. It was one of the peculiar offices of an apostle to be a witness of our Saviour's resurrection (Luk 24:48); and, when Paul was called to the apostolical office, he was made an evidence of this sort; the Lord Jesus appeared to him by the way to Damascus, Act 9:17. Having mentioned this favour, Paul takes occasion from it to make a humble digression concerning himself. He was highly favoured of God, but he always endeavoured to keep up a mean opinion of himself, and to express it. So he does here, by observing, (1.) That he was one born out of due time (Co1 15:8), an abortive, ektrōma, a child dead born, and out of time. Paul resembled such a birth, in the suddenness of his new birth, in that he was not matured for the apostolic function, as the others were, who had personal converse with our Lord. He was called to the office when such conversation was not to be had, he was out of time for it. He had not known nor followed the Lord, nor been formed in his family, as the others were, for this high and honourable function. This was in Paul's account a very humbling circumstance. (2.) By owning himself inferior to the other apostles: Not meet to be called an apostle. The least, because the last of them; called latest to the office, and not worthy to be called an apostle, to have either the office or the title, because he had been a persecutor of the church of God, Co1 15:9. Indeed, he tells us elsewhere that he was not a whit behind the very chief apostles (Co2 11:5) - for gifts, graces, service, and sufferings, inferior to none of them. Yet some circumstances in his case made him think more meanly of himself than of any of them. Note, A humble spirit, in the midst of high attainments, is a great ornament to any man; it sets his good qualities off to much greater advantage. What kept Paul low in an especial manner was the remembrance of his former wickedness, his raging and destructive zeal against Christ and him members. Note, How easily God can bring a good out of the greatest evil! When sinners are by divine grace turned into saints, he makes the remembrance of their former sins very serviceable, to make them humble, and diligent, and faithful. (3.) By ascribing all that was valuable in him to divine grace: But by the grace of God I am what I am, Co1 15:10. It is God's prerogative to say, I am that I am; it is our privilege to be able to say, "By God's grace we are what we are." We are nothing but what God makes us, nothing in religion but what his grace makes us. All that is good in us is a stream from this fountain. Paul was sensible of this, and kept humble and thankful by this conviction; so should we. Nay, though he was conscious of his own diligence, and zeal, and service, so that he could say of himself, the grace of God was not given him in vain, but he laboured more abundantly than they all: he thought himself so much more the debtor to divine grace. Yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. Note, Those who have the grace of God bestowed on them should take care that it be not in vain. They should cherish, and exercise, and exert, this heavenly principle. So did Paul, and therefore laboured with so much heart and so much success. And yet the more he laboured, and the more good he did, the more humble he was in his opinion of himself, and the more disposed to own and magnify the favour of God towards him, his free and unmerited favour. Note, A humble spirit will be very apt to own and magnify the grace of God. A humble spirit is commonly a gracious one. Where pride is subdued there it is reasonable to believe grace reigns.
After this digression, the apostle returns to his argument, and tells them (Co1 15:11) that he not only preached the same gospel himself at all times, and in all places, but that all the apostles preached the same: Whether it were they or I, so we preached, and so you believed. Whether Peter, or Paul, or any other apostle, had converted them to Christianity, all maintained the same truth, told the same story, preached the same doctrine, and confirmed it by the same evidence. All agreed in this that Jesus Christ, and him crucified and slain, and then rising from the dead, was the very sum and substance of Christianity; and this all true Christians believe. All the apostles agreed in this testimony; all Christians agree in the belief of it. By this faith they live. In this faith they die.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv1–32 Moreover brethren, I declare unto you the Gospel,.... The…
Moreover brethren, I declare unto you the Gospel,.... The apostle here passes on, and proceeds to a new subject, the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead, which some in this church denied; and which he undertakes to prove, establish, and defend; and in order to lead on to it, observes, that what he was about to declare, make known, or put them in mind of, was no other than the Gospel he had formerly preached to them, they had received, professed to stand in, and were saved by, unless their faith was in vain. The doctrine of the resurrection of the dead he calls "the Gospel", that being a most important doctrine, and a fundamental article of it. The resurrection of Christ from the dead made a considerable part in the ministry of the apostles, to the grief of the Sadducees among the Jews, to the scorn of the Gentile philosophers, and to the faith, hope, and comfort of Christians: this is the sum and substance of the word of faith, or doctrine of the Gospel, upon which the whole depends; see Rom 10:8 and the resurrection of the saints is connected with it, and assured by it. This indeed is the Gospel, good news, glad tidings that the bodies of the saints shall be raised again, and made like to the glorious body of Christ; and being reunited to their souls, shall live with him to all eternity; and were this out of the Gospel, it would not be Gospel, or good news; it would be an idle story, faith would be a vain thing, and hoping and believing Christians of all the most miserable. Moreover, says the apostle, the Gospel I declare, is
which I preached unto you; meaning, when he first came among them, and which had been so very useful to them for conversion and consolation; and therefore if he himself, or an angel from heaven, was to preach any other doctrine, it was to be rejected; and hence, much less should the false teachers be regarded: yea, adds he, it is the doctrine
Read full note →
which also you have received; when first enlightened and converted, with all gladness and joyfulness, with all readiness and cheerfulness, in the love of it, and by a full assent to it; and therefore having had such an experience of it, should not now depart from it: nay, he further says,
and wherein ye stand; as he hoped they did, at least it was what they ought to have done, and doubtless was the case of the majority of them, and whose example it became the rest to follow.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 Ye are saved, if ye hold fast - Your…
Ye are saved, if ye hold fast - Your salvation is begun, and will be perfected, if ye continue in the faith. Unless ye have believed in vain - Unless indeed your faith was only a delusion.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 The Gospel which the apostle preached to the Corinthians;…
CHAPTER XV.
The Gospel which the apostle preached to the Corinthians; viz.
Read full note →
that Christ died for our sins, and rose again the third day,
1-4.
The witnesses of his resurrection, Peter, James, and more than
five hundred brethren, 5-7.
Lastly, Paul himself saw him, and was called by him to the
apostleship, 8-11.
Objections against the resurrection of the dead answered, 12-34.
The manner in which this great work shall be performed, 35-49.
The astonishing events that shall take place in the last day,
50-57.
The use we should make of this doctrine, 58.
NOTES ON CHAP. XV.
It appears from this chapter that there were some false apostles at Corinth, who denied the resurrection, see 1Co 15:12; in consequence of which St. Paul discusses three questions in this chapter:-
1. Whether there be a resurrection of the dead? 1Co 15:1-35.
2. What will be the nature of the resurrection bodies?
1Co 15:35-51.
3. What should become of those who should be found alive in
the day of judgment? 1Co 15:51-57.
I. The resurrection he proves,
1. From Scripture, 1Co 15:1-4.
2. From eye witnesses, 1Co 15:5-12.
II. He proves the resurrection by showing the absurdity of the
contrary doctrine:-
1. If the dead rise not, Christ is not risen, 1Co 15:13.
2. It would be absurd to have faith in Him, according to the
preaching of the Gospel, if he be not risen, 1Co 15:14.
3. The apostles must be false witnesses who attest this
resurrection, 1Co 15:15.
4. The faith of the Corinthians must be vain who believe it,
1Co 15:16; 1Co 15:17.
5. All the believers who have died in the faith of Christ have
perished, if Christ be not risen, 1Co 15:18.
6. Believers in Christ are in a more miserable state than any
others, if there be no resurrection, 1Co 15:19.
7. Those who were baptized in the faith that Christ died for
them and rose again, are deceived, 1Co 15:29.
8. The apostles, and Christians in general, who suffer
persecution on the ground that, after suffering awhile here
they shall have a glorious resurrection, are acting a foolish
and unprofitable part, 1Co 15:30-32.
Verse 1. The Gospel which I preached unto you] This Gospel is contained in Christ dying for our sins, being buried, and rising again the third day. See the following verses.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 14, 19, 20, 23, 24, 25, 28, 29, 31 1Co 15:1-2. Moreover, brethren — The resurrection of the…
1Co 15:1-2. Moreover, brethren — The resurrection of the body being one of the great objects of the faith and hope of Christians, the apostle in this chapter sets before the Corinthians, and all mankind, the proof by which that joyful event is rendered indubitable, namely, that it is a necessary consequence of the resurrection of Christ. Wherefore, to lay a firm foundation for this proof, he judged it proper to recall to the remembrance of the Corinthians the arguments by which he had proved to their satisfaction the truth of Christ’s resurrection, which is the subject that he first touches upon. I declare — Γνωριζω, I make known; the gospel — The principal doctrines thereof; which I preached unto you — At the very beginning of my ministry among you; which also you received — In faith and love; and wherein you stand — In the faith of which many of you persevere; by which also ye are — Or shall be; saved finally, if ye keep in memory — Ει κατεχετε, if ye hold fast; what I preached unto you — The great truths to which I bore testimony: that is, your salvation is begun, and will be perfected if ye continue in the faith; unless ye have believed in vain — Or rather, rashly, as εικη seems evidently here to signify, denoting the disposition of those who do a thing by chance and lightly, without knowing for what reason or end they do it.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv1–32 Moreover - But (δὲ de). In addition to what…
Moreover - But (δὲ de). In addition to what I have said, or in that which I am now about to say, I make known the main and leading truth of the gospel. The particle δὲ de is “strictly adversative, but more frequently denotes transition and conversion, and serves to introduce something else, whether opposite to what precedes, or simply continuative or explanatory” - Robinson. Here it serves to introduce another topic that was not properly a continuation of what he had said, but which pertained to the same general subject, and which was deemed of great importance.
I declare unto you - (Γνωρίζω Gnōrizō). This word properly means to make known, to declare, to reveal Luk 2:15; Rom 9:22-23; then to tell, narrate, inform Eph 6:21; Col 4:7, Col 4:9; and also to put in mind of, to impress, to confirm; see the note at 1Co 12:3. Here it does not mean that he was communicating to them any new truth, but he wished to remind them of it; to state the arguments for it, and to impress it deeply on their memories. There is an abruptness in our translation which does not exist in the original. Bloomfield.
Read full note →
The gospel - See the note at Mar 1:1. The word here means the “glad announcement,” or the “good news” about the coming of the Messiah, his life, and sufferings, and death, and especially his resurrection. The main subject to which Paul refers in this chapter is the resurrection, but he includes in the word gospel. Here, the doctrine that he died for sins, and was buried, as well as the doctrine of his resurrection; see 1Co 15:3-4.
Which I preached unto you - Paul founded the church at Corinth; Act 18:1 ff. It was proper that he should remind them of what he had taught them at first; of the great elementary truths on which the church had been established, but from which their minds had been diverted by the other subjects that had been introduced as matters of debate and strife. It was fair to presume that they would regard with respect the doctrines which the founder of their church had first proclaimed, if they were reminded of them; and Paul, therefore, calls their attention to the great and vital truths by which they had been converted, and by which the church had thus far prospered. It is well, often, to remind Christians of the truths which were preached to them when they were converted, and which were instrumental in their conversion. When they have gone off from these doctrines, when they had given their minds to speculation and philosophy, it has a good effect to “remind” them that they were converted by the simple truths, that Christ died, and was buried, and rose again from the dead. The argument of Paul here is, that they owed all the piety and comfort which they had to these doctrines; and that, therefore, they should still adhere to them as the foundation of all their hopes.
Which also ye have received - Which you embraced; which you all admitted as true; which were the means of your conversion. I would remind you, that, however that truth may now be denied by you, it was once received by you, and you professed to believe in the fact that Christ rose from the dead, and that the saints would rise.
And wherein ye stand - By which your church was founded, and by which all your piety and hope has been produced, and which is at the foundation of all your religion. You were built up by this, and by this only can you stand as a Christian church. This doctrine was vital and fundamental. This demonstrates that the doctrines that Christ died “for sins,” and rose from the dead, are fundamental truths of Christianity. They enter into its very nature; and without them there can be no true religion.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv7, 8, 10, 13, 24, 28, 29, 31, 32 He was seen by James. The time is not…
He was seen by James. The time is not mentioned in the gospels. (Witham)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
John Nelson Darby 1862 · Public Domain On v1 1 Corinthians Chapter 15
1 Corinthians Chapter 15
But other evils had found means to introduce themselves into the midst of the shining gifts which were exercised in the bosom of the flock at Corinth. The resurrection of the dead was denied. Satan is wily in his dealings. Apparently it was only the body that was in question; nevertheless the whole gospel was at stake, for if the dead rose not, then Christ was not risen. And if Christ was not risen, the sins of the faithful were not put away, and the gospel was not true. The apostle therefore reserved this question for the end of his epistle, and he enters into it thoroughly.
Read full note →
First, he reminds them of that which he had preached among them as the gospel, that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and was raised again according to the scriptures. This then was the means of their salvation, if they continued in it, unless they had believed in vain. Here at least was a very solid foundation for his argument: their salvation (unless all that they had believed was but a profitless fable) depended on the fact of the resurrection, and was bound up with it. But if the dead rose not, Christ was not risen, for He had died. The apostle begins therefore by establishing this fact through the most complete and positive testimonies, including his own testimony, since he had himself seen the Lord. Five hundred persons had seen Him at once, the greater part of whom were still alive to bear witness of it.
Observe, in passing, that the apostle can speak of nothing without a moral effect being produced in his heart, because he thinks of it with God. Thus, 1Co 15:8-10, he calls to mind the state of things with regard to himself and to the other apostles, and that which grace had done; and then, his heart unburdened, he returns to his subject. The testimony of every divine witness was the same. Everything declared that Christ was risen; everything depended on the fact that He was so. This was his starting-point. If, said he, that which was preached among you is that Christ was raised from the dead, how happens it that some among you say there is no resurrection of the dead? If there is none, Christ is not risen; if He is not risen, the preaching of His witnesses is vain, the faith of Christians vain. Nor that only; but these witnesses are false witnesses, for they had declared, with respect to God, that He had raised up Christ from the dead. But God had not raised Him up if the dead do not rise. And in that case their faith was vain: they were yet in their sins; and those who had already fallen asleep in Christ had perished. Now, if it be in this life only that the believer has hope in Christ, he is of all men the most miserable; he does but suffer as to this world. But it is not so, for Christ is risen.
Here, however, it is not only a general doctrine that the dead are raised. Christ, in rising, came up from among the dead. It is the favour and the power of God come in, [17] to bring back from among the dead the One who had in His grace gone down into death to accomplish and to display the deliverance of man in Christ from the power of Satan and of death; and to put a public seal on the work of redemption, to exhibit openly in man the victory over all the power of the enemy. Thus Christ arose from among all the other dead (for death could not hold Him), and established the glorious principle of this divine and complete deliverance, and He became the first-fruits of them that slept, who, having His life, await the exercise of His power, which will awaken them by virtue of the Spirit that dwells in them.
This evidently gives a very peculiar character to the resurrection. It is not only that the dead rise, but that God, by His power, brings back certain persons from among the dead, on account of the favour which He has for them, and in connection with the life and the Spirit which are in them. Christ has a quite peculiar place. Life was in Him, and He is our life. He gained this victory by which we profit. He is of right the first-fruits. It was due to His glory. Had He not gained the victory, we should always have remained in prison. He had power Himself to resume life, but the great principle is the same, it is not only a resurrection of the dead, but those who are alive according to God arise as the objects of His favour, and by the exercise of that power which wills to have them for Himself and with Himself-Christ, the first-fruits: those who are Christ’s, at His coming. We are associated with Christ in resurrection. We come out like Him, not only from death, but from the dead. We mark, too, here how Christ and His people are inseparably identified. If they do not rise, He is not risen. He was as really dead as we can be, has taken in grace our place under death, was a man as we are men (save sin) so truly that, if you deny this result for us, you deny the fact as to Him; and the object and foundation of faith itself fails. This identification of Christ with men, so as to be able to draw a conclusion from us to Him, is full of power and blessing. If the dead do not rise, He is not risen; He was as truly dead as we can be.
It needed to be by man. No doubt the power of God can call men back from the tomb. He will do so, acting in the Person of His Son, to whom all judgment is given. But that will not be a victory gained in human nature over death which held men captive. This it is which Christ has done. He was willing to be given up to death for us, in order (as man) to gain the victory for us over death and over him who had the power of death. By man came death; by man, resurrection. Glorious victory! complete triumph! We come out of the state where sin and its consequences fully reached us. Evil cannot enter the place into which we are brought out. We have crossed the frontiers for ever. Sin, the power of the enemy, remains outside this new creation, which is the fruit of the power of God after evil had come in, and which the responsibility of man shall not mar. It is God who maintains it in connection with Himself: it depends on Him.
There are two great principles established here: by man, death; by man, the resurrection of the dead; Adam and Christ as heads of two families. In Adam all die; in Christ all shall be made alive. But here there is an all-important development in connection with the position of Christ in the counsels of God. One side of this truth is the dependence of the family, so to call it, upon its head. Adam brought death into the midst of his descendants-those who are in relation with himself. This is the principle which characterises the history of the first Adam. Christ, in whom is life, brings life into the midst of those who are His-communicates it to them. This principle characterises the second Adam, and those who are His in Him. But it is life in the power of resurrection, without which it could not have been communicated to them. The grain of wheat would have been perfect in itself, but would have remained alone. But He died for their sins, and now He imparts life to them, all their sins being forgiven them.
Now, in the resurrection, there is an order according to the wisdom of God for the accomplishment of His counsels-Christ, the first-fruits; those who are Christ’s, at His coming again. Thus those who are in Christ are quickened according to the power of the life which is in Christ; it is the resurrection of life. But this is not the whole extent of resurrection as acquired by Christ, in gaining the victory over death according to the Spirit of holiness. The Father has given Him power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as the Father had given Him. The latter are those of whom this chapter treats essentially, because its subject is resurrection among Christians; and the apostle, the Spirit Himself, loves to speak on the subject of the power of eternal life in Christ. Yet he cannot entirely omit the other part of the truth. The resurrection of the dead, he tells us, is come by man. But he is not here speaking of the communication of life in Christ. In connection with this last and nearer part of his subject, he does not touch upon the resurrection of the wicked; but after the coming of Christ he introduces the end, when He shall have given up the kingdom to the Father. With the kingdom is introduced the power of Christ exercised over all things-a different thought entirely from the communication of life to His own.
There are three steps therefore in these events: first, the resurrection of Christ; then, the resurrection of those who are His, at His coming; afterwards, the end, when He shall have given up the kingdom to the Father. The first and the second are the accomplishment in resurrection of the power of life in Christ and in His people. When He comes, He takes the kingdom; He takes His great power and acts as king. From His coming then to the end is the development of His power, in order to subdue all things to Himself; during which all power and all authority shall be abolished. For He must reign till all His enemies are under His feet; the last subdued will be death. Here then, as the effect of His power only, and not in connection with the communication of life, we find the resurrection of those who are not His; for the destruction of death is their resurrection. They are passed over in silence: only that death, such as we see it, has no longer dominion over them. Christ has the right and the power, in virtue of His resurrection and of His having glorified the Father, to destroy the dominion of death over them, and to raise them up again. This will be the resurrection of judgment. Its effect is declared elsewhere.
When He has put all His enemies under His feet, and has given back the kingdom to His Father (for it is never taken from Him, nor given to another, as happens with human kingdoms), then the Son Himself is subject to Him who has put all things under Him, in order that God may be all in all. The reader should observe, that it is the counsels of God with regard to the government of all things which is here spoken of, and not His nature; and moreover it is the Son, as man, of whom these things are said. This is not an arbitrary explanation: the passage is from Psa 8:1-9, the subject of which is the exaltation of man to the position of head of all things, God putting all things under His feet. Nothing, says the apostle, is excepted (Heb 2:8) save, as he adds here, that He is necessarily excepted who put all things under Him. When the man Christ, the Son of God, has in fact accomplished this subjugation, He gives back to God the universal power which had been committed to Him, and the mediatorial kingdom, which He held as man, ceases. He is again subject, as He was on earth. He does not cease to be one with the Father, even as He was so while living in humiliation on the earth, although saying at the same time “Before Abraham was, I am.” But the mediatorial government of man has disappeared-is absorbed in the supremacy of God, to which there is no longer any opposition. Christ will take His eternal place, a Man, the Head of the whole redeemed family, being at the same time God blessed for ever, one with the Father. In Psa 2:1-12 we see the Son of God, as born on earth, King in Zion, rejected when He presented Himself on earth; in Psa 8:1-9 the result of His rejection, exalted as Son of man at the head of all that the hand of God has made. Then we find Him here laying down this conferred authority, and resuming the normal position of humanity, namely, that of subjection to Him who has put all things under Him; but through it all, never changing His divine nature, nor-save so far as exchanging humiliation for glory-His human nature either. But God is now all in all, and the special government of man in the Person of Jesus-a government withwhich the assembly is associated (see Eph 1:20-23, which is a quotation from the same Psalm)-is merged in the immutable supremacy of God, the final and normal relationship of God with His creature. We shall find the Lamb omitted in that which is said in Rev 21:1-8, speaking of this same period.
Thus we find in this passage resurrection by man-death having entered by man; the relationship of the saints with Jesus, the source and the power of life, the consequence being His resurrection, and theirs at His coming; power over all things committed to Christ, the risen Man; afterwards the kingdom given back to God the Father, the tabernacle of God with men, and the man Christ, the second Adam, eternally a man subject to the Supreme-this last a truth of infinite value to us (the resurrection of the wicked, though supposed in the resurrection brought in by Christ, not being the direct subject of the chapter). The reader must now remark that this passage is a revelation, in which the Spirit of God, having fixed the apostle’s thoughts upon Jesus and the resurrection, suddenly interrupts the line of his argument, announcing-with that impulse which the thought of Christ always gave to the mind and heart of the apostle-all the ways of God in Christ with regard to the resurrection, to the connection of those that are His with Him in that resurrection, and the government and dominion which belong to Him as risen, as well as the eternal nature of His relationship, as man, to God. Having communicated these thoughts of God, which were revealed to him, he resumes the thread of his argument in 1Co 15:29. This part ends with 1Co 15:34, after which he treats the question, which they had brought forward as a difficulty-in what manner should the dead be raised?
By taking the 1Co 15:20-28 (which contain so important a revelation in a passage that is complete in itself) as a parenthesis, the 1Co 15:29-34 become much more intelligible, and some expressions, which have greatly harassed interpreters, have a tolerably determined sense. The apostle had said, in 1Co 15:16, “If the dead rise not,” and then, that if such were the case, those who had fallen asleep in Jesus had perished, and that the living were of all men most miserable. At 1Co 15:28 he returns to these points, and speaks of those who are baptised for the dead, in connection with the assertion, that if there were no resurrection those who had fallen asleep in Christ had perished; “if,” he says, repeating more forcibly the expression in 1Co 15:16, “the dead rise not at all”; and then shews how entirely he is himself in the second case he had spoken of, “of all men most miserable,” and almost in the case of perishing also, being every moment in danger, striving as with wild beasts, dying daily. Baptised, then, for the dead is to become a Christian with the view fixed on those who have fallen asleep in Christ, and particularly as being slain for Him, taking one’s portion with the dead, yea, with the dead Christ; it is the very meaning of baptism (Rom 6:1-23). How senseless if they do not rise! As in 1Th 4:1-18, the subject, while speaking of all Christians, is looked at in the same way. The word translated “for” is frequently used in these epistles for “in view of,” “with reference to.”
We have seen that 1Co 15:20-28 form a parenthesis. 1Co 15:29 then is connected with 1Co 15:18. 1Co 15:30-32 relate to 1Co 15:19. The historical explanations of these last verses is found in the second epistle (see 2Co 1:8-9; 2Co 4:8-12). I do not think that 1Co 15:32 should be taken literally. The word translated “I have fought with beasts” is usually employed in a figurative sense, to be in conflict with fierce and implacable enemies. In consequence of the violence of the Ephesians he had nearly lost his life, and even despaired of saving it; but God had delivered him. But to what purpose all these sufferings, if the dead rise not? And observe here, that although the resurrection proves that death does not touch the soul (compare Luk 20:38), yet the apostle does not think of immortality,(18) apart from resurrection. God has to do so, with man? and man is composed of body and of soul. He gives account in the judgment of the things done in the body. It is when raised from the dead that he will do so. The intimate union between the two, quite distinct as they are, forms the spring of life, the seat of responsibility, the means of God’s government with regard to His creatures, and the sphere in which His dealings are displayed. Death dissolves this union; and although the soul survives, and is happy or miserable, the existence of the complete man is suspended, the judgment of God is not applied, the believer is not yet clothed with glory. Thus to deny the resurrection, was to deny the true relationship of God with man, and to make death the end of man, destroying man as God contemplates him, and making him perish like a beast. Compare the Lord’s argument in that passage in Luke of which I have already quoted one verse.
Alas! the denial of the resurrection was linked with the desire to unbridle the senses. Satan introduced it into the heart of Christians through their communication with persons with whom the Spirit of Christ would have had no communion.
They needed to have their conscience exercised, to be awakened, in order that righteousness might have its place there. It is the lack of that which is commonly the true source of heresies. They failed in the knowledge of God. It was to the shame of these Christians. God grant us to take heed to it! It is the great matter even in questions of doctrine.
But further, the inquisitive spirit of man would fain be satisfied with respect to the physical mode of the resurrection. The apostle did not gratify it, while rebuking the stupid folly of those who had occasion every day to see analogous things in the creation that surrounded them. Fruit of the power of God, the raised body would be, according to the good pleasure of Him who gave it anew for the glorious abode of the soul, a body of honour, which, having passed through death, would assume that glorious condition which God had prepared for it-a body suited to the creature that possessed it, but according to the supreme will of Him who clothed the creature with it. There were different kinds of bodies; and as wheat was not the bare grain that had been sown, although a plant of its nature and not another, so should it be with the raised man. Different also were the glories of heavenly and earthly bodies: star differed from star in glory. I do not think that this passage refers to degrees of glory in heaven, but to the fact that God distributes glory as He pleases. Heavenly glory and earthly glory are however plainly put in contrast, for there will be an earthly glory.
And observe here, that it is not merely the fact of the resurrection which is set forth in this passage, but also its character. For the saints it will be a resurrection to heavenly glory. Their portion will be bodies incorruptible, glorious, vessels of power, spiritual. This body, sown as the grain of wheat for corruption, shall put on glory and incorruptibility. [19] It is only the saints that are here spoken of-”they also that are heavenly,” and in connection with Christ, the second Adam. The apostle had said that the first body was “natural.” Its life was that of the living soul; as to the body it partook of that kind of life which the other animals possessed-whatever might be its superiority as to its relationship with God, in that God Himself had breathed into his nostrils the spirit of life, so that man was thus in a special way in relationship with God (of His race, as the apostle said at Athens). “Adam, the son of God,” said the Holy Ghost in Luke-made in the image of God. His conduct should have answered to it, and God had revealed Himself to him in order to place him morally in the position that was suitable to this breath of life which he had received. He had become-free as he was from death by the power of God who sustained him, or mortal by the sentence of Him who had formed him-a living soul. There was not the quickening power in himself. The first Adam was simply a man-”the first man Adam.”
The word of God does not express itself thus with regard to Christ, when speaking of Him in this passage as the last Adam. He could not be the last Adam without being a man; but it does not say “the last man was a quickening Spirit,” but the “last Adam”; and when it speaks of Him as the second Man, adds that He was “from heaven.” Christ had not only life as a living soul, He had the power of life, which could impart life to others. Although He was a man on earth, He had life in Himself; accordingly He quickened whom He would. Nevertheless it is as the last Adam, the second Man, the Christ, that the word here speaks of Him. It is not only that God quickens whom He will, but the last Adam, Christ, the Head, spiritually, of the new race, has this power in Himself: and therefore it is said-for it is always Jesus on earth who is in question-”He hath given to the Son to have life in himself.” Of us it is said, “God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son: he who hath the Son hath life, and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.” Howbeit that which is of the Spirit is not that which was first, but that which is natural, that is, that which has the natural life of the soul. That which is spiritual, which has its life from the power of the Spirit, comes after. The first man is of the earth-has his origin, such as he is (God having breathed into his nostrils a spirit or breath of life), from the earth. Therefore he is of the dust, even as God said, “Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.” The last Adam, though He was as truly man as the first, is from heaven.
As belonging to the first Adam, we inherit his condition, we are as he is: as participating in the life of the second, we have part in the glory which He possesses as Man, we are as He is, we exist according to His mode of being, His life being ours. Now the consequence here is that, as we have borne the image of the earthly, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. Observe here, that the first Adam and the last, or second Man, respectively, are looked at as in that condition into which they entered when their respective trials under responsibility had ended; and those who are connected with the one and the other inherit the condition and the consequences of the work of the one and the other, as thus tested. It is the fallen Adam who is the father of a race born after his image-a fallen and guilty race, sinful and mortal. He had failed, and committed sin, and lost his position before God, was far from Him, when he became the father of the human race. If the corn of wheat falling into the ground does not die, it bears no fruit; if it die, it bears much fruit. Christ had glorified God, made expiation for sin, and was raised in righteousness; had overcome death and destroyed the power of Satan, before He became, as a quickening Spirit, the Head of a spiritual race,[20] to whom-united to Himself-He communicates all the privileges that belong to the position beforeGod which He has acquired, according to the power of that life by which He quickens them. It is a risen and glorified Christ whose image we shall bear, as we now bear the image of a fallen Adam. Flesh and blood, not merely sin, cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. Corruption (for such we are) cannot inherit that which is incorruptible. This leads the apostle to a positive revelation of that which will take place with regard to the enjoyment of incorruptibility by all the saints. Death is conquered. It is not necessary that death should come upon all, still less that all should undergo actual corruption; but it is not possible for flesh and blood to inherit the kingdom of glory. But we shall not all sleep; there are some who will be changed without dying. The dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we (for redemption being accomplished and Christ ready to judge the quick and the dead, the apostle always looked at it as a thing immediately before his eyes, ready to take place any moment) shall be changed (a change equivalent to resurrection); for that which is corruptible, if not already in dust and corruption, shall put on incorruptibility; that which is mortal, immortality. We see that this relates to the body; it is in his body that man is mortal, even when he has eternal life, and shall live by Christ and with Christ. The power of God will form the saints whether living or dead for the inheritance of glory.
Take especial notice of what has just been said. Death is entirely conquered-annulled in its power-for the Christian. He possesses a life (Christ risen), which sets him above death, not perhaps physically, but morally. It has lost all its power over his soul, as the fruit of sin and judgment. It is so entirely conquered, that there are some who will not die at all. All Christians have Christ for their life. If He is absent, and if He does not return-as will be the case as long as He sits on His Father’s throne, and our life is hid with Him in God-we undergo death physically according to the sentence of God; that is to say, the soul is separated from the mortal body. When He shall return and exercise His power, having risen up from the Father’s throne to take His people to Himself before He exercises judgment, death has no power at all over them: they do not pass through it. That the others are raised from the dead is a proof of power altogether divine, and more glorious even than that which created man from the dust. That the living are changed proves a perfection of accomplished redemption, and a power of life in Christ which had left no trace, no remains, of the judgment of God as to them, nor of the power of the enemy, nor of the thraldom of man to the consequences of his sin. In place of all that, is an exercise of divine power, which manifests itself in the absolute, complete, and eternal deliverance of the poor guilty creature who before was under it-a deliverance that has its perfect manifestation in the glory of Christ, for He had subjected Himself in grace to the condition of man under death for sin; so that to faith it is always certain, and accomplished in His Person. But the resurrection of the dead and the change of the living will be its actual accomplishment for all who are His, at His coming. What a glorious deliverance is that which is wrought by the resurrection of Christ, who-sin entirely blotted out, righteousness divinely glorified and made good, Satan’s power destroyed-transports us by virtue of an eternal redemption, and by the power of a life which has abolished death, into an entirely new sphere, where evil cannot come, nor any of its consequences, and where the favour of God in glory shines upon us perfectly and for ever! It is that which Christ has won for us according to the eternal love of God our Father, who gave Him to us to be our Saviour.
At an unexpected moment we shall enter into this scene, ordained by the Father, prepared by Jesus. The power of God will accomplish this change in an instant: the dead shall rise, we shall be changed. The last trumpet is but a military allusion, as it appears to me, when the whole troop wait for the last signal to set out all together.
In the quotation from Isa 25:8 we have a remarkable application of scripture. Here it is only the fact that death is thus swallowed up in victory, for which the passage is quoted; but the comparison with Isaiah shews us that it will be, not at the end of the world, but at a period when, by the establishment of the kingdom of God in Zion, the veil, under which the heathen have dwelt in ignorance and darkness, shall be taken off their face. The whole earth shall be enlightened, I do not say at the moment, but at the period. But this certainty of the destruction of death procures us a present confidence, although death still exists. Death has lost its sting, the grave its victory. All is changed by the grace which, at the end, will bring in this triumph. But meantime, by revealing to us the favour of God who bestows it, and the accomplishment of the redemption which is its basis, it has completely changed the character of death. Death, to the believer who must pass through it, is only leaving that which is mortal; it no longer bears the terror of God’s judgment, nor that of the power of Satan. Christ has gone into it and borne it and taken it away totally and for ever. Nor that only,-He has taken its source away. It was sin which sharpened and envenomed that sting. It was the law which, presenting to the conscience exact righteousness, and the judgment of God which required the accomplishment of that law, and pronounced a curse on those who failed in it,-it was the law which gave sin its force to the conscience, and made death doubly formidable. But Christ was made sin, and bore the curse of the law, being made a curse for His own who were under the law; and thus, while glorifying God perfectly with regard to sin, and to the law in its most absolute requirements, He has completely delivered us from the one and the other, and, at the same time, from the power of death, out of which He came victorious. All that death can do to us is to take us out of the scene in which it exercises its power, to bring us into that in which it has none. God, the Author of these counsels of grace, in whom is the power that accomplishes them, has given us this deliverance by Jesus Christ our Lord. Instead of fearing death, we render thanks to Him who has given us the victory by Jesus. The great result is to be with Jesus and like Jesus, and to see Him as He is. Meanwhile we labour in the scene where death exercises its power-where Satan uses it, if God allows him, to stop us in our way. We labour although there are difficulties, with entire confidence, knowing what will be the infallible result. The path may be beset by the enemy; the end will be the fruit of the counsels and the power of our God, exercised on our behalf according to that which we have seen in Jesus, who is the Head and the manifestation of the glory which His own shall enjoy.
To sum up what has been said, we see the two things in Christ: firstly, power over all things, death included; He raises up even the wicked: and secondly, the association of His own with Himself. With reference therefore to the latter, the apostle directs our eyes to the resurrection of Christ Himself. He not only raises up others, but He has been raised up Himself from the dead. He is the first-fruits of them that sleep. But before His resurrection He died for our sins. All that separated us from God is entirely put away-death, the wrath of God, the power of Satan, sin, disappear, as far as we are concerned, in virtue of the work of Christ; and He is made to us that righteousness which is our title to heavenly glory. Nothing remains of that which appertained to His former human estate, except the everlasting favour of God who brought Him there. Thus it is a resurrection from among the dead by the power of God in virtue of that favour, because He was the delight of God, and in His exaltation His righteousness is accomplished.
For us it is a resurrection founded on redemption, and which we enjoy even now in thepower of a life, which brings the effect and the strength of both into our hearts, enlightened by the Holy Ghost who is given to us. At the coming of Christ the accomplishment will take place in fact for our bodies.
With regard to practice, the assembly at Corinth was in a very poor condition; and being asleep as to righteousness, the enemy sought to lead them astray as to faith also. Nevertheless, as a body, they kept the foundation; and as to external spiritual power, it shone very brightly.
Footnotes for 1 Corinthians Chapter 15
17: Christ could say, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up,” for He who dwells in the temple is God. It is also said that He was raised up by the Spirit, and at the same time by the glory of the Father. But here He is viewed as man who has undergone death; and God intervenes, that He may not remain in it, because here the object is, not to shew forth the glory of the Lord’s Person, but to prove our resurrection, since He, a dead man, has been raised. By man came death; by man, resurrection. While demonstrating that He was the Lord from heaven, the apostle always speaks here of the Man Christ.
19: It is a striking collateral proof of the completeness of our redemption, and the impossibility of our coming into judgment, that we are raised in glory. We are glorified before we arrive before the judgment seat. Christ will have come and changed our vile body and fashioned it like His glorious body.
20: It is not that as Son of God He could not quicken at all times, as indeed He did. But in order to our partaking with Him, all this was needed and accomplished, and here He is looked at as Himself risen from the dead, the heavenly Man. Thus also it is founded in divine righteousness.
John Nelson Darby — Synopsis of the Books of the Bible: the New Testament (c. 1857–1862) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On vv1, 29 A. Refutation of its deniers(1) from the well attested…
XVI
DOCTRINE OF THE RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD
Read full note →
A. Refutation of its deniers(1) from the well attested facts of the resurrection of Christ, which with all connected therewith, pre-supposes its possibility, and is the pledge of its actual occurrence
1Co_15:1-28
1 Moreover, brethren, I declare [make known, γνωρίζω] unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have [om. have] received, and wherein ye stand [have been standing, ἑστήκατε]; 2By which also ye are [being] saved, if ye keep in memory [hold fast, κατέχετε what [with what discourse, τίνι λόγῳ] I preached unto you, unlessye have believed [became believers, ἐπιστεύσατε] in vain. 3For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures: 4And that he was buried, and that he rose [has risen, ἐγήγερται] again the third day1 according to the Scriptures: 5And that he was seen of [appeared to] ὤφθη Κηφᾷ] Cephas, then of [to] the twelve2: 6After that, he was seen of [appeared to] above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto thispresent, but some3 are [have also, καὶ ἐκοιμήθησαν] fallen asleep. And 7after that, he 8was seen of [appeared to] James; then4 of [after that to, ἔπειτα] all the apostles. And [But, δὲ] last of all he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time [as to the untimely-born-one, he appeared to me also, ὡσπερεὶ τῷ ἐκτρώματι, ὤφθη κἀμοί]. 9For I am the least of the apostles, that am not meet [sufficient, ἱκανὸς] to be called anapostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10But by the grace of God I am what I am: and his grace which was bestowed upon [was towards, εἰς] me was not in vain; but I laboured more abundantly than they all: yet not I, but the grace of God11which was [om. which was] with5 me. Therefore whether it were I or they, so wepreach, and so ye believed. 12Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead,6 how say some among you7 that there is no resurrection of the dead? 13But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen [not even Christ hath risen, οὐδὲχρ. ἐγήγερται]: 14And if Christ be [hath] not risen, then is our preaching8 vain, and8 your faith is also vain. 15Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of [against, κατὰ] God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. 16For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised: 17And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain [fruitless, ματαία]; ye are yet in yoursins. 18Then they also which are fallen asleep [fell asleep, κοιμηθέντες] in Christ are19[om. are] perished. If in this life only we have hope [If only in this life we havebeen hoping] in Christ9, we are of all men most miserable. 20But now is Christ risen [has Christ been raised, ἐγήγερται] from the dead, and become10 [om. and become] 21the first fruits of them that slept [have been sleeping, κεκοιμημένων]11. For sinceby man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. 22For as in Adamall die [are dying, ἀποθνήσκουσιν]12, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. 23But every man in his own order [orderly rank, τάγματι]:13 Christ the first fruits; afterward they 24that are Christ’s at his coming [appearing, παρουσίᾳ]. Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up [he delivereth over, παραδιδῷ] the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down [done away with, καταργήσῃ]14 all rule, and all authority and power. 25For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. 26The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death [Death, the enemy, shall at last be done away with, καταργε͂ιται]. 27For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith, All things are [have been, ὑποτέτακται]15 put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted, which [it is with the exception of him who16, ἐκτὺς τοῦ ὑποτάξαντος] did put all things under him. 28And when all things shall be subdued unto him17, then shall the Son also himself be subject [subject himself, ὑποταγήσεται]18 unto him that put all things under him, that God may be [the, τὰ] all in all19.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
[We now come to what may be called the crowning glory of this Epistle, viz., a demonstration of the truth of a future resurrection. Forming, as it does, a portion of the burial service in nearly every Christian church, it has come to be associates with our tenderest and most hallowed recollections, as affording to us precious consolation in regard to departed friends, and laying the foundation for our own triumph in the hour of death. It is not surprising, therefore, that it should have been made the subject of more earnest study than any other portion of this Epistle, and that every line and word of it has been searched for golden meanings. Happy will it be for us, if we shall be able to set forth its deep significance in any thing of its true light, and so contribute some share towards increasing and strengthening the faith of the Church].
For fuller information respecting the opponents of the doctrine of the resurrection, who are here refuted, see what is said on 1Co_15:12.
[The points of the argument are as follows: 1. Whether there is any resurrection of the dead (1Co_15:1-34). The affirmative is proven—first, by a reference to the fact that Christ did rise from the dead with the evidence which establishes it (1Co_15:1-11); secondly, by showing the absurdity of the contrary doctrine in several particulars. 2. What will be the nature of the bodies that shall be raised up (1Co_15:35-51). This is illustrated by various analogies, and also set forth in direct statement as to some of the peculiar characteristics of the risen body. 3. What will become of those who shall be alive at the second advent (1Co_15:51-54). 4. The practical consequences of this doctrine].
1Co_15:1-4. Paul here begins to lay the foundation for his demonstration, which rests upon a fact not denied by the opponents of the doctrine of a general resurrection, viz., that of Christ’s resurrection. First of all, he reminds the Corinthians that this doctrine had formed a part of the fundamental contents of that Gospel which he had proclaimed among them from the first.—Moreover,—δέ here indicates an advance in his discourse, a transition to an entirely different subject; for there is no connection between this and the preceding chapter.—brethren, I declare unto you—γνωρίζω; the word is neither equivalent to ὑπομιμνήσκω, I remind you, [Chrys., Bloomf., Billr.]; nor yet to I call your attention to [(Rück.); both which meanings are inadmissible from the usage of the word, as maybe seen in Rob. Lex.; though Stanley affirms that in all the passages, where it is used in the earlier epistles, it carries these significations]. It means, I make known, I declare. The expression has something of solemnity in it, as though he were about to make a new proclamation. What he intends, however, is to remind them of something already known, about which their recollection needed to be refreshed; [unless there is a latent sarcasm in the word, intimating that though professing Christians—“brethren,” they had so far forgotten one of the fundamental tenets of their faith that they needed to have it proclaimed to them anew].—the Gospel—[Not indeed the whole Gospel (as Alford), but that which so lies at the foundation of the whole Gospel, that which is its main condition and verification to such an extent that by metonymy it might be said to be the Gospel, so that the expression is here used for the purpose of showing the essential importance of the subject of which he was about to treat. And, also, by applying to the doctrine of the resurrection the designation of Gospel he teaches them that it is not a point on which they were at liberty to form any opinion they might choose, without prejudice to their own salvation].—Respecting this he mentions four particulars, in regular climax, by which he exhibits its claim upon their faith.—which I preached unto you,—[i.e., when he first went among them to lay the foundations of the Church].—which also ye received,—[not ‘have received.’ The aorist signification must be adhered to as important, pointing to what took place at the first—their cordial reception of his proclamation].—in which also ye stand;—He here indicates the firm maintenance of what had been accepted as truth on the part of the great majority of the Church (2Co_1:24; Rom_5:2). [This remark is not intended to flatter them; because all to whom he wrote firmly believed that Christ died and rose again. Were it not for this, he could have built on the fact no argument that was valid for them. But though believing this, all had not drawn the same conclusion in respect to a resurrection as he had; so that he is here pointing to that faith among them to which he was about to appeal in support of what he had to say. And then, to finish his climax by showing the personal importance of that faith, he adds,—through which also ye are saved,—By the use of the present tense the attainment of salvation is here presentiated, as though it were something altogether certain]. Yet that he means hereby an attainment still future, is clear from the conditional clause appended. The repetition of the κα ὶ, also, serves to introduce the successive particulars which form the climax, [and also to strengthen the assertions].—with what word I preached unto you, if ye hold fast,—There is a question as to the connection in which this clause stands with what precedes. Luther and some after him take this to be a further definition of what is alluded to in the opening clause of the first verse, q. d., ‘I remind you of the gospel, in what form I proclaimed it to you;’ but the conditional words “if ye hold fast” do not suit with the expression “I remind you.” They also contradict the assertion that they were standing still on the doctrine in question, and they furnish no point, of junction with what follows, “unless ye have believed in vain.” We must therefore connect the clause before us with what immediately precedes, recognizing here an inversion of the natural order of words for the sake of emphasis, q. d., “if ye hold fast with what word I preached the gospel unto you.” To be understood, we here see the condition stated upon which their salvation would be secured; [so that it is an argumentum ad hominem, put in advance for the purpose of conciliating their interest in the truth he was about to demonstrate].—By the expression “with what word” (τίνι λόγῳ) he denotes either the contents of what he had delivered to them (Meyer) [so that it is equivalent to “what,” as in the E. V.]; or the grounds out of which (Act_10:29), or with which he established his argument. So Bengel: “qua ratione, quis argumentis.” The latter is the more correct interpretation; since in what follows he not merely gives the contents of his preaching (the fundamental facts of redemption), but also he brings emphatically to view the grounds of its truth and validity. Luther’s welcher Gestalt may embrace both significations. To, suppose an allusion here to the simplicity of his style, is a little too far fetched. By ‘holding fast’ (κατέχειν) he means, not simply an intellectual retention, a preservation of the thing in the memory, to which the interrogative τίνι appears to point, but a holding fast, in such a manner that a person is certain of the thing. [May it not go still further and point to the practical regard for the truth in their life and conduct, so as to signify their perseverance in saving faith?]—That the fact of their salvation is admissible only on the condition of a steadfast maintenance of this truth, is still further exhibited apagogically.—unless ye believed in vain.—i.e. their failure of salvation was conceivable only on the hardly supposable condition that their exercise of faith was a vain and fruitless thing.—εἰκῇ, in vain (comp. Gal_4:11; Gal_3:4). [It may mean either without cause, or without effect, i. e., to no purpose. If the former, then Paul means to say, ‘unless ye believe without evidence’ ‘had no ground for your faith.’ 20 If the latter, the meaning is ‘unless your faith is worthless,’ and this was a thing not to be supposed. The latter best suits the connection]. On ἐκτὸς εἰ μὴ see 1Co_14:5. This clause is more correctly attached to the main proposition contained in the word “ye are saved,” to which that which follows is subordinate, and to be taken as confirming it together with the condition annexed. The act of believing stands in the closest relation to the gospel as the subjective appropriation of its proffered salvation; and to assert its fruitlessness (which from the Christian standpoint is utterly unconceivable) would be equivalent to the denial of all salvation through the gospel. But, if we attach the words before us only to the conditional clause immediately preceding, and that too in relation to the phrase “with what word I preached to you,” then would εἰκῇ be equivalent to rashly, i.e., without sufficient grounds, q. d., ‘if ye hold fast the grounds on which I preach the gospel to you; otherwise it would follow that ye believed without grounds, in a shallow, superficial manner.’ Or, if we connect it with the words “if ye hold fast,” then some such clause must be supplied as ‘but ye do hold it fast altogether,’—which would not suit. Adopting the former reference, the connection is indeed simple, and the sense good and strong, but it is calculated rather to awaken confidence, than to warn against danger (Meyer assumes both?!), or to hinder their abuse of it to a false security (Osiander).—For I delivered to you—The question here arises, first of all, with what is this to be connected? Is that here set forth an explanation of his manner of discourse (τίνι λόγῳ), either as to its contents (Meyer and de Wette), or as to its grounds? or is it to be referred back to the main statement in the first verse, “I declare unto you?” The latter is to be preferred, inasmuch as the manner of discourse is spoken of in a subordinate clause. His meaning is, ‘what I now hold up before you, viz., the truth of Christ’s resurrection in its bearing on our salvation, is only a proclamation of that gospel which I preached unto you at the beginning.’ Here he speaks in relation to the fact itself, and that too in its significance for the faith, according to the Scriptures.—Catholic expositors use the word παρέδωκα support of the legitimacy of tradition.—among the first (things),—in the order of time [Chrys.]; or still better, in importance, in primis, before all, “as belonging to the weightiest articles of faith. Burger: “as one of the first points.” Neander. [Rückert connects the words directly with “to you,” as though the Corinthians were “among the first” to have the doctrine preached to them; which is not true. The following passages from LXX. may throw some light on the expression: “and he placed the two maid servants and their children first, ἐν πρώτοις (Gen_33:2); “and David said whosoever smiteth the Jebusites first,” ἐν πρώτοις (2Sa_5:8).] He here takes into account, not simply the order of time, but also the momentousness of the thing communicated.—what also I have received,—παρέλαβον, because it stands correllative to παρέδωκα, is to be understood otherwise than in 1Co_15:2, as denoting the simple reception of a thing imparted; and this, not through human tradition only, but also by special inward revelation from the Lord. The fact itself, i.e., of Christ’s death which he was about to speak of, he had undoubtedly learned before his conversion; but he is here treating not solely of the fact, but likewise of its significance for a life of faith, and this he had to learn by revelation. So too in regard to the resurrection. This he had heard of and flouted as fable; but its verity was at last disclosed to him in such a manner by the glorious appearance of Christ in the way, that all doubt in reference to it as though the death had been only one in appearance, or a deception, was entirely dissipated; and by a subsequent illumination, which explained to him the bearing of Scripture upon these facts, they had obtained his full and firm faith as the fundamental articles of his religious creed. [And in saying that ‘he delivered’ only what ‘he had received,’ he was but asserting the faithful discharge of his duty as an apostle, which was to proclaim at first hand, as it were, the truth of Christ].—that Christ died for our sins,—Here the expiatory power of Christ’s death is clearly indicated as in 1Co_1:13; Rom_5:8 (by the simple ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν); comp. Gal_1:4; 1Pe_2:24; Rom_3:24 ff; Rom_4:25.—ὑπὲρ=περὶ, for the sake of. [Stanley says, “for our sins,” not merely ‘in our behalf,’ which would have been ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν, as in Rom_5:8; nor ‘in our place’ which would have been ἀντὶ ἡμῶν; but ‘as an offering in consequence of our sins,’ ‘to deliver us from our sins.’ “ ‘Υπὲρ has the same ambiquity as the English for, in behalf of; but the idea of service and protection always predominates. Whenever in speaking of Christ’s death the idea of substitution is intended, it is under the figure of a ransom; in which case it is expressed by ἀντὶ (Mat_20:28; Mar_10:45). Whenever the idea of covering or forgiving sins is intended, it is under the figure of a sin-offering in which case the word used is περὶ, as in Rom_8:3; 1Pe_3:18; 1Jn_2:2; 1Jn_4:10; περὶ ἁμαπτἰας or ἁμαρτιῶν.—But what connection has this with the doctrine of resurrection? Much every way. Christ’s death could not have availed to expiate sin had he remained under the power of death. In order to prove that He died not for His own sins, but for the sins of others, and to demonstrate this ability and right to confer pardon and blessedness as the Lord of life, it was necessary for Him to rise again. Hence though atonement is secured by His death, yet righteousness comes through His resurrection (Rom. 5:25). To deny his resurrection, therefore, is to annul also the efficacy of His sacrifice, and with this all hope of pardon through Him. And the fatal extent to which the denial of any fact must carry us, should be shown as a part of the argument in its defence].—according to the Scriptures:—He here intimates that Christ’s death for our sins was the fulfilment of the divine counsel foretold in the Old Testament Scriptures. The use of the plural points to the long line of witnesses which runs through the various portions of the sacred record (comp. Mat_26:54; Luk_24:32). “We must keep in view the manner in which the calling of the Messiah was regarded. It was one towards which the entire development of the theocracy was continually tending, and which therefore might be found indicated in various ways. The apostles do not distinguish between the ideal and the literal reference, as this was not the way of the Holy Spirit, but only of scientific investigation.” Neander. Paul here undoubtedly had in mind, not simply such prophecies as Isaiah 53, but also such types as the offerings and the paschal lamb. (Comp. 1Co_5:7). [Paul protested before Festus that in preaching the Gospel he had said, “none other things than those which Moses and the prophets had said, should come that Christ should suffer, and that He should be the first that should rise from the dead, and should show light unto the people and to the Gentiles.” And he assured the Romans that his gospel was “witnessed to by the law and the prophets.” Thus it will be seen that the doctrine of atonement for sin by the death of Christ pervades the entire Word of God. Hence not to believe in it was declared by our Lord to indicate “folly and slowness of heart” (Luk_24:25; Luk_24:27)].—And that he was buried,—[This is an important fact, both as indicating the undoubted truth of His having died, and as the necessary antecedent to the resurrection. In entering the grave our Lord but finished the course appointed for all mankind, and it was the natural fulfilment of His earthly career. The fact, therefore, properly forms a distinct article in our creed].—and that he has been raised on the third day,—ἐγήγερται. The perfect indicates that the fact is not a transient one like that of dying and being buried,—marks the continuation of the state just begun, or of its consequences—‘has been raised and is alive.’—according to the Scriptures:—The testimony here referred to bears primarily on the fact of His having risen (comp. Psa_16:10; Act_13:34 ff.; Isa_53:8-10 ff.), including also the time of His rising which is hinted at in the type of Jonah (comp. Mat_12:40; Mat_16:4). But this type, as well as the prophecy in Isa_53:9, allows also of a reference to the burial; but the repetition of ὃτι before ἐγήγερται forms an objection to this reference. Besides, it is only the two essential factors in the work of redemption, viz.: the death and the resurrection of Christ that are sustained upon Scripture testimony. So Meyer Ed. 3. [But how can this be, when Peter referred in his speech at Pentecost to the declaration of David, “thou wilt not leave my soul in hell neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption,” as a prophecy of Christ’s burial and resurrection?]
1Co_15:5-7. And that he was seen of Cephas,—The ὃτι, that, shows that in grammatical structure the dependance of the clauses upon παρέδωκα, 1Co_15:3, is still maintained; while the independent statements begin at the next verse. From this, however, it does not follow that he had delivered to them merely that which is asserted in 1Co_15:5. He undoubtedly is here recapitulating the whole testimony in proof of Christ’s resurrection, as he had often given it to them. That he is following the chronological order of the evidence, is clear from the use of the definite adverbs of sequence, “then,” “after that,” “last of all.”—The appearance of the risen Saviour to Peter, recorded Luk_24:34, ‘is mentioned first, not “because the authority of Peter was the chiefest, as being the prince of the apostles” (Estius), but in accordance with the historical order of occurrences, passing over, however, the manifestation previously made of Himself to Mary Magdalene (Joh_20:14 f.). “Mary Magdalene was, indeed, a witness to the brethren, but not to the people at large,”—W. F. Besser; [and to have cited her testimony would, with multitudes, at that period, have tended to call out a sneer, rather than strengthen belief].—then of the twelve:—This was the common designation of the smaller circle of disciples, although it was not then complete [“twelve being a name, not of number, but of office”]; and the manifestation here alluded to (Luk_24:36 ff.; Joh_20:19 ff.) is not to be confounded with that which followed eight days after (Joh_20:26). Thomas also was not present. The apostles appear also here as witnesses of the resurrection of Christ (Act_2:23; Act_3:15; Act_10:40 ff; Act_13:31). By ὥφθη, was seen, we are to understand a literal perception by the senses, and not a vision. After that, he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once;—The manifestation here spoken of is nowhere else recorded; in Mat_28:16 mention is made only of “the eleven.” The expression “at once” implies that the “more than five hundred” saw Him, not separately, but altogether; and this probably took place at a time when numerous Galilean disciples were still at Jerusalem, and therefore before the termination of the festival season. The fact that about the time of Pentecost only about one hundred and twenty disciples are spoken of, does not militate with this supposition. [Hodge says, “This manifestation may have taken place on the occasion when Christ met His disciples in Galilee.” Before His death He told them, “After I am risen again, I will go before you into Galilee,” Mat_26:32. Early in the morning of His resurrection, He met the women who had been at His tomb, and said to them, “Be not afraid; go tell my brethren, that they go into Galilee, and there shall they see me,” Mat_28:10; and accordingly in 1Co_15:16 it is said, “Then the eleven went away into Galilee, into a mountain where Jesus had appointed them.” “This, therefore, was a formally appointed meeting, and doubtless made known as extensively as possible to His followers; and it is probable, therefore, that there was a concourse of all who could come, not only from Jerusalem, but from the surrounding country, and from Galilee. Though intended specially for the eleven, it is probable that all attended who knew of the meeting, and could possibly reach the appointed place. Who would willingly be absent on such an occasion?”—Hodge].—of whom the greater part remain until now,—This is added to show that a large number of witnesses of the resurrection could still be called upon for their testimony. [And here we have a most striking proof of the fact before us. Had the resurrection of Christ been only a fiction, “so many false hearts and tongues would never have acted in concert; nor would they all have kept a secret, which remorse, interest, and perhaps often torture, might urge them to divulge—especially as there had been one traitor among the twelve; on account of which, had they been conscious of a fraud, a general suspicion of each other’s secrecy must have arisen.” Doddridge].—Μένειν, as in Joh_21:22; Php_1:25).—but some are fallen asleep.—[The sweet language of the gospel for expressing the nature of the believer’s death—transforming its very terrors into attractions. It carries in itself also the implication of an after-awakening, and hence is the only term that could be used when speaking of death in a discourse on the resurrection].—After that he was seen of James;—This manifestation, which happened to a single individual, is also alluded to only here. This James is undoubtedly the brother of our Lord mentioned Gal_2:9, as among the “pillars” of the church; he is also introduced in Act_15:13; Act_21:18 as a specially important personage, one of “the brethren of the Lord,” 1Co_9:5. It was this manifestation of the risen Saviour that proved indeed for him and his brethren the turning-point of their lives, so that they at once became His decided followers (Act_1:14). According to the legend in ‘the gospel of the Hebrews,’ cited by Jerome, James was honored before all others with a manifestation of Christ. This story is a product of the Jewish tendency to hero-worship.—then by all the apostles.—Inasmuch as the twelve have been already mentioned, the disposition with many (Chrys., Calvin, and others) is to take these words in a more comprehensive sense, so as to include James also, and other eye-witnesses of the life of Jesus, It is a question whether this manifestation occurred immediately before the ascension. There is nothing in the narratives of this fact to contradict the supposition. [“The word ‘all’ may be used to indicate that the appearance was to the apostles collectively; and this, from its position, is the most natural explanation. Or the meaning may be, He appeared to James separately, and then to all the apostles, including James. If the James intended was James of Jerusalem; and if that James were a different person from James the son of Alpheus (a disputed point), then the former interpretation should be preferred. For ‘the apostle’ answers to ‘the twelve,’ and if James of Jerusalem was not the son of Alpheus, he was not one of the twelve.” Hodge]. “It was a providential circumstance that Paul was led to adduce these witnesses for the appearance of Christ after the resurrection. Should any one be inclined to doubt the genuineness of the testimonies of the Evangelists on this point, and to assume in these a mythic element, he is here entirely debarred from so doing; since nobody ever has doubted,. or will doubt the genuineness of this epistle, and Paul is here speaking of historical facts throughout. Accordingly, we may say that the resurrection of Christ is a fact as well attested as any in the past. Without it there would be a gap in history unfilled; since the resurrection is essentially presupposed in the very existence of the Church as built up by the Apostle.” Neander.
1Co_15:8-10. He here mentions himself as the last apostolic witness of the resurrection. In one respect, indeed, he stood after the others; but in respect of that which he had wrought by the power of divine grace, he had become distinguished above them all.—But last of all,—πάντων, of all, is not to be taken as neuter (as de Wette, [Hodge, Alford, who take the whole phrase here as an adverb of order, winding up the whole series]), but as masculine, and is to be referred in accordance with the context to the apostles.—as it were by the untimely born,—ὡσπερεὶ precedes for the sake of modifying the strong and remarkable expression which follows. The τῷ is neither to be taken for τῷ=τινί, since this form no where occurs in the New Testament, not even in 1Th_4:6; neither is it equivalent to the indefinite article; but it is here emphatic, the, and by it Paul designates himself as preëminently the unworthy one among all the rest, [“the only abortion in the whole company—the one whose relation to the rest in point of worthiness was as that of the immature and deformed child to the rest of the family.” Alford]. The point of comparison is not in the matter of a suitable education, such as was furnished to the other apostles by a longer intercourse with the Lord wherein he lacked [Eustatius, Bloomf., and Macknight]; nor yet in the suddenness and violence of his conversion and appointment to the apostleship (Calvin); and still less his diminutive form (Wetstein); but as 1Co_15:9 shows, his unworthiness in comparison with the other apostles. [“The corresponding word abortivus in Latin was metaphorically applied as here to such senators as were appointed irregularly. Suet., Oct. c. 35, 2). The word itself is of Macedonian Greek and corresponds to the Attic “ἅμβλωμα”. Stanley].—he was seen also by me.—The seeing here connot be regarded as a mere mental vision, [as some are inclined to interpret the event which took place on the way to Damascus; but in consistency with all the previous manifestations here spoken of, we must regard this appearance] as an actual objective one, just such as we are to anticipate from the glorified Redeemer in His second advent. [There is a meaning not to be overlooked in the order of the words here. “Also by me” forms a sort of climax expressing the great wonder in the condecension of Christ to him in this manifestation of himself. Paul could never advert to the grace of Christ shown towards him without being brought both to feel and express in contrast therewith his own great unworthiness. See Tim. 1Co_1:12-13. On the subject of “Paul a witness for the resurrection of Jesus,” see an able article by Prof. G. P. Fisher, in the “Bib. Sac.” Vol. XVII. p. 620 ff.] And now comes the reason for this self-disparagement.—For I am the least of the apostles,—(comp. Eph_3:8). ‘O ἐλάχιστος, the least, as contrasted with μέγιστος, the greatest; without any reference to the order of time, as though implying ‘the last’; for the word is never used in this sense in connection with persons. It is more fully explained in the following relative clause.—who—ο͂ς=quippe qui, ‘inasmuch as I’—am not fit—ἱκανὸς=ὰξιος, worthy (comp. Mat_3:11; with Joh_1:27). lit. sufficiently qualified, fit, suitable, as in 2Co_3:5.—to be called—καλεῖσθαι here denotes honorable designation ‘to bear the name of ’—an apostle,—The reason of this is—because I persecuted the Church of God.—[This is the sin which Paul never forgave himself, and from it we see that the forgiveness of sin does not obliterate the remembrance of sin, neither does it remove the sense of unworthiness and ill-desert (Hodge)]. Comp. 1Ti_1:13; Act_8:3; Act_9:1; Act_22:4; Acts 24; Gal_1:13 ff. [“Paul does not refuse to be the most worthless of all, as next to nothing, provided this contempt does not impede him in any degree in his ministry, or does not at all detract from his doctrine.” Calvin]. But the lower he humbles himself, so that no opponent might see him lower, the more decidedly he brings to view the other side—the glorious operation of divine grace in him or through him. “His apostolic office he will not allow to be contemned inasmuch as God had through him wrought more abundantly. By reason of opposers he feels constrained to array himself in his calling and boast.”—Luther.—But by God’s grace I am what I am:—χάριτι, grace, stands first by way of emphasis. No article is needed. What he means to say is, ‘God’s grace it is which has made me what I am.’ Grace presupposes unworthiness in the recipient. It is unmerited love, favor; here as forgiving, renewing and qualifying for office (comp. 1Co_3:10). The latter element, grounded upon the two former, appears more prominently in what follows. In “what I am” he refers to his office as an apostle and to his qualification for it; (or as Meyer, Ed. 3, his whole present state and condition as distinguished from what he was before his conversion. This is further developed in the following clauses, where he points to the consequences of the divine favor towards him in fitting him for his work; first, negatively.—and his grace which was (manifested) toward me was not made vain;—i.e., was not void of fruit. But that this negative statement was far below the actual facts of the case, he goes on to show.—but more abundantly than they all did I labor:—And this was precisely the fruit of the operation of the divine grace. And lest this should seem to be regarded by him as an occasion for boasting, he at once repudiates all claim to honor in the most emphatic manner, showing that, after all, the efficient agent in all his labors was not himself, so much as it was the grace of God working in him and through him.—yet not I, but the grace of God with me.—If we read σὺν ἑμοί without the article then it must be taken as connected with some words to be supplied as the following: ‘labored more abundantly with me,’ i.e., standing by me, or in active coöperation with me (Meyer). [See the critical notes on this point. Calvin attributes the omission of the ἡ to the blunder of some old translator, and insists on its maintenance to obviate the inference of Semipelagians from this text, who would ascribe half the praise of success to God and half to man as being joint-laborers in the work. But the preponderance of authority is for the omission of the article, it being obviously inserted apparently for the purpose of vindicating the absoluteness of Divine Grace. But it is not needed for this. The language of the Apostle is decisive enough without this—“not I, but the grace of God did it”]. Comp. Mar_16:20. By this antithesis, which is not to be weakened into, ‘not only I, but also,’ or into, ‘as well I, as,’ the entire glory of successful achievement is attributed to Divine Grace (comp. 1Co_3:5; Php_2:13; Mat_10:20, and elsewhere). περισσότερον, neuter accusative, not to be taken adverbially [(Alford Stanley)].—αὐτῶν πάντων, not, than Any individual of them, but, than all put together. The explanation of this is to be found in his widely extended sphere of labor.—κοπιᾶν properly means to be weary, or, become weary; then, to exhaust one’s self by working, to strain one’s self; but here on account of the contrast, “not in vain,” and because afterwards the Divine Grace is shown to be the real subject, it can only denote the work with its results; while elsewhere it denotes the work as an exhausting effort (comp. 1Co_4:12; Gal_4:11).—From this digression, introduced no less by the fervor of his spirit than on account of the condition of affairs in the Corinthian church—a digression, however, not to be construed as a grammatical parenthesis—he now returns to his main theme.
1Co_15:11; 1Co_15:13. Whether, therefore,—οὑν as in 1Co_8:4.—I or they,—i.e., the other apostles with whom he henceforward associates himself. “Such was the perfect agreement among all the apostles in reference to the appearance of the risen Saviour.” Neander. In the expression “I or they,” the Apostle casts a polemic glance at the oppugners of his apostolic office.—so we preach,—The “so” is to be explained from what is said from 1Co_15:4-12. It refers to the great fact in question and its proofs.—and so ye believed.—The “so” here is equivalent to “thereby,” viz., that such doctrines have been preached to you; [or, it may be like the previous “so,” meaning after this manner, viz., as above stated].—ἐτιστεύσατε, as in 1Co_15:2. “The accordant and powerful testimony of the apostles is here accredited by its fruits; the Corinthians themselves are here summoned as witnesses through the faith they once exercised.” Osiander. “Faith once accorded often strengthens subsequent faith; and its former strength not only obligates, but often retains the wavering.” Bengel.
1Co_15:12. Over against the preaching of the eye-witnesses of Christ’s resurrection, and the faith it secured, he now exhibits in contrast the denial of any resurrection from the dead on the part of some in the church. And he mentions it as something in the highest degree strange and incredible that such a denial could be made, when (as he afterwards shows) it involved a denial also of that which was the burden of the apostles’ preaching, and lay at the foundation of their faith.—But if Christ is preached—εἰ δὲ Χριστὸς κηρύσσεται—not a hypothetical but an actual condition (Passow, εἰ, I. A. 1. a.), q. d., ‘since Christ is preached.’—Christ is mentioned first by way of emphasis; for the contradiction lies here between the preaching of Christ as one risen from the dead, and the denial of any resurrection from the dead.—that he rose from the dead,—Some readings put ἐκ νεκρῶν before ό́τι; if this were critically established, the transposition of the natural order would be for the sake of emphasis also; but such a double emphasis is hardly probable.—how say some among you—i.e., how is it possible that they can say? It does not comport with the fact supposed, that in the midst of you, a Christian church, there are any who say—that there is no resurrection from the dead?—οὐκ ἐ̓στι, is not, ‘is not to take place’ (comp. Eph_6:9). The whole exposition proceeds on the supposition that the fact of Christ’s resurrection was not a matter of controversy. Hence, the Apostle was able to plant himself on this well-attested theme of Apostolic preaching, and controvert opposers on the ground that their assertions would, by implication, go to undermine the foundations on which both stood, and with it overthrow the whole scheme of salvation by Christ. That these people were Sadducees, is altogether improbable, since this class, by reason of their peculiar views, altogether ignored the preaching of the resurrection of Jesus (Act_4:2), and kept far aloof from Christianity. Besides, had they been contemplated, the mode of argument pursued would have been far different. From what is said in 1Co_15:32, we might suppose them to have been Epicureans; but these persons whose anti-christian tenets would have required a still more definite refutation, remained at as great a remove from Christianity as did the Sadducees; and what is read in 1Co_15:32, is no more than a practical deduction of the Apostle from the premises assumed, and it naturally follows upon his description of a practical Epicureanism (Isa_22:13). So, too, we can hardly look to find in Corinth Jewish Christians of a theosophic class, who denied the doctrine of a re-incorporation of the soul on the grounds of a false spiritualism. “The Essenes certainly may have accepted the doctrine of a personal existence after death, in a form not involving the doctrine of the resurrection; but there is nothing else here which points to the elements of their faith.” Neander. It is more natural to suppose that these opponents were heathen converts of a certain philosophic training, who sought to impose, or taught doctrines that were very seductive to the Corinthians, predisposed as they already were to them. Such would regard, with abhorrence, the idea of a restoration of their material part, and hence for such, an argument like that in 1Co_15:35 ff. was entirely suitable. Among the philosophically educated of all ages we discover a disinclination for this doctrine; and in this question, to seek out a reference to the several parties that existed in the Christian Church, would be uncertain business. In any case, these opposers could not have belonged to the party of Cephas, or of Paul; and they could be reckoned in the Christ party, only on the doubtful supposition that this was characterized by a theosophic spiritualism. And if we assigned them to the party of Apollos, they could only have been certain individuals of this party who denied the doctrine in question by reason of their philosophical peculiarities, and not the party as a whole. It was, in fact, no party question. Besides, there is no warrant for supposing that, like the false teachers mentioned in 2Ti_2:18, they regarded the resurrection as past already. Moreover, we are not to infer from 1Co_15:19 that, together with the resurrection of the body, they also denied the immortality of the soul. Bather we are to infer from this verse only this, that in the Apostle’s view the immortality of the soul was inconceivable without assuming the possibility of a re-incorporation or of a restoration and glorification of the bodily life, that the continued existence of the simple personality (Ichheit) was no true life.
1Co_15:13; 1Co_15:16, That the preaching of Christ’s resurrection was inconsistent with a denial of the resurrection of the dead, the Apostle proceeds to show by a chain of conclusions and consequences connected by δέ—But—[“the but argumentandi frequent in mathematical demonstrations.” Alford.]—if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ is risen:—[First consequence—a palpable absurdity, not only in view of what a being Christ was, but also in view of all the testimony offered to the contrary.] He here argues from the general to the special, since the denial of the former naturally involved that of the latter, it being included under it. ‘If there is no such thing at all as the resurrection from the dead, then must this hold good also of Christ. He also has not risen from the dead.’ The identity of Christ’s nature with that of mankind at large—a fact which underlies this whole argument—is not suspended or dissolved by His Divine Sonship and His sinlessness. For, in that He emptied Himself of His former glory, He became a veritable actual man (σάρξ); and if He died, though sinless, then can the restoration of His body not be affirmed, if such a restoration is impossible for men in general who are dead. Of Christ as the first-fruits (1Co_15:20) nothing is as yet said, so that an argument can be drawn of this sort: ‘If the effect is done away, then also must the cause go with it.’ The statement, “then is Christ not risen,” is not put forth here as a premise (Osiander); but with the exhibition of the impossible conclusion here set forth his whole series of inferences, as it were, celebrates its first triumph. What consequences must arise if Christ be not risen, if he still remains in the grave, he now goes on to show.—And if Christ has not arisen, vain then is our preaching,—[A second consequence—the absurdity of holding that the Gospel with all its provisions and promises, with all it had done, and yet proposed to effect, was a delusion]. κενὀν, which stands first by way of emphasis, means here groundless, untrue, without reality, not ‘fruitless’—a thought which first appears in 1Co_15:17. Still less are we to take the two meanings as here combined. The thought is this: since the redemption in Christ is the grand theme of gospel preaching, and has the resurrection of Christ as its essential foundation, therefore, all preaching without this mast be empty, groundless, unreal, ἄρα, then, brings the inference yet more prominently to view. If the καί is genuine, then the meaning is, if the former be not true, then the latter is not true also.’—The same inference holds good also of the subjective reception of the preaching.—vain also is your faith.—The two refer back to what is said in 1Co_15:11; although the preaching must here be taken in a more comprehensive sense.—ὑμῶν, your is undoubtedly the correct reading; not ἡμῶν our.—To the former clause there is added a third inference, which sets the preachers in a very bad light.—And we are found also false witnesses of God;—From the fact that this again is to be inferred from the supposition that Christ is not risen, it does not follow that this clause belongs in with the previous apodosis, and that simply a comma is to be put after ὑμῶν (Lachmann and Meyer), [or after ‘faith,’ as in our version]. Such punctuation and construction is also inconsistent with the δὲ καὶ; [besides, as Alford says, 1Co_15:15 does not depend on the condition expressed in 1Co_15:14, “if Christ be not risen,” but has its reason given below.]—εὐρισκόμεθα is put first for emphasis, and means we are found, or proven, as before a tribunal of investigation.—ψευδομάρτυρες τοῦθεοῦ, either false witnesses concerning God (gen. obj.,) or false witnesses belonging to God (gen. subj.), i.e., who pretend to be witnesses and are not. The former interpretation is sustained by the following explanatory clause.—[“Observe, false witnesses, not mistaken witnesses. Paul allows no loophole of escape. The resurrection is a fact, or else a falsehood; and it is such persons as Peter, and John, and James, and himself, that are guilty of perpetrating it—a monstrous supposition, when we think of the men, and the truthful ring of their earnest declarations, and the seal they put to them.” Robertson.]—because we testified against God that he raised up Christ:—If a person says of God that He has done something which He has not done, and yet could have done, then is he a false witness in relation to Him, and the false testimony given is a testimony against Him (κατά as in Mat_26:59-62 not equivalent to περί, in respect of [Alford], nor yet as summoning God for a witness like ὸμόσαι κατά Heb_6:13). For, knowingly to ascribe to God anything untrue, is a wicked and hostile crime against Him; and this would be a veritable lie, since they had announced something as an act of God actually witnessed by them, which yet never did take place, and indeed was impossible,—whom he did not raise, if in reality (as they assert)—such is the force of εί́περ, the strengthened εἰ; and ἅρα which means accordingly.—the dead are not raised.—The last statement is confirmed in 1Co_15:16, which is almost a literal repetition of 1Co_15:13, and is introduced for the sake of precision. [“But why is this? Why may not a man admit that Christ, the incarnate Son of God, arose from the dead, and yet consistently deny that there is to be a general resurrection of the dead? Because the thing denied was that the dead could rise. The denial was placed on ground which embraced the case of Christ.” Hodge].
1Co_15:17-19. Here follows a new series of inferences exhibiting the sad result of the doctrine of his opponents upon the salvation of Christians themselves. As before he expressed the groundlessness, and hence the falsity of the faith, on the supposition of these deniers, by the word κενή, empty, idle; so now he expresses its fruitlessness by the word ματαία.—And if Christ is not risen, vain is your faith;—Vain i.e., without any beneficial results (comp. 1Co_3:20; Tit_3:9; Jam_1:26), as is clear from the clause which follows.—ye are yet in your sins.—Here we see that his reference is mainly to the matter of justification, which is primarily a remission of sins. All this is frustrated by the denial in question, since, as Paul asserts (Rom_4:25), Christ was raised for our justification. If Christ was still detained in the power of death, then could no pardon be pledged by Him; He could not act the part of Redeemer and Reconciler, but like all other sinners, would appear to have fallen under the doom of sin. Thus that expressed in 11. 1 Corinthians 2 : “Ye are justified in the name of the Lord, and by the Spirit of our God,” is all done away. The ethical side of Christianity, viz., sanctification and liberation from the dominion of sin, does not lie in the context.—The frightful consequences are shown to extend yet farther, affecting not only the living, but also the departed.—Then they also who have fallen asleep in Christ,—i.e., who have died in communion with Him, being united to Him by faith (comp. 1Th_4:6; Rev. 4:13). By these he means, not the ancient saints who lived before the time of Christ, but deceased Christians, and these, too, not simply the martyrs (ἐν=διά), but believers in general.—perished.—Perdition, according to the Scripture, is not annihilation, but the state of damnation, remaining in Gehenna; and this is here brought forward as a consequence of being yet in sin. If Christ did not rise for our justification, then those whose death seemed but a blessed sleep to a happy awaking in fellowship with their living and glorified Redeemer, so far from having been received into eternal life, were doomed still to abide under the wretched dominion of death. A consequence like this must have made too profound an impression upon the loving disposition of Christians to be lightly allowed. Whatever doctrine constrained them to regard their beloved associates in the faith as lost, must needs appear to them as in itself highly questionable. [“Here,” says Stanley, “we find the climax of the whole argument. As may be seen from 1Th_4:13, one of the most harrowing thoughts to the apostolic Christians was the fear lest their departed brethren should, by a premature death, be debarred from that communion with the Lord which they hoped to enjoy; and in itself nothing could be more disheartening to the Christian’s hope, than to find that Christians had lived and died in vain”]. The method of proof here adopted, though indeed not carrying the force of a mathematical demonstration for unbelievers, is nevertheless fitted to strengthen the hearts of the faithful against the doubts of unbelief. It concludes with an impressive reference to the sad state of those Christians whose hope of eternal life, pledged through the resurrection of Christ, was thus cut off. This touching assertion is introduced without any verbal connective. Comp. 1Co_7:24 ff—If only in this life we have been hoping in Christ,—And here we must, first of all, take into consideration the correct order of the words. The received text puts ἐν χριστῶ after ἐσμέν. In this arrangement, which is feebly attested, we might be tempted to unite the μόνον with χριστῶ̣ as if equivalent to ε̇ν μόνω̣ τῶ̣ χριστῶ̣, q. d., ‘in Christ alone,’ which would be the better expression (Rückert). But in order to obtain a correct relation of the apodosis to the protasis, we must supply that on which it is properly conditioned, viz., ‘and Christ is not risen.’ But if ἐν χριστῶ̣ is to be put after ταὑτη, which is the more critically authorized order, then might we dispense with this otherwise not probable explanation. But then the question arises, to what does μόνον, only, belong? Is it to the words: “if we have hope,” so that it serves to express simply a hoping which remains unfulfilled, q. d., ‘if we have hope only?’ or to the words: “in this life,” putting it in contrast with eternal life; q. d., ‘if we have hope in this life only [Hodge]? Or, finally, does it belong to the whole clause; q.d., ‘if we have no more than put our hope on Christ in this life, and do not hope in Him even after having gone to our rest;’ or, as Meyer says, “if the hope of future glory which the Christian grounds upon Christ in his earthly life perishes with this life, inasmuch as death but transfers him to a state where the Christian hope proves but a deception” [Alford, Stanly]? The last interpretation deserves the decided preference. According to the first, it is not easy to perceive why the words: ἐν τῆ̣ ζωῆ̣ ταύτη̣, “in this life,” are put first. Indeed, they appear to be altogether unnecessary. The second is opposed by the position of μόνον, only. The expression ἐλπίζειν ἐν appears also in Eph_1:12, (spes reposita in Christo), and is analogous to πιστεύειν ἐν. The use of ζωή to denote the present period of existence as distinct from a state of existence, occurs only here and in Luk_16:25. Very short and impressive is the conclusion.—more miserable than all men are we.—i.e., all men, aside from us Christians that still live. In this statement, the Apostle by no means stoops to the level of a common eudemonism, [arguing here from a main reference to happiness as the ultimate end of life]; but his meaning is this: ‘Christians who live as strangers in this world, denying themselves in every way, and bearing life’s heavy load, and enduring all manner of sufferings, and this in the hope of an eternal reward in the kingdom of heaven, are, in case their hope is a vain dream destined to vanish with this life, more miserable than all those who take enjoyment in earthly things: for these things have some sort of reality; while, on the contrary, the salvation for which Christians forego all, and fight, is but a delusion. (Comp. Osiander). [If by ἐλεεινότεροι we understand a positive wretchedness, this declaration must be limited as applicable only to Christians as they were in the times of the apostles—exposed to all manner of privations and sufferings; for it can hardly be affirmed as true of Christians in general, that their faith makes their temporal condition more miserable than that of men of the world. Godliness hath the promise of the life that now is, as well as of that which is to come. This is a part of its glory—a glory which is not all eclipsed even amid the greatest tribulations; for martyrs rejoice and triumph even amid tortures and flames, “not accepting deliverance.” The inward happiness they experience is something which no mere outward circumstances, however painful, can wholly overcome. Would it not, therefore, be more appropriate to abide by the original signification of ἐλεεινός, pitiable, and understand it as referring to the delusion under which Christians would live, and the great disappointment they were destined to experience; in case, having given up all for Christ, and exulted in hope of living and reigning with Him after death, they should find at last that He had not risen, and there was no resurrection for them. Taken in this sense the declaration would admit of universal application. Some commentators, like the translators of the E. V., instead of construing the adjective in the comparative as governing the genitive πάντων ἀνθρώπων, suppose a Hebrew idiom here, and take the genitive partitively, and construe the adjective as though superlative—‘of all men most miserable’ (Jelf. Gr. Gram. § 534)].
1Co_15:20-22. In contrast with the whole deplorable results which would follow on the supposition involved in the denial of his opponents, Paul now triumphantly sets before them the irrefragable fact of the resurrection as established by the testimony previously adduced (1Co_15:4 ff.) and also the significance which it has for the faith and hope of Christians—a significance which is itself a refutation of all skepticism. As Neander says: “He passes on to unfold the chain of consequences arising from the resurrection of Christ, and to exhibit it as the beginning of a new creation which is to find its consummation in the life to come. Nor does the rapture of the apostle, borne on as he is by the contemplation of the glorious theme, allow him to stop at the point where the argument first conducts him; but he follows out the truth onward to its final ground and goal.”—But now,—νυνὶδέ, logical as in 1Co_13:13; 1Co_14:6; and elsewhere. It suggests the subaudition: ‘If Christ has not risen then does it go ill with us.’ But now, as the matter stands, the case is far otherwise; these sad consequences cannot be admitted; our faith is not vain;—Christ is risen from the dead, the first fruits of them that have slept.—Instead of confronting gainsayers with a negative assertion, he strongly lays down a positive, which involves the denial of all the evil consequences above pointed out. Not only is Christ risen, but, as the risen One, He is the beginning of a whole line of those who are destined to arise out of death’s sleep to life eternal—the first fruits, as it were, of a resurrection harvest. The expression: “first fruits” stands in apposition with the previous clause, and contains the theme of the whole subsequent exposition. Ἀ παρχή as in 1Co_16:15; Rom_8:23; Rom_11:16; Rom_16:5. The same thought is expressed in Col_1:18; Rev_1:5, by the words, “first born of the dead,” or, “from the dead” (comp. Act_26:23).—That the primacy of time includes also a primacy of worth, and a causal relation to all that follows, is clear from the position which Christ holds as the Head of humanity, as well as from what is asserted in 1Co_15:21 f. But whether there is such a reference here to the waving of the first sheaf on the day after Easter Sabbath by way of consecrating the harvest (Lev. 32:10), is a matter of question. In favor of it there is: 1. The typico-symbolical interpretation which the apostle elsewhere employs (1Co_10:3 ff.; 1Co_9:8 ff.); 2. That Christ rose on that very day; 3. The composition of this epistle about the time of Easter (comp. 1Co_5:8). In this case the statement would involve the idea of a consecration and pledge of the coming harvest. [“The apostle does not mean merely that the resurrection of Christ was to precede that of His people: but, as the first sheaf of the harvest presented to God as a thank-offering, was the pledge and assurance of the ingathering of the whole harvest; so the resurrection of Christ is a pledge and proof of the resurrection of His people.” Hodge.] Neither the resurrections from the dead recorded in the Old and New Testaments, nor yet the instances of Enoch and Elijah are in contradiction with what is here said of Christ as the first fruits. In the case of the former, there was no arising to an immortal life; in the case of the latter, there was no dying, so that a resurrection could occur.—But whom are we to understand by “them that have slept?” believers, or the dead in general? The latter seem to be implied from what is said in 1Co_15:21; but that the former are meant is evident both from the expression “first fruits,” and also from the designation “sleep,” which is used in the New Testament to denote the death of believers only. The question must be decided by the interpretation we put on the following verses, [where we find the explanation of what is here asserted], in a parallel drawn between Adam and Christ,—first, in the form of a general proposition stating a rule of the divine administration, that what has been taken away from us by man shall be restored to us also by man.—For since—ἐπειδή, a particle of cause, not of time (as in 1Co_1:21; Act_13:46); so that here we have a fundamental principle stated, apart from all relations to time, requiring in the following ellipsis only the supply of the ordinary copula.—through man (is) death, also through man (is) the resurrection of the dead.—The antithesis shows that by “death” is here meant only the death of the body. [The underlying truth here is that community of nature is requisite for the transmission of powerful and all-pervading influences. Like can best act on like. The nature of the causal connection is, however, not stated. Meyer thinks that a knowledge of this is presupposed in the readers, as having been imparted to them by oral instructions of which they are here reminded].—The general fact grounded on the organic union of the race, on the one hand, with the head of its natural development, who introduced death into it, and, on the other, with the head of its spiritual development who brought about the destruction of death, he proceeds to exhibit more fully by referring to the actual fulfilment of this law as it took place in the former instance, and as it is to be anticipated in the latter. And here we have the formulas of the comparison,—As-so—The headship in the one case is Adam, in the other is Christ.—in the Adam—Instead of διά we here have ἐν in, denoting that each of these processes of development has its ground, or source, in its peculiar head. Accordingly, “in the Adam” means ‘as partakers of his nature which is doomed to death as united with him.’ The nature of this union as expressed by διά, through, and its consequences are more fully exhibited in Rom_5:12; Rom_5:15; Rom_5:17, “Through one man death passed upon all men.” all are dying,—[In what sense? Hodge extends the meaning of the word so as to include moral death. The scope of the apostle’s argument, however, requires us to abide by the literal signification. He is here speaking solely of death natural and life natural, and we are to construe his language as bounded within this province (so Calvin and others). As Alford says, “The practice of Paul to insulate the objects of his present attention from all ulterior considerations must be carefully borne in mind.” Barnes also argues for the same limitation with great pertinence].—As the other member of the comparison we have—so also in the Christ shall all be made alive. In the former case, since death was ever in progress, the verb was in the present, ἀποθνήσκουσιν, but here on the contrary the restoration is spoken of as something yet to be,—hence the future ζωοποιηθήσονται. Here, however, commentators divide. Some, starting from the idea of a vital communion with Christ which reaches its perfect consummation at the resurrection, understand by ‘being made alive’ an introduction into a state of supreme blessedness. In this case, they interpret the term “all” either relatively, taking it to denote all believers only, who alone are spoken of in the context; or absolutely, finding in this passage a statement of universal salvation (comp. 1Co_15:28)—“the restoration of all” (αποκατάστασις πάντων). The question is, Ought not the word “all” to have the same scope in the two clauses? The context does not justify our limiting it to believers in the first clause; for he is throughout treating of the resurrection of the dead in general, what ever may have been their religious state, and of Christ as the person who in this respect has taken the lead, and by His resurrection has fixed a point in history from whence death as the separation of soul and body should date its cessation, even as from Adam it dated its commencement. But whether the dogma of a general restoration is a Pauline doctrine is, to say the least, very problematical (comp. 1Co_6:9 ff.; 2Th_1:9.) As Burger says, “It is not possible to prove from our text, nor yet from the whole context, the doctrine of a so-called restoration of all things, which asserts that all at last, both good and bad, even the devil and his angels, shall be made partakers of divine grace.” Elsewhere, Paul speaks of “a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and of the unjust” (Act_24:15). Of this mention is made also in Joh_5:28 ff., where it appears as the work of the Messiah whom the Jews expected to be the general quickener of the dead (comp. Lücke on Joh_5:21 ff.; and de Wette, Bibl. Dogm., p. 203).—But the expression, “be made alive” might be used to signify the resurrection of both classes (Rom_4:17). It means to be restored to life in general; its specific application must be determined by the context: an ethical, natural introduction into life generally, and into a truly blessed life. Accordingly we must side with those who take the word “all” in its broadest sense, and understand ‘the being made alive’ of a general resurrection. For to interpret the second clause of the comparison ideally, of the original destination of all men to a blessed resurrection and of the power of the Redeemer to make all share in it (J. Müller Stud, und Krit. 1835. p. 751) would hardly be doing full justice to the expression.—But is not the above interpretation opposed by the words “in Christ?” No; for we might say, the whole race obtains in Christ the principle of the Resurrection. He, the second Adam, has been implanted in humanity as the destroyer of death; and the result of this will indeed prove glorious or fearful according to the relation which the individual may sustain towards Him, whether positive or negative. Nothing, it would seem, can be decisively adduced against this broader interpretation, from the fact, that in the onward course of his argument the apostle brings into view only the resurrection of believers; since the problem before him by no means required a complete unfolding of the whole subject, in all its aspects. With all this, however, it still remains doubtful whether “the resurrection unto damnation,” which is contrasted with “the resurrection unto life” (Joh_5:29,) can be covered by the expression “made alive.” At all events, a consistency with the main clause (1Co_15:20) would be preserved if we interpreted “all” in the second clause of the antithesis to mean the totality of those who shall be made alive, whoever they are, as in the first clause, to mean the totality of those who die. Accordingly the main thought would be, that Christ, as the risen One, is the informing principle, and commencement of all restoration to life in the race on the part of God. In this respect, He constitutes a parallel to Adam, who was the informing principle and commencement of all death. It is true, the expression “each one” in the next verse, so far as it may stretch even beyond “those that are Christ’s,” seems to require us to take “all” in the broadest sense, and also to give the broader meaning to “make alive “(Meyer); but, opposed to this, there stands, again, the word “first fruits,” the inconsistency of using which in relation to those awaking to “the resurrection of damnation,” reasonably awakens doubt. [Hodge, interpreting the word ζωοπιοιεῖσθαι in a moral as well as physical sense on grounds hardly tenable, restricts the term “all” to believers. But the great majority of commentatators, ancient as well as modern, (Chrys. Theod. Theoph. Beza, Olsh. de Wette, Meyer, Bloomf., Barnes) abide by the universal reference, preserving the parallelism in both clauses. “As the death of all mankind came by Adam, so the resurrection of all men came by Christ; the wicked shall be raised by Him officio Judicis, by the power of Christ as their Lord and Judge: The righteous shall be raised beneficio Meditatoris, by virtue of their union with Him as their head.” Valpy. The necessity for adopting this view will more fully appear as we proceed.]
1Co_15:23-28.—Passing on now from the successive stages of the resurrection, the apostle proceeds to open a view into the final consummation of the divine economy, at the conclusion of the ways of God with man. First—we have the several steps of the great process of restoration in Christ set forth. But every one—sc. ‘shall be raised,’ or ‘made alive’—in his own order:—The word τάγμα does not mean series, but a well ordered multitude, a division of the army, a cohort; and only in this sense can it be translated order. Those who are raised at successive periods of time are conceived of as coming forth in troops or bands, in some one of which every one will be found. [Hodge says, however, that “the word is used by later writers, as Clemens in his epistle to the Corinthians, 1:37-41, in the sense of τάξις, order of succession. And this best suits the context, for Christ is not a band. All that Paul teaches is, that, although the resurrection of Christ secures that of His people, the two events are not contemporaneous.”] ‘I δίω̣, his own, that which belongs to him, and fits him=ἑαυτοῦ. [If we adopt the meaning of band or cohort for τάγμα, then the implication is that those in Christ will come forth by themselves, and the wicked by themselves—those of a kind keeping together. And this will be the natural order, since “those who sleep in Jesus, God will bring with Him.”]—Christ the first fruits;—He forms the first division, [as being a host in himself], which leads the ranks of those who are to be made alive hereafter. The expression corresponding to the figure would be ἀρχηγός, leader, captain (comp. Meyer hoc loco.) The resurrection of all, Christ’s included, is a great fact.—The next division is composed of—those that are Christ’s—The expression is found also in Gal_5:24.—The time of their rising is at his coming.—By the παρουσία here, is not meant Christ’s continued presence on earth (Mat_28:20) onward unto his “glorious appearing;” but, as elsewhere (1 Thes.; 2 Thes.; 2 Pet.; 1 John; James; Mat_24:3; Mat_24:27; Mat_24:37; Mat_24:39), His revelation in power for the setting up of His kingdom. With this the first resurrection, that of the dead in the Christ (Thes. 1Co_4:16; comp. Rev_20:5 is coincident, and it follows upon the destruction of the anti-Christian powers (Revelation 19; 2 Thessalonians 2). By those who are Christ’s, we may understand either true Christians or Christians in general. Meyer says; the latter, referring to 2Co_5:10; Rom_14:10. But it is a question whether the expressions, “those who are Christ’s,” and, “the dead in Christ,” can be used of formal Christians who finally perish.—Afterwards—εἵτα introduces a new epoch (analogous to ἕπειτα) which follows after an interval, when we have the conclusion of the whole development. [Hodge questions this, and says, “it has been the constant [?] faith of the Church that the second advent of Christ, the resurrection of the just and of the unjust, the final judgment and end of the world, are parts of one great transaction.” But to interpret thus, would be both to make the τάγμα (=τἁξις), series, very short, consisting of only two items! and also to contradict the constant use of εἶτα which never stands for τότε, then, as indicating a point of specified time, but always afterward, next, denoting successive occurrence (Mar_4:28; 1Co_12:28). It is a singular illustration of the power of a theory to warp the mind from the fixed meaning of words, that Calvin, while using the Latin text which rightly translated εἶτα, postea, yet goes on to comment in the use of tunc, utterly ignoring the difference of signification. By the words ἔπειτα and εἶτα, two separate epochs are distinctly marked; and it is a violation of all usage of terms to construe them otherwise. The interval between the first and second is stretching beyond 1800 years; how many ages will intervene between the second and third—who can tell?]—the end,—τέλος in this connection means the termination of the process of the resurrection, and stands correlatively to “the first fruits;” it marks the period of the resurrection of the rest of mankind who do not belong to Christ, yet among whom may be found some that are susceptible of the divine quickening (comp. Mat_25:31; [where, at the general judgment, those on the right hand, by reason of their declared ignorance of Christ, are supposed, by many, to be those among the heathen who, by their fidelity to the light within them, and by their general kindness and charity, had evinced a state of mind which qualified them for a welcome into the society of believers. Consult Stier, Olsh., and Alford on this passage.]) The period, thus designated, is one which coincides with the end of the world, with the entire destruction of the present order of things, and with the coming in of the “new heavens and the new earth.” [Alford, Hodge, and others, however, interpret τὀ τέλος absolutely, THE END, i e., of the world, when all shall be accomplished, and the mediatorial work of Christ is come to its conclusion]. As to what shall intervene between these two points—the first and the second resurrection—and as to the duration of the interval, there is nothing in the apostolic writings (save what is contained in the Apocalypse) clearly determined as yet. Thus far this whole subject is enveloped in darkness—just as in the prophets, the coming of Christ in the flesh, and His coming in glory were not definitely separated; but the intervening period, with all its history, lay for the time concealed. In the parousia or revelation of Christ, we may distinguish between the beginning of that manifestation of the Lord’s power in the first resurrection, and in all that which is to precede or is connected with it, and its consummation in the general resurrection of the dead, and in the great events connected with that (Mat_25:31 ff.); and this, in fact, amounts to a distinction between a second and third advent. Respecting “the end,” he explains himself more fully by mentioning that which is to occur contemporaneously with it.—when he shall deliver up the kingdom to the God and Father,—From this passage some have unwarrantably inferred that we are to understand “the end “to be the end of Christ’s kingdom, and so supply the words, ‘of his kingdom.’ But that which is asserted here of His kingdom is something appended, to which the course of the Apostle’s reasoning does not immediately conduct him. The transfer of the kingdom to God and Father (who is at the same time the Father of Jesus Christ—the article prefixed embracing both words (τῶ̣ θεῶ̣ καὶ ΙΙατρὶ) as in Rom_15:6 f.) presupposes that revelation of Christ as the Sovereign of God’s kingdom—as the Possessor of a power that covers heaven and earth (Mat_28:18), which takes place at His advent; and it is itself the termination of the mediatorial reign (i.e., of that progressive struggle with the hostile powers of darkness, and subsequent subjection to God in the power of the redeeming and atoning work of the Lord, who is the royal The anthropos, the God-Man, the perfect Vicar of God), and the commencement of the absolute, immediate, Divine rule, when the Son is to transfer unto the Father the whole universe as a realm made entirely subject to Him, having in it no opposing force, where He can rule with majesty serene and undisturbed; inasmuch as the Son who entered into the course of its history, and took part in its strife, has overcome all opposition, so that resistance no more is to be found.—[“Nothing is here said which can affect either (1) His co-equality and co-eternity with the Father in the Godhead, which is prior to, and independent of this mediatorial work, and is not limited to the mediatorial kingdom; or (2) the eternity of His humanity: for that humanity ever was, and is subordinate to the Father; and it by no means follows that when the mediatorial kingdom shall be given up to the Father, the humanity in which that’ kingdom was won, shall be put off; nay, the very fact of Christ in the body being the first-fruits of the resurrection, proves that His body, as ours will endure for ever; as the truth that our humanity, even in glory, can only subsist before God by virtue of His Humanity, makes it plain that He will be very man to all eternity.” Alford].21 ‘Βασιλεία here means not the subjects of kingly rule—the kingdom so far as its contents are concerned, but the royal power itself, in its exercise—the reign of Christ. “Inasmuch as the work of Christ, founded upon His redemptive acts, proceeds towards a definite goal, it must needs come to a termination when this goal is reached.” Neander.—The transfer takes place,—when he shall have put down all rule, and all authority and power.—Of course such only are meant as are anti-Christian and anti-Divine—the kingdom of Satan, with every thing appertaining to it, which holds supremacy and exercises power, whether it be demoniac (Eph_6:12; Col_2:15), or human that has become subject to demoniac powers. Calvin’s supposition, that “powers legitimate and ordained by God,” or Olshausen’s, “that all rule, good and evil, even that of the Son,” is here meant, is inconsistent with the connection (1Co_15:25), and also with the signification of καταργεῖν, to put down. The extermination of the powers of the higher spiritual world can be understood to denote only the destruction of their external activity—the stripping them of their power, but not of their existence (Neander).—But the whole idea of a transfer and of a kingdom is altered, if we assume the meaning here to be, that God shall be generally acknowledged as the Supreme Ruler (Theod. Estius, etc.; comp. per contra Osiander, p. 711). Unsatisfactory, also, is Meyer’s conception of Christ as the under-regent—as it were, the life-bearer of God.—The explanation of the Fathers who interpret it of the leading of the elect to behold the face of God, the transfer of the heirs of the kingdom into the immediate communion and glory of God the Father; and that of the Reformers, who take it to denote the presentation of the risen members of the divine kingdom before God, e. g., “He presents the elect to God, in whom, henceforth, the Father will reign per sese without intervening token, and in whom He will reveal His glory per sese, and not in Christo only,”—transcend the correct meaning of the words and the scope of the context. From this surrender of the kingdom, we are not to suppose that the eternal kingship of Christ is disowned or denied; for He is indeed the Eternal associate with God on the throne (σύνθρονος). This relationship is only, as it were, taken up in with the glory of the Father. After the great battle has been victoriously fought through, and the work of the Mediator has been finished up, then that rule which has been occupied in the conflict and mediation, naturally ceases. But inasmuch as every thing has at last been brought into subjection to the Father, and so the purpose of the mediatorial reign has been accomplished, the regal glory of the Son, so far from being annihilated thereby, has only been enhanced.
The fact of such a transfer of the kingdom ensuing upon the putting down of all alien rule, and not before, is next referred to a higher necessity, even to a divine decree, and on this it is made to rest (γάρ).—For it must needs be that he reign until he hath put all enemies under his feet.—The authority had in mind by the Apostle is Psa_110:1, “The Lord said unto my Lord, sit Thou at my right hand, until I make Thine enemies Thy footstool.” From this it might be inferred that the subject of the verbθῇ , hath put, is God; and then, inasmuch as this verse expresses essentially the same thought as is found in the last clause of the previous verse, “when He shall have put down all rule,” etc., we must likewise suppose that God was intended there also. But it is evident that He who “puts down all rule,” must be the same as the one who “gives up the kingdom;” and neither the reference to the Psalm (which is here not literally cited, but only appropriated, and freely handled), nor yet 1Co_15:27, (where indeed God is the subject of υπέταξεν, put under, but so that a passive clause intervenes) constrains us to suppose that there is any other- subject than Christ in this verse. And were it otherwise intended, we would, for the sake of clearness, naturally expect that God would be definitely mentioned both here and before καταργήσῃ (1Co_15:24), because these clauses are so closely connected with clauses where Christ is the expressed subject. From the phrase “all enemies,” it is perfectly clear that the words “all rule” (πᾶσαν ἀρχήν) are not to be taken in a middle sense. The necessity here spoken of (δεῖ) is founded on a divine decree (Neander). Comp. Luk_24:26; Luk_24:46. The arch-enemy of all is he from whom all opposition to Christ and His kingdom proceeds (comp. Mat_13:39); with him are connected all powers instrumental in carrying on this opposition, and every thing wherein this opposition is manifested—hence, also, death itself. Comp. what is said in Heb_2:14, “that through death He might destroy him that had the power of death, even the devil.”—ἂχρις οὖ marks the point of termination. Only in case ἂχρις ἄν stood without οὖ could it mean also so long as; but such a rendering is decidedly opposed by the context (1Co_15:24) as well as by the aor. subj. (θῇ). The putting under foot denotes the most perfect subjection in connection with the deepest humiliation. Comp. Jos_10:24, where Joshua bade the captains of the men of war come near and put their feet upon the necks of the conquered kings of Canaan. A similar expression occurs in Rom_16:20, “The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet.” That which already has taken place in its essential principles through the incarnation, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ (comp. Luk_10:18 f.; Joh_16:11; Joh_16:33), comes at last gradually to its fulfilment, being realized onward, step by step, until the grand termination is reached. Or, we may say, that that which was consummated by those acts in relation to Christ’s person, and which His followers may regard as having been accomplished also for them (comp. 1Jn_5:4), is carried out at last in relation to the whole sphere of redemption along the lapse of ages, and finally comes to its complete fulfilment after the fearful conflicts of the last times.
Out of the whole number of foes here alluded to, the apostle brings prominently to view that one whose destruction forms the close of the forementioned subjugation.—The last enemy (that) shall be destroyed (is) death.—[So the English version renders ’Εσχατος ἐχθρὸς καταργεῖται ὁ θάνατος. Εσχατος is an adjective used for an adverb of time. (Jelf. gr. gram. § 714, 2, b). Accordingly we should perhaps better translate: “Lastly, death, the enemy, shall be destroyed.” Tyndale: “And at the laste, death, the enemy, shall be distried.” Rheims: “And the enemie death shal be destroied last.”22 This enemy is destroyed when the resurrection is complete. By this event the power of death is forever annulled, and there is no such thing more as dying or being dead. Death is here personified as in Rev_20:14. He is termed an enemy, inasmuch as he entered as a disturbing force into the original constitution of God, which was one of pure life and the unfolding of life. Moreover, in the destruction of death, the devil,—he who has the power of death—is rendered utterly powerless, as it were, in his last bulwark, and incapacitated for any injurious reaction upon the kingdom of God. But from this fact we are by no means justified in identifying death and the devil, as Usteri does.
That all hostile powers are finally done away, is still further established (1Co_15:27).—For he hath put all things under his feet.—The argument is either this, “He hath put everything under Him, hence also death;” or, more indirectly, “Inasmuch as God hath subjected every thing to Him, by this means a perfect harmony has been established, which would not be possible, unless death were done away.” The apostle here introduces, without any formula of citation, words taken from Psa_8:7. (lxx. “πάντα ὑπέταξας ὑποκάτω τῶν ποδῶν αὐτοῦ.” “Thou hast put all things under his feet.”) That he intended these words as a quotation, is seen from what follows. What the Psalmist said in relation to man whom God had endowed with divine majesty and worth, and established as lord over this lower creation, is referred anagogically by Paul to that person in whom the idea of humanity is perfectly realized; and in so doing he takes the word “all,” on which the emphasis rests, in its most comprehensive sense. [“This may be called the hidden meaning of the Psalm, because it never would have been discovered without a further revelation, such as we find in the exposition given by the inspired apostles.” Hodge]. To understand “God” as the subject here was, in part, very possible, (“since, indeed, He is the One who works through all things,” Neander), and, in part, very natural, because of the obvious suggestion of the text of the Psalm.—He now turns back to the subject of the surrender of the kingdom, showing more fully that it included also the subjection of Christ himself. But before exhibiting this point positively, he obviates an unsuitable extension of the word “all,” as though God himself might be included therein. This exception he states as something self-evident, and then introduces the positive counterpart.—But when he shall have said,—ὀ̓ταν δὲ ἐίπη; the subject here is God. The point intended is diiferently interpreted. Some take it that Paul here meant to explain the language of Scripture, and to obviate any misconception in regard to it, so that the word “said” refers back to the Scriptural expression, which is thus designated as a declaration of God himself. (Comp. on 1Co_6:16.) In this case, “when” (ὄταν) would be equivalent to, ‘in so far as,’ or, ‘in that,’ q.d., ‘in that he said.’ Others, like Meyer, regard it as an expansion of the thought, and as designating a future point of time, ‘when he shall have declared,’ i.e., has publicly announced that the subjection has been complete, and the work of Christ finished,—that all things have been subjected,—Since this yields a good sense, it is not necessary to deviate from the ordinary use of “when,” which prevails in the context.—it is evident that—We are here to supply, ‘all things have been subjected,’—excepting him who subjected all things to him.—This observation might be attributed to the germs of the Gnostic view, which elevated Christ above the Father as an imperfect O. T. God. It is, however, unnecessary to suppose such a reference; and the remark may have also a purely dialectic significance, as implying, ‘so far from this expression meaning, that God should be included in the “all,” that, on the contrary, when he shall have said: all things have been subjected, the exception is manifest,’ etc.—And when all things shall have been subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject to him,—The verbs ὑποταγῇ and ὑποταγήσεται may be both taken as middle, subject themselves, only with this difference, that in the former case the subjection is one grounded in the consciousness of a perfect weakness, and in the latter case, as an act of the highest willingness; or both verbs may be passive, be subdued, only with the distinction that in the former case the subjection is one of constraint, and in the latter of free self-determination. Both interpretations amount to the same thing. The self-subjection of the Son coincides with that surrender of the kingdom mentioned in 1Co_15:24; and we must here either limit the idea of the Son to the human nature of Christ, from doing which the expression “the Son also himself,” is sufficient to restrain us; or we must refer it to the church, the mystical body of Christ, for doing which, 1Co_12:12 gives us no justification on account of the diversity of the expressions, “Son”—“Christ;” nor yet are we warranted in interpreting the self-subjection into the perfect oneness of thought (πολλή ὁμὀνοια) between the Son and the Father, or into a manifestation of His dependence on God in respect to His glory. The Apostle here points to one of the deep things of the Godhead, viz., that the coequal Son, who is Himself essentially God, even when at the highest point of His glory, subjects Himself, with all that has been subdued under Him, unto the Father, choosing even in His majesty as Lord of all to be dependant upon the Father wholly and forever. The title Son is given to Christ in our epistle, in only one other passage. “Christ gives the power conferred on Him, back into His Father’s hands, not to possess it no more, but in order to possess it again, as He possessed it in communion with the Father, from all eternity, before the foundations of the world were laid.” Burger. “The historic Christ, as such, is perpetually distinguished from God. Christ will subject Himself, yet not in the same way as He subjected His enemies.” Neander. [“The subjection here spoken of is not predicated of the eternal Logos, the second person of the Trinity, any more than the kingdom spoken of in 1Co_15:24, is the dominion which belongs essentially to Christ as God. As there the word Christ designates the Theanthropos, so does the word Son here designate, not the Logos as such, but the Logos as incarnate.” Hodge]. The adjuncts “also himself,” serve to set forth more prominently the exalted character of the Son. [“Himself”—voluntarily. “Himself” is contrasted with “all things,” so that it denotes the infinite excellence of the Son; and besides, as often, it signifies something voluntary; for the Son subordinates Himself to the Father; the Father glorifies the Son.” Bengel]. That by this subordination the Trinity itself becomes, as it were, dissolved, is a very strange assertion (de Wette); on the contrary, the absolute unity in the distinction of persons will only become the more entirely, conspicuous. Now comes the final clause with which this survey concludes, stating the object to be obtained—in order that God may be the all things in all.—This statement is used as the main authority for the support of the doctrine of a final restoration of all things. The expression, “be the all things,” signifies primarily absolute supremacy, or rule, [without the intervention of mediators or subordinates, such as acted with a sort of delegated authority under God in the mediatorial kingdom.] But how are we to understand the other expression—“in all?” Is the adjective to be construed as masculine or neuter? On the former supposition its scope must be limited to believers, members of the kingdom that has been hitherto ruled by Christ (Meyer); and this entirely excludes the doctrine of restoration. On the other supposition, all created existences must be here understood, in which God will be the all determining power,—hence, also Satan and his angels included; and thus with this will come the cessation of damnation, and so the restoration of all things. But could the Apostle Paul, who puts the lost in contrast with the saved, as he does in 1Co_1:18 (comp. Php_3:19), have had such a doctrine in mind? Still less indeed could he have intended any pantheistic absorption of all creatures in God, and so the annihilation of all distinct personality, since this is already opposed by the doctrine of the resurrection. If we take the words “in all” in a narrower sense it is natural to include in them also the angels (comp. Eph_1:10), and to suppose not only the absolute supremacy of the divine will among them, but also an absolute communication and perfect revelation of the divine love, as intended. In both these things together there is included the complete manifestation of God’s glory. According to Rom_8:19 ff. the expression “in all” might be extended to the entire irrational creation making the adjective neuter. The immediate context however does not conduct us to such an interpretation, though the idea is in itself correct and appropriate. Neander explains the thought thus: “that God may work with all things without the intervention of a Mediator.”—If we take the expression “in all” in its widest sense, including therein also beings until then hostile to God, then we might with Calvin explain the expression “be all,” so far as it bears on such parties to imply “that in their destruction the glory of God will be conspicuous.” But although we may variously modify and limit the words “be all” according to the various capacities or receptivities of the creatures contemplated, yet we cannot include in it both the idea of glorification as shown in the highest self-communication of the Deity and also that which is shown in the destruction of the creature; and only when we look away from the subjective side, or have in view the absolutely objective universal sovereignty of God can we take the words “in all” in this comprehensive sense, so that in reference to beings that are hostile to God there will be meant here the removal of all opposition on their part and their absolute impotence. But the question is, whether in setting forth the consummation of the ways of God, or of His entire economy, such an interpretation of the expression “be all” suffices?—The problem here presented is, so to understand the word destruction (ἀπώλεια) that God’s being ‘all in all’ is possible when understood even in the wider sense, and not simply as a controlling power in the hearts of the faithful; and so to explain the being ‘all in all’ that the idea conveyed by the destruction of the wicked shall not be altered. And it is a question whether this problem has been solved in the doctrinal method proposed by Beck, according to which the Scripture exhibits the destruction (ἀπώλεια) of the lost (unspiritual) soul as an ultimate result in which, as a second death, the whole being becomes pervaded by death, and so the very personality ceases in dying; or, in other words, the personal conscious life becomes annihilated, although all existence itself does not cease (Bibl. Seelenlehre, pp. 19, 40). This will then be more accurately conceived thus; ‘that the kingdom of heaven, by means of a regeneration which with the purging away of all dross restores a pure state of life, obtains for itself a new organization of the heavens and the earth to be the theatre for the display of its own peculiar glory, and so becomes an immediate theocracy in the absolute and perpetual reign of God, without the human mediatorial form of Christ which had been assumed only for a season, but not therefore without His distinctive character as a Son which He holds in the being of the Triune God, where God is the fullness of life in all its purity and perfection in all the living. To enter however more fully into this subject does not fall within the province of exegesis.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
[1. The Gospel—its historical character. In its essential elements the Gospel is not a system of abstract truths deduced by reason, but a summary of marvellous facts which have occurred in the history of the world through the direct interposition of God, and which were designed for man’s salvation. Of these the great central ones are the appearing, expiatory death, resurrection and ascension of the long foretold Messiah, forming altogether the good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people. It was mainly in the proclamation and attestation of these facts that preaching originally consisted; and such must ever be one of the chief characteristics of evangelical preaching, differencing it from all other kinds of discourse. The ground on which it relies for acceptance must be, therefore, primarily of a historical kind—the testimony of sound and competent witnesses declaring plainly that the facts announced are so as stated. And in accordance with this, evangelical faith must ever have the form of a cordial belief in the testimony adduced, and of an acceptance of the facts unto the ends contemplated in them. If, then, the testimony be such as stands the test of the most searching scrutiny, and seems altogether unimpeachable, we may go on preaching and believing, undisturbed by any objections which human science or philosophy may be disposed to make, No argument can have available force against any stupenduous fact of which it may be said, “thus it was foretold ages ago, and thus it has come to pass as witnessed by a large number of honest and sane men.” And in regard to such a fact we may feel assured that, let objectors argue as they may, it will prove its consistency with all other facts and truths of the world’s history, and will also vindicate its importance by other manifestations accordant in dignity and kind with itself. It cannot stand alone. If e.g. it be a fact that “Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,” there was manifested here in human nature a power over death which, as happening by itself and for its own sake only, must ever remain an inexplicable phenomenon. Therein we behold a revelation of Divine Omnipotence and Love, which at once inspires hope, and seems to render the resurrection of others both possible and probable. The inference is one which nothing can hinder us from drawing and resting in. The main thing which concerns us, therefore, is the certainty of the underlying fact; and in regard to this we are not left in doubt. The resurrection of Christ is one of the best attested events in history. The skepticism which discards this must, to be consistent with itself, at the same time set at naught all history. And the faith which accepts this must, to be consistent with itself, accept the whole Gospel which centres in Jesus Christ, “who was declared to be the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead.”]
2. The Resurrection of Christ,—its import and bearings. This great fact which, next to that of our Lord’s atoning death, formed the main topic of the apostle’s preaching, serves at once to illustrate and confirm the truth of man’s salvation in a two-fold direction. 1. Retrospectively. That Christ rose from the dead in fulfilment of what He had, in part, hinted, and in part, definitely predicted before His death, furnishes abundant proof in favor of His incarnation and atoning death. Had He remained in the grave the conclusion would have been that He was nothing less than a false prophet, a betrayer, a blasphemer, who had suffered death justly; but then, what an inexplicable riddle his life would have been! Besides, how fatal to the faith and hope of Christians would such continuance under the power of death have been! There could be no forgiveness of sins through His blood, no life, no blessedness through His name! To follow Him in self denial and devotion were but to make life more miserable, and those who died believing in Him only perish like all the rest of mankind. But now having in truth arisen to an endless life by the power of God, He appears before as God’s Holy One who could not see corruption—as the servant of the Lord, who, in his death, has been commissioned to bear our sins—as the righteous One who, having made His soul an offering for sin, would still prolong His days and see His seed, and through His knowledge justify many—as the Son to whom the Father hath given to have life in himself, and so could impart life to others—in short, as the one who is to abide forever as “the Way, the Truth and Life.” 2. Prospectively, in relation to what must yet happen for the fulfilment of God’s gracious consel. Through Christ, as the risen One, death, the wages of sin, is essentially destroyed. It has been so already, in so far as by His resurrection the atoning power of His death has been sealed. But it will be so still more, in so far as He, the Head of a new humanity, redeemed and restored to God, had passed out from under that death in which He had suffered the judgment of sin for all, into an imperishable life, and has thereby, been, as it were, set up, both in humanity and for it, as the principle and power of a new life, capable of vanquishing death and enduring unto immortality, and is now carrying on a most comprehensive work, first, inwardly, in creating the new man through the regenerating and quickening power of His Spirit, and, next, in developing this spiritual life throughout our entire organism. The life thus begun and developed, will be manifest, first, in those who belong to Him, when he shall appear again in glory (this is called the first resurrection); and then it will show itself in the rest of mankind—so far as through all the revelations of His life onward to its onward consummation some susceptibility for these can be awakened—until the work of redemption is accomplished, and all opposition is vanquished, and the power of death is entirely destroyed, and a new external realm is organized, suited to the inward perfection of the whole mass of redeemed men and celestial spirits, who are united in Christ as their Head, and in and with Him are made absolutely subjected to God—a realm pervaded in all its parts by the power of the Holy Love of God that is henceforth, to regulate all things. All that is not included in this new organization will utterly perish through obstinate resistance, being excluded from all the blessed realities of a universe that has entered into the Divine life with and in Christ.
[3. The mediatorial reign of Christ. The risen Saviour is declared in the Scriptures to have “ascended on high” and to be “set down on the right-hand of the throne of the majesty in the heavens,” “far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age, but also, in that which is to come.” His ascension was, therefore, the inauguration into universal sovereignty of the incarnate Logos, the God-Man, or Theathropos—a sovereignty which had indeed been prepared for from the beginning, and also had been in a measure, exercised in another form (for the Word or Logos had been in the world before, as a Light which lighteth every man), but which was not actually entered upon until after the successful achievement of the priestly work on which it was conditioned. It was because “He had been found in fashion as a man, and had humbled himself, and become obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, that God exalted Him and gave Him a name above every name, that to Him every knee should bow and every tongue confess that He was Lord.” And the ulterior end of all this was “the glory of God, the Father.” But, although now reigning in heaven, it cannot yet be said that His kingdom has come, since its glory is not manifest. This is an object still to be anticipated and prayed for. Meanwhile, a great preparation is making for its advent by the ministration of the Spirit; and this dispensation will go on until He who has gone to take unto Himself the kingdom, shall return in power and great glory, gather about Him the servants whom He had entrusted with His gifts, and appoint the faithful to their larger trusts of dominion under him. It is at this point that the Redeemer’s kingdom may be fairly said to begin in its perfect form upon the earth; as it is then that the proclamation will be made, “The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign unto the ages of ages.” What the particular nature of this administration will be, this is not the place to discuss. But as this reign will have a beginning, and a specific object, it is natural to conclude that it will also come to an end, when this object shall have been accomplished. And that there will be a fixed period for its perfect accomplishment, when Christ can say “it is finished,”—just as when He made this same solemn declaration on completing His work as Mediator and Sacrifice on the cross, we have every reason to infer from the very fullness of power that dwelt in Him. To be ever doing and never to have done, especially in such a work as the overthrowing of rebellion, would be an imputation upon His all-sufficiency. We must, therefore, look for a time when the object for which He took upon Himself our nature shall be accomplished, and the glory of His victory shall shine forth in unquestionable splendor and majesty. At what moment this crisis will arrive, we know not; but we know that it will not come until after a long series of mighty events, both blessed and awful, of the nature of which we have some foreshadowing in the book of Revelation. The conclusion of all these will be the general resurrection, and the final judgment which shall determine the ultimate destinies of all the righteous and the wicked. This will be “the end,” when Christ shall deliver up this mediatorial reign unto the Father that appointed Him, and God shall rule, just as He did before the apostasy of Satan and the fall of man, throughout a universe, untroubled by the presence of evil and hence not needing the intervention of a theanthropic Mediator and his subordinates.
Here certain questions arise. (1) What shall become of the wicked when God is the “all in all?” Shall they be restored? or annihilated? or still continue to exist in some place outside the sphere of God’s presence and glory? Certainly not restored; for in the general judgment they are sentenced to “depart” as “cursed into everlasting fire.” Not annihilated; for then where would be the necessity of the everlasting fire? We must, therefore, suppose them to be shut up, as it were, in some prison house, in some outer darkness, where they shall be as if they were not; and neither the sight, nor the hearing, nor the influence of them shall, in any way disturb the blessedness which shall reign supreme throughout the realms of God, the Father, in whose presence there will be a fullness of joy forever and ever.—(2) What are to be the relations of the glorified God-Man unto the people whom He has redeemed? That the Logos will cast off the nature which He had assumed, and become as before the incarnation, can hardly be supposed. If not, how will the surrender of the kingdom to the Father then affect His previous position as the head of the Church?—Is His sovereignty over believers to cease, and His followers to be brought into any more direct connection with God the Father, than before? The intimations of Scripture in regard to the perpetuity of Christ’s Headship hardly allow of such a supposition. And yet, a change of administration in some sort is very plainly predicted. God is to be the “all in all” in some special and more perfect sense than He was before the surrender. It may be that on the quelling of rebellion, and on the ingathering of all the redeemed (the veil of all mediatorship being removed) there will shine forth upon the immediate apprehension of saints and angels, as the result of this long and wonderful history, far richer displays of the Divine wisdom, power and glory, than ever were witnessed before, and that in that beatific vision their happiness is to be perfected. But on this point the wisest course, perhaps, will be to suspend all speculation, and leave the subject in that sublime suggestiveness where the language of the apostle leaves it—“God shall be all in all.”]
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
Starke:— 1Co_15:1-2. Hed.: Do not forget what you so often hear, nor yet adulterate the savor of the word. Thousands hear and receive not—receive and keep not—keep and feel not the word of life. This is the great condemnation and blindness of these times!—If thou receivest the word, then thou art already blessed, not only because thou hadst a sure hope of blessedness, but also because thou hast within thee the earnest of the future world, and with this the foretaste of blessedness in thine heart (Heb_6:5).—It is not enough to have begun well, if the end does not also accord with the beginning. He who apostatizes from the faith, has believed in vain, and incurs a greater damnation than if he had never believed (2Pe_2:21).—1Co_15:3-4. Christ is the center of the Holy Scriptures, the foundation of our faith, especially in His death for our sins and His resurrection for our righteousness. Without the knowledge of these facts all science is ignorance.—The Holy Spirit explains through the apostles what He had formerly spoken through the prophets concerning Christ.
1Co_15:5 ff. Upon sorrow follows joy: thou weepest because Jesus thy Friend has concealed Himself; thou wilt rejoice again when He shall reveal Himself unto thee (Joh_16:22).—Hast thou sinned, repent; then will Jesus appear to you with His grace (Mat_26:75).—Who can doubt the resurrection of Christ? It has been confirmed by some hundreds of witnesses.—Though thou hast not seen Jesus the risen One with thine eyes, yet behold Him in faith, and thou wilt hereafter be certain to behold Him in glory (Joh_20:29; 1Pe_1:8).
1Co_15:8 ff. The grace of God is shown where the greatest of sinners are; and such often become the most edifying preachers, when through the grace of God they have been led to cast off the yoke of sin (Psa_51:13).—The sins committed before conversion are indeed forgiven; but they leave behind them a troubling remembrance for our humiliation, especially when others have been scandalized thereby, and the world knows of them.—Hed: Humble boasting, holy pride, to say to Satan, ‘God has become strong in us!’ But what does this word mean in the mouth of the godless? Are they partakers of Divine grace? Does it work in them to God’s glory?
1Co_15:12 f. It is all the same whether we deny the resurrection by word or deed.—The articles of our Christian faith hang together like a chain. When one is broken, the whole is broken. This is what makes error so fearful. Let a person guard himself at the start, lest he fall from one error into another.
1Co_15:15. Preachers should see to it that they do not make themselves false witnesses for God by producing lying fables, and turning aside from the truth of the Gospel in their teachings.
1Co_15:16. Those who deride the resurrection of the dead are like wild boars of the forest who would root up and overturn the very foundations of the faith. But they will not succeed. The truth will stand while they perish.
1Co_15:17. Faith must lay hold upon Christ as a living Saviour, and enter with Him into eternal life.
1Co_15:19. The simple life of the children of this world is indeed more miserable than the cross-life of believers. Nevertheless that man is to be deemed the most miserable of all, who, while not believing in the resurrection of Christ and eternal life, yet subjects himself legally to the rules of Christianity and. endures persecution for its sake.
1Co_15:20. A true member of Christianity who, without any self-deception, carries in himself the witness of his spiritual resurrection has no cause to be afraid of death—no more than he has to be afraid of that natural sleep, which the weary court for their refreshment.—Through the resurrection of Christ we receive all power unto life, and upon this there follows the full harvest of the general resurrection.
1Co_15:22. Let no one be astonished that we shall all be made alive on account of the Lord Jesus: for if one man was able to introduce death upon all; why should not also one man, who is at the same time God, and who makes all things alive, restore life to all the dead?
1Co_15:24. Spener: The Lord lays aside His previous sway over His kingdom, where he commanded His gospel to be preached, and equipped and sent out His servants into the work, and poured out His Spirit and His blessing upon the word given, in order that men might be converted, enlightened, regenerated, justified, sanctified, disciplined by the cross, and protected against the devil, and where He now wins over him one victory after another—this supremacy he lays aside with the public and actual attestation in heaven before God and all the angels and saints that He had fulfilled His Father’s will, and had finished his work; and, together with this he will then, as their Head, present his believing ones to the Father as henceforth fully blessed and fit for the enjoyment of a perfect felicity for ever more. Regnum non cessabit, sed modus regnandi per fidem. (Chemnity).
1Co_15:25 ff. After Christ has overcome everything in the subjects of His kingdom, there yet remains Death, who, so long as they lie in their graves, still in a certain sense holds them captive; but in the resurrection Death too is destroyed, and in its place there reigns eternal life (Rev_20:14; Rev_21:4.
1Co_15:28. In the surrender of his kingdom, Christ, as the God-Man, the Head and Mediator of the church, will show also His own subjection to the Father.—For the present, and so long as the work of restoration endures, Christ is called “the all in all” (Col_3:11); but when the saints are made perfect, and, having been freed from all sin and its consequences, are surrendered to the Heavenly Father, then, by virtue of Christ’s accomplished mediation, will the Heavenly Father together with the Son and Holy Spirit, become directly “the all things in all” to them, and fill their understanding with His Divine wisdom, their wills with His Divine holiness, their desires with His Divine sweetness and joy, their bodies with heavenly glory and delight, and, in short, their entire selves wholly with Himself forever and ever Spener: God will then hold converse with His saints without any mediation, since they will see Him as He is, and He, without obstruction, will have glory over all, and shine in all and through all.
Berlenburger Bibel:
1Co_15:1 f. The Gospel must be inwardly received, and for this result God must prepare, enlighten, and sanctify the heart. This happens when we yield to the Holy Spirit. Then the hungry heart receives the Word with joy, and learns to behold Jesus and His salvation there, because it sees itself to be so empty and destitute of grace.—It belongs to the proper acceptance of the Word that we learn to abide fast in known truth; since the knowledge of our need ever drives us to our own hearts, where the Lord Jesus and. His holy word are implanted. God’s gift and calling are without repentance. God has taken us once for all into His care. If we will only abide therein, nothing can be wanting to us in the future, for our salvation will never cost Him more than it did at the beginning. For our sakes, however, it is, said, “Hold fast that which thou hast” (Rev_3:11).—The tidings that ‘Christ lives,’ and that this brings after it the resurrection of the others is so important that, for the sake of it, Paul is willing to let every thing else go. If the truth of Christ’s history is not inwardly confirmed, then an hour of temptation may easily come when, for many, all foundation in Christ may be shaken by reason and unbelief, as well as by the assaults of foes.
1Co_15:3. When the soul wrestles against sin, it will often appear to it as if Christ had not died for our sins. But Christ has died, and thereby expiated our sins, in order that we, being planted together with Him in the likeness of His death, may die unto sin, and live unto righteousness (1Pe_2:24). We then truly experience that Christ was slain for our sins in the flesh, when, through His death, our own sin is also daily slain. How can we comfort ourselves in the death of Jesus Christ if we still live in those sins unto which we must die?—Sharp compunctions of heart in repentance under the law are needed, ere we can become fit for, and participate in the super-abundant grace of Christ. This pearl belongs only to the pure, and not to swinish hearts which trample it under their feet.
1Co_15:4. Where the new life does not exist, there can be no power or certainty in the resurrection of Christ. Indeed, men are rather ashamed of it in works, when they confess it only with the mouth.—If we believe not the power of Christ’s life, then we have neither the will nor the power to be free from sin. But if such truths are not made known in power, how will men be disposed to receive them, and to stand therein?
1Co_15:5. It was necessary that Christ should reveal Himself also as a living one; for in so doing He has adapted Himself to our understandings; for he, who proposes to impart a great light to any one, does this gradually, for the sake of those weak eyes which could not endure a strong light let in upon them at once.—The seeing of Christ bodily did not help those Jews who believed not. We must therefore know Him in Spirit, and learn to recognize Him as present in our hearts.—He must dwell in us by faith, speak inns and through us, enlighten, sanctify, and purify us, as He needs did it in Paul.
1Co_15:9. This is what a scholar of Christ learns from his Master, when, as a weary one, he comes to the “Lowly in heart,” viz., the deepest humility.
1Co_15:10. Whatever of good we have or do, is all owing to the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. This grace, then, by which Christ designs to live in us, we should not suffer to remain in us to no purpose.—When we are in Jesus, we learn to arrogate nothing to ourselves exclusively, but to lay the greatest gifts of grace humbly at the feet of God, and to be as if we had them not. Only the grace of God must not be suffered to lie idle in us. This is an essential part of holiness, to unite with the holy and the glorified in heaven in casting all crowns, all praise, and honor, and glory, at the feet of God and the Lamb, and to confess, “Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but Thine be the praise.” In this way a soul sinks and loses itself in God, who is the source of its being, just as a drop of water is merged in the great sea, and becomes again what it was in the beginning.
1Co_15:14. If we have no living Saviour, whereupon then does the whole Christian religion rest? All grace, forgiveness, righteousness, springs from the resurrection of Christ, and is founded thereupon.
1Co_15:17. The greatest fruit of the resurrection is deliverance from those sins for which Christ died. Then does our faith become true, and firm, and actual.
1Co_15:19. Men who long after pleasure and worldly delights, and riches, and honor, have some actual good here; but it is only a seeming good. But if Christians, who make the life of God, even eternal life, their chief end, and hope for the same, and strive after it, have only a hope of it, and not the actual enjoyment and. the substance of it, then are they of all persons the most miserable.
1Co_15:25. “He must reign”—this is not yet fulfilled, but it is in process of consummation, and it must pass through many stages ere it comes to the end.
1Co_15:26. The appropriation of the ransom involves the removal of all that which deserves to be called death. The full consummation of this is indeed to be deferred unto the end: but since so much precedes, we cannot doubt the result.
1Co_15:27. All created things, in the end, become subordinate to their rightful Lord, and become so subject as to stand under Him in whom God had created them in the beginning.
1Co_15:28. The divine subjection of the Son of God unto the Father will bring with it something more glorious than His previous sovereign rule. Sin and imperfection will no more be found in any creature; but every thing will be directly ruled by God, each in its own measure, just as the humanity of Jesus was ruled by His divinity: hence, there will be no more any need of governing through the person of a Mediator.—When God shall become “all in all,” and when the creatures made subject to God and Christ are thoroughly penetrated by the Spirit of God in all their being and powers, so that they with God, and God with them, shall become one spirit, then will the future holy and righteous world, wherein Christ has ruled, lose itself, as it were, in the still all-blessed eternity; yet, it will not thereby pass away, but only enter into the sweetest state of peace, where we shall know by experience as little of what is meant by devil, sin, death, wrath, or hell, as was known of these things when as yet all creatures lay concealed in the eternal creative power of God, or when, in the beginning of their creation, they were all alike very good.—O, what a depth of riches, wisdom, righteousness, mercy, and love in God!
Heubner:
1Co_15:1 f. In regard to every new doctrine that is propounded, we must inquire first whether it is consistent with the original apostolic doctrine, and whether we have reason for changing the old faith. Thoughtlessly to change our faith is a matter which touches our salvation. An unchanging adherence to primitive Christianity must be a fundamental principle with the Christian; he who objects to this, ceases to be one.
1Co_15:3 f. Christianity is: 1. established upon accredited facts; 2. exceedingly simple. Its sum is: 1. the atonement through Christ; 2. the divine acceptance of it proved by the resurrection; and 3. the fruit of redemption, viz., our future glory. If Christ’s death purifies us from sins, justifies us, and obligates us to die unto sin, so does His burial show us how we should conceal ourselves from the world, and avoid its temptations; and the resurrection gives us new eternal life, that we may long after heavenly things and strive to obtain them.
1Co_15:9. In all that we have become through God, we should never forget what we once were. The greater our former humiliation, the more wonderful the height to which God raises us.
1Co_15:10. The humble recognition of divine grace characterizes all saints.—Humility does not require the ignoring of what we are, and what we have performed; but we must give God the honor.—Luther: “Of myself I have enough to humble and crush me; but on and in God I have reason to be proud, and to be glad at His gifts, and to rejoice, and triumph, and boast. But it is all to the praise and glory of God.” Without humility, high achievements, distinguished success and labors bring us into great danger, and make us the more guilty before God.
W. F. Besser:
1Co_15:2. All, all is given to us by the grace of God. He calls us through the gospel; He works faith; He makes us happy in the fellowship of His dear son, and not so much forces us into such happiness as keeps us back from the iniquity, and the unfaithfulness, and the unthankfulness of those who refuse the gospel (Heb_12:25), or who turn from it after they have received it.—1Co_15:2-4. Preserve us, O Lord, by thy Word! Grant us such a hearing of the Word that we may derive from its proclamation a clearer knowledge of its chief facts, the proper seat and fountain of gospel life, and may look ever more profoundly, even to the very foundation whereon our salvation is based.
1Co_15:1-20. Pericope for Easter. 1. The Christian’s faith is a well-grounded one; it rests, a. upon our own experience of its beatific power (1Co_15:1-2); b. upon Christ’s holiness and truth, confirmed by His death and resurrection (3); c. upon several divine confirmations of the mission of Jesus, among which the resurrection is the chief, established by many witnesses (4–7); d. upon the continual operations of Christianity (the conversion of Paul, the spread of Christianity), which are evidently a work of divine grace (8–10). 2. The progressive stages of Christian faith, a. The knowledge of the gospel from its preaching, which one has often heard and considered (1), and has understood as to its great object (2); b. a firm conviction of the truth of the history of Jesus, His death and resurrection; c. experience of the power of the grace of God in one’s own heart, which sheds a light in the soul (8); and puts us to shame, and discloses our former hostility to God (9); but also creates us anew unto good works (10). 3. The close connection between doctrine and history in Christianity. On 1Co_15:3-4, compare Dr. Steinkopf in “One Lord, one faith,” p. 189 f. Three chief pillars of the Christian faith. a. Christ’s death for our sins sweetens to every believer that death which appears so fearful to the unbeliever or formal Christian, b. His burial and rest in the grave eclaircises the view of the Christian as he looks into the grave so dark and fearful. c. His victorious resurrection has stamped upon the Saviour’s person a doctrine and word the seal of divinity, and is the sure pledge of our resurrection. On 1Co_15:10 th see Harm’s “Winter-postille.” Man’s work, without God’s grace, is, a. low, bad and vain; b. through, with, and in God’s grace it is glorious, righteous, and enduring.
1Co_15:13. In all the propositions which we receive, we should consider their bearings upon faith.
1Co_15:17 ff. He who takes from us faith in Christ, snatches away all consolation. The Christian faith, without a future life, is a thing most irrational and comfortless; since Christianity would then impose upon its confessors the severest self-denials, conflicts and sacrifices, and in earthly things insure us nothing; and Christians would then cleave to a deceptive image, and contemn the only real thing which remains to them. Earthly life, without its consummation in eternity is a vain sport.
1Co_15:20. The resurrection of Christ as the entrance into an eternal, indestructible life, is the pledge of eternal life for us—not simply a proof for the possibility of our resurrection.
1Co_15:22. Our mortal first parent begat mortal men. Christ has the right and the power to quicken all again; this happens through our spiritual union with Him.
1Co_15:24 ff. The history of Christ will not come to its end for a long time. The most important thing is still in advance.—So long as the Messianic kingdom stands, God’s glory is mediately bound to this economy. Every thing which God does, He does through the Messiah. This economy, when it has fulfilled its object, will give place to the immediate reign of God. God, as Lord and Father, will reign immediately over all, and impart Himself directly to all, without the intervention of a mediator. The use of the Scriptures, and of the sacraments, will cease, because no more needed.
1Co_15:26. The victory which Christ has achieved over death: a. What death had been for us without His resurrection. b. How Christ has conquered him through His resurrection.
[I. Barrow:
1Co_15:3. The death of Christ. 1. Its nature—a true and proper death. 2. Some peculiar adjuncts, which commend it to our regard as being, a. a result of God’s eternal decree; b. a matter of free consent and compact between the Father and Son; c. anciently prefigured and predicted; d. executed by God’s hand and providence; man concurring; e. the death of a person so holy and so excellent. 3. The principles and impressive and meritorious causes thereof. a. It originated in the love of God the Father, and in the love of the Song of Solomon 4. The ends aimed at, its fruits and effects. a. The illustration of God’s glory. b. The dignifying and exalting of the Lord Jesus. c. The salvation of mankind. 5. The practical influences which its consideration should have; a. should beget the highest degree of love and gratitude toward God and Christ; b. should excite in us great faith and hope in God; c. should comfort us and satisfy conscience in regard to guilt; d. should discover unto us the heinousness of our sins; e. should work in us kindly contrition and remorse; f. should deter us from the repetition of sins; g. should engage us to patient submission and resignation to God’s will; h. should oblige us to the deepest mortification in conformity to Christ’s death; i. should engage us to the fullest measure of charity toward our brethren; j. should bind us to yield us up wholly to the service of our Saviour.]
R. Stier:—1Co_15:1-10.—The three pillars of our faith. 1. Scripture—giving the account of Christ beforehand. 2. History—proving Scripture fulfilled. 3. The effects of grace in converting the bitterest of foes, such as Paul.
[I. Newton:
1Co_15:20. The Lord is risen, indeed; as proven by reliable testimony. 1. The “witnesses were competent judges of what they asserted, as is evident: a. from their numbers; b. from the nature of the fact. 2. They were faithful and upright witnesses. a. Their writings proved them well meaning. b. Had no advantage to gain. c. They met with success such as God only could give. 3. There is besides the witness of an ever-present Spirit, which takes of the things of Christ, and shows them to us.
Ibid:—1Co_15:21-22. Death by Adam, life by Christ. 1. The malady. a. Death moral, b. Death natural. c. Death eternal. 2. The cure. a. Deliverance from condemnation, b. Deliverance from the power of sin. c. Deliverance from the fear and power of death, d. Eternal blessedness and glory.
A. Butler:
1Co_15:22. The power of the resurrection of Christ. 1. A great public manifestation of His authority over the power of physical decay and death. 2. This power exercised with a view to the beings He came to redeem. 3. Consequently, the resurrection power did not cease after Christ’s departure, but, on the contrary, it was not till then adequately in action. 4. The final consummation of the resurrection work to be greatly desired.
R. Hall:—1Co_15:26. Death, the last enemy, shall be destroyed. 1. Nature of this enemy, and why called the last. 2. The manner and the successive stages in which our Lord has already conquered in part, and will completely conquer this last enemy.
H. Melvill:—The termination of the mediatorial kingdom. 1. Christ is now vested with a kingly authority, which He must hereafter resign. 2. As a consequence of this resignation, God himself will become all in all to the universe].
Footnotes:
[1][1Co_15:4.—Lachmann, Tischendorf, and Alford put τῇ τῆτρίη after ἡμέρα. Alford thinks that the Rec. (which puts those words before ἡμέρα) was an alteration to conform to Mat_16:21; Mat_17:23; and from not perceiving the solemnity and emphasis of the other arrangement. Lachmann’s reading is best sustained by the uncials (A. B. D. E. Sinait.), but the Rec. has in its favor F. G. K. L., with the Vulg., Pesch., Goth., Basm., Chr., Theodt., et al.—C.P. W.].
[2][1Co_15:5.—For δώδεκα D. E. F. G., the Ital., Vulg., Goth., later Syr. (Marg.), Arm., Slav., and a number of the Fathers have ἐνδεκα. Augustine mentions “nonnulli codices” of this kind. It was, however, a correction for greater accuracy, while the Apostle used the official designation. Comp. Joh_20:19 : comp. 24.—C. P. W.].
[3]1Co_15:6.—Lachmann throws out καὶ; but it has important MSS. in its favor, and it was likely to be left out as superfluous, [or from the copyists confounding- ε καὶ with the first two syllables of the next word. It is omitted by A. (probably). B. D. F. G., the Ital., Vulg., Goth., Copt., Basm., later Syr., Aug., Ambst.—C. P. W.].
[4]1Co_15:7.—Tischendorf has ἐ̓πειτα but the Rec. and Lachmann have εἰτα. The MSS. are about equally balanced.
[5]1Co_15:10.—Lachmann has σὺν ἐμοί without the ἡ before them [with B. D. E. F. G., Sinait., Ital., Vulg., Orig. (latin), and the Latin writers]. In like manner Meyer, who thinks that “the article was inserted partly, perhaps, in a merely mechanical way after ἡ εἰς ἐγὼ but also to some extent intentionally, from a dogmatic prejudice, to bring out more completely a contrast to οὐκ ἐγὼ. A reason similar to this last was probably the occasion for the more feebly supported ἡ ἐν ἐμοί. Before εἰ̓ς ἐμέ also, the ἡ is wanting in D. (1st hand), F. G. The Vulg., Ital., and the Latin Fathers read gratia ejus in me. In this case, however, its introduction was not occasioned by the context, but the article seemed superfluous, and it was therefore omitted.”—C. P. W.].
[6]1Co_15:12.—Tischendorf has ἐκ νεκρῶν ὀ̓τι, but the Rec. and Lachmann have ὅτι ἐκ νεκρῶν. The latter is best sustained. [It is thus found in A. B. D. (2d hand), K. L., perhaps all the cursives, the Vulg., Goth., Chrys., Theodt., and Iren. (translation).—C. P. W.].
[7]1Co_15:12.—Tischendorf, with very good MSS., has ἐν ὐμῖν τινὲς, but the Rec. has τινὲς ἐν ὑμῖν. [The former order is found in A. B. Sinait., Syr. (both), Orig., Chrys., Damasc.—C. P. W.].
[8]1Co_15:14.—The καὶ before τὸ κήρυγμα is doubtful, as also is δὲ after κενή. Tischendorf has both; Lachmann has κ αὶ. but [brackets it, and] leaves out the δὲ; probably correctly. [A. D. E. F. G. K., Sinait., 20 cursives, Goth. and Basm. versions, Dial., and (Œum. have ἀ̓ρα καὶ (some Latin writers omit ἄρα also), and A. B. D. F. G., Sinait., 5 cursives, the Latin, Copt, versions, and a few Fathers omit δὲ—C. P. W.].
[9]1Co_15:19.—Lachmann and Tischendorf, with a great preponderance of authority, place ἐν χριστῷ after ταύτη. The Rec. puts these words after ἐσμὲν, although this is not the lectio difficilior, [and hence it is likely to have been a transposition for perspicuity. Lachmann’s reading (ἐν χρ. ἠλτικότες ἐσμὲν μόνον) is also adopted by Alford, Stanley, and Wordsworth, in accordance with A. B. D. E. F. G., Sinait., 5 cursives, the Vulg. and Goth, versions, and some Latin Fathers. The confusion into which this text early fell, is apparent from the evident attempt (in Orig., the Vulg., Ital., Goth., Ambr.) to make μόνον precede ἐν Χριστῷ, so that it may be referred more distinctly to ἐν τῆ ζωῇ ταύτη alone, and not to the whole sentence, as it would, be if it were placed after ἐσμὲν. See Exeget. notes and Meyer—C. P. W.].
[10]1Co_15:20.—The Rec. adds ἐγένετο at the end of the sentence, but it is feebly attested, and is pronounced by Meyer “a supplemental gloss.”
[11]1Co_15:21.—In several important MSS. the article is wanting before θάνατος. Meyer thinks it was derived from Rom_5:12; but it might have fallen away on account of the parallel ἀνάστ. νεκρῶν.
[12]1Co_15:24.—The Rec. has παραδῷ; but better authority exists in favor of παραδιδῷ and some good MSS. have παραδιδοῖ. The aorist was occasioned by a conformity to καταργήοη [without observing that ὀ̓ταν in the one case required an indefinite present, and in the other an aorist in the sense of a Fut. exact. Instead of παραδῷ (defended by Reiche, with K. L., Orig., Euseb. (com.), Epiph. (often Damasc.), we have παραδιδοι in B. F. G., and παραδιδῶ̣ in A. D. Sinait., Goth., Basm., and Sahid. versions, and the rest of the Greek Fathers.—C. P. W.].
[13]1Co_15:25.—The anthority for ἀ̓ν in the Rec. before θῆ is feeble. It is from the Sept. of Psa_110:1.
[14]1Co_15:25.—The authority for αὐτοῦ after ἐχθροὺς is not sufficient. [A. F. G., several codices of the Vulg., with the Goth., and a few Greek writers insert it, but it is omitted in B. D. K. L., Sinait. the Vulg. (best MSS.), the later Syr., and the most important Greek Fathers.—C. P. W.].
[15][1Co_15:26.—This verse is transferred by D. E., Sinait. (1st hand), one copy of the Vulg. (tolet.), Jerome and Ambrst., so as to stand after τοὺς πόδας αὐτοῦ in 1Co_15:27. Two cursives entirely omit 1Co_15:26-27, doubtless in consequence of copyists mistaking the ὑπὸ τ. πόδας αὐτοῦ of the one for that of the other (homœoteleuton).—C. P. W.].
[16]1Co_15:27.—Some good MSS. [B., two cursives, the Vulg., the Lat. translations of Iren. and of D.] omit the first ὸ̀τι. Lachmann brackets it.
[17]1Co_15:27.—Sinait. inserts τὰ before the second πάντα: F. G. omits it before the third.—C. P. W.].
[18]1Co_15:28.—Lachmann brackets καὶ after τότε, but Tischendorf, with very good authorities [A. D. (3d hand), K. L., Sinait.. Vulg., Syr. (later), Copt., Basm., and many Greek writers], retains it.
[19]1Co_15:28.—The Rec. and Tischendorf have τα before the last πάντα. Lachmann, with some good MSS. [A. B. D. (1st hand) 17, Hippol.], omit it. [D. (3d hand) E. F. G. K. L., Sinait., and nearly all the Greek Fathers insert it, and rightly, for it might easily fall out, and it adds great force to the Apostle’s expression.—C. P. W.].
[20][This accords with the classic use of the word. Thus Plutarch τοῦτο ἡμείς εἴπομεν ἐν τί τῶν εἰκῆ πεπιστεύμενων—“this we said was one of the things believed without good authority.” Similarly the Latins use credere frustra, ‘to believe in vain’ or ‘rashly.’ Alex. Paraphrase].
[21][“The Scriptures constantly teach that Christ’s kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and of His dominion there is no end. In what sense, then, can He be said to deliver up His kingdom? It must be remembered that the Scriptures speak of a threefold kingdom as belonging to Christ. 1. That which necessarily belongs to Him as a Divine person, extending over all creatures, and of which He can never divest Himself. 2. That which belongs to Him as the incarnate Son of God, extending over His own people. This also is everlasting. He will for ever remain the Head and Sovereign of the redeemed. 3. That dominion to which He was exalted after His resurrection, when all power in heaven and earth was committed to His hands. This kingdom, which He exercises as the Theanthropos, and which extends over all principalities and powers, He is to deliver up when the work of redemption is accomplished. He was invested with this dominion in His mediatorial character for the purpose of carrying on His work to its consummation. When that is done, i.e, when He has subdued all His enemies, then He will no longer reign over the universe as Mediator, but only as God; while His headship over His people. is to continue for ever.” Hodge].
[22][We here give R. Hall’s criticism, which is worthy of note in this connection. “It may not be improper to remark that there is an inaccuracy in our common version, which be vitiates its application that it does not seem to sustain the conclusion to which the Apostle had arrived. It was his purpose to establish the perfection of our Saviour’s conquest, the advancement of his triumphs, and the prostration of all enemies, whatever beneath his power. Now to say that “the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death,” by no means affords a proof of this position. Though death might be destroyed, and he the last enemy that should be destroyed, it would not thence appear but that other enemies might remain not destroyed. But the proper rendering is, “Death, the last enemy, shall be destroyed”].
[23]1Co_15:29.—The Rec. has τῶν νεκρῶν instead of αὐτῶν, but the reading is feebly attested. [It has for it D. (3rd hand), L. Syr. (Pesch.) Chrys. Theodt. Oecum. Theophyl. and Jacob (Nisib.); but against it A. B. D. (1st band), E. F. K. Sinait. 20 cursives, Ital. Vulg. Goth. Copt. Basm. Syr. (later), Arm. Orig. and several Greek and Latin writers. Alford calls it a mechanical repetition of the last words of the preceding clause,—C. P. W.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv2–32 ye are saved--rather, "ye are being saved."
ye are saved--rather, "ye are being saved."
if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you--Able critics, BENGEL and others, prefer connecting the words thus, "I declare unto you the Gospel (Co1 15:1) in what words I preached it unto you." Paul reminds them, or rather makes known to them, as if anew, not only the fact of the Gospel, but also with what words, and by what arguments, he preached it to them. Translate in that case, "if ye hold it fast." I prefer arranging as English Version, "By which ye are saved, if ye hold fast (in memory and personal appropriation) with what speech I preached it unto you."
Read full note →
unless--which is impossible, your faith is vain, in resting on Christ's resurrection as an objective reality.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv1–32 1. The Christ-history, especially Christ’s Resurrection, as received from…
1. The Christ-history, especially Christ’s Resurrection, as received from apostolic witness, fully and firmly stated, 1-11.
We have here the historical argument for Christ’s resurrection, and so for the truth of Christianity, which was fully expanded into full and unanswerable volume by Paley. It is not the sole argument, but it is the ground argument, for our faith. By it Christianity is not a philosophy, like the teachings of Socrates, but a religion like nothing else in the world. A philosophy springs up from the human mind’s own powers; a religion comes down from above to man, revealing truths above man’s human powers.
Read full note →
1. I declare—I now here state, I recapitulate, spread out before your view.
The gospel—The joyful Christ-history, with its doctrines embodied in the history. Note on Matthew’s title, before Mat_1:1.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 Ch. 1Co_15:1-58. The Doctrine of the Resurrection
Ch. 1Co_15:1-58. The Doctrine of the Resurrection
1. Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you] This gospel was indeed good tidings. Beside the fact that Christ had been offered for our sins (1Co_15:3) St Paul, as well as the rest of the Apostles (1Co_15:11), taught that He had risen again in order to communicate to us that new and Divine life whereby our own resurrection should be assured—a life which should make the human body, though laid in the grave, a seed from whence in God’s own good time, a new and more glorious body should arise. This chapter is one of the deepest and most mysterious in the Bible. It is the one exception to the statement in ch. 3 that St Paul was unable to feed the Corinthians with meat; for it ranks with the profound exposition of the principles of Justification in the Epistle to the Romans, and the weighty but most difficult enunciation of the doctrine of God’s foreknowledge and man’s call in the first chapter of the Epistle to the Ephesians. The chapter may be divided into six parts. See Introduction.
Read full note →
which also you have received] Rather, which ye received, that is, when it was preached.
and wherein ye stand] Stand fast, that is, against the assaults of sin. Cf. Rom_5:2; 2Co_1:24; Eph_6:11; Eph_6:13-14. Our faith in Christ, the giver of the new life of holiness, can alone defend us from evil.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 (1) Moreover, brethren.—This chapter is throughout occupied with the…
XV.
(1) Moreover, brethren.—This chapter is throughout occupied with the DOCTRINE OF THE RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD. The occasion which caused the Apostle to dwell at such length and with such emphasis on this subject was the denial of the resurrection by some members of the Corinthian Church. It has been suggested by some writers that what the Apostle had to combat was a false conception of the resurrection—that at Corinth there were probably those who refined away the doctrine of the resurrection into merely a rising from the death of sin into a life of righteousness, something after the manner of Hymenæus and Philetus (2Ti_2:17-18), who taught that “the resurrection was past already.” It seems clear, however, from the emphatic statement in 1Co_15:12, and from the general scope and drift of the entire argument, that what the Apostle is here meeting is not a perversion, but a denial of the doctrine. There were many elements in such a mixed body as the Corinthian Church which would have contributed to the growth of this error. Amongst the Jewish converts would be some traces of the Sadducean (Mat_22:23) denial of the resurrection, and in the Gentile section of the Church there would linger the spirit of the Athenians who “mocked when they heard of the resurrection of the dead” (Act_17:32), and of the Epicurean philosophers who said, “Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die.” From these and from other like sources there had crept into the Church itself a denial of the doctrine of the resurrection. In reading this chapter it is well to remember that the Apostle probably intended it, not only as a reply to these corruptors of the faith, but as supplying those who remained faithful with a confirmation of their own faith, and arguments with which they might meet their opponents. It is always difficult to give a clear, exhaustive analysis of an argument by such a writer as St. Paul. The enthusiasm of his nature leads him to mingle the syllogism of passion with the syllogism of logic; and, as he was not writing himself, but dictating the composition, a word often leads him off from his argument into some splendid outburst of pathetic exhortation, or of prophetic utterance. Still, including such digressions, the general argument of this chapter may be tabulated thus:—
Read full note →
I.—THE DOCTRINE OF THE RESURRECTION (1Co_15:1-34).
Subdivided as follows:
(1) The resurrection proved by the historical fact of Christ’s resurrection (1Co_15:1-15).
(2) The resurrection proved by an appeal to the moral consequences involved in a denial of it (1Co_15:16-28).
(3) The truth of the resurrection involved in certain existing practices (1Co_15:29-34).
II.—THE METHOD AND PRINCIPLE OF THE RESURRECTION (1Co_15:35-58).
(1) Illustration from analogy (1Co_15:35-44).
(2) Illustration from our dual descent from. Adam and from Christ (1Co_15:44-49).
(3) The great change (1Co_15:50-53).
(4) A song of triumph (1Co_15:54-57).
(5) Concluding exhortation (1Co_15:58).
I declare unto you.—The Apostle opens his historical argument by reminding the Corinthians that this is no new nor unimportant matter. It is the original gospel which he had preached to them, which they received, and in which they stand, and by which they are being saved (not “are saved,” as in the English).
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv1–32 Vers. 1-58. The doctrine of the resurrection. This chapter,…
Vers. 1-58. The doctrine of the resurrection. This chapter, and the thirteenth, on Christian love, stand out, even among the writings of St. Paul, as pre-eminently beautiful and important. No human words ever written have brought such comfort to millions of mourners as the words of this chapter, which form a part of the Burial Service of almost every Christian community. It is the more deeply imprinted on the memory of men because it comes to us in the most solemn hours of bereavement, when we have most need of a living faith. The chapter falls into six sections.
1. The evidence of Christ"s resurrection (vers. 1-11).
Read full note →
2. The resurrection of Christ is the foundation of our faith in the general resurrection (vers. 12-19).
3. Results to be deduced from Christ"s resurrection (vers. 20 28).
4. The life of believers an argument for the resurrection (vers. 29-34).
5. Analogies helpful for understanding the subject (vers. 35-49).
6. Conclusion and exhortation (vers. 50-58).
Vers. 1-11. The evidence of the resurrection of Christ.
Moreover. The de of the original merely marks the transition to a new topic. The gospel. He here uses the word with special reference to the Resurrection, which is one of the most central and necessary doctrines of the "good tidings," and which always occupied a prominent place in St. Paul"s preaching, (Act_17:18 Act_23:6) as well as in that of all the apostles. (Act_1:22 Act_4:2 1Pe_3:21) Ye have received; rather, ye received. The "also" is emphatic. The Corinthians had not been like Christ"s "own," who "received him not". (Joh_1:11)
HOMILETICS. Vers. 1-11. The apostolic gospel.
brethren," etc. On all hands we hear persons talk about the simple gospel. And it appears to us that, in the majority of cases, the expression means nothing more than a few crude notions which the speaker has received, or possibly formed, about the gospel. Some men"s "simple gospel" is an offence to reason, a dishonour to God, and, curse to Christianity. The passage under review presents to us Paul"s "simple gospel." And let us look at Christianity as here indicated. We observe
I THAT CHRISTIANITY IS BASED UPON HISTORICAL FACTS. It is not founded upon human reason upon any of its primitive axioms or logical conclusions. It is not founded upon human imagination; it is neither an ingenious hypothesis to account for any phenomena, nor a poetic myth to adumbrate any truth. It is based on facts.
1. These facts are personal. They are connected with a person, and that person is not Socrates, Plato, nor Caesar, but one whom Paul calls Christ. It is founded upon the personal history of one, and but one, individual, and that is Christ.
2. These facts are few. He "died," he was "buried," and he "rose." These facts are compendious facts; they imply many more, and may be reduced even to less. The resurrection of Christ involves the whole; and in the subsequent verses of this chapter, Paul uses it as such.
3. These facts are well attested. After his resurrection, Paul tells us here that he "was seen of Cephas," of "the twelve," then of "five hundred," and then of "me also." No facts on record are better attested than these.
II THAT CHRISTIANITY IS DESIGNED FOR THE REMOVAL OF EVIL. Why did these facts take place? What is the aim of the whole? He "did for our sins." The great end of Christianity is to "put away sin" from the world, to put it away from the hearts, literature, institutions, customs, and governments of mankind. Let sin be put away, and all evil is put away; natural evil is but the effect of moral. Philosophically, there is no system on earth suited to destroy man"s sinful disposition and to change his heart but Christianity, and historically nothing else has ever done it. Let the fact ring louder and louder through the world, that the grand end of Christianity is not the formation of creeds, however correct, nor the organization of societies, however scriptural; but it is to "put away sin.
III THAT CHRISTIANITY IS TO BE PREACHED WITH THIS DESIGN. "By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory hold fast what I preached unto you," etc. Paul preached that they might be saved, but they could only be saved as they renounced and hated sin. The passage suggests three ideas in relation to Paul"s preaching with this view.
1. He preached Christianity convincingly. He says, "The gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye... received." They believed his gospel; then he must have convinced them by arguments. Christianity in preaching is to be commended "to every man"s conscience.
2. He preached Christianity scripturally. He showed those facts in the light of the Scriptures, "according to the Scriptures.
3. He preached Christianity humbly. The expression "born out of duo time" evidently indicates his humility; and then in the next verse he says, "Nor I am the least of the apostles, that am not meet to be called an apostle," etc. We thank God for such a system as this a system built not on propositions, but on facts, personal, few in number, but well attested. Such facts are most palpable and attractive; a system which cures the evils of the moral world by taking away its sins. Let it be preached, as Paul preached it convincingly, scripturally, and humbly.
HOMILIES BY C. LIPSCOMB. Vers. 1-4. Introduction.
"Moreover" indicates a change of subject. "Declare unto you," or remind you, is somewhat emphatic. What St. Paul brings to memory are certain fundamental ideas which he does not hesitate to call "the gospel," the glad tidings of God to the world. It was the same gospel he had preached unto them, the same they had accepted, the same in which they stood. By it these Corinthians were saved, present and future, if they adhered to their faith, unless indeed their faith was "in vain." Was this faith a vain thing? Was it possible that it was an illusion? How could this be when they had embraced it, stood in it, felt its power to save, and rejoiced in its blessedness? The power of this gospel lay in these facts, viz.: Christ had died, had been buried, had been raised from the grave; and these had occurred for a special purpose and agreeably to pre-announcement of Divine revelation. What was the specific object of Christ"s death? He died "for our sins." In this he was the Christ of God, the Messiah, the Anointed, the Jesus of Nazareth, who, as "the righteous Servant of the Father," was ordained to "bear their iniquities." It was not, then, a common death. It was not a death brought about as to its main end by the disappointment of his nation because he had refused to be a secular king. It was not the death of a martyr. Worldly influences, earthly agencies, Satanic power, appear in the immediate and circumstantial connections of his crucifixion. His arrest was an act of human violence; his trial was twofold, Jewish and Roman; his execution was Roman; and yet all this array of man"s hate and skill and successful wickedness passes out of sight, and is lost in a view infinitely higher. Judas could not have betrayed him, Caiaphas and the Sanhedrim could not have condemned him, Pilate could not have given him over to the Pharisees and Sadducees, unless Christ himself had permitted them to control the manner and incidents of his death. The death itself, as to its motive, spirit, and aim, occupies the whole mind of the apostle. Man and man"s instrumental relation to it fade from view, and it is with him a vicarious, expiatory, propitiating death, deriving its reason, character, and value from a single consideration a death for our sins. On no other basis could he regard the gospel as glad tidings. And how had the knowledge of this as a doctrinal reality come to him? He had "received" it from Christ himself, who had appeared personally to him at midday. The historical facts of his death, burial, and resurrection had been known to him; for Saul of Tarsus could not have been ignorant of these things as events involving the nation. Mysteriously, too, he had felt their impression in vague ideas, in vaguer fears; out of unconscious depths, sounds had throbbed as strange pulsations on the inner ear; and so sharp had been the call to thought and reflection, as for the Lord Jesus to remind him on the way to Damascus that he had been kicking against the goads which had pierced his conscience. His conversion was sudden and marvellous. Sudden and marvellous it could not have been but for the long and acute goading that had opened his heart to the hand of the Divine Healer. Yet this preparatory work of conviction was all within himself, under the Spirit"s agency. What he knew of Christ"s death was not from the historical fact alone, but from the doctrinal truth couched in the fact, and this saving truth he had received. It was a revelation to his soul, a direct and assuring manifestation from the Lord Jesus. To be an apostle, he needed this immediate communication from heaven, this peculiar intensifying of conviction and conversion. Means and methods suited to others were not adapted to his case. Notorious as he had been in the championship of the national Church the forlorn hope of Sadduceeism and Pharisaism, the young hero whose fanatical strength was adequate to replenish the wasting and well nigh exhausted forces of the Sanhedrim it was not for him to go over to Christ in some quiet way by meditation, by laborious inquest of soul, by those high resolves which often have their birth from the womb of solitude. No; he must be signally converted, for his own sake and for the sake of others. The change was a momentous affair in the history of the Jewish Church no less than the Christian Church, and, accordingly, he speaks of himself as having "received" the grace of God in an exceptional manner. But were human means disowned? Was naturalness set at nought or even depreciated? Not so; what he "received" was altogether in unison with the true creed of Israel as contained in the records of her national faith. "According to the Scriptures," argues he, was the truth of Christ"s death which I "received." Above the effulgence that flashed from the Syrian noon upon his eye, there was another light, and it spread all over Pentateuch, Psalms, prophecies. What, indeed, Gamaliel stood for, but was not; what Sadducee and Pharisee ideally meant, but utterly failed to make real; what priest and scribe had been designed to represent, but had hidden under carnal observances; what temple and sacrifices had been set apart to commemorate and prefigure, but had obliterated in sign and symbol; all these were now illumined. "According to the Scriptures," which he had learned when a boy in Tarsus, and had come to Jerusalem that he might enlarge and perfect his knowledge of these holy writings; "according to the Scriptures," which St. Stephen had expounded before the Sanhedrim when the shadow of death retreated before the glory descending upon the youthful saint from the "Son of man standing on the right hand of God;" "according to the Scriptures" that Ananias had explained to him at Damascus, when "there fell from his eyes as it had been scales," and, in no long time, the inner eyesight was made clear and strong. Thus it was that providence in the past became providence in the present, the Holy Ghost alike in each, and Tarsus, Jerusalem, and Damascus brought, though seemingly so wide apart, into the unity of his soul"s development. Verily, a wondrous scheme of personal history, recognizing home and parents, life in "no mean city," life in the metropolis that was venerated as the glory of the elect nation, life in the leadership of an assault on the young Church, and forever memorable in her annals because of the crown of martyrdom then first won; a marvellous interweaving of the natural and supernatural as warp and woof in one and the same fabric. Back to the original promise spoken in Eden that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent"s head; back to the early institution of sacrifice, and thence on to the organization of the Divine idea in a most solemn and august ceremonial that allowed no day to escape its impressive symbolization; all through penitential psalms and instructive prophecies. The great doctrine was present everywhere that "without shedding of blood there is no remission," that "he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows," and that "the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all." No emaciating criticism here; no destructive intellect; no disposition inclining St. Paul to obscure Christ in the shadow of the Jewish nation, and minimize his figure to the smallest dimensions consistent with any faith at all. No such taste and temper had this man, fresh from the schools and master of the theology of his times. Nor is it other than one of his very marked peculiarities, that he so frequently cites his thorough and familiar acquaintance with the Scriptures, and that from first to last in his Epistles, he is quite as much a commentator of the Old as an exponent of the New. The two grand hemispheres of religious thought formed one globe in him. From the one to the other, he passed with unobstructed step. Over the immense domain, divided and cut up to so many other minds, adverse or even hostile sections to not a few honest souls; over all this stretch of diversified territory, there was to St. Paul the very perfection of unity. His footsteps never missed their pathway; his eye never lost a landmark. For him, Christ was in Eden, in Abraham, Moses, David, Isaiah, Hosea; and the Old Testament was what it was and all it was because Christ was in every one of its doctrines and institutions. The present Christ to him the Christ of Damascus, and Arabia, and Jerusalem, and Athens, and Ephesus, and Corinth was the Christ of the past, and he was this because he was the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." Is it like]y, then, that we shall find too much of Christ, and especially as it respects the legal bearings of his death, in the Old Testament? Clearly St. Paul did not think so. "According to the Scriptures" was prefatory, and essentially so, to the logic, sentiment, fervour, of the grand argument he was about to make. What was this argument to be? A defencethe defence of the doctrine of the resurrection of the human body. Observe now that the historical fact of the Lord"s resurrection was not in debate. No one of the Corinthians denied or even doubted that. What, then, was in controversy? This it was, viz.: Did the doctrine involved in the Lord"s rising from the dead apply to all? Was there to be a general resurrection? From this point of view, we see why in the present case he laid such stress on his dying for our sins. It was not death as an ordinary termination of life, but death considered in this exclusive instance as an atoning death, as a vicarious and expiatory offering, as a complete and perfect satisfaction to law and justice. It is this death that stands so closely related to his resurrection, and through it to our resurrection. Taking merely an ethical view of the matter, and confining ourselves to what Jesus of Nazareth taught, and to the example of moral excellence he set before men, we can see no reason why he should have risen. He added nothing to morality, nothing to example, nothing to a high and self-sacrificing manhood, by returning to life and reappearing at sundry times to his disciples during the forty days. On the other hand, looking at his death as penal "for our sins we can understand why, if he was "delivered for our offences," he should be "raised again for our justification." Without the resurrection, we could not be assured whether he died simply and solely as a good man, the best of men, or as the Son of God to expiate our sins. If, indeed, law and justice have been satisfied by the sacrifice, let them express in an authoritative and sovereign manner, clear of all liability to misapprehension, and assuring to the most eager solicitude, that the penalty has been paid and a full pardon for guilt in man made possible. Precisely this was accomplished by Christ"s resurrection, and thus the scars of Calvary, preserved upon his person, were shown to the disciples as the signs of victory over "hell and death." He rose, furthermore, on "the third day." Though it was not Christ"s habit to fix times and seasons, yet he was careful to settle the day of his resurrection. Again and again he announced the date of the event. Friends, in their overwhelming dismay, forgot it, or if some remembered it, as the two who journeyed to Emmaus, it was clouded by grief and distrust. Foes remembered it and provided a guard for the sepulchre, and his foes were the first to know that he had risen, and that, too, from their own soldiers. There was no ethical reason for him to rise on the third day or on any other day, but, viewing his death as penal, its purpose instantly answered when he died, we can see congruity between the two facts, "the third day" being his own appointment and a proof that he had died, not as a mere man, but as the eternal Son of God. St. Paul repeats, "according to the Scriptures," i.e. Christ"s resurrection had been foretold. "Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption". (Psa_16:10) Christ"s death, burial, and resurrection hold together, and their congruity is determined by the fact that "the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes we are healed." To these truths the apostle gave prominence in the opening of his argument. Logically, they had to assume that commanding position, and emotionally they could have no other. And therefore, "first of all," he delivered these doctrines. They took precedence of all else; they were the data foreverything in Christianity; they were "the gospel." So that if he was about to dwell on a topic which should evoke his power to the utmost, nor leave a faculty of his mind disengaged nor a sensibility unmoved, he would "first of all," as he had done in his preaching, rest his whole cause on Christ dying and rising as the Redeemer of the human race. L.
HOMILIES BY J.R. THOMSON Vers. 1-58. The exposition and defence of the resurrection.
This chapter stands, as it were, by itself in the Epistle, and indeed in the Scripture. The Gospels relate the fact of our Saviour"s rising from the dead; but St. Paul in this passage, remarkable alike for closeness of reasoning, for fervent of eloquence, and for elevation of spiritual treatment, writes as the theologian of the resurrection. In opposition to false teachers who had arisen in the Corinthian Church, the apostle maintains the fact of Christ"s resurrection to be the basis of Christian faith, practice, and hope; and especially deduces from the historical event the expectation of a glorious immortality, then and ever the possession of the Church, and destined to be the possession of humanity.
I THE FACT OF CHRIST"S RESURRECTION IS PROVED AND PREACHED. (Vers. 1-11.) This is here exhibited as:
1. The substance of Christian preaching.
2. The fulfilment of Old Testament predictions.
3. Verified by the witness of the apostles and of five hundred brethren.
4. Attested by Paul himself.
5. Believed and professed by the whole Church of the Redeemer.
II INFERENCES FROM THIS FACT. (Vers. 12-28.)
1. Destructive inferences. (Vers. 12-19.) The resurrection of Jesus is represented as conflicting with and altogether overthrowing the belief inculcated by false teachers, that the dead rise not.
2. Constructive inferences. (Vers. 20-28.) The Lord Christ, as a risen Saviour and King, is represented as the Firstfruits of the spiritual harvest, and as the supreme Governor and Controller of the universe.
III CONFIRMATIONS OF THE DOCTRINE OF THE GENERAL RESURRECTION FROM THE DEAD. (Vers. 29-49.)
1. Christian practice, and especially the endurance of opposition, persecution, and martyrdom, can only be accounted for by the power of a belief in worlds to come. Nothing is more evident than that the apostle himself, and many of the early Christians, came under the influence of this new and mighty power, making of them nothing short of new men.
2. Natural analogies support the doctrine of the resurrection. Especially the analogy of the seed sown from which vegetable life takes its rise, and to which the harvest of fruit is traceable. The manifest order subsisting in nature, and the progressive revelation of God himself, are in harmony with the Christian"s hope.
IV THE GLORIOUS PROSPECTS OF CHRIST"S PEOPLE. (Vers. 5057.)
1. The mystery told. The inheritance of incorruptible and immortal blessedness.
2. The triumph foretold. Man"s worst foes, sin and death, shall be vanquished, and that by the might of the Divine Conqueror, Christ.
V CONSEQUENT EXHORTATION TO STEADFASTNESS. (Ver. 58.) Against apathy on the one hand, and enthusiasm on the other hand, Christians are warned. Labour is not in vain, for its fruits shall be reaped in eternity. Steadfastness and diligence are the appropriate attitude and habit of those who, believing that their Lord has risen, themselves look forward to the Divine, immortal life of heaven. T.
Vers. 1-4. The apostolic doctrine.
It is interesting and valuable to have in these words from St. Paul"s own pen a confirmation of the statements of the inspired historian, St. Luke, regarding the preaching by which the first moral victories of Christianity were achieved.
I THE SUBSTANCE OF APOSTOLIC DOCTRINE. Paul disclaims any pretension to a ministry of human learning or wisdom; he here as everywhere relies upon the facts which form the substance of his preaching and teaching.
1. The apostles proclaimed the death and burial of their Lord. These, indeed, were unquestioned historical facts, yet they lay at the basis of all their subsequent teaching, alike of doctrine, of promise, and of precept.
2. In conjunction with this they preached the resurrection of Christ. Whilst none denied that Jesus of Nazareth had been crucified, there were many who received the proclamation of his resurrection with incredulity and ridicule. But, however their preaching might be received, the apostles never wavered in their declaration that their Lord had risen from the grave.
3. These events were represented as a fulfilment of Old Testament prophecy; what had happened was "according to the Scriptures." To the Jews such a representation would appeal with peculiar power; and the Gentiles would recognize in it the unity of the dispensations of God.
4. The purpose of these events was represented as being the pardon and abolition of the sins of those who believed. The explanation of this "mystery" was a matter of inspired doctrine; but the fact was published abroad to all who would hear the Word.
II THE RECEPTION OF APOSTOLIC DOCTRINE.
1. In the case of true converts, this was not vain, unreasonable, frivolous. There are those who are ready to receive every new doctrine; and some such professed adherence to Christianity without any sufficient acquaintance with the truth, without examining its credentials, without counting the cost of their decision. But sincere Christians act reasonably and deliberately in their acceptance of the Word of life.
2. True converts were stable in their faith. Such is the teaching of this passage: "Wherein ye stand;" "Ye hold it fast." Deliberate acceptance and adhesion may be expected to be followed by tenacious retention of the truth. Stability in faith and godliness is the condition of the enjoyment of true blessing.
III THE ULTIMATE AIM AND RESULT OF APOSTOLIC DOCTRINE. No reader of the New Testament can suppose that the first preachers of the gospel intended simply to convey information. Theirs was a moral, a spiritual aim; they sought the salvation of their fellow men their deliverance from the curse, the bondage, the love of sin. Why was St. Paul so anxious that his hearers and his readers should receive and retain his teaching? It was because in his heart there glowed the flame of benevolence, because he desired above all things that his fellow-creatures should be rescued from the bondage of sin, and should rejoice in the liberty of the sons of God, and because he believed that this blessed result could be brought about only by their cordial reception of the gospel which it was his privilege and joy to preach. T.
HOMILIES BY E. HURNDALL Vers. 1-8. The gospel which Paul preached.
I IT WAS A RECEIVED, NOT AN ORIGINATED, GOSPEL. "For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received" (ver. 3). He tells us that he received it by "the revelation of Jesus Christ". (Gal_1:12) He had the more confidence in it that it was not of himself, and we have also. It came from the very central Source of all. Paul"s gospel of Christ came from Christ. Some preachers of the gospel are so able that they feel bound to originate. They throw a new light upon the truth instead of the old light. They preach, as they consider, a magnificent gospel, but it is unfortunately "of man," and thus worthless. Man can do many things, but he cannot make a gospel. When he tries he advertises his folly. With Paul, we should get as near as we can to the fountainhead the streams are apt to become contaminated.
II TWO CONSPICUOUS FEATURES.
1. The atoning death of Christ. Paul preached constantly, untiringly, supremely, the atonement (see his strong expression,. (1Co_2:2) He laid greatest emphasis upon the death of Christ. The life was beautiful, full of teaching; but in the death was the propitiation for sin. He died for our sins; our sins were so great that they required his death! "He bore our sins in his own body on the tree." And the death of Christ did not come suddenly upon the world. It was "according to the Scriptures:" foretold by the prophets, as, for example, by Isaiah in the fifty-third chapter of his book. He had no sins of his own to die for; he died for ours. He "gave himself for us.
2. The resurrection of Christ. This was the demonstration of the efficacy of his death, a proof that he conquered and was not conquered. The real triumph achieved in his death was manifested by his resurrection. A pledge of our resurrection through him. A token of his acceptance by God.
(1) The apostle laid stress upon the fact that Christ died. It was no swoon. A real death, and then a real resurrection. He "died" and "was buried" (ver. 4). He rose "the third day," so that for a day and part of two others he was in the sepulchre. Stone afterwards denied the actual death of Christ, and thus made void his resurrection. The apostle here anticipates their attack.
(2) That his resurrection accorded with prophecy. It was "according to the Scriptures". (see Psa_16:10)
(3) That his resurrection was well attested by witnesses. Paul does not give here all the appearances of Christ after his death, but a selection.
(a) Appearance to Peter. (Luk_24:34)
(b) To the twelve. Called by the familiar name "the twelve," though Judas was gone. (Luk_24:33-36)
(c) To five hundred brethren. Possibly in Galilee, where intimation of his appearing had been given, and may have been widely known, occasioning a large gathering of his followers (Mat_26:32 and 28:10, 16).
(d) To James. Probably James who presided over the Church at Jerusalem.
(e) All the apostles. (Joh_20:26 or Act_1:4)
(f) To St. Paul. As of one born out of due time. The least of the apostles. A grand array of evidence, and yet not all. The writer and speaker could bear personal testimony. Most of the five hundred were alive and could be interrogated. Others had "fallen asleep" in hope of a glorious resurrection through him who had appeared to them after his own death and burial.
III RESULTS.
1. Men received it. (Ver. 1.) It arrested their attention. It convinced their judgment. It moved their heart. It was adapted to human want. It glorified ordinary live.
2. Men were saved by it. (Ver. 2.) It was the power of God unto salvation. Conscience was satisfied. Life was purified and ennobled. Christ was followed. God was feared and served and loved. Death lost its terror. "After death" was paradise.
3. Men stood in this gospel. (Ver. 1.) As long as they held to it they stood, and having done all, stood. Through it came a power which was "able to keep them from falling." Have we received this gospel? Do we stand in it? Are we saved through it? We need "hold it fast" (ver. 2, New Version)grip it and keep gripping it. A mere assent will lead to "letting it slip." It has no power to save unless we hold it and it holds us. H.
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK Ver. 1. The large use of the term "gospel.
The general meaning of the term "gospel" is "good news," "glad tidings." It is "God"s spel," or "word." All that is connected with the Lord Jesus Christ may properly be called good news, and the word "gospel" may be thought of as including it all. There is, indeed, a tendency to limit the term to a portion only of our Redeemer"s work, which needs to be resisted. The gospel is treated as if it were only the message of our Lord"s sacrificial death. But that is, evidently, not the matter that is at all in the mind of the apostle when he wrote to the Corinthians of the "gospel which he preached unto them." He was thinking of the "gospel of the resurrection," and of those truths which rest upon the risen rather than upon the dying Redeemer. We plead, therefore, for a full comprehensive application of the term "gospel," as including
I THE GOSPEL OF THE INCARNATION. The "good news" that God is willing to take upon himself our human nature; to become a man among men; and to show to us that humanity is not hopelessly depraved, but is still within reach of the redemptive power of God. The "good news" that God"s love is no mere sentiment, but a holy pity leading him to make effort and sacrifice in accomplishing the purposes which love can fashion.
II THE GOSPEL OF THE MIRACLES. The "good news," thus illustrated for us is that there is no ill from which humanity suffers, no bitter and terrible and seemingly hopeless consequence of sin, which Divine love and power cannot reach. Even death itself, man"s last enemy, is well within God"s control. And the "good news" that God, in his gracious Fatherhood, is as mightily and wonderfully caring for us every day, as Jesus was caring for sick sufferers and imperilled disciples and bereaved friends.
III THE GOSPEL OF THE HOLY LIFE. The "good news" that a man has actually lived here upon the earth "holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners." And that he will not only show us how to live as he did, but will give us the grace for so living. He left us the "example that we should follow his steps," but he gave us also to be partakers of that Divine nature in which alone the following of the example becomes possible.
IV THE GOSPEL OF THE SACRIFICE. The "good news" that our sins have been borne for us; acceptable sacrifice for them has been offered. The demands of infinite righteousness have been adequately met. The hindrances to reconciliation have been effectually removed. And men now have "peace with God through Jesus Christ our Lord.
V THE GOSPEL OF THE RESURRECTION. The "good news" that God has signified his full acceptance of his Son. The "good news" that he who died for our sins lives to carry out his purpose of grace in our hearts. The "good news" that Christ "had risen again in order to communicate to us that new and Divine life whereby our own resurrection should be assured a life which should make the human body, though laid in the grave, a seed from whence, in God"s own good time, a new and more glorious body should arise." It is the gospel in this large and inclusive sense which has to be preached to men, and not a doctrine formulated by men respecting one part only of the "good news of God." They only preach the true gospel who can say with the apostle, "I have not shunned to declare unto you the whole counsel of God. R.T.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 10, 11, 12, 19, 20, 21, 23, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel.
1Co_15:1-12
Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel.
Read full note →
The apostolic gospel
I. Christianity is based on historical facts, not on human reason or imagination; it is neither an ingenious hypothesis to account for any phenomena, nor a poetic myth to adumbrate any truth. It is based on facts. These facts are--
1. Personal. They are connected with a person, and that person is not Socrates, Plato, nor Caesar, but Christ.
2. Few. He died, He was buried, and He rose. These facts are compendious facts, they imply many more.
3. Well attested (1Co_15:4-8). No facts on record are better attested than these.
II. Christianity is designed for the removal of evil.
1. He died for our sins.
2. It is to put away sin from the hearts, literature, institutions, customs, and governments of mankind; natural evil is but the effect of moral.
3. Philosophically, there is no system on earth suited to destroy mans sinful disposition and to change his heart, but Christianity; and, historically, nothing else has ever done it.
III. Christianity is to be preached with this design (1Co_15:2). Paul preached that they might be saved, but they could only be saved as they renounced and hated sin. Paul preached Christianity--
1. Convincingly, which also ye received. They believed his gospel; then he must have convinced them by arguments. Christianity is to be commended to every mans conscience.
2. Scripturally. He showed those facts in the light of the Scriptures, according to the Scriptures.
3. Humbly, born out of due time, … the least of the apostles, etc. (D. Thomas, D.D.)
The gospel which Paul preached, and in which the Corinthians found salvation
I. The reception of the gospel by the Corinthians, and the use which they made of it (1Co_15:1-2).
1. Paul brought glad tidings with him to Corinth, and proclaimed them everywhere--in the synagogue, in the workshop, in the market-place.
2. Nor did he preach without effect. Many might listen incredulously, and others resist, but many received his glad tidings.
3. In that gospel these Corinthians were now standing. Their ancient superstitions had passed away, and they stood upon the rock--Jesus Christ, and the hope of a resurrection. That reception of his apostolic message was not only the pledge of blessedness in the great hereafter, it indicated their present security. Now they were safe. The strong swimmer, battling with the waves of a stormy sea, may be living, and not without hope; but not until his feet touch the beach may he whisper to himself, Now I am safe! So these Corinthians had been saved, but their Christian work was not then over. The saved Christian is not to stand still and think of doing nothing more. Keep in memory might rather be translated firmly maintain. Without this they had believed in vain.
4. Here, then, we are presented with the apostles ideas of evangelical conversion. It was a process of preaching on his part followed by these steps on theirs--reception, belief, steadfast adherence. What Paul taught, that must ministers teach still. What the Corinthian Christians received, etc., that must we receive, stand upon, and adhere to, or risk the salvation of our souls.
II. The the truth with which he desired that their minds should be especially occupied (1Co_15:3-4). In these words we have plainly an epitome of the gospel. He himself had received this gospel, and felt it to be the power of God unto his own personal salvation; and now he declared that he had delivered it to them as equally available for theirs. Nay, he did so first of all, i.e., as the chiefest and most important statement in the gospel message. What was the all-important truth?
1. It was that Christ had died for our sins. There was something in that death which possessed an atoning virtue, and this was according to the Scriptures (Isa_53:1-12).
2. In token of the reality of Christs death Paul affirms that He was buried.
3. In token also that His atoning work was completely effectual, He rose from the dead the third day. (J. Cochrane, A.M.)
Pauls gospel
Pauls gospel in its substance. How that Christ died, etc. Good news must; be the record of a fact. And this is the great peculiarity and the great blessedness and sign of the universal adaptation of Christianity, that it is first and foremost, the story of things that happened on this green solid earth of ours. It is not airy speculations coming from the clouds, it is not a mere morality or republication of mans duty, with new emphasis, and with sweeter or more terrible sanctions. There is a theology underlying it, deducible from it, and which must be deduced from it. There is a system of morality in it, but the beginning of everything is the story of a life, the history of plain facts. And how else can God be revealed? You cannot reveal a person by anything but deeds. And further, for ever and ever it remains a fact that the highest form in which you and I can conceive of, or be taught of God, is the form of man. The beginning of the gospel is the story of the Christ. Christ is Chistianity; and its first form is neither morality, nor theology, nor philosophy, but simple history, Still further, there is another thought here, and that is that Pauls gospel, fastened, as its central fact, on the death and accompanying burial, and the consequent resurrection of Jesus Christ. There is the vital centre of the gospel. There! if you tear that out; of it, you have no life left in it; and its morality will never get itself executed, and the fair pattern will never be reproduced, and we shall have but one more of the tragical multitude of systems that have promised to us glorious crowns and left us in the dust. And there is one more point to be noticed, and that is Pauls gospel carried, as an integral part of itself, the explanation of the meaning of death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. How that He died for our sins according to the Scriptures. What is it that changes the historical fact into an historical proclamation of the good news of God? Is it the bare statement Jesus Christ died? Is that a gospel? Is it any more a gospel than the statement that Socrates died, or that anybody else died? The only statement about Christs death that makes it a gospel is that He died for our sins.
II. Pauls gospel in its power. He specifies two of its mighty influences upon men: Wherein ye stand … by which also ye are saved. First, the reception of that gospel into our hearts enables us to stand. In that gospel, received into our believing hearts, we get firm footing for our lives; a certitude. Men all around us are saying, Who will show us any truth? What are we to believe about God, about men, about the relations of the two? What are we to think of the destiny of humanity? What are we to think of the future? The answer lies here. Christ died for our sins; Christ is risen again for our salvation. In that truth, grasped, fed upon, unfolded as the germs unfold themselves in the sweet May-days, will be found the answer to all perplexities, the certainties amidst all shifting opinion, the basis upon which a whole lifes thinking may be reared, the ground of all true morality, the sum and substance of all real theology, the germ of prophetic anticipations of the fortunes of men and of individuals. Again, the word is employed in another aspect. That gospel of Christ, received into a mans heart, enables him to resist. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth. Then there is another aspect here of the power of Pauls gospel in that familiar word--By which ye are saved. By which also ye are being saved would be a truer translation. It is a process lifelong, and that process, including deliverance from all forms of evil, whether sin or sorrow, and investiture with all possibilities of good, whether righteousness or happiness, begins with the reception of Christ into the heart, and steadily runs parallel, with the increased reception of His grace, until the grey dawn passes through all the shades of saffron yellow, and rosy pink, and pearly white, and comes at last to the colourless completeness and unsetting radiance of the midday sun.
III. Pauls gospel, in its conditions. If ye keep in memory, or more correctly, If ye hold fast what I preached unto you. Unless ye have believed in vain. First, there must be a solid faith, not a faith which is lightly and without due cause taken up. There is such a thing, you know, as the seed being sown upon stony places, with an inch of earth above a great lateral shelf of rock. And just because the rock, into which the seed can never penetrate, retains much of the heat of the midday sun, and warms the film of earth above it, it grows quickly. So in a mans heart, the Word may be sown, it may strike down its little rootlets, and very soon come to an impenetrable layer of rock. And just because it cannot get any deeper it begins to germinate at once, and anon with joy they receive it. Such endure but for a while. They believe rashly, without due consideration. Their faith is not the deliberate act of the whole man. It is a momentary emotion that produced it. There is no adequate perception of the facts which it grasps, or of the necessities from which it seeks to be delivered. Let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord. But then do not forget that faith may be genuine though it be feeble; and that all which I have been saying about a shallow confidence has no bearing upon people simply because they find that their faith is not what it ought to be; or subject to many a sad break and gap. Again, remember the other condition here, viz., the continuous grasp of the truth which makes the essence of the gospel. Ye are being saved, if ye keep hold of what I preached to you. The gospel works upon us as long as we think about it, and keep it in our hearts, and not one instant longer. The polestar will guide you as long as you look at it; but if your eyes are wandering away to the will-o-the-wisps upon the marsh, or to the comets that flash across your sky, you will lose your guide, and wander into the darkness. It is whilst you believe that the gospel is saving you. And, remember, that continuous grasp of Gods truth cannot keep up without a continuous effort. I have seen conjurers that have said to a man, Take that coin in your hand. Close your hand upon it. Are you sure you have got it? Yes! Certain it is there? Certainly. Open your hand! Gone! Ay! And the world, the magician world, conjures his faith out of many a professing Christian mans clenched hand. And when he opens it--and perhaps he does not open it till he gets before the throne--an empty palm. Where is his faith? Tighten your grasp, lest at any time you should let them slip. (A. Maclaren, D.D.)
The certainty of the gospel
I. Of its facts.
1. Declared by competent witnesses.
2. Preached to us.
II. Of its experience.
1. We have received.
2. We stand in it.
III. Of its hopes.
1. It can save us fully and for ever.
2. If we hold it fast by faith. (J. Lyth, D.D.)
How ought the gospel to be preached
I. Faithfully, according to the Word of God.
1. Which is simple in its details.
2. Absolutely true.
II. Out of personal. Experience.
1. This gives confidence.
2. Conveys life.
III. Humbly.
1. With a consciousness of unfitness.
2. In dependence upon Divine grace.
3. With a full recognition of the labours of others. (J. Lyth, D.D.)
The resurrection of Christ
1. Because this chapter forms part of the Funeral Service, and every syllable stands associated with some mournful moment in our lives, is one reason why the exposition is attended with some difficulty. It sounds more like stately music heard in the stillness of night than like an argument.
2. The subject, like almost all the others treated of in this Epistle, had been forced upon the apostle by the heresies which had crept into the Corinthian Church. Note the great difference made by the apostle between moral wrong-doing and intellectual error. When incest had been committed the apostle at once commanded expulsion, but here he only expostulates with and endeavours to set the heretics right.
3. In the present day this error arises out of materialism. Now the unbelief of those distant ages was something very different from this. But the Corinthians denied the resurrection of the body because they believed that matter was the cause of all evil; and they hailed the gospel chiefly because it gave them the hope of being liberated from the flesh with its corrupt desires. They regarded the resurrection therefore as a figurative expression. The apostle now controverts this error, and he does it by a twofold line of argument.
I. By historical proofs of the resurrection of Christ (1Co_15:4-8).
1. The Christian doctrine was not merely immortality, but resurrection; the historical fact of Christs resurrection being the substantial pledge of ours.
2. There are two forms in which it is conceivable that Christianity may exist--essential and historical. Suppose, e.g., that without the aid of Christ, a man could arrive at the chief Christian doctrines--the Fatherhood of God; that it is a Divine Spirit which is the source of all goodness in man; that the righteousness acceptable in His sight is not ceremonial but moral goodness, etc., he would have arrived at the essence of Christianity. And history tells us that before the Redeemers advent there were a few who, by the aid of the Spirit of God, had reached to a knowledge which is marvellous to us. By historical Christianity, however, we mean not those truths abstractedly, but considered as actually existing in the life of Christ. Reverence for persons precedes the belief in truths. A few remarkable exceptions have reached truth without knowing Him who is the Truth, but this is not the rule. Those truths which you hold deepest, you have gained not by the illumination of your intellect, but first by trusting in some great or good one, and then, through Him, by obtaining credible evidence of those truths. Take, e.g., the doctrine of the resurrection. The times when it seemed almost incredible to us were those in which we began to despair of human nature--when some great crime or meanness had set us wondering why such beings should be permitted to live hereafter. And the moments when we believed most strongly in it were the moments when we felt assured that human perfectibility was no dream, since we saw the evidence of a goodness most like Gods which could not be limited by death. Carry on this principle, and then you have the very spirit of historical Christianity. For we do not believe that there shall be a life to come merely because there is something within us which craves for it, but because we have believed in the life and death and resurrection of the Man of Nazareth. Our Christianity is not merely the abstract truths which Christ taught, but Christ Himself.
II. By the argument reductio ad absurdum (1Co_15:13-20). If there be no resurrection--
1. Then is Christ not risen. It is an absurdity to believe that that man perished. The Son of Man grounded His pretensions on this, that He should rise again from the dead. If, then, He did not, He was an impostor; and you are driven to this, that a holy life is not a whit more certain of attaining to Gods truth than a false one.
2. The Christian faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins. Except in the belief of the resurrection the quitting of sin is impossible. Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die, is an inevitable conclusion. And you are driven also to this, that, just as all other religions have failed in redeeming man from sin, the Christian religion has also failed. It has become the fashion to hold that in proportion as a belief in the resurrection enters into our motives, right-doing loses its value, that he alone can do any really good work who disbelieves in a life hereafter, because he alone does good for its own sake and not from the hope of reward. But--
(1) In removing the hope of the life to come you have taken away all that makes life worth possessing, or mankind worth living for. Why should we labour for beings scarcely higher than the half-reasoning elephant?
(2) To do right Christianly is not doing so for the sake of happiness in the world to come, but for life. It is more life and fuller that we want.
3. The apostles would be found false witnesses. There is something touching in the manner in which the apostle writes this. That he should be a false witness! He does not leave room for supposing the possibility of a mistake. It was either true or false. James, Cephas, the twelve, the five hundred, either had or had not seen the Lord Jesus; Thomas either had or had not put his finger into the print of the nails; either the resurrection was a fact, or else the apostles were intentional false witnesses before God. Now there is a certain instinct within us generally which enables us to detect when a man is speaking the truth. Truth has a certain ring by which it may be known. Now this chapter rings with truth; and before you can believe that there is no resurrection, you must believe that this glorious chapter was written by one who knew at his heart that he was speaking what was false. Another witness to this fact was the Apostle Peter. There are two things which rarely go together, courage and falsehood. There are circumstances in which a brave and honest man may be betrayed by the sudden force of temptation into a dereliction from the truth, and such a thing had occurred in the life of St. Peter. But after his bitter repentance he went forth and stood as upon a rock, protesting that he knew that the Lord was risen. There must he a cause given for this. Can we believe that the man who laid his hand on the axe, or he who asked that he might be crucified with his head downwards, as unworthy to die as his Redeemer died, that his life was a systematic and continued falsehood kept up to the very last; and that the brave, true man with his dying lips gave utterance to a lie?
4. Those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished, i.e., the noblest of the human race have lived--only to die for ever. You are required to believe, moreover, that they attained to this excellence by believing what was false, namely, the resurrection; so that we are driven to this strange paradox--that by believing that which is false we become pure and noble, and by believing that which is true we become base and selfish! Believe this who can! (F. W. Robertson, M.A.)
The resurrection of Christ
I. Its place in the Christian creed.
1. What did Paul mean by the resurrection of Christ?
(1) He meant His rising from the grave with a body glorified or made fit for the heavenly life He had entered. Flesh and blood cannot enter upon that life, but must pass through a process which entirely alters its material.
(2) But yet he always speaks as if there were some connection between the natural and the spiritual body, and regards the body of Christ as that into the likeness of which the bodies of His people are to be transformed. Now we can only suppose that the body which was laid in the sepulchre was transformed into a spiritual body by a process which differed from that which is to operate in ourselves only by its rapidity. We do not understand the process, but all along the line which marks off this world from the spiritual world mystery broods. There are in nature many forces of which we know nothing, and it may one day appear to us most natural that the spirit should clothe itself with a spiritual body. As the life that is in the body now assimilates material and forms the body to its particular mould, so may the spirit hereafter. Paul refuses to recognise any insuperable difficulty here.
2. What was the position occupied by the Corinthians?
(1) In that day the resurrection was denied by materialists, such as the Sadducees, who believed that mental and spiritual life are only manifestations of physical life and dependent upon it. But many who opposed materialism held that the resurrection of the body if not impossible was at all events undesirable. To be free from all connection with matter was an essential element in their idea of salvation.
(2) In our own day the resurrection of Christ is denied from both points of view. It is said that Christ lay in His grave, and the elements of His body have passed into the bosom of nature, as ours will before long; but His spirit lives, perhaps in us. On the other hand, it is said that although the body of Christ remained in the tomb, His spirit survived death, and lives a disembodied but conscious and powerful life. But what the apostles saw was a veritable body that could stand handling and whose lips and throat could utter sound. Besides, if we accept either view we are at once confronted with the difficulty that Christs glorification is not yet complete. If Christ now sits at Gods right hand in perfect human nature, it is not as a disembodied spirit, but as a complete person in a glorified body. And it must also be remembered that the primitive faith and restored confidence in Christ to which the very existence of the Church is due, were created by the sight of the empty tomb and the glorified body.
3. Consider the place which our Lords risen body had in Pauls conversion. The idea of a crucified Messiah had been abhorrent to him, but from the moment when he saw the risen Lord he understood, with the rest of the disciples, that death was the Messiahs appointed path to supreme spiritual headship. So from the first Paul put the resurrection of Christ forward as an essential and fundamental part of the gospel he had received. If, says Dr. Fairbairn, it be true that no living Christ ever issued from the tomb of Joseph, then that tomb becomes the grave, not of a man, but of a religion, with all the hopes built on it and all the splendid enthusiasms it has inspired. It is not difficult to perceive what it was in the resurrection of Christ which gave it this importance.
(1) It was the convincing proof that Christs words were true, and that He was what He had claimed to be. Destroy this temple, He said, and in three days I will raise it again. As Jonah had been lost for three days and nights, but had thereby only been forwarded in his mission, so with our Lord. In order that His claim to be the Messiah may be understood, it was necessary that He should die; but in order that it might be believed it was needful that He should rise. The apostles evidently accepted the resurrection as Gods great attestation to the person and work of Christ. It changed their own thoughts about Him, and they expected it would change the thoughts of other men. They could now confidently say, He died for our sins, and was raised again for our justification.
(2) There is disclosed by it a real and close connection between this world and the next. There is no need now of argument to prove a life beyond; here is one who is in it. It is by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead that we are begotten again unto a lively hope.
(3) In it we see at once the norm or type of our life here and of our destiny hereafter. Holiness and immortality are two inseparable aspects of the Divine life we receive from Christ. His Spirit is the source of both (Rom_8:1-39.). The hope that uplifts and purities every part of the Christians character becomes a living hope, full of immortality, in all who are now actually drawing their life from Christ. Therefore does Paul so continually hold up to us the risen life of Christ as that to which we are to be conformed.
II. Its proof. As a preliminary to the positive evidence here adduced, it may be remarked that we have no record of any contemporary denial of the fact, save only the story put in the mouths of the soldiers by the chief priests. The authorities resolved there should be no tampering with the grave, and accordingly had set their official seal upon it and placed a guard to watch. Their action after the resurrection proves that the tomb was empty, while their previous action proves that it was emptied by the actual rising of Jesus. So when Peter affirmed it before the Sanhedrin no one was hardy enough to contradict him; or why did they not prosecute the disciples for breaking the official seal? What hindered them from bringing proof that there had been no resurrection? If the body was still in the grave nothing was easier than to produce it; if the grave was empty, as they affirmed, because the disciples had stolen the body, no more welcome handle against them could have been furnished to the authorities. But they could not in open court pretend any such thing. It is admitted on all hands that the disciples had a bona fide belief that Jesus had risen; how was that belief produced? To this there are three answers.
1. That the disciples saw our Lord alive after the crucifixion, but He had never been dead. This answer is plainly inadequate.
(1) As not in harmony with the facts. His death was certified by the surest authority. Though the soldiers see that Jesus is dead, they make sure by a spear-thrust, and Pilate would not give up the body until he had received the necessary certificate that the sentence of death had been executed.
(2) As an explanation. The Person the disciples saw was not a crushed, defeated man, who had death still to look forward to, but one who had passed through and conquered death, and was now alive for evermore.
2. That the disciples only thought they saw Christ, e.g.--
(1) Some clever and scheming person may have personated Jesus. Such personations have been made, but never with such results. Imposture, in fact, does not fit the case before us at all; and the more we consider the combination of qualities required in any one who should personate the risen Lord, the more we shall be persuaded that the right explanation of the belief in the resurrection is not to be sought in this direction.
(2) The disciples simply believed that such a soul could not become extinct. Quite so, they of course believed that His spirit was in paradise, and for that very reason fully expected to find His body in the tomb: which they did not.
(3) Renans account of the growth of this belief is that the world, accustomed to attribute to its great men superhuman virtues, cannot admit that they have submitted to the death common to all. When Mahomet expired Omar rushed from the tent, sword in hand, and declared that he would hew down any one who should dare to say that the prophet was no more. Heroes do not die. So Jesus had lived so entirely in those who surrounded Him that they could but affirm that after His death He was still living. M. Renan forgets, however, that Omar was followed by Abu Bekr, who said, Whoso hath worshipped Mahomet, let him know that Mahomet is dead, but whoso hath worshipped God that the Lord liveth and doth not die. Then, again, none of the apostles said that their Master was not dead. Besides, all these hypotheses omit altogether to explain how the disciples disposed of the tomb of our Lord, in which, according to this hypothesis, His body was still quietly reposing. Is there, then, no possibility of the disciples having been deceived? Had the belief in the resurrection depended on the report of one or a few who were anxiously looking for the resurrection of Jesus, then these might have persuaded themselves they saw Him. But what we have here to explain is how several persons, at different times, in various moods, came to believe they had seen the risen Lord. He was recognised not by persons who expected to see Him alive, but by women who went to anoint Him dead; not by credulous, excitable persons, but by men who would not believe till they had gone to and into the sepulchre. The resurrection formed no part of the Jewish creed regarding the Messiah; and the idea that the disciples were expecting it is contradicted by the narrative. There was not one person to whom our Lord appeared who was not taken wholly by surprise.
3. There remains, therefore, only the explanation that the disciples did see Christ alive after He had been dead and buried. The men who said they had seen Him were men of probity, whose lives and conduct are only to be explained by their having been brought in contact with the spiritual world in this surprising and solemnising manner. The testimony of Paul is conclusive. It is simply inconceivable that he should have abandoned all his prospects and entered on a wholly different life without carefully investigating the chief fact which influenced him in making this change. No saner or more commanding intellect ever headed a complex and difficult movement. There is no one of that generation whose testimony to the resurrection is more worth having, and we have it in the most emphatic form of a life based upon it. In fine, no one who takes a serious interest in all this evidence can deny that it would be quite sufficient to authenticate any ordinary historical event. The majority of the historical events are accepted on much slenderer evidence, and the evidence for this can be refused only on the ground that no evidence, however strong, could prove such a miracle. But those who reject it are compelled to accept a miracle equally astounding, viz., that those who had the best means of ascertaining the truth and every possible inducement to ascertain it, should all have been deceived, and that this deception should have been the most fruitful source of good, not only to them, but to the whole world. (M. Dods, D.D.)
Difficulties in the way of disbelief in the resurrection of Christ
I. Exegetical. There is the clear testimony of St. Paul, and the great distinction made by the New Testament between the description of visions and the narratives of our Lords appearance.
II. Psychological. All likelihood is wanting for the supposition that so many and such very differently constituted persons should, even by hundreds at a time, have been simultaneously predisposed to see visions. There is the sudden and thorough change in the disciples frame of mind, especially, too, the conversion of St. Paul; and finally the cessation of Christs appearance.
III. Dogmatical. Whence should the idea of an isolated individual resurrection, hitherto foreign to their belief, arise in the minds of the disciples?
IV. Chronological. Unanimous historical evidence points to the third day, and this leaves no space for the gradual development of visions, or for the translocation of the first appearances in Galilee.
V. Topographical. There, in a well-known spot, stands the empty tomb, with its loud question, Where is the body? which neither Jew nor Roman attempts to answer, though investigation would have been easy.
VI. Historical. There is the immove-able belief of the disciples; their preaching, so full of victorious joy and martyr courage, there is the Christian Church founded on the rock of belief in Christs death and resurrection. VII. Moral There is the regeneration which followed the teaching of the apostles. (Prof. Christlieb.)
No-resurrection impossible
1. The first impossible consequence may be called the argument from mind, and is thus expressed: If there be no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not raised. What Paul really means to say is this: If there be no immortality of the soul, Christ is dead--the highest of minds has become extinct. It may seem as if this were a mode of reasoning which never would be used in modern times. A writer of our day would certainly put it differently; he would say, Are all the aspirations of the human soul to count for nothing--all the yearnings after moral purity, all the search for truth, all the thirst for beauty? To him the aspirations of the human soul were all fulfilled already in the image of a perfect mind. The life of the Son of Man was, for him, the synonym for all that humanity ever did, or even can do, in the path of greatness; it was aspiration crystallised into fact. Accordingly, when he says, if there be no immortality, Christ is dead, there is a deep significance in his words. It is quite equivalent to saying, what becomes of the dignity of man? The notion that Christ could be dead was to Paul a contradiction in terms. Sometimes a man gets his whole conviction of immortality from his inability to realise the death of a single soul. There are presences in this world so vivid and so strong that their removal by death dissipates the idea of death; they are our types of immortality. But what was Christ to Paul? To say He was a strong and vivid presence is to say nothing; He was a presence that literally filled all things. That such a being should cease to be was, for him, a contingency unthinkable, that God should suffer His Holy One to see corruption was a paradox unparalleled.
2. The second of those impossible conclusions which St. Paul derives from the denial of immortality is expressed in the words: Your faith is vain. Put into modern form, his meaning is this: If Christ be not raised--if the highest imaginable powers of the human mind have been extinguished in death, then we have an anomaly in the universe--a faculty without an object. We must remember that, in the view of Paul, faith is not a mere act of credulity; it is a faculty, a power of the soul. This is shown by his tendency to oppose faith to sight, clearly implying that the former is an inner vision, as the latter is an outer vision. Wheresoever he turns he can find no other trace of a faculty without an object. Every sense has its environment, every power its appropriate field of exercise. Is the sense of the supernatural to have no object? The sense of the supernatural is what Paul calls faith--that faculty which looks to the things that are unseen. These unseen things are to him at once the symbols and the proofs of immortality; they are not temporal but eternal. If the existence of these be a delusion, then we have an eye without light, an ear without music, a hand without material to work upon, a sense of beauty without the symmetry to fill it; our faculty of faith is useless, objectless, vain. From this point of view it becomes easy to understand St. Pauls collateral statement, that our preaching is vain. It is cruel to stimulate a sense of want which no scene of existence can ever gratify; to awake a power into being which no sphere of life will ever require is a process of education which can only lead to pain. The fact that no faculty can be vain is itself the proof that Christ is risen.
3. This brings us to the third argument. It is different in its nature both from those that precede and from those that follow it. They are founded upon facts which appeal to the universal nature of man; this, in the first instance at least, rests on an historical experience of the apostles own life and on an emotion induced by it. He says, If there be no resurrection, and if therefore the highest specimen of the human mind be dead, then I am found a false witness for Christ, to whose rising I testify. What Paul really means to say is: If there be no resurrection, I am myself an anomaly; We are found false witnesses for God, i.e., for goodness--false witnesses for the immortality of self-sacrifice. Such is the paradox or impossible consequence, which Paul here designs to convey. One cannot but remark what a singular light St. Paul here unwittingly throws on his own character as a witness. He suggests even more than he means. He only wants to prove that he is not a false witness in relation to others; he powerfully impresses us with the additional conviction that he is not a false witness in relation to himself. For, as we follow him in the foregoing train of thought, we see that this man even in his Christianity is no fanatic.
4. St. Paul states his fourth argument thus: If there be no resurrection, and if therefore Christ be not risen, ye are yet in your sins. It is an argument which is often misunderstood. Paul is speaking, not of a miserable consequence, but of an impossible consequence. What he means is really this: if there be no Christian immortality, there cannot be at this moment in the world a Christian life; ye are in this case yet in your sins: there is no power keeping you from evil. But your own experience tells you that this is not true; you are not in your sins. There is a life within you which is not part of your natural life, nor a product of that life--a spirit lusting against your flesh, a law of your mind warring with the law of your members. What is it? Whence came it? How do you explain it? If there be nothing but earth and the conditions of earth, in what manner shall we account for a sentiment which transcends those conditions? If there be no resurrection, you ought to be yet in your sins; how comes it to pass that you are not in your sins? To Kant the existence, of a moral law within the soul was the very demonstration of a life transcending the present order of being. St. Paul, instead of seeking the evidence of a risen Christ in the documents of antiquity, seeks it in the Church of his own day; nay, in himself as a member of that Church. He asks what it is that has given rise to this stream of Christian feeling, which is ever widening into an ocean of universal love. He cannot find a source for that stream in the soil of the natural life; for it flows in a channel the reverse of what we call natural. He is forced, therefore, to seek it in a life beyond nature; and the only such life he can find is that said to have been lived by the Son of Man. The evidence that Christ is risen is the consciousness that we are not in our sins.
5. We pass to St. Pauls final argument. He says: If there be no possible resurrection even of the highest life, if even Christ be not risen, then they that have fallen asleep are perished. This, then, is the argument from affection, since it is evident that here St. Paul directs his main appeal to the feelings of the heart. It would be unfair to say, however, that on this account it is less logical than his other arguments. The feelings of the heart are just as much facts of nature as the sensations of the body, and the intuitions of the intellect. St. Paul, therefore, has a perfect right to appeal to the human heart, whose instincts would be violated by the denial of immortality. (G. Matheson, D.D.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 1, 2. I declare unto you the gospel which…
1, 2. I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you. He states the fundamentals of that gospel as the basis of the argument he is about to make. That gospel was common ground, for they received it and still professed it.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On vv1, 12, 20 1. The main teaching of chapter is almost pure…
CRITICAL NOTES
Note:
Read full note →
1. The main teaching of chapter is almost pure dogma. It is for the most part matter of simple revelation and belief.
2. The earliest extant written account of the appearances of the Risen Lord. The earliest Gospel is not so early as this. This account written not more than thirty years after the asserted Resurrection of Christ. [Important in its bearing upon 1Co_15:6.]
1Co_15:1. I declare.—With some shade of reproach that they required it. See the same phrase, 1Co_12:3; 2Co_8:1; Eph_6:21; Col_4:7; 2Pe_1:16.
1. Note, Christ’s resurrection is an integral part of “the Gospel”; which is here both the historical facts, and the good news founded upon, rooted in, the facts. (Cf. Gal_1:6-9.)
2. Note the cumulative “also, also, also.” Q.d. “You have as great a stake in the matter of its falsehood or truth as I have. True, I preached it; but so did you accept it, and it is your basis of life.”
3. Note “which … in which … by (means of) which.” (Cf. “we stand” in Rom_5:2; Rom_11:20.)
1Co_15:2.—Note the punctuation and supplied words of the Ye are (being) saved.—Continuously; present part., as usual. In what word.—Literally; so then “the word of the Cross” (1Co_1:18) includes much more than merely the Crucifixion; there would be no Atonement without a Resurrection. In vain Choose between
(1) margin, and
(2) “so as to end after all in no saving result” (Gal_3:4; Gal_4:11).
(1) would imply a baseless belief;
(2) a fruitless belief. (For the thought of
(2) Heb_2:11.) Evans prefers “rashly, without due reflection.”
1Co_15:3. I received, … I delivered.… Ye received (1Co_15:1).—Three first links in tradition. A typical preacher:
(1) A witness; of
(2) what he heard at first-hand and himself had seen;
(3) not creator of message; it is objective, not subjective. First of all.—Not
(1) in order of time in the history of his preaching at Corinth, nor
(2) in the order of doctrine in their Christian instruction, but
(3) as of first-rate importance. Died … buried … rose.—These are all included in the “word of The Cross” (1Co_1:18). For our sins.—Evidently, then, the vicarious character of the death of Christ must not be made to rest, in (say) 2Co_5:15, upon the mere lexical force of the preposition; it is abundantly to be gathered from the sense of (say) Joh_11:50. See other prepositions in Rom_4:25; Gal_1:4; 1Pe_3:18. According to the Scriptures.—E.g. Isa_53:5; Isa_53:8; (Dan_9:26); Psalms 22.; Zec_12:10; the Paschal Lamb. See how authoritatively the Risen Lord put His disciples into this Christian way of reading the Old Testament (Luk_24:25-27; Luk_24:44-46). [Everything He did and said on that first Christian “Sunday” was carefully chosen and significant—typical—carrying a large principle with it.] So before His death (Luk_22:37). Peter, at Pentecost, at once began using this Christian method of exposition; N.B., at Pentecost, another day which carried ruling precedents with it (Act_2:25-31). [Peter kept to this principle (1Pe_1:11; 1Pe_2:24). As to New Testament in Old Testament, cf. also Act_8:35; Act_13:33-35; Act_17:3; Act_26:22-23; Joh_2:22; Joh_20:9.] “These words carry us back to a time when the events of Christianity required not only to be illustrated or confirmed, but to be justified by reference to Judaism” (Stanley).
1Co_15:4. Buried.—Not an unimportant link in the chain of Christian evidences. Looks, moreover, like a touch of the oral detail with which the story was by the first preachers communicated. Emphasised also in each of the four Gospels. Yet did not need the emphatic clenching “According to the Scriptures.” “Earth sacred above all planets as the burial-place of the Redeemer” (Beecher). Was raised.—Not “rose”: cf. Psa_2:7; Isa_55:3 (Hos_6:2); Psa_16:10.
1Co_15:5. Cephas.—The first man, to see the Risen Christ. A very important coincidence with apparently casual words in Mar_16:7 (and Luk_24:34, which most probably has this force). Cephas too [“Cephas,” as they said at Corinth] was an authority at Corinth; an ad homines touch, this. Twelve.—Already “officially” equivalent to “the Apostolic college”; in fact ten (Luke, as above), and then eleven (Joh_20:26).
1Co_15:6. Five hundred … at once.—Probably in Mat_28:16 (perhaps confirmed by Joh_21:1). The one hundred and twenty of Acts 1 were only those in Jerusalem. Paul’s word, so obviously open to challenge, and, if false or mistaken, to refutation, is authority for this fact. [Not to insist upon his inspiration.] The omission of this in the Gospels agrees with Joh_20:30. Fallen asleep.—(1Co_15:18; cf. 1Co_7:39; 1Co_11:30.) After the death of Christ, dying is never in the New Testament called “death,” in connection with Christians. Was the phrase born of the words of Christ, Mat_9:24? “The Church never dies or thinks of death, though she buries her dead” (Pope). Remain.—Joh_21:22-23; 1Th_4:15.
1Co_15:7. James.—Unrecorded. The James of Acts 15, and of the Epistle. Tradition (in “Gospel of the Hebrews”) that (from Mat_26:29) James (unbelieving in Joh_7:5) had vowed neither to eat, from the Last Supper onward, until he had seen the Risen Lord. Jesus appeared to Him. “Bring a table and bread. My brother, eat thy bread because the Son of Man is risen from the dead.” See the prominence of Cephas and James in Galatians 1,
2. All the apostles.—Choose between Joh_20:26; Mat_28:16; and Act_1:4. [Evans would emphasise “apostles” rather than “all.”]
1Co_15:8. Due time.—Rather lay stress on the physical inferiority of the abortive-born than upon the comparative time of birth. [Paul was born long after time, not before time.] Stanley gives Suet., Octavius, xxxv. 2, as authority for magistrates appointed irregularly being called abortivi. To me.—A necessary credential to put him on equality with Cephas and the rest. See 1Co_9:1; Act_9:17 (where Ananias is presumably reporting what he has learned from Christ Himself), Act_26:16 (read in connection with Gal_1:16, which must not be forced into mechanically restricted coincidence with this “appearance” alone). Last of (them) all.
1Co_15:9.—“I am nothing;” 1Co_15:10, “I am greater than any of them.” Cf. another Pharisee (Luk_18:10).
1Co_15:10. In vain.—Cf. 2Co_6:1. [Like the stony ground, or thorny-ground, hearers.] Cf. also Eph_3:8; 1Ti_1:12-16.
HOMILETIC ANALYSIS.—1Co_15:1-11
Paul and the Gospel.
I. Paul himself.—
1. The evangelist.—Note this:
(1) He is preaching the Gospel whilst he is teaching such many-sided facts as these of our paragraph, and whilst rising to such an exalted strain of prophecy as follows in the chapter. He is “the Prophet Paul.” He claims in 1Th_4:15 to speak “in the word of the Lord,” like a prophet of the old dispensation (cf., e.g., 1Ki_20:35-36). In this very chapter he soon leaves behind him Old Testament Scripture and Contemporary Testimony, and soars away to a height and into a glory of Revelation as to the future, where our eye can scarcely see anything distinctly for very brightness, and where we hear his words indeed, but can hardly interpret some of them. Yet he never ceases to be practical. The lark at her highest flight, and lost in a blaze of glory where her song is indistinct for very distance, belongs to earth. Paul’s sudden, swift return to theology in 1Co_15:56-57, and to the practical, prosaic round of daily duty and service in 1Co_15:58, is very like her sudden drop to her nest, and to her motherly duty to her young ones, when her song is done. None of these exalted themes are revealed merely for the sake of giving, even accurate, information about the future. What is revealed is for the sake of its bearing upon practical life; so much only is revealed as may serve this purpose, [(a) “What is that to thee? Follow thou Me” (Joh_21:22). (b) “Are there few that be saved?” “Enter ye in at the strait gate,” i.e. “Few or many, see that you make one” (Luk_13:23). (c) “Lord, who did sin, this man or his parents?… We must work the works of Him that sent Me while it is day” (Joh_9:2; Joh_9:4). (d) These may illustrate a Bible reading on 2Ti_2:23.]
(2) All this sheds useful light on his words in 1Co_2:2 : “Christ, and Him crucified,” is no narrow theme. “The Cross” touches everything in the history of a fallen, redeemed race. But “the Cross” here includes the Resurrection. “So we preached,” when he came to Corinth. No scorn should be poured on the Evangelical preachers of the Georgian Revival that with them it was all “the Cross,” “the blood.” These themes were greatly prominent; the men were physicians for souls, who had found by observation and comparison of many thousands of “cases,” of all types, ages, ranks, what was the mischief of the human heart, and, by as wide experiment, what form of presentation of the truth, and what particular detail of the whole round of Truth, best cured their “sick.” Certainly results justified them. But they did not, in point of fact, confine themselves so literally to the Cross. They quite understood, “saved by His life” (Rom_5:10), and preached the Resurrection and the high-priestly Intercession as the necessary complements of Calvary. A “Gospel” preacher will roam far and wide in the field of revealed knowledge; he will explore in many directions, but he will always start from the Cross; he will account himself to have lost his bearings when he can no longer see it; he will account himself “lost” when he has wandered so far that the Cross has sunk beneath his mental horizon; he will keep open, however far afield, his communications with this Sacred Base of operations. Every theme will be traced up to, and treated as it is related to, the Cross and its atonement; subject to that condition, every theme of Revelation and its suggestions is open to him. Such themes as the Resurrection of the Lord, of the saints, of the sinner; the victory of the Lord over all opposing evil; the mysterious “End”;—so dealt with, these are all part of “the Gospel.” His prime qualification is that he is—
2. Paul the witness.—
(1) To have seen Christ Jesus as the Risen Lord was a necessary credential of apostleship, in the narrowest sense of that title. It made Paul, perhaps, rather than Matthias (Act_1:26), the twelfth of these patriarchs of the new Israel. [The Benjamite was the youngest-born, the Benjamin, amongst them.] Peter may have been too forward [Pentecost had not yet given the fulness of the Spirit] in choosing the man, but at least he was right as to the requisite credential: “One must be ordained to be a witness with us of His resurrection.” The Resurrection gives an adequate account of the origin of the Christian Church; thus actually to have seen Christ gives an adequate account of the transformation of Saul into Paul; taking all the circumstances of the case into the reckoning, nothing else does. To see the glorious Form, and to hear the voice of Jesus of Nazareth speaking as from heaven to him, years after He had been accounted dead, buried, and finally disposed of, like any other dead man,—this was a fact which at one blow brought down in ruins all the creed and all the personal righteousness of Saul of Tarsus. “These Nazarenes, then, whom I have been imprisoning because they said that the Crucified One was living again, and even bringing to the death when I could not get them to apostatise,—they were right; I have been wrong. My orthodox Judaism has no room for this fact; I must needs recast it. And who is He Whom I have despised, hated, calling Him a ‘blasphemer,’ who deserved to be crucified? I have been mistaken. I have been the blasphemer. I am the sinner—chief of sinners!” The one fact revolutionised Paul’s life. [No man’s life is ever the same, he cannot himself be again the same, when once he has intelligently, distinctly, come face to face with the Risen Christ and His claims. The meeting may lead to salvation; it may intensify rebellion: but life can never after be the same.] He also would have been the most earnest in saying that his capacity to be a witness to the Resurrection was no mere eyewitness capacity for testifying to a bare historical fact, however important and however far-reaching in its consequences. He knows of a belief in and a confession of a Risen Christ which only coexists with, which indeed is, salvation (Rom_10:9-10). The aim of his personal life is to have a knowledge, which is a sharing, of the resurrection of his Lord (Php_3:10-11). The Christian apologist of to-day, rightly enough, only appeals to the eyewitnesses of the historic fact; but Paul would have made the appeal of his “testimony” to lie here,—not that, so many years ago, God revealed His (risen) Son to him—a fact to grow more and more dim, perhaps, as it receded into the perspective of the past, and to become every year more and more a memory, open to challenge and to critical doubt as to its validity,—but that God, then and ever after, “revealed His (risen) Son in him” (Gal_1:16); the historical fact became an experienced one; the objective having a subjective which was its counterpart, and its continuously new verification.
(2) Still, here Paul is the historic witness, “delivering what” he has “first received.” For apologetic or evidential purposes, the “simpler” the witness, so he be manifestly honest, the stronger the evidence he gives. The man who has evidently no arrière pensée, who in all transparent directness does nothing but repeat what he knows at first-hand, is the best purveyor of facts for a verdict. Paul, like his brother apostles, was “put in trust with the Gospel” (1Th_2:4); they were simply “stewards of the mysteries,” not creators or proprietors (1Co_4:1); it is “a deposit” (2Ti_1:14); as with every true preacher, there is with him no “feigning these things out of his own mind.” [He had, moreover, “received” it just as the Corinthians had received it in their turn from him. In them it had been a “believing” which made them, who were once “without strength,” to “stand,” and had “saved” them.] The old argument is of perpetual force, that the very inartificiality of the Gospel accounts of the Resurrection, the very “discrepancies” which testify to independence and to absence of collusive design, are guarantees of the truthfulness of the witnesses, and so inferentially to the truth of their story. [So, again, the only effective preacher of the Gospel is one who “delivers what” he has “received.” Hence his knowledge of the facts and of the dogmas depending upon them, here passes over into his personal character. He is—].
3. Paul the sinner saved.—
(1) How diverse his tone: in 1Co_15:9 he labours, he accumulates language of depreciation, to make out that he is nothing before God and in comparison with the rest of the Apostolic company; in 1Co_15:10 he boldly claims equality with the best of men, and to be more than they all. “Is that honest and consistent with Christian sincerity? Particularly, is it true when he says ‘least of all’ [and ‘chief of sinners’]? (1Ti_1:15). Would you not rather call him chief of apostles, chief of saints?” Natural questions. Yet all he says is true. [2Co_2:17 should apply most strictly to a man’s statement of his Christian experience, particularly to his relation of his ante-conversion experience. There is no use, and no honour done to God, in forgetting, or undervaluing, or denying, the good wrought in a man by the Spirit of God, even before by regeneration he became definitely a Christian.] For “I persecuted the Church of God.” (a) Sin once committed, not even God can undo it. Pardon of the past cannot alter the past. It may be forgiven, but it abides a fact. Paul did stand by, “consenting,” when Stephen was stoned, as certainly as he did study in the school of Gamaliel. The veil of Divine mercy may “cover” the sin, but the thing is there. Sins fade from our memory, or the remembrance may lose its poignancy by time [it evidently did not with Paul]; God’s anger on account of them is turned away, from the moment that the sinner trusts in Christ; from that moment there is no hell to fear on their account: but they are there. The prodigal sits forgiven and happy at his father’s table, but the riot of a far country is a fact and the inheritance is wasted. The bankrupt gets his order of discharge, but his debts are facts nevertheless. And he owes them still. Legally they no longer concern him; he is “justified” from them. He may prosper, and his new gains are safe; but he is in debt still. The law and the favour of his creditors make him safe; but an honest man feels that morally and in fact he is a debtor still. So Paul, the chief apostle, is God’s debtor still. In the moment fixed precisely for his readers in Php_3:7, a line was graciously drawn across the record of his life; nothing beyond it would again come up to his condemnation. But the line was drawn by grace, by mere favour for the sake of Another. The persecutor might and did build high in holy attainment, but the foundation was an act of favour, grace, and only grace. “By the grace of God I am,” etc., is as continuously true of his standing before God as of his abundant and fruitful life-activity. In himself and his own status, this chief apostle is “not meet to be called an apostle, because,” etc. The guilt of his persecution is not now upon him; he is being sanctified from his love of sin; it has no dominion over him, we may well believe; he is pardoned, rejoicing, God-honoured, holy. But there is the fact, unalterable to all eternity,—“I persecuted.” And the remembrance of all this will make such words as 1Co_15:9 always natural and always true. (b) How does that father [e.g. John Tregenoweth: His Mark, M. G. Pearse] in after-years look upon that child whom years ago he injured or blinded in the utter ignorance of deep intoxication? How does that man look upon his friend, when he finds that in an hour of passion, though in perfect good faith [the good faith of a madman], he said and did what proves to have been utterly false and to have done a lifelong wrong to his friend, at least with some who have not come, or will not, to know his friend as he now knows him? How does he feel, who in the dark has struck his very brother, supposing the while that he was resisting an enemy? With all the energy of a grand native capacity and all the force of intense conviction, Paul had flung himself against [“fallen upon” (Mat_21:44)] his Brother, his Best Friend, the Redeemer of his soul, his Divine Messiah. True he “did it ignorantly,” but he did it. Oh, the horror of it! Oh, the shame of it! Oh, the wrong, the sin, of it! “Chief of sinners!” “Least of the apostles! Not worthy to be called an apostle!” The words are natural, honest, true. All this, then, being remembered, he is free to say—
(2) “More than they all.” But “by the grace of God.” [Some poor, wretched, lost souls on earth have to say, and in hell will have to say eternally, “In spite of the grace of God, I am what I am!” Men may “receive the grace of God in vain,” making it to end in no such saving result as it was designed to accomplish. There are some lives of which one has to say, reversing Rom_5:20, “Where grace abounded, sin did much more abound.” In many senses true, “What maketh heaven, that maketh hell.” Paul is a “good steward of the grace of God” (1Pe_4:10).] He is not here thinking only or principally of his standing with God, but of himself as measured by what he has been able to accomplish for his Master’s work. Not merely “by the favour of God”; “grace” seldom means so little as that in the New Testament. It is rather the actual power which has quickened and enlightened the mind, and energised the will, and aroused the devotion of the heart; a power and force which, when pursued to its last analysis, is revealed as the indwelling, personal Spirit of God. [John Hunt, one of the early missionaries to the Fiji islands, desiring to impress this practical interchangeableness of the thoughts, “grace” and “Holy Spirit,” in a preliminary and confessedly tentative rendering of some of the Epistles into the Bau dialect, several times deliberately translated “grace” by “Holy Spirit” (told to H. J. F. by Hunt’s colleague, R. B. Lyth).]
(3) The meaning and practical value of such self-assertion as is here found in Paul’s letters, is dealt with in many other places of these Epistles, particularly chap. 9 and 2 Corinthians 10 sqq. It is never the gratuitous parading of himself which is natural to the vain man, who cannot be happy unless he is the centre of attention; nor the masterful self-assertion of the consciously strong man. It is always forced upon him by others (2Co_12:11, “Ye have compelled me”); it is forced out from him by others. It is here a question of safeguarding and vindicating an Apostolic status and consequent authority, whose primary purpose and main worth were the service of the Churches and the “edification” of the Corinthians themselves (2Co_10:8). And, moreover, with the more reason, that he found his action in declining the maintenance by the Church which other teachers accepted, was misconstrued into a confession of conscious inferiority of status. A Christian man cannot be too utterly humble as before God; his sense of abundant and entire indebtedness to the grace of God for all he is, and for all he has been able to accomplish, cannot be kept too keen. After every new success [and at every new “failure”] he will do wisely to present himself before God, with fullest acknowledgment that in it all he is only the organon of the Spirit of God. [There are two moments when Self is very near and when self-centering thought is a very real peril to the spiritual life; the moment of “more abundant” success, and the moment of more abundant failure.] Comparison with his fellow-workers is a dangerous occupation of thought for any man, and, as here, needs instantly and constantly guarding with the fullest acknowledgment, “Yet not I, but … God.” [Cf. another, “Yet not I, but,” etc. (Gal_2:20), where the thought is substantially unaffected by the important various reading.] It will be the rarest occupation of his meditation, and still more rarely will such words of self-assertion come to his lips. The facts of his life and work best speak for him. Yet, like Paul, he may thankfully appear before his Master,—like the servant in the Parable of the Pounds [not, of course, the Talents, the structure and teaching of which illustrate a distinctly different point],—whose pound has gained ten pounds, whilst the same original “capital” in the case of his fellow-servants has only produced five or none (Luk_19:16-20); and may remember how greater native capacity and more abundant work have co-operated with the grace of God, to give him a real pre-eminence in toil and fruit. And he may bear himself amongst his fellows as one in whom the grace of God has found a conspicuous and instructive example of what it can do in human nature. But all for the glory of God, and for the advancement of the work committed to his hands.
We have also in this paragraph:—
II. An early account of “the Gospel” as,
1. Resting on facts;
2. Rooted in Old Testament Scripture;
3. Received by faith.
1. Resting on facts.—
(1) If any facts of ancient history can be attested at all, such main outlines at the least of the Gospel story as are given here may be. Naturally such facts, particularly that of Christ’s resurrection from a real death, need more evidence than do facts against which no presumption arises from their being unlike those of ordinary experience. “Need,” for producing conviction in ordinary minds; for one “proof,” if it were irrefragable and gave demonstration, may establish a certainty; anything beyond simply facilitates belief, by eliminating the chances of error which may lurk behind a single proof, and by giving the (not simply added, but) multiple certainty of convergent proofs, and by reducing to a minimum the force of any preliminary presumption against. When a writer says, “Early Christianity was, in all its essentials, a special development of the common religious ideas of Asia Minor and Syria. It was the creed of Adonis, the creed of Attis, dressed up afresh and applied with minor differences to a certain historical or mythical personage, said to have lived in Galilee about the beginning of the Christian era. Of this personage himself we know really nothing but the name or names; every supposed fact or incident related of him is merely one of the common and universal incidents related of all the other gods” (Grant Allen, Fortnightly Review, September 1893),—he is not only asserting what few responsible historical students would affirm, but is displaying a scepticism which would make any certainty about all ancient history, or about any facts not actually within a man’s direct personal knowledge, impossible. Historical evidence is probable evidence; but sufficient testimony may make probability practical certainty.
(2) These verses are a piece of documentary evidence acknowledged on all hands to be of the highest value. There is no important disbelief that they are part of a letter of a man practically a contemporary of the events he chronicles, writing not more than twenty-eight or thirty years after the date assumed for them. They are of a good class of testimony; epistolary, incidentally stated, not formally proved; asserted to be accepted by the readers of the letters as well as by the writer; and that, moreover, by readers many of whom were at most not favourably disposed towards the writer, whilst some of them would have been glad to discredit anything he was or said; especially when also he is here using what he claims to be their belief, to rebuke and refute what he asserts to be their inexcusable, unreasonable, mischievous error. The fact of a resurrection of a dead Christ is not one hard to be brought to the test; it is not easy, or a thing easily credible as an explanatory theory, to mistake for a Divine man risen from the dead in full vigour and glory a crucified sufferer, never really dead, reviving from a swoon, creeping feebly out of a grave (and this especially guarded) to an obscure life where no most interested enemy ever suspected His presence, or succeeded in discovering Him. The death was officially secured and acknowledged; the burial was conducted by friends, but with the cognisance and under the surveillance of enemies; a real resurrection was not difficult of verification or disproof. Fraud or conscious deception on the part of the early witnesses is not now seriously alleged.
(3) Very marked and warranted attention has of late been drawn to the evidence of 1Co_15:6. Its force was long ago perceived, but it has come into prominence as meeting the suggestion of some hallucination of a woman, infecting other women, and working with a predisposition to believe [a thing entirely without evidence, and against all such evidence as is extant, whatever be its value], to make a company of disheartened men believe that, not only was Jesus risen, but that they had seen Him so risen. “The greater part” of five hundred simultaneous spectators and auditors of the Risen Lord remained for testimony and examination. I.e. not fewer than two hundred and fifty-one, and perhaps three or four hundred, persons are asserted by Paul to be still living, not later than thirty years (at the outside) after the fact in question,—a fact about which there could be little room for mistake,—and all of them most thoroughly assured that they all saw the Crucified Christ at one and the same time. The history of conspiracies does not make it likely that in this one case only there should never have been either a penitent, or a traitor, to reveal a concerted deception, if even so many could have been brought to agree to it in the first instance. One person may be under an illusion, but hardly twelve, or two hundred and fifty-one, or five hundred; and certainly no two or twelve or five hundred would be under the same illusion, and all under the same at once. The number of the simultaneous witnesses eliminates everything subjective,—predisposition, illusion, temperament, fraud. [Myths, it is also urged, take longer time to grow than did this “myth” of Christ’s miracles and resurrection, which (N.B.) had plainly already “grown,” some years earlier than this Corinthian date. Myth, or subjective persuasion, does not account for the holy character and effects of the story. A myth, or a story whose basis was a predisposition or a temperament or a mistake, does not afford adequate foundation for the Christian Church, or account for the character and the steadfastness of the first Christians, who, against all their interests, against all the tendencies of the sinful human heart, and at severe and deadly cost, persisted in their creed and succeeded in spreading it. Nor do they account for the perennial vitality of the belief age after age, or for its renewing power in all races, Churches, social ranks, ages, both sexes, etc.
2. Rooted in Old Testament Scripture.—
(1) Christianity and its several basal facts are never fairly judged if brought to the bar standing alone. Its most startlingly miraculous fact loses much presumptive improbability, gains some presumptive probability, if it is seen to be part of a coherent scheme of facts and doctrines, in which each lends meaning and support to every other, and which gives an adequate reason for the divergence from the “natural” order and ordinary human experience. The whole company of facts must be brought to trial in their combination. [E.g. on the Christian theory of the nature and work of Christ, it is not improbable that His entrance into the world should be exceptional, or that His departure from it should be exceptional; that such a person for such a purpose should work miracles, or rise from the dead. Christianity, on its own suppositions, gives an adequate reason for all the “miraculous” in it.]
(2) Christianity must be read in the light of this fact amongst others, that it was preceded by a collection of books, held sacred by its Jewish opponents, of which it claims to be the continuation, the expansion, the complement, the fulfilment (Heb_1:1). The very claim is noteworthy, in face of the notoriously unfriendly attitude of Judaism to Christianity from the very first; let the reasons for making such a claim be considered. However to be accounted for, the fact remains that the Old Testament from beginning to end contains many things, many passages, which exhibit a wonderful coincidence with, and suitableness to, the history and the Christian account of the work of Christ. The Founder of Christianity Himself put His followers upon the track of discovery of such correspondences. (See Critical Notes.) Christianity and the Resurrection of its Christ are no isolated facts, sprung full-grown into a void place in the history of religions. The theory of the creation of a Christ by His followers out of presuppositions and expectations gathered from their reading of the Old Testament, disregards the only available or colourable historic evidence, that their reading and training in the Old Testament led them, as it led their Jewish enemies, into quite another line of conception and expectation of the Christ. Old Testament and New Testament are two parts of one Revelation. The Mosaic system is not the main stream of the Old Testament. It “came in” by the way; “it was added” for a special purpose (Rom_5:20; Gal_3:19); it flows alongside of the main stream. It is abundantly rich in teaching about Christ and the Gospel, the very arrangements of the Tabernacle being an object lesson in Divine truth (Heb_9:8; Heb_9:11). But “the Scriptures” are larger than “the Law,” and some are older, or contain a record of an older revelation, than “the Law.” Christ, and the Resurrection which sets the seal of completeness upon His redeeming work, are the fulfilment of, not the hope of Israel only, but of man. In Christ are the pledge and the contents of a covenant as old as Abraham (Gal_3:14; Gal_3:16; Gal_3:29). Christ is a new Adam, over against the first Adam. The importance of rooting the new Gospel thus firmly in the Old Testament Scriptures lay in this, that it was not Israelite only in its scope and redemption grace, but wide as mankind. And amongst its cogent “evidences” is this, that it fulfils previsions, predictions, promises, hopes, put on record long before—fulfils them where only One Mind, the Divine, could have arranged the coincidences, the correspondences, the paired anticipations and realisations (see Appended Note).
3. Received by faith.—“Ye believed;” “unless ye believed in vain.” How vital was the connection between the truth of the history and their personal Christian life will be seen subsequently in the chapter (1Co_15:12-19). But it is there discussed with regard rather to the theory of the Christian life. Practically the connection is very close. John often connects faith in the Incarnation with regeneration (1 Eph_4:15; Eph_5:5; Eph_5:10-12, etc.). Paul himself very closely connects salvation with faith in the Resurrection of Christ [Rom_10:9; observe also how this is rooted in Old Testament Scripture, Deu_30:14]. The Lord and Teacher of both had connected “eternal life” with “knowing the Only True God” (Joh_17:3). In fact, no doctrine is believed in until it has become a truth into which living experience has admitted a man. He may indeed fall away, fearfully, from such knowledge as is even thus gained (Heb_10:26; Heb_6:4-6). But it is a remote possibility. The people of Christ are “sanctified by the truth.” They have within themselves a Faith deeper than a mere Creed, however intelligently accepted and held. Without being a theologian a man may be a believer, and one also who can give a good account of his “faith.” A new environment, where unbelief is customary; a crop of difficulties and objections, not known or appreciated earlier; above all, a moral deterioration; may sever the merely “othodox man” from his creed. The believer “stands” by his faith; it gives him status before God—his only status; it brings him a real strength in which he “stands” against trial, persecution, doubt. The martyrs were drawn from this class of believers. They died for truths which had become part of their very selves, for truths which had made them what they were. [Might it be said by way of illustration, that the merely orthodox man, like the crustacean, carries his skeleton and shield and strength outside him, and so can easily “cast” it, as the crustaceans do; whilst the believer has his supporting, strengthening “truth” within, where vertebrates have their skeleton? The skeleton within the man is belief; the skeleton outside the man is orthodoxy.]
SEPARATE HOMILIES
1Co_15:5-6. “According to the Scriptures.”—Two points grow out of this phrase:—
I. This organic unity between Old Testament and New Testament, and between their separate component parts, must not be underestimated. It is a fact perceived by so many students of Scripture, of such various types of mind and training, and so variously equipped with “learning,” possessing much or little of it, or (in the ordinary sense) none; it is a fact the evidence for which, whilst it can be conclusively stated in broad outline, nevertheless so reveals its full force, and the abundance of material from which it is drawn, only to patient and minute students of the Scripture, every fresh reading adding to the evidence both wealth and cogency; that it cannot be dismissed as a mistake, a subjective fancy, the dream of a particular, “mystical,” cast of mind, or of a particular school of interpretation. All devout readers find forced upon them a consistent scheme and plan in a Revelation developing from the earliest ages, and from what have hitherto been reputed the earliest books, to the latest. Above all, they have seen a disclosure of the coming Christ, growing fuller in detail, more definite in outline, from the beginning onwards. The fact has been too often perceived and verified by too great a number and variety of students of Scripture to be dismissed as an error. Part and part “hang together”; part and part give and receive light and confirmation in turn; the coincidences between Old Testament and New Testament are so many, so often incidental, so often “trivial”—many times escaping notice at a first or many a subsequent reading—that, even mathematically speaking, the chances are infinite against the Coincidence being anything less than, any other than, a real, designed, organic Connection. All the results of many centuries of study of Scripture by students of all types have accumulated “evidence” of internal harmony, of a coherent history, embodying a consistent, gradually unfolding scheme of truth, and an ever clearer disclosure of a Personality, all of which culminates in Christianity and Christ, and finds its clearest expression in Him as He is expounded by the Holy Spirit. All this must be taken account of in the present-day inquiries into the historical value of (say) the earlier story of Israel or of the Mosaic Institute, and into the literary history of the process by which the Bible has reached its present form. Higher Criticism approaches the problem of the origin and composition of the extant Bible, simply as dealing with an ancient literature. It endeavours to discover and exhibit the constituent elements of those books which it believes to show a composite structure; it hopes to trace the process of literary composition, as conducted by several hands at several points of time; it endeavours to trace and date the sources from which material has been gathered for our present books; it hopes to fix scientifically the authorship of whole books or separate portions. Moreover, it endeavours to appraise the historical value or no-value of the contents of the books. The process of inquiry is perfectly legitimate; the Bible may be examined from that standpoint, as from many others. The results arrived at are reached under the conditions and with the risks attaching to all “specialist” inquiry, or any many-sided or complex subject whatsoever. And they need checking by and co-ordinating with the results arrived at on all other lines of inquiry, and yielded by the examination of all other kinds of evidence, which may bear upon the problem of the literary origin and history of the composition of what, in the issue, is in the hands of the Church as the Old Testament and the New Testament,—the Bible. Inquirers and students who are not competent to attack the problem from the side of literary criticism can and do attack it from the side and study of the organic connection and consistent development of both history and doctrine which is found to obtain in the extant Bible. When some Higher Criticism pronounces that no books in their present form, and no very reliable history amongst their contents, date much farther back than (say) the days of Josiah, and that very much of the Mosaic Ritual Law, and even the Tabernacle itself, is a late, very late, and not very honest, after-thought of a priestly order, then the students of the organic structure and development ask that their results may also be taken into account before the verdict on the whole case is finally given. They point out, e.g., that in 1Co_15:22; 1Co_15:45-49 a parallel is brought out, and wrought out, between Adam and Christ and their respective relations to the race—a parallel which is by no means a mere Rabbinic allegorising of a story which may be a pretty and serviceable myth, but is a development of a great idea of God underlying the whole scheme of ruin and redemption, from its inception in Eden to its consummation in glory. Before the early pages of Genesis are dismissed as unhistoric, the place their narrative occupies in the organically developing Divine plan should be considered. If “Abraham” be a mere eponymic personage, it is difficult to attribute any serious present-day value to the arguments in Galatians 3, 4 as to the relation of “the covenant confirmed to him by God in Christ” to the Law and to the Gospel and the privileges of believers. If the widely current critical account of the origin and history of the Tabernacle and its ritual of atoning and other sacrifices be true, what permanent worth, what truth which would be more than pretty fancies or happy allegorising, what truth for which God could be held responsible, would there be in all the discoveries therein, by (say) the writer of Hebrews, of anticipations of the Great Sacrifice and of the whole scheme of Sin and its Remedy? The whole story of Israel, and especially of its Exodus from Egypt and its Eisodus into Canaan, yields an abundant and abundantly verified harvest of points of spiritual significance and of parallelism with the regenerate life, and with even the historic life of Jesus of Nazareth. All these separate and very significant episodes of the Old Testament story are so used by Christ and His apostles as to bring them into the closest designed connection with the one, whole, harmonious, age-long unfolding of God’s redeeming idea and its historical introduction into the world. if Christ, if Redemption, if the Christian life are all “according to the Scriptures,”—“Law, Prophets, Psalms,” all (Luk_24:44),—then what are the Scriptures, even in their earliest portions? If they be not history, then there might have been indeed a developing story of a Redemptive Work, but at all events we have no reliable account of it. If Adam and Abraham and Moses and David are not certainly historical, then all the New Testament account of the Old Testament preparation for Christ, in which they are essential factors, has no practically certain value.
II. Another suggestion may also be of some practical value. If the Author of Nature be the same with the Author of Revelation, and if there is development apparent in the history of the process by which Nature and Revelation have reached, each of them, their present form and stage, it would only be in agreement with all we know of His work in other directions to expect that the principle of the development would be identical, though the facts with which in the one case and the other it stands connected would belong to diverse orders, whilst yet presenting some analogies to each other. Many a student of Scripture and Revelation can pretend to no such acquaintance with the facts of the natural world as enable him to exercise an independent judgment on the methods or conclusions of the man who is a student of biological science; but he does claim a fairly complete knowledge of the facts of his own special field, where moreover the area of the field is not too large to be very thoroughly known. What be finds to be the truth about development in revelation he would expect to find to hold true in nature—that and no more. He would expect to find that the ultimate form of the theory of Origins, accepted by the students of physical science, will coincide with the result of his own working on his own group of facts, and in his familiar field. He would say, e.g., that “Man came, and is, ‘according to the Scriptures’ of the ‘stone book’ of the earlier geological history of the earth, just as Christ is, and came, and died, and rose, ‘according to the Scriptures’ of the earlier, the Old Testament ‘strata’ of the successive stages of Revelation.” The idea of the Creator, first set forth in very meagre, simple form, has in both cases been more and more fully developed. From time to time, never apart from a distinct interposition of the will of the Author of all, a new stage has been reached, a new departure has been taken, a new embodiment of His idea has been exhibited, in both Nature and Revelation. The new form has always been on the same essential lines as the older, but with many modifications, with new touches here and there, with fuller detail everywhere, adapting the old to new conditions and to the requirements of a new stage in the ruling purpose. Until at last the one series of developing expositions of the Worker’s thought culminated in Man, and the other in the God-man. [Both in the end meet in Him (Hebrews 2).] Man is the goal of Creation; Christ of Revelation. Man sums up all the creatures which have preceded him; Christ and His history sum up all the persons and the history which preceded them. The development which is verifiable in the history that leads up to Christ will be found to be the verifiable development in the geological and biological history which has led up to man.
HOMILETIC SUGGESTIONS
1Co_15:6. “Fallen asleep.”—Sleep the new, Christian name for Death. The new, Christian name for a burial-place: Cœmetery (= Sleeping-place).
I. Merely an incident in a continuous life.—
1. No break at death in the personal life. The same Self awakes; and, through the night’s parenthesis in consciousness and activity, the same Self has gone on. [No inference to be drawn from the figure, as to any asserted loss of consciousness between death and resurrection. Figure only suitable at all as seen from the spectator’s standpoint, not the sleeper’s.] “I shall awake—I.” “I shall see for myself,” etc. Shall answer the call of the awakening trumpet, with the consciousness that it is my same Self which greets the dawn of the eternal Day.
2. As, of a morning, the happy soul has many a time awoke eager to resume “fellowship with the Father”; has awoke to find the Father, Who has been waking whilst the child slept, still there, just as He was there, filling the last moments of last night’s consciousness with the sense of His presence; so the soul which closed its eyes in the presence of the Father, wakes from this “Sleep” to say, as its first glad greeting of the Morning of Eternity: “When I awake I am still with Thee!” The same Self awakes, to find the same God, and to enjoy the same holy fellowship.
II. Sleep has the prospect of awakening.—Bold unbelief in the French Revolution wrote upon the gate of Père la Chaise, “Death is an eternal sleep.” No. Whatever Death may introduce to, it is but to a terminable, temporary experience. The “grave is not the goal” of life; only another, passing, stage towards the goal. [The certainty of the awakening “in Christ” is mainly in this chapter. But the man out of Christ is to remember how temporary is the episode called “Death”; how certain is the awakening; how he then takes up again, how indeed he has all through taken along with him, the old responsibility and guilt.]
III. A brief passage in our continuous existence.—Psa_90:5 reminds how a night’s sound sleep seems but as a moment; a man seems only just to have come to rest. It will not be long before our “sleeping” shall be broken in upon by the voice of one who says tenderly, and yet mightily, “Talitha cumi” (almost = “Awake up, my child”). Then also rest is suggested; an escape from the trouble and clamour of life, and from the tension which strain brain and heart almost past endurance (2Th_1:7).
IV. Remember: “Asleep in Christ;” “asleep through Jesus.”
V. Remember the first instance of the phrase: Stephen has struggled to his knees for a prayer, after the crush of the first stones, hurled upon his chest by the witnesses, as he lay upon the ground. Next he is struck down again by the hail of stones, or sinks exhausted. But he sees his Lord “standing,” watching the scene with keen interest; standing, as if He could not keep His seat upon His throne, in His eager restlessness to welcome the first to follow Him through the gate of blood into heaven’s rest. And he no longer sees the scowling, angry, murderous faces that glower upon “the Nazarene blasphemer.” The shouts of execration die out of his ears. He perhaps hardly longer feels the stones. He sees the Son of Man, and “falls asleep.” A rough bed for the death scene!
1Co_15:6. Some are fallen asleep.—The first reflection upon the early resting of one of the ministers [workers] of Jesus Christ comes most naturally in the words of His own comforting question, “Are there not twelve hours in the day?” He gave it as a reason for not shrinking from the risk of returning into a dangerous place at the call of duty. “Immortal till His work was done,” He would “go into Judæa again.” He would “walk today and to-morrow and the day following,” regardless alike of Herod’s threatening and of Judas’s treachery; the day has twelve hours, and it will surely see them to their close. This teaches us a new measurement of time. It is not the accomplishment of the threescore and ten or fourscore years which makes a life complete in the reckoning of God’s sanctuary. The life of a little child has its twelve hours. It may be a complete life, as God sees it, quite as truly as the life which has been dragged out to its utmost length of ninety years on a hundred. It may as perfectly have accomplished the thing whereto He sent it—it may have borne as real a testimony to His loving, life-giving grace—as if childhood had lived on into youth, and youth into manhood, and manhood into old age. “They reckon not by days and years, Where he has gone to dwell.” There were twelve hours, even in that life’s brief day. Though the constituent “hour” may not have been one year long, still—to apply, somewhat inaccurately, the words of a Prophet—still “the child may die,” in God’s reckoning, “a hundred years old.” Certainly there may be the twelve hours of a very full day in a [ministerial] life very brief in years. Some of the men of everlasting remembrance in the Church [of England] have died at the age of thirty years or under. It is the devotion which counts. It is the earnestness which tells. We do not undervalue the testimony of a long life—a life protracted into days even of weakness, suffering, and silence in the holy service. But we say this, that in some respects, and for some purposes, no testimony is like the testimony of the young, and no [life’s] ministry has the same astonishment in it, for the world that looks on, as [that] of one who, with all the life in him, all the impulses which drive others into self-indulgence and sin, is seen firm in principle and resolute in duty, having “given himself first to the Lord,” and then all he has—all that he might have enjoyed, and all that he might have become.
Brethren, the time is short for the youngest of us—what must it be for the one eldest?… Age advances, and death must come; let us work while it is day. Let us help one another while we can. Let us remember them that are fallen asleep, trying to follow them as they followed Christ, “whose faith follow, as you contemplate the end of their conversation”—their death, that is, in the faith of Jesus; remembering that One Person never dies—“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and to-day and for ever.” Let us cherish the bond which binds us to each other—a true bond, powerful to knit hearts. Let us pray for one another, that we may all meet at last, not one missing, in that world of which it is written, “These are they that have washed their robes”—they were not clean always—“and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore,” etc.—Extracted from sermon by Dean Vaughan, “Rest Awhile,” pp. 94–100.
1Co_15:6, coupled with 1Co_15:34.
I. There is a death which is only a sleep.
II. There is a sleep [of sin] which is a [moral] death (Eph_5:14).
1Co_15:10. All of Grace.
I. Our experience.
II. Our labours.
III. Our success.—[J. L.]
1Co_15:11. Two All-important Things about the Preaching.
I. Not the preacher, but the truth preached—[“Whether I or they;” that matters nothing.]
II. Not the hearing, but the belief of the truth.—[J. L.]
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain On vv6, 8, 12, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 32 1Co 15:1-21
THE RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD
1Co 15:1-21
Read full note →
6. “— of whom most remain to this day, but some are fallen asleep.” Our Savior corrected them when they said Lazarus was dead, refusing to receive their report. He said, “Lazarus is not dead, but sleepeth.” The great Bible truth involves the conclusion that man inherited immortality from the creative fiat appertaining to soul, mind and body. Hence the body is as immortal as the soul, only taking a nap in the dust, awaiting the mandate of God, revealed by the resurrection trumpet. It is very injudicious for us to speak of our departed loved ones as dead, as it is difficult to keep hearts and faces bright while indulging in blue talk. “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.” We should look upon and speak of our departed friends as yet alive, and living in a better country than ever before.
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain On v1 1Co 15:1-2
1Co 15:1-2
I. "I declare unto you"—
Read full note →
I.would recall to your remembrance—"the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received." There is an affecting allusion here to past times. There is a touch of tenderness, as the Apostle delicately recalls his own early ministry among the Corinthians and their acceptance of it. There are occasions in Christian experience when such a retrospect may be most seasonable and profitable, when it may be useful to remind Christians of the sort of welcome they were accustomed to give the gospel in days gone by. Surely it is good for us, when our confidence and affection are beginning to fail, when we are tempted to throw the blame of the failure on the gospel as preached to us in the old fashion, and to fancy that it might tell on us more in a new dress, to go back to the old time, and recall our early reception of it in the days of our soul’s spiritual birth, our life’s morning march when our bosom was young.
II. "I declare unto you the gospel,... wherein ye stand"—or have got a standing. It commanded your assent and consent once, your warm embrace and cordial acceptance. And well it might do so; you might well be willing to receive it as you did. For in it you have now got a position which you never otherwise could reach—a position of secure, stable, settled righteousness and peace.
III. By the gospel also "ye are saved." This gospel is indeed the power of God unto salvation to every one that believes. All the elements of salvation are provided for us and secured to us in this gospel—free forgiveness, complete acceptance in the sight of God, a sure standing in His favour, a new principle of holy loyalty. Surely, then, it is not a gospel to be lightly abandoned, or superseded, or changed!
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 2.
Reference: 1Co 15:1, 1Co 15:2.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. v., p. 31.
1Co 15:1-4
Paul’s Gospel.
I. We have here Paul’s gospel in its substance. "How that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day, according to the Scriptures." (1) The great peculiarity, and the great blessedness and sign of the universal adaptation of Christianity, is, that it tells the story of things that happened on this green solid earth of ours. (2) Paul’s gospel fastened, as its central fact, on the death and accompanying burial, and the consequent resurrection, of Jesus Christ. There is the vital centre of the gospel.
II. Note what we learn here of Paul’s gospel in its power. He specifies two of its mighty influences upon men—"wherein ye stand," "by which also ye are saved."
III. Note what our text tells us of Paul’s gospel in its conditions. (1) There must be a solid faith, not a faith which is lightly and without due cause taken up. (2) The other condition is that continuous grasp of the truth which makes the essence of the gospel. It is whilst you believe that the gospel is saving you.
A. Maclaren, Christian Commonwealth, May 27th, 1886.
References: 1Co 15:1-4.—C. Kingsley, National Sermons, p. 285. 1Co 15:1-11.—Homilist, vol. vi., p. 190. 1Co 15:2.—J. Edmunds, Sixty Sermons, p. 335. 1Co 15:3.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. vii., p. 261; W. J. Knox-Little, The Mystery of Sorrow, p. 1. 1Co 15:3, 1Co 15:4.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. iv., p. 105.
1Co 15:3-11
I. The gospel which Paul preached was very simple. (1) The articles of his creed were few and plain. "Christ died; He was buried; He rose again." (2) He delivered them "first of all." They were among the first things of which he spoke. He put them in the van and forefront of all his teaching. (3) He delivered them as that which he also received. They constituted his message and his mission, both of which came to him directly from the Lord.
II. Having described the gospel which he was accustomed to preach at Corinth, Paul indicates the character in which he preached it. He preached it as an apostle, as one who had actually seen the risen Lord. For it was their having actually seen the Lord after His resurrection that qualified the apostles for declaring that doctrine of the atonement which depends on the truth of it. Hence, Paul reminds the Corinthians how, in delivering to them that which he received concerning the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ, it was his practice to appeal to the testimony of the original apostles. It was his practice also to associate himself with them, as competent to bear the same testimony that they bore. He was consequently authorised to preach the same gospel that they preached, and to preach it in the same character in which they preached it—that of an eyewitness of the resurrection of Christ.
III. In what we testify and in what we teach we are all at one. This is the last consideration which Paul urges on behalf of the old doctrine, which some were for improving upon by their innovations. It has, he argues, this great recommendation, that, in declaring it, and in bearing witness to the great fact on which it rests, the apostles of the Lord are united and unanimous. "So we preach, and so ye believed."
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 13.
References: 1Co 15:5-8.—J. N. Norton, The King’s Ferry Boat, p. 255. 1Co 15:6.—Homilist, 2nd series, vol. iv., p. 191; T. Arnold, Sermons, vol. v., p. 1. 1Co 15:7.—T. Gasquoine, Christian World Pulpit, vol. x., p. 20 1Co 15:9.—G. Dawson, The Authentic Gospel, p. 205; H. Wonnacott, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xvii., p. 238.
1Co 15:10
Sudden Conversions.
The conversion of St. Paul was a wonderful conversion, as our church in one place calls it, because it was so unexpected and (as far as the appearance went) so sudden. It may be useful to mention one or two kinds of what may be called sudden conversions, and to inquire which of them really took place in St. Paul’s case.
I. First, some men turn to religion all at once from some sudden impulse of mind, some powerful excitement, or some strong persuasion. Such sudden conversions deceive for a time even the better sort of people.
II. In these cases of sudden conversion, when men change at once either from open sin, or again from the zealous partisanship of a certain creed, to some novel form of faith or worship, their lightmindedness is detected by their frequent changing—their changing again and again, so that one can never be certain of them. This is the test of their unsoundness—having no root in themselves their convictions and earnestness presently wither away. But there is another kind of sudden conversion, in which a man perseveres to the end, consistent in the new form he adopts, and which may be right or wrong, as it happens, but which he cannot be said to recommend or confirm to us by his own change. A man who suddenly professes religion after a profligate life, merely because he is sick of his vices, or tormented by the thought of God’s anger, does no honour to religion.
III. When men change their religious opinions really and truly, it is not merely their opinions that they change, but their hearts, and this evidently is not done in a moment—it is a slow work. Nevertheless, though gradual, the change is often not uniform, but proceeds, so to say, by fits and starts, being influenced by external events and other circumstances. There was much in St. Paul’s character which was not changed by his conversion, but merely directed to other and higher objects and purified. It was his creed that was changed and his soul by regeneration. That all-pitying, all-holy Eye, which turned in love upon St. Peter when he denied Christ and thereby roused him to repentance, looked on St. Paul also while he persecuted Him and wrought in him the sudden conversion.
J. H. Newman, Parochial and Plain Sermons, vol. viii., p. 217. (See also Plain Sermons by Contributors to "Tracts for the Times," vol. v., p. 307.)
References: 1Co 15:10.—Beecher, Sermons, vol. ii., p. 59; H. J. Wilmot Buxton, The Life of Duty, vol. ii., p. 94; A. Blomfield, Church of England Pulpit, vol. vii., p. 53; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. ix., p. 25; W. Page, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxxiv., p. 204; J. A. Carr, Church of England Pulpit, vol. xi., p. 305; A. K. H. B., Graver Thoughts of a Country Parson, 3rd series, p. 216. 1Co 15:11.—Church of England Pulpit, vol. xviii., p. 185. 1Co 15:12.—H. W. Beecher, Forty-Eight Sermons, vol. i., p. 257.
1Co 15:12-14
The Certainty of the Resurrection Demonstrated.
There are two propositions furnished by the Apostle in our text—each is comprehensive of many truths, and may be divided into more. The first is, that if there be no resurrection from the dead then Christ is not risen—a proposition which assumes or affirms that the resurrection of all men is a necessary consequence of the resurrection of Christ; so that to prove the one is to establish the other. The second, that if Christ be not risen "our preaching is vain and your faith is vain," a proposition which clearly makes Christianity nothing better than a worthless delusion if you take it from the article of the Redeemer’s resurrection.
I. Consider first the necessary connection between the resurrection of Christ and the resurrection of all men. If Christ rose, He rose not as an individual, but as head of the whole race; His was the resurrection of human nature, and therefore must all men eventually rise. If, on the other hand, the dead are to rise, Christ must have risen; they can rise only through human nature having been redeemed from its own dark image by the resurrection of Christ. All would agree in the statement that if men are not to die then is Adam not dead. They are bound by the same reasoning to assent to the proposition of our text, that if there be no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen.
II. Consider the indispensableness of the truth of the resurrection to the worth of Christianity. If Christ be not risen, we shall not rise. But if we shall not rise, our nature is still unredeemed, and the Mediator must have failed in the great work which He came to achieve. If Christ have not secured a resurrection for the body, He cannot have secured eternal happiness for the soul. If He succeeded He threw life into human dust, as well as ransomed the human spirit; if He failed He has as much left the soul in hell as the body in the grave. In pleading for the truth of the resurrection we are pleading for the whole Christian system.
H. Melvill, Penny Pulpit, No. 1502.
1Co 15:12-17
The fact of the resurrection of Christ and the belief in a general resurrection are intimately and inseparably connected. So the Apostle Paul here, as elsewhere, teaches. The resurrection of Christ and the general resurrection are so related to one another that they stand or fall together. If Christ is risen, then the dead rise; if the dead rise not, then is Christ not raised.
I. It gives a stern living reality to the statement that Christ died for our sins. He died for our sins in the sense of dying in them, literally and fully in that sense. Our sins were the occasion of His death. They made it necessary. They were the cause of it. He could not have saved us from our sins otherwise than by dying for our sins. Had it been possible for Him to be holden of death, He must have continued to occupy the position and to bear the character of the guilty criminals whom He represented when He died.
II. The burial of Christ, viewed in the light of the Apostle’s argument, is a fact of great significance. The agony is past; the curse is borne. But He is not yet freed from His vicarious partnership with us in our sins. His grave is to be with the wicked. The man Christ Jesus, as to His whole manhood, body as well as soul, has not yet got rid of our sins. They are with Him, they are upon Him, He is in them, while He lies, as to His dishonoured body, in that dark and narrow cell.
III. Up to the moment of His resurrection He is bearing our sins. But He is rid of our sins now. And if we are in Him, we are rid of them too, in the very same sense and to the very same extent that He is. There is now no condemnation to them which are in Christ. Our faith in Him is not now vain, for He died for our sins and rose again for our justification.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 35.
Reference: 1Co 15:13-20.—F. W. Robertson, Lectures on Corinthians, p. 215.
1Co 15:14
This is the Apostle’s way of saying, as strongly as he can, that there is no doubt whatever about the fact of our Lord’s resurrection from the dead. He tells his readers that Christ is risen, because if He is not risen consequences must follow which he knows they will treat as plainly absurd.
I. "If Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain." "Our preaching." St. Paul associates himself with the older apostles who had seen the Lord Jesus on earth, and especially after His resurrection. He and they alike had been preaching a message to the world which, if Christ had not really risen from His grave, was vain, literally empty—a mere assortment of words and phrases without a soul—a doctrine which, if it could be called a doctrine, was devoid of all that entitled it to command the attention of human beings. The resurrection was the apostles’ reason for preaching at all. The resurrection was the main substance of what they taught. If they were deceived as to its reality, their teaching had neither basis nor substance.
II. But the Apostle adds, "If Christ be not risen, your faith is also vain." (1) The most characteristic state in the habitual thought of a Christian is the conviction that, although utterly unworthy, he is a redeemed man. But if Christ be not risen from His grave, where is the justification of this? The resurrection pours a flood of light upon the passion. If Christ be not raised, there is no proof that He who suffered on Calvary was more than the feeble victim of an enormous wrong. (2) A second ruling feature of a Christian’s habitual state of mind is that he is constantly looking forward to another life. But if Christ died and did not burst the fetters of death, it is trifling with the hopes and with the anxieties of the soul of man to tell us that He has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, or that He has opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers. (3) A third feature of the state of mind created in the soul by Christian faith is belief in the possible perfection of man. If Christ be not risen, our faith in the perfection of man must perish irretrievably. (4) A last characteristic of the state of mind produced by Christian faith is confidence in the ultimate victory of good over evil. If Christ be not risen, our faith in the ultimate victory of good is only too surely vain. If Christ be risen indeed, then neither is the apostolic teaching vain, nor is the faith of Christians vain; and, therefore, to the end of time, the apostolic message will sway successive generations of men with a conviction of its truth and power, and the faith of Christians will be, as it has been, the strength and the consolation of millions as they pass through the world to the life which is beyond the grave.
H. P. Liddon, Penny Pulpit, No. 1092.
References: 1Co 15:14.—Homilist, 2nd series, vol. iii., p. 378; A. Ainger, Sermons in the Temple Church, p. 74; J. Irons, Thursday Penny Pulpit, vol. vi., p. 185.
1Co 15:14-15
What Comes of a Dead Christ?
I. The first point the Apostle makes is this: that with the resurrection of Jesus Christ the whole gospel stands or falls.
II. Secondly, with the resurrection of Jesus Christ stands or falls the character of the witnesses.
III. Again, with the resurrection of Jesus Christ stands or falls the faith of the Christian.
IV. Lastly, with the resurrection of Christ stands or falls the heaven of His servants.
A. Maclaren, The Unchanging Christ, p. 136.
1Co 15:16-17
The Resurrection of Christ.
I. When Christ died, all died. His death was not for Himself, but for mankind. And by all being thus subjected to the punishment of sin in Him the sin of the world was taken away. But it remained that the positive results of redemption should be assured to us. He was delivered for our offences, but, in order to our justification, He must be raised again. His death for sin was the voluntary carrying out to the utmost of His assumption of that whole nature which had incurred death as the penalty of sin. But His resurrection was the sign that that penalty was all paid, and He, our representative, discharged.
II. Now, what have been to us, what to our world, the consequences of this resurrection of our Lord? Let us take them, by reversing the negative process of reasoning, in our text. If Christ be raised, the dead are also raised. We have dwelt much on Him as the head of our race. He, the Head, is raised, and is in glory. By this He has become the firstfruits of them that sleep. As truly as the first ears of the ripened grain are not alone, but are a sample of the innumerable multitude which are to follow, so truly our risen Saviour is but what His people shall be. Their bodies, like His body, shall pass into death. Their bodies, unlike His body, shall see corruption. But the mighty power of Him, their Head, abiding in and working in them, shall again bring their bodies, but changed and glorified, up out of the dead of the earth, and repossess them with their spirits, and beautify and invigorate them for a blessed eternity.
III. The great doctrine of the resurrection of the body was ever in old times the mark of the Christian creed. Still, it is to be feared, it remains a stumblingblock even now to some Christian minds. An immortality of the spirit they are prepared to grant, but a rising again of the body seems to them a strange and, indeed, a needless thing. Let us remind such persons that the salvation to be wrought for man by Christ must be as entire as that fall into sin, out of which it is to raise him. In that fall the body became an instrument of iniquity; by that salvation it must become an instrument of holiness. That salvation does not free it from death, the consequence of its inherited and actual sin; but it puts the man into communion with that energising Spirit, which shall quicken the whole man—body, soul, and spirit—into glorious and heavenly life.
IV. Our text draws for us another important inference from Christ’s resurrection. "If Christ be raised, our faith is not vain; we are not still in our sins." That empty tomb witnesses that we are justified before God. That stone rolled away declares that our redemption is achieved. Now at length is the victory won for man. Now the kingdoms of this world are wrested out of the hand of the prince of this world, and are becoming the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign for ever and ever.
H. Alford, Quebec Chapel Sermons, vol. iv., p. 146.
Reference: 1Co 15:17.—W. J. Woods, Christian World Pulpit, vol. ix., p. 381.
1Co 15:18
Moral Certainty of the True Christian’s Resurrection.
I. The Apostle means the words of the text to express what is most shocking and most impossible. If they who had lived all their days in patience and self-denial and love, had done all this for nothing; if they had set their hopes upon a fond dream, purifying their hearts and enkindling their best affections with the thought of Him to whom they were nothing, and who was nothing to them; if the only good men in the world should prove to have been the only foolish ones, the only ones who had lived in vain—then indeed our language and our very nature seem confounded; it would be well with us if we and all around us were but the creatures of a dream.
II. Many persons lessen by their conduct, both for themselves and others, the argument for belief in the resurrection; they so live that when they are gone, it would not seem in any way monstrous to think that they were perished for ever. By "perished" I mean what the word means in the text—that is, were become as though they had never been born, and were vanished into nothing. But conceive of one who, loving God in Christ, has been chastened by His fatherly hand in a long course of severe suffering. Conceive such a one, so young, so suffering, so sanctified, finding in the very last hour no abatement of pain, but a fearful increase of it; yet while they who stand by were most distressed, the faith and love of the sufferer were never clouded, and the trust in Christ and cheerful submission to His will never for a moment shaken. Conceive this; and shall not heaven and earth pass sooner than that one sleeping in Jesus should not also be raised up by the Spirit of Jesus, and presented by Him before the throne of His Father, to live for ever in the fulness of His blessing?
T. Arnold, Sermons, vol. iii., p. 103.
References: 1Co 15:18.—E. C. Wickham, Church of England Pulpit, vol. vii., p. 308.
1Co 15:18-19
I. "Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished." They have perished. This does not mean that upon the supposition made they have ceased to exist. The question of the continued existence of men after death is not raised in the argument What the Apostle has in his view, as to those which had fallen asleep in Christ, is not their perishing in the sense of ceasing to exist either in the body or out of the body, but their perishing in the sense of not being saved, but lost. Was it a lie that these holy men and women grasped in their right hand when they walked so fearlessly through the valley of the shadow of death? And are their eyes now opened in that other world—to the sad and awful truth—that for all their faith in Christ they are yet in their sins; that they believed in One who died, indeed, for their sins, but is not, to this hour, Himself extricated from them?
II. In truth the innovation involves us all, the dead and the living, who have believed on Christ in one common ruin: "If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable." In this life we have hope in Christ, and there may be pleasure in such hope in Christ while it lasts. But it is a hope which, if there be, as there assuredly is, a hereafter, will be found to be utterly hollow and untrue. For it is the hope, it is the faith of our being saved from our sins. But we are not saved from our sins if Christ be not raised.
But it is not so. Christ is risen from the dead. He who was dead is alive for evermore. Therefore we, as well as our predecessors in the life of faith, have a hope which neither death nor sin can touch.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 48.
1Co 15:19
What is the exact hope respecting the future that we owe to our risen Lord? Is it the hope that we shall exist for ever? Is our continuous existence hereafter altogether dependent upon faith in communion with the risen Christ? No, this is not what the Apostle meant; our immortality is not a gift of the Redeemer, it is a gift of the Creator; and it is just as much a part of our being as any of the limbs of our body, or as reason, imagination, or any of the natural endowments of our mind.
I. We look forward as reasonable beings to immortality. But to what sort of immortality does this anticipation point? Is it, for instance, (1) the immortality of the race, and does the individual really perish at death? No, it is not this to which we men look forward. A race of beings does not really live apart from the individuals which compose it; only a person, only a feeling, thinking, and resolving centre and seat of life can be properly immortal. (2) Is it, then, an immortality of fame? How many in each generation could hope to share in such an immortality as this? (3) Is it an immortality of good deeds? No; the immortality of our actions is not an immortality which ever can satisfy the heart or the reason of man, since this yearning for immortality is above all things based on a sense of justice.
II. The hope in Christ is the hope of a blessed immortality. This He has won for us by His perfect and sufficient sacrifice on the cross, whereby our sins are blotted out; and His cross and His virtue is proved to us by His resurrection from the dead, that He lives in order that we may live also is the very basis of our hope in Him. Apart from this conviction, Christianity is indeed a dream; the efforts and sacrifices of Christian life are wasted; we are the victims of vain delusion, and we are of all men most miserable.
H. P. Liddon, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxiii., p. 209.
References: 1Co 15:19.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. x., No. 562; H. P. Liddon, Easter Sermons, vol. i., p. 1; Homilist, 2nd series, vol. iv., p. 61; J. Fordyce, Christian World Pulpit, vol. viii., p. 342; H.W. Beecher, Ibid., vol. xxii., p. 36; J. G. Rogers, Ibid., vol. xxxvi., p. 59. 1Co 15:20.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. viii., No. 445; Ibid., Morning by Morning, p. 131; G. E. L. Cotton, Sermons and Addresses in Marlborough College, p. 126; J. Kennedy, Christian World Pulpit, vol. v., p. 369; J. B. Brown, Ibid., vol. viii., p. 347; A. Craig, Ibid., vol. xvi., p. 197; Plain Sermons, vol. vii., p. 118. 1Co 15:20, 1Co 15:21.—G. Huntington, Sermons for Holy Seasons, p. 99. 1Co 15:21.—E. White, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxiii., p. 185. 1Co 15:21-39.—F. W. Robertson, Lectures on Corinthians, p. 223.
1Co 15:20-23
I. The principle upon which the Apostle proceeds is the same when he reasons on the assumption of Christ’s resurrection being admitted, as when he argues on the hypothesis of its being denied. That principle is the substantial oneness of Christ and His believing people. Your faith unites you to Christ and identifies you with Him. It commits you to share His fortune. It involves you in His destiny, whatever that may be. Your union with Christ, which would be your destruction if Christ were not risen, now that He is risen is your life and glory. Your union with Christ therefore is the explanation of the connection between His resurrection and yours. You are yourself in Him, and your resurrection, consequently, is also in Him—His resurrection is yours.
II. The two economies, the original and the remedial, the original economy of nature, or a law working death, and the remedial economy of grace, with its resurrection of the dead, have several features in common for those who have experience of both. (1) In both economies there is representation. It is by or through a representative man that death reaches you. It is by or through a representative man that the resurrection of life awaits you. Christ in His resurrection represents you, precisely as Adam, when he incurred death, represented you. (2) In both economies there is union. You are in the man Adam, by whom comes death. You are in the man Christ Jesus, by whom comes the resurrection of the dead. It is as being in Adam by nature that you all die the death which comes by him, and it is as by life in Christ by grace that you shall all be made alive with the life, the resurrection of the dead, which comes by Him. (3) Subordination. "Every man in his own order." Christ is Himself alone the firstfruits. That is His position, His rank, and His order. Most gladly and cheerfully do we concede it to Him.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 63.
1Co 15:22
The Christian’s Life in Christ.
I. "In Christ shall all be made alive." We shall live then, not only as having our souls restored to our bodies, and our souls and bodies living on in the presence of Almighty God; great and unutterable as were this blessedness, there is a higher yet in store, to live on "in Christ." To dwell in God must be by His dwelling in us. He takes us out of our state of nature in which we were, fallen, estranged, in a far country, out of and away from Him, and takes us up into Himself. He cometh to us, and if we will receive Him, He dwelleth in us, and maketh His abode in us. He enlargeth our hearts by His sanctifying Spirit which He giveth us, by the obedience which He enables us to yield, by the acts of faith and love which He strengthens us to do, and then dwelleth in those who are His more largely. By dwelling in us He makes us parts of Himself, so that in the ancient Church they could boldly say, "He deifieth me—that is, He makes me part of Him, of His body, who is God."
II. Whether or no Christ giveth to the faithful soul to feel its own blessedness, or in whatever degree He makes the soul to hunger after Him, and so satisfieth the hungry soul with His own richness, the inward unseen presence of God in the soul is the gift of the gospel. This is its greatest, its one all-containing promise. They who obey the Spirit, who receive the Spirit of God to dwell in them, although in the body, are, St. Paul says, "not in the flesh, but in the Spirit"—they are encompassed, enfolded, enveloped in the Spirit. The Spirit is penetrating the whole man, and so imparting to the whole its own nature. As the iron, when placed in the fire, is no longer dark and heavy-looking and cold, but transparent and glowing and bright and kindled, and gives out light and warmth, and seems of another nature, so the whole soul and body of him who obeyeth the Spirit of God is in a course of change, becoming, as our Lord says, "full of light" and glowing, and on fire with love.
E. B. Pusey, Sermons from Advent to Whitsuntide, vol. i., p. 230.
1Co 15:24
The Certain End.
It is not possible to rule these words out of life. They are perpetually recurring. You tell of any process, you trace out how it is going to work on from step to step, you. see how cause opens into effect, and then effect, becoming cause, opens into still further effect beyond; but always, by-and-by, your thought comes to a stoppage and a change. The process is exhausted. "Then cometh the end." Your story has to round itself to that.
Let us think of this characteristic of life, and see what it means.
I. We may begin by noting this—which is the most striking thing about the whole matter—the way in which men’s desire and men’s dread are both called out by this constant coming of the ends of things. Look (1) at man’s desire of the end. It is, in the most superficial aspect of it, a part of his dread of monotony. There is something very pathetic, it seems to me, in man’s instinctive fear of being wearied with even the most delightful and satisfactory of all the experiences which he meets with in the world. Is it not a sign, one of the many signs, of man’s sense that his nature is made for larger worlds than this, and only abides here temporarily and in education for destinies which shall be worthy of its capacities? "I would not live alway" has been a true cry of the human soul. (2) But this is the most superficial aspect of it. Very early in every experience there comes the sense of imperfection and failure in what we have already done, and the wish that it were possible to begin the game again. Already there are some things in life which the soul would fain get out of life. The first sketch has so marred the canvas that the perfect picture seems impossible. In many tones, yet all of them tones of satisfaction, men desire the end. (3) Turn now to the other side, and think of the dread with which men think of the coming of ends in life. There is (a) the sheer force of habit It is the inertia of life. That this should cease to be is shocking and surprising. (b) Very often one shrinks from the announcement of the coming end of the condition in which he is now living, because, when he hears it, he becomes aware how far he is from having yet exhausted the condition in which he is now living. (c) There is the great uncertainty which envelops every experience which is untried.
II. The workman’s voice has not to summon out of the east the shadows of the night in which no man can work. God sends it. And, if around the instability of human life is wrapped the great permanence of the life of God, then is there not light upon it all? All satisfaction with the temporariness comes only from its being enfolded and embraced within the eternity of the Eternal.
Phillips Brooks, The Light of the World, p. 401
References: 1Co 15:24.—H. J. Wilmot Buxton, Waterside Mission Sermons, 2nd series, No. 20. 1Co 15:24-26.—Christian World Pulpit, vol. xiv., p. 384.
1Co 15:24-28
I. There is a remarkable and significant transaction between the Son and the Eternal Father. "Then cometh the end, when He shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father." Plainly, the kingdom here means, not the realms or territories over which kingly authority is exercised, but the kingly authority itself. It is not certain dominions that Christ delivers up, but the right of dominion. And the right of dominion then to be delivered up is evidently that which Christ wields, as having all things put under His feet. It is that by which He puts down all rule and all authority and power. It is His mediatorial sovereignty, His prerogative of supremacy and empire, as Messiah the Prince. But how does He deliver it up to God the Father? What does that imply? Does He so deliver it up that it passes from Him, and He ceases to reign? It can scarcely be that, we answer. Christ comes as His Father’s delegate and viceroy to the world, invested with full power and absolute authority over the whole province and all within it. The universal power and authority thus conveyed to Him He is commissioned to use, on the one hand, for attaching all who are to be His adherents to Himself, and, on the other hand, for the overthrow of every hostile force. The war is long, the struggle is severe; but at last it is over. The Captain of salvation has gathered round Him the entire number of the people that are to be saved. His delegated authority He has been wielding on their behalf. He needs to wield it no more. In their name, as well as in His own, "He delivers up the kingdom to God, even the Father."
II. Christ and His redeemed occupy the earth for ever. He continues to reign over the seed given to Him and purchased by Him. On earth, as elsewhere, God is all in all.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 77.
Reference: 1Co 15:24-28.—Homilist, 1st series, vol. i., p. 92.
1Co 15:25
The Quantity and Quality of the Evidence for the Resurrection.
Look:—
I. At the amount of evidence afforded. St. Paul sums it up (1Co 15:1-11). Can anything be more conclusive, within the limits which, for the very highest reasons, it seemed important to observe? Here was no tremulous expectation, no eager, excited expectation. The Cross had withered all their hopes. Far from watching for a resurrection, the women took spices to embalm Him. Far from being in a state of mind to invent a resurrection to fulfil their hopes, the apostles were much more in a state to regard the real resurrection as an illusion. But the evidence was simply overwhelming. "He showed Himself alive after His passion" by so many infallible proofs that there was no room for the faintest hesitation. They saw, and inevitably believed. And when demonstration to the most capable judges was complete, He was seen of five hundred brethren at once, and then the fact enshrined itself indisputably in human history. We have no means of sifting the evidence in detail and of examining the witnesses. But there were very powerful political and religious bodies who had the opportunity, and who had, moreover, the deepest interest in proving the resurrection to be an imposture. But it offered evidence which assured its acceptance, and planted it firmly in the deepest convictions of mankind.
II. The quality of the evidence is entirely that of disciples—those who knew the Lord after the flesh, and by whom, when the first incredulous surprise was conquered, the truth was eagerly welcomed and joyfully enshrined in their hearts. It is the evidence of those whose sympathies, affections, and hopes disposed them to believe. I attach the greatest importance to the evidence of the Apostle Paul. We can weigh the objections in the balance of the mind of a man who was a master of arguments, who had the widest learning and the keenest discernment, and who tells us what he thought by living and dying the martyr of the Resurrection. Saul of Tarsus, who knew everything about it, became a convert to the truth of the Resurrection; he lived through a long life of matchless trials and sufferings with one simple object—to preach it; and he lifted up his voice to proclaim his faith in it in the moment when that voice was hushed in death.
J. Baldwin Brown, Christian World Pulpit, vol. viii., p. 347.
References: 1Co 15:25.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xiv., No. 807. 1Co 15:26.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xii., No. 721; vol. xxii., No. 1329; R. L. Browne, Sussex Sermons, p. 31; S. Minton, Christian World Pulpit, vol. v., p. 305. 1Co 15:26, 1Co 15:27.—C. W. Furse, Sermons at Richmond, p. 72. 1Co 15:27.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol., ii., p. 254.
1Co 15:28
Our Relations to Christ in the Future Life.
I. Going forward into the future life, so much appears to be determined, that we shall there know God unalterably and for ever as trinity—Father, Son, and Spirit. The Son, therefore, as discovered in trinity, is of course never to be merged, or passed out of sight, or in such a sense made subject. How, then, shall we understand the Apostle when he testifies that the Son shall be subject or retired from the view? He is speaking plainly of the Son as incarnate, or externalised in the flesh, visible outwardly and in the man form, and known as the Son of Mary. He it is that, after having as a king outwardly regnant put all things under His feet, is in turn to become subject also Himself, that God may be all in all, and the machineries hitherto conspicuous be for ever taken back as before the advent.
II. Trinity then, as Paul conceives, will remain, but the mortal Sonship, the man, will disappear, and be no more visible. And let us not too hastily recoil from this. It may be that we have been promising ourselves a felicity in the future world made up almost wholly of the fact that we shall be with Christ in His humanly personal form, and have used this hope to feed our longings, quite apart from all higher relations to His eternal Sonship. Our relations to Christ in the future life are to be relations to God in Christ and never to the Jesus in Christ. They centre in the triune Deity, and specially in the Eternal Word or Son, who is represented for a time in the person of Jesus. But when that which is perfect is come, that which is in part will be taken away. Christ will remain because the Eternal Son is in Him, but the Jesus, the human part, will be made subject, or taken away, because all that He could do for us in the revelation of God is done. Back there under that veil is the Son of Mary, the Child of her manger, the Healer that came about on foot, and slept uncovered by the roads and on the mountains, He that was bowed to suffering, He that could be hated and die—all this He is above, as characterised for us by what He was below, nowise exalted above it, but rather by it, for ever. Gone by as the Jesus, also as the Christ under time, He is yet the Eternal Son for ever Christed by His mortal story; so that we behold Him eternalised as our Christ, and hear Him saying as it were out of His humanity, "I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, which is, and which was, and which is to come." It is as if the Christ we loved were visible in all His dear humanities, though Trinity alone is left.
H. Bushnell, Sermons on Living Subjects, p. 442
References: 1Co 15:28.—G. Matheson, Moments on the Mount, p. 182. 1Co 15:29.—Homilist, 3rd series, vol. vii., p. 278.
1Co 15:29-32
I. The first and chief puzzle of this passage is in the twenty-ninth verse. What is meant by being baptized for the dead? The meaning which most commends itself at least to the fancy and the heart is the one which, retaining the idea of substitution, makes it not a vicarious representation of the persons of the dead, but as it were the vicarious occupancy of the position which till death they filled. The vacancies left in the ranks of the Christian army when saints and martyrs fall asleep in Jesus are supplied by fresh recruits, eager to be baptized as they were and pledged by baptism to fall as they fell, at the post of duty and danger.
II. The Apostle points to the dangers which always and everywhere beset believers as thus baptized for the dead, and most emphatically describes his own condition as being one not merely of continual exposure to death, but of the continual endurance of death. It is singularly strong language that he uses. Where, he says, if the dead rise not, is that rejoicing of yours which I have, which is my joy in our Lord Jesus Christ? Wherefore, if the dead rise not, should I for so vain a dream of bliss be doomed to die daily?
III. And if, says Paul, your rejoicing which I have in Christ Jesus and which reconciles me to my dying daily—if that does not move you, what do you say to my actual, outward estate here in Ephesus, whence I am now writing to you? Speaking to you as men are wont to speak to one another of their trials, I tell you that here in Ephesus it has seemed to me as if it were rather with wild beasts than with human beings that I had to contend. Why provoke the resentment of wild beasts at Ephesus, if, after all, there is no resurrection of the dead?
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 91.
References: 1Co 15:31.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xiv., No. 828; H. J. Wilmot Buxton, Sunday Sermonettes for a Year, p. 174; Homilist, 3rd series, vol. ix., p. 334. 1Co 15:32.—Ibid., 3rd series, vol. vii., p. 339; C. S. Robinson, Sermons on Neglected Texts, p. 268 1Co 15:33.—G. Litting, Thirty Children’s Sermons, p. 85; W. Braden, Christian World Pulpit, vol. ix., p. 52.
1Co 15:33-34
I. We sometimes feel a difficulty in understanding why Paul should be so very earnest in insisting on the resurrection of the body. It seems as if he thought that without that element the belief of immortality might not only fail to exercise a good influence, but might even exercise an evil influence over one who so embraces it. The favourite doctrine of the gnostics that matter is in itself essentially and incurably corrupt, and is the cause of all corruption, compelled them to deny the possibility of a literal bodily resurrection. From this theory of theirs two practical conclusions flowed. It led them to throw the entire blame of whatever evil still adhered to them not on the renewed and risen soul, but on that dead and defiled body which would not let the soul purely and freely live. And worse than that, it led them to argue that the amount of evil, more or less, which might still adhere to them, was really very much matter of indifference. Since being all centred in the body, it would all be got rid of when the body was cast aside. Thus by brief stages their error led to sin. Well might the Apostle write the solemn warning, "Be not deceived; evil communications corrupt good manners"!
II. The Apostle is here thinking of that deeper and wider view which he has been taking as to the bearing of the denial of the resurrection on the entire scheme of the gospel as a provision of life and salvation for the lost and guilty children of men. If Christ is not risen bodily, then all proof is wanting of His emancipation, and ours in Him from the penalty of sin. All proof is wanting of His righteous justification for us and our righteous justification in Him.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 109.
1Co 15:34
Who then are these Corinthian disciples, that they have not so much as the knowledge of God? Plainly enough our Apostle is not charging them here with ignorance, but with some lack of the Divine illumination which ought, if they are true disciples, to be in them. They certainly know God in the traditional and merely cognitive way.
I. We shall best understand the point assumed in this impeachment if we raise the distinction between knowing God and knowing about God. Doubtless it is much to know about God—about His operations, His works, His plans, His laws, His truth, His perfect attributes, His saving mercies. This kind of knowledge is presupposed in all faith, and constitutes the rational ground of faith, and so far is necessary even to salvation. But true faith itself discovers another and more absolute kind of knowledge—a knowledge of God Himself; immediate, personal knowledge, coming out of no report or statement, or anything called truth, as being taught in language. It is knowing God within, even as we know ourselves.
II. We have every one two kinds of knowledge relating to ourselves. One is what we know mediately about ourselves, through language, and one that which we have immediately as being conscious of ourselves. Under the first we learn who our parents were and what others think of us, what effects the world has on us, what power we have over it, and what is thought to be the science, it may be, of our nature as an intelligent being. Under the second we have a knowledge of ourselves so immediate, that there is no language in it, no thought, no act of judgment or opinion; we simply have a self-feeling that is intuitive and direct. Now, we were made to have first such an immediate knowledge of God as of ourselves, to be conscious of God, only this consciousness of God has been closed up by our sin, and is now set open by our faith; and this exactly is what distinguishes every soul enlightened by the Spirit and born of God.
III. But there is an objection to this mode of conceiving holy experience as implying an immediate discovery of God. What is the use, in this view, some will ask, of a Bible or external revelation? what use of the incarnation itself? Are not these advances on our outward knowledge superseded and made useless when we conceive that God is offered to immediate knowledge and experience? In one view they are, and in another they are not. Does it follow that, because we have an immediate knowledge of heat, we have therefore no use at all for the scientific doctrine of heat, or the laws by which it is expounded? Suppose it is a part of our interest in this article of heat that we be able to generate more of it, or use it differently and with better economy. So far we have a use in knowing about heat, as well as in knowing heat. In the same way it is of immense consequence to know everything possible about God, that we may find out the more perfectly how to know God.
H. Bushnell, Sermons on Living Subjects, p. 114.
References: 1Co 15:34.—Homilist, 2nd series, vol. ii., p. 81. 1Co 15:35.—Ibid., 3rd series, vol. i., p. 28; W. J. Woods, Christian World Pulpit, vol. x., p. 398; W. J. Keay, Ibid., vol. xvii., p. 213.
1Co 15:35-38
I. Death, dissolution, decay, decomposition—whichever may be the body subjected to that process—is not only no obstacle in the way of that body living again, but affords a presumption that if it is to live again at all, it may be to live in a superior condition; it may be to live possessed of a new nature, a new organisation, adapted to the new sphere into which it is to be introduced. In the case of the seed the bare grain is cast into the ground to die, the resurrection is to a new life, to a life altogether new and fresh. The dead seed is quickened into a new life. So if the body is to exist again, it may be under a new law of life. Death is not the destruction, but the quickening of it.
II. The body which you are to receive in the resurrection may differ from that which you have now—very much as what springs out of the ground and presents itself to view in late autumn in the shape of a luxuriant shock of corn, differs from the bare seed dropped into the ploughed earth in spring. The body that now is and the body that is to be are not to be exactly the same.
III. Still, there is real identity. "To every seed his own body." It is to be such a body as God may be pleased to give, but still it is to be its own body. It is to be a body which the individual himself and all who knew him may and must recognise as his own. It may be changed from what it was when the tomb received it—weak, wasted, worn. It may wear the bloom of summer life, instead of the cold bleak deadness of the bare grain. It will not, however, be so changed but that the instinct of conscience will feel it to be the body in which the deeds of this life were done.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 134.
The Analogy of Nature.
This is St. Paul’s answer to objections against the resurrection of the body. The objector took his stand upon supposed impossibilities. "How are the dead raised up?" (as if death were extinction) "and with what body do they come?" (as if corruption were annihilation). St. Paul’s answer is drawn, not from faith, but from nature. "Death," he says, "is a condition of life. Death does not extinguish the seed; it must die before it can be quickened, and ’thou sowest not that body that shall be, but bare grain.’" The change or corruption of the seed is not annihilation, but the germination of a new form, a more perfect structure, the blade, the stalk, and the ear. Nature refutes your fancied impossibility by her perpetual facts. The resurrection is before your eyes. You believe it already. Nature has her resurrection as well as grace; both are kingdoms of God, and His omnipotence is in both alike. There is a relation of virtue and power, as between seed and fruit; so between the body sown and the body that shall be raised from the dead. We shall consider, not the particular subject of St. Paul’s controversy, the resurrection of the body, but the form of his argument, which we are wont to call the analogy of nature. It is of great moment that we should well understand its use; for no argument is so strong within its sphere, and none more fatal if pressed too far. Within its legitimate range it makes nature divine; when pushed beyond it reduces faith to a natural religion. Let us see, then, how far it is good, and when it becomes bad.
I. The argument from analogy is good and unanswerable. (1) First, when it is used, as by St. Paul in this place, to refute objections. It is plainly absurd to argue against revelation, or any specific doctrines of revelation, on the ground of difficulties and supposed impossibilities the like of which may be found already to exist in the acknowledged facts of nature. (2) The argument from analogy may be used to some extent affirmatively also. What was simple refutation becomes a presumptive proof. We may now say, "You cannot deny these facts in nature; you acknowledge that nature is from God; the faith is so far a counterpart of nature, bears the same features, the tokens of one and the same hand: how can you deny that the faith too is from God?" This is not offered as a positive or constructive proof. It is a strong presumption, a high probability, but revelation awaits its own proper evidence. It does but reduce the assailant to his defence, and throws the burden upon the objector.
II. This analogical way of reasoning may be bad and destructive. (1) It would be mere infidelity to take the analogy of nature as the measure or limit of revelation. For this, in fact, has been the normal argument of freethinkers. In truth, as has been said by a great master of analogy, we can be no judges of the wisdom of God in the order we find established in the world; and nothing but the knowledge of another world, to which we might compare it, would give the criterion for such a judgment. Let us, then, while we trace the unity and harmony of all God’s works, both in nature and in grace, beware how we limit the manifold fulness of Divine procedure.
H. E. Manning, Sermons, vol. iv., p. 152.
References: 1Co 15:35-38.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. vi., No. 306; Homilist, 1st series, vol. vi., p. 328. 1Co 15:35-45.—F. W. Robertson, Lectures on Corinthians, p. 232. 1Co 15:36, 1Co 15:37.—H. P. Liddon, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxxiii., p. 241. 1Co 15:37, 1Co 15:38.—G. Dawson, The Authentic Gospel, p. 308. 1Co 15:38.—H. Batchelor, The Incarnation of God, p. 101; C. S. Brooks, Christian World Pulpit, vol. viii., p. 161; H. J. Wilmot Buxton, The Children’s Bread, p. 88.
1Co 15:39-42
Pursuing the line of thought indicated in the previous verses with reference to the question "How are the dead raised up?" the Apostle may be supposed to ask, "Is not the question answered now? If not, there are still three other facts, or analogies founded on facts, which may reconcile you to the idea of the dead rising again, with bodies substantially the same, and yet with such difference as God may see fit to make."
I. Bodies on earth differ from each other as to the kind of flesh they possess. If God can form here, on the earth, so many different sorts of body, all of flesh, but of flesh all but indefinitely and endlessly diversified; how should it be thought a thing incredible that He should provide for His risen saints bodies suited to their new condition?
II. Heavenly bodies differ from earthly. God gives to the multitudinous stars bodies as it hath pleased Him; and can He not find bodies for the saints to be raised up in? Can He not find for them bodies so much better than those they have now, as the flesh of men is better than the flesh of beasts, fishes, birds? Can He not find for them bodies differing from their present ones, as the glory of celestial bodies in the firmament above differs from the glory of terrestrial here below?
III. Among the heavenly bodies themselves there is diversity. The Creator’s power for dealing with matter so as to fit it for mind at any stage of advancement is not to be measured merely by the forms and fancies our flesh takes on earth. The heavenly orbs move freely, and among them there is gradation. Matter is capable of indefinite elevation through the several kinds of earthly flesh and the gradations of glory in the heavenly bodies; why may it not rise higher still?
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 147.
1Co 15:41
This is part of St. Paul’s great argument for immortality. The reasoning is quite clear. He speaks of the splendour of heavenly things. He has been claiming man’s resurrection on the strength of Christ’s resurrection. Christ has risen and entered into His glory; man, because he is one in human nature with Christ, must rise.
I. St. Paul bases the argument for immortality on the richness and splendour of this mortal life. Because this world is so great and beautiful, therefore there must be another greater and still more beautiful. St. Paul makes heaven not a compensation, but a development. His doctrine seems to teach that immortality is not a truth to be distinctly striven for as an end, but a truth which will hold itself around the man who deeply realises the meaning of life, the man who realises living, how identity and variety blend and unite to make the richness and solemnity of living. To quicken identity with variety, to steady variety with identity, is to make a man always keep himself and yet always feel the power of new conditions around him.
II. Consider the consequences of this truth of identity and variety. (1) It will produce self-respect. If you can only know two things—first, that you are a different creature from any that the world has ever seen since Adam, and, secondly, that you are a branch of the tree of life from which sprang Isaiah and St. John—there must come self-respect from both these truths when they are really wrought and kneaded into the substance of the human nature. "There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars." There is the ground of self-respect. (2) Then see how inevitably respect for others is bound up in such self-respect as this. The absorbing character of great enthusiasm is a matter of the commonest observation. He who cares very earnestly for anything is apt to care very little for other things, and to be indignant that other people do not care as much as he does for the thing he cares for. But surely it must be possible for men to be profoundly devoted to their own work and yet profoundly thankful for the work which other men are doing, work which they cannot do, and whose details and methods it is not in their nature to understand! "All things are yours, and ye are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s." That every thing should reach its best, that every man should do his best in his own place, in his own line, that every star should shine brightly in its own sphere, comes to be the wish and prayer and purpose of my life. (3) To Paul this truth was a proof of immortality. We want the life of earth now, the life of heaven by-and-by, and all clear with its own glory, and our humanity capable of them both, capable of sharp timely duty here and now, capable also of the supernal, transcendal splendour of the invisible world when the time shall come: the glory of the star first, the glory of the sun at last.
Phillips Brooks, The Light of the World, p. 63.
Reference: 1Co 15:41, 1Co 15:42.—J. H. Thom, Laws of Life after the Mind of Christ, 2nd series, p. 284.
1Co 15:42-44
I. This body of ours is a body that, whenever and however sown, is sown in corruption, in dishonour, and in weakness. These are the three capital faults of our present mortal bodies. And the three faults are intimately connected and mutually related. They grow into one another; they flow from one another; first corruption, then dishonour, lastly weakness. (1) Corruption is liability to dissolution and decay. The body that is to be sown in corruption is a body capable, or susceptible, of decomposition. It may be broken up. And when it is broken up, its fragments, or fragmentary remains, may be resolved into the constituent elements, or component particles, of which they consist. (2) But dishonour also belongs to what is sown: to the bare grain, to the mortal frame. Under the rich and rare clothing of joyous health, of radiant and smiling bloom, we watch the slow and secret gnawing of the insidious element of corruption that is too surely to undermine it all. The honour that is so perishable is scarcely honour at all. (3) As corruptibility implies dishonour, so it occasions, or causes, weakness. It paralyses physical strength. It paralyses both strength of endurance and strength for action and performance.
II. None of these defects will be found in the resurrection body. That body is incorruptible, indestructible, a meet companion for the immaterial and immortal soul. It is to be no clog or restraint, through its impotency, on the free soul; but apt and able, as its minister, strong to do its pleasure.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 159.
Reference: 1Co 15:43.—F. Basset, Church of England Pulpit, vol. xii., p. 238.
1Co 15:44
We dare not even imagine the full meaning of this phrase—a spiritual body. But there are three ideas with regard to it which we may venture to indicate. We hint at three of its probable characteristics.
I. In the first place, it takes the impress or stamp of the higher spiritual principle of Divine intelligence, or intelligence divinely enlightened and inspired, as easily and spontaneously—as much in the way of its being a matter of course—as naturally, in short, as the present body assumes the character, attitude, and expression of the lower principle of mere animal life—of animal feeling and emotion. It is as good an index of what is spiritual, as the present body is of what is animal in man.
II. The body is an inlet, as well as an outlet. It is the index or image of what is within. But it is also an avenue inwards for things without. It takes the stamp or impress of the inner life, whatever that may be, for which it is adapted. It takes the stamp and impress also of the outer world, and conveys that stamp and impress of the outer world to the living principle, the master that it serves. The spiritual body will be true and faithful as the spirit’s minister; and it will be apt and able too. It will lay the entire universe of God under contribution, not at all, in any sense or in any measure, to the lower principle of animal life and feeling, but wholly and exclusively to the higher principle of pure intelligence and Divine thought.
III. The body is an instrument by which the spirit works. The spiritual body will be sleepless, unfatigued, needing neither food nor rest, made like with the angels. How may the redeemed in glory, with those glorious spiritual bodies of theirs, be ever plying the glad and busy task of acting out the impulses of their own spiritual nature, and doing the pleasure of the Lord that bought them!
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 170.
References: 1Co 15:44.—F. W. Aveling, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xvii., p. 120. 1Co 15:45.—Spurgeon, Morning by Morning, p. 362.
1Co 15:45-49
The two bodies, the natural and the spiritual, are connected with the first Adam and the second Adam respectively. That is the teaching of these verses. The Apostle is anxious to strengthen in the minds of those to whom he is reasoning the conviction that there is a spiritual body as well as a natural body.
I. "The first man Adam was made a living soul." The statement of the Apostle is a quotation from Gen 2:7. Had Adam not fallen, it might have been said of him that he became, not a living soul, but a living spirit; his material frame being now accommodated and assimilated, not to the lower "soulish" principle of the animal life, but to the higher principle of life, spiritual and Divine. Even in that case, however, he could not be said to become a life-giving or quickening spirit. That honour belongs to the second Adam alone. At the best, the first Adam would only have been a receiver of the new spirituality, or spiritual vitality, in his body, which was to supersede and displace its original merely animal vitality. It would have been to him personally a gift of grace. It was not his to give to his posterity.
II. "The last Adam was made a quickening spirit." Where, and how? At his resurrection, and by His resurrection. It cannot be His incarnation that is here referred to. He was then made, He then became—in the first Adam, and as the seed of the woman in the first Adam—simply a living soul. As a quickening spirit, the second Adam, the Lord from heaven, dying for us and rising again, quickens spiritually our whole human nature in all its parts. There must, therefore, be a spiritual body. It is no devout imagination to speak of such a thing. Nay more, the Apostle apparently looks upon the spiritual body as the fitting sequel and, as it were, complement of the natural.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 190.
1Co 15:46
Consider:—
I. The dispensations of revealed religion. "The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ." The gospel is more excellent than the law. The law was the shadow; the gospel is the substance. The law was bondage; the gospel is liberty. That was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural. First the law, and then the gospel—first Moses, then Christ—first thunder, earthquake, terror; then love.
II. In the second place, the upward progress is seen in Christian experience and the development of Christian character. The history of any thoughtful Christian soul, from the cradle to the grave, would manifest this.
III. This upward progress is seen in the increase of the spiritual kingdom in the world. The progress is not rapid. But let the Church of God calm her heart. Let us learn to wait and work. "He that believeth shall not make haste."
T. Jones, Penny Pulpit, new series, No. 659.
Reference: 1Co 15:46-58.—F. W. Robertson, Lectures on Corinthians, p. 239.
1Co 15:47
God always looks upon men as placed under some federal or representative head. There is no doubt it is so in a degree now in every family: God deals with the family through the father, and according to the character of the father. But the principle is true on a much larger scale. Adam was not a mere man; he was the representative head of the whole human race. Had he stood, all would have stood; when he fell, all fell.
I. It surely ought to take away every fear that any child of God may have about the Second Advent, to know that He who shall sit upon the throne of glory will be the second Man. There, though perfect and glorified, He will still be in all things just like unto us; only not like what we now are, like we shall become at that moment. As He stooped to man when He was upon earth, He will stoop then; the look with which He looked on John, the accent with which He spoke to many, will be the look and the accent of the King of kings. The body will be distinguishable, but perfect; though with some process that we cannot follow, it will be all spiritual; and there will be seen there, just as when Thomas saw, the very marks of His wounds. To these wounds every sinner shall turn and say, "I plead those wounds"; and with the light which encircles that head with many crowns He will look and say, "For me Thou didst thus rise; for me Thou didst put on this glory; for me Thou art radiant with that dignity."
II. The humanity of the second Man is ours. We are in it, we shall be like it; just as the first man was of the earth, earthy, that we might be earthy, the second Man is the Lord from heaven, that we may be heavenly.
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 4th series, p. 263.
We are tempted to ask in what sense our Lord could be called the second Man, whereas there were so many millions of men intervening between Him and the common ancestor Adam. The answer is, in brief, that the others were mere copies of the first—differing, indeed, in detail of character and nature, but fundamentally the same, and presenting the same radical defects; whereas Christ introduced a new kind of man, not after the pattern of Adam, and became the head of a new family of man. Thus Adam and Christ, dividing all human life between them, are rightly called the first and second man respectively. Let us look into this more closely, and first inquire into the differences between Adam and Christ. Now, these differences are two—difference of origin and difference of nature.
I. Of origin. "The first man is of the earth, earthy." Whatever may be said, and truly said, of the Divine and unearthly parentage of Adam, it is nevertheless true that, according to his physical nature, he and his belong essentially to this earth. The second man was the Lord from heaven. His origin was as distinctly Divine and heavenly as Adam’s origin was earthy. He stepped down into the ranks of created life; He assumed that humanity which was perhaps on its physical side developed from the very lowest form of existence; but He Himself, in His true, unaltered personality, was the Lord and ruler of the universe, whose dwelling-place is in heaven.
II. This was the difference of origin, and there was a second—of nature and character. Not only does every single child that grows up afford a fresh example of the tendency to do wrong, but it is more and more a principle of science to assert the hereditary character of all such tendencies. If the instinct by which the young bird feeds itself be the experience of its remote ancestors, transmitted to it by hereditary descent, how much more readily shall we believe that the moral evil which began in Adam has become an inseparable characteristic of his race! But Christ was not sinful, and the consequence of His holiness, so peculiar to Himself among the children of men, was that death and the grave had no claim upon Him. He tasted death for every man else, but not for Himself. Adam and Christ divide mankind between them, not only as the two types, but as the two authors of all human life. We have life from God by both of these—indirectly, through Adam, and from him polluted and mortal; directly, through Christ, and from Him pure and immortal; both live on in us, the first man and the second Man.
R. Winterbotham, Sermons and Expositions, p. 306.
References: 1Co 15:48.—Spurgeon, Morning by Morning, p. 341. 1Co 15:49.—E. L. Hull, Sermons, 3rd series, p. 12; M. Dix, Sermons Doctrinal and Practical, p. 298; G. Brooks, Five Hundred Outlines, p. 188. 1Co 15:50.—Homilist, 3rd series, vol. ix., p. 334.
1Co 15:50-53
The two main propositions contained in this verse are the following—the first, Flesh and blood is corruption; the second, The kingdom of God is incorruption.
I. Flesh and blood is corruption. To say that bodies corrupted by sin, or by the fall, cannot enter heaven would be simply an irrelevant truism, and would be held to be so by the parties with whom Paul is dealing. It is the admission, or the assertion, that flesh and blood, even in its best state, is corruption, and cannot therefore inherit incorruption; which alone meets their view fairly, and lays the foundation for the inference or conclusion that what is composed of flesh and blood must be changed into something better. The corruption, then, here spoken of is not an evil quality or effect superinduced on the bodily frame by sin; it is the essential property of flesh and blood, as originally made. (1) The body necessarily limits and renders fragmentary any knowledge of the Godhead. (2) It is the antagonist of the Divine life in us; we have to wrestle against it. (3) It has become mortal. On account of sin it is doomed to die. Remaining on the earth unchanged, flesh and blood is sure to die. The sentence on guilty man, "Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return," takes full and universal effect. "His breath goeth forth; he returneth to his earth."
II. The kingdom of God is incorruption. It is a state or condition of things in which there is nothing perishable, no corruption. What it is positively is not here said. The kingdom of God, the heavenly world—in a word, heaven—is not here described. The elements which enter into its pure and holy joy are not specified. But it is identified with incorruption. (1) Death is out of the question, and hence there can be no room or occasion for such arrangements as are here necessary to stave off death. (2) In the kingdom of God there can be nothing to intercept or obscure the beatific heavenly blessedness of the pure in heart.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 206.
Reference: 1Co 15:50-58.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. i., p. 346.
1Co 15:51
The Commemoration of the Faithful Departed.
I. The early Church commemorated the dead, (1) out of love to them and to their image. She could no longer behold them and break bread with them; but she could prolong their presence by the vivid recollection of their beloved image, and by the consciousness of a united adoration; she knew that while she tarried praying without, they were but within the precinct of an inner court, nearer to the eternal throne. (2) And next, she commemorated them in faith to keep up the conscious unity of the Church. They were not severed, but only out of sight. The communion of saints was still one. Nothing was changed but the relation of sight, as when the head of a far-stretching procession, winding through a broken, hollow land, hides itself in some bending vale; it is still all one, all advancing together; they that are farthest onward in the way are conscious of their lengthened following; they that linger with the last are drawn forward, as it were, by the attraction of the advancing multitude. Even so they knew themselves to be ever moving on; they were ever pressing on beyond the bounds of this material world. (3) Again, they commemorated their sleeping brethren in faith, that they might give God the glory of their salvation from this evil world. In the commemoration of the saints they showed forth the manifold grace of Christ, and the manifold fruits of His mysterious passion; and thus, while they lovingly cherished their memories, they also and above all glorified the King’s saints.
II. Consider, next, of what especial moment is this affectionate remembrance of saints in feasts and eucharists in the Church of these latter times. (1) First of all, it is a witness against what I may call the Sadduceeism of Christianity. Most earthly are the images of the sleeping saints, even in better minds; as for the rest of men, they soon forget them. When they have buried their dead out of their sight, the unseen world closes up with the mouth of the grave, and they turn back to their homes and muse in sadness how they may begin to weave the same web over again, and make a new cast for happiness and begin life afresh. And why is all this? What should put so unnatural a face upon the very instincts of the heart but the cold tradition of a Christian Sadduceeism? Against this, then, the commemoration of the Church is a direct and wholesome witness. (2) Another most excellent benefit of this commemoration is its tendency to heal the schisms of the visible Church. In all the contests of the Church on earth all her members, be they never so much divided (so that it be not by heresy or schism), still hold communion with the court of heaven. They all find the common head in the King, and a common fellowship in the communion of saints. And as the saints of Christendom are the hallowed bond even of divided churches, so is the hallowed ancestry of each particular church a bond of unity with its several members.
H. E. Manning, Sermons, vol. i., p. 320.
References: 1Co 15:51.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. ii., p. 94; Todd, Lectures to Children, p. 222; H. J. Wilmot Buxton, Sunday Sermonettes for a Year, p. 186; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iv., p. 86. 1Co 15:51, 1Co 15:52.—J. Edmunds, Sermons in a Village Church, p. 111. 1Co 15:52, 1Co 15:53.—Plain Sermons by Contributors to "Tracts for the Times," vol. ix., p. 205. 1Co 15:53.—J. Taylor, Saturday Evening, p. 333.
1Co 15:53-54
What the change is to be of which the Apostle speaks, and how it is to be effected, it is needless to inquire particularly. It may be more profitable to notice some lessons which it suggests.
I. By an irresistible argument, a fortiori it bars the door against whatever is unholy, impure, sensual, or vile. If even physical corruptibility is inadmissible there, what shall we say of moral defilement? Is the body better than the spirit? If we cannot pass into these realms of light and glory with a body corruptible and mortal, how can we reach them with mind, heart, and soul polluted and unclean?
II. How high and holy is that fellowship with Christ into which we are brought as members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones! He took our natural body, corruptible and mortal, that we might take His spiritual body, incorruptible, immortal. In respect of our corporeal as well as our spiritual nature, we are married, we are united to Christ.
III. What a motive have we in this to be spiritually-minded and heavenly-minded; and to be so more and more as our union to Christ grows closer and the time of our being glorified with Him draws nearer. Surely the things which should chiefly engage my mind and interest my heart, in the view of what I am then to be and where I am to be, are the pursuits for which my risen body in that heavenly world will be adapted, rather than those for which my natural body here on earth is fitted! Surely I may be expected to give myself to the acquiring of those tastes and habits that will be found to be congenial when I am raised in Christ incorruptible in body as well as in spirit, to be with Him in glory for ever!
IV. Finally, what a reason is there, in this high hope, for patient waiting all the days of our appointed time, till our change come!—"This corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality."
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 229.
1Co 15:54
I. Death in this world is the great devourer. He swallows up all living things. Power has no weapon to resist his onset. Worth has no protection against his rancour, nor wisdom against his rules. None are humble enough to be overlooked and pitied. None are good enough to be reverenced and spared. None are high enough to have the right to bid him stand at bay. The king of terrors, formidable to all, is himself afraid of none. He seizes and swallows up the whole family of man. But the destroyer will himself be destroyed.
II. "Death is swallowed up in victory." It is victory that swallows up death. This is the second idea suggested by the oracle. And it admits of being subdivided into two. In the first place, death is swallowed up, or destroyed—victoriously, triumphantly, finally and for ever. In the second place, death is swallowed up and destroyed, merged and lost, in victory. In either view, victory is on the field, determining, on the one hand, the manner of death’s destruction, and on the other hand, the fruit of it. In the first place, death is swallowed up or destroyed in victory; victoriously, in the open field, in open fight and triumph. It is by open conquest that death’s ruin is effected, and not by stealth and stratagem. The victory in which death is swallowed up the Apostle has already described in a previous part of the chapter. It is the restitution of all things. It is the glorious advent of the Lord. He returns in triumph to this earth which was the scene of His suffering and shame. And at His bright appearing His saints start forth in immortal beauty from their tombs, and a renovated world rejoices in the endless life, the unchanging and unclouded sunshine of paradise at last restored.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 248.
Reference: 1Co 15:55.—Todd, Lectures to Children, p. 99.
1Co 15:55, 1Co 15:56.
The Triumph over Death.
I. The most remarkable feature of the triumph over death is the acknowledgment of death’s victory and of the manner of it. The triumph is thus seen to be a triumph of a humbling and mortifying character. The triumphal song is chiefly occupied with a recognition of death’s unworthy conquest, now happily and gloriously reversed. A sting and a victory belonged to him once, but where are they now? Death, then, has a victory. He is a conqueror, the conqueror. All other conquerors yield to him; he yields to none. He lends his aid to other conquerors. By means of him and his instruments of destruction, they succeed. But whatever else they may conquer, they cannot conquer him. He, on the contrary, vanquishes them. Neither science nor power, neither arts nor arms, can vanquish him. The traces of his victory are everywhere. It is such a victory as a sting might be expected to win. For surely a sting is a vile sort of weapon, and any victory achieved by it must be vile.
II. Death is the humiliation of man. Sin is his sting. He comes to conquer, introduced by sin. Sin treacherously throws open the gates, and allows him entrance into the city. And entering, he compels the traitor to become his tool. Sin is his weapon as well as his warrant. Literally and emphatically the sting of death is sin.
III. But victory is ours. It is a victory that is ever brightening as we press on in our Christian course and calling. The security of it is ever more and more distinctly seen. The peace of it is ever more and more deeply felt. The high hope which it animates is ever more and more eagerly grasping the fulness of its eternal heavenly joy.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 266.
References: 1Co 15:56.—J. M. Gibson, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxv., p. 56. 1Co 15:56, 1Co 15:57.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. i., No. 23; F. W. Robertson, Sermons, 3rd series, p. 212; Homilist, 1st series, vol. i., p. 98.
1Co 15:57
St. Paul speaks in this chapter as if the resurrection of Christ were the victory over the grave. Was it impossible then, for men, before the resurrection of Christ, to look beyond the grave?
I. The apostles unquestionably speak of our Lord’s resurrection as an unprecedented fact in the world’s history. But they say that its importance to human beings lay in this, that it declared Jesus to be the Son of God with power. It was an act retrospective and prospective. It revealed the Head of the human race. It revealed the relation of the human race, in the person of its Head, to the Father of all. That which was manifested to be true, when He who had taken on Him our nature, and had died as we die, rose out of death because He could not possibly be holden of it, had been true always. Those who believed in Christ could not doubt that man was to learn his condition from Christ, that he could learn it only from Christ. The evidence for the resurrection lay in all the history, in all the experiences and life of men, up to that hour. Fishermen and tent-makers could not establish it. If there was such a Person, such a Head of man, such a Son of God, as they said was denoted by this event, God would show that there was; if not, there was no gospel.
II. It is God who giveth us the victory. We are in as much danger of fancying that He is not the God of Life, but of death that is bent on our destruction, as the Jews or Greeks were. And next, it is most needful to remember that this victory is a gift. Therefore give up thy life to God, that He may use it as He knows best. Let Him have thy vigour, to turn it against the foes of thy country and of men. Let Him have thy feebleness, that His fatherly love and sympathy, and the obedience that He wrought out in Christ by suffering, may shine forth in thee. Be sure that He has most various methods of manifesting the power of His Son’s resurrection here; but that, if thou trustest in Him, and dost not faint, the end will be the same; all shall share alike in the victory.
III. It is a victory. Immortality is not natural if by natural is meant that which would befall us supposing we were not voluntary spiritual beings. It belongs to us only as voluntary spiritual beings. If we surrender that condition, we surrender our immortality, we take up our position as mortal. But we cannot surrender it; we feel and know that we cannot, even when we are trying most to do it, even when we are stooping to the deepest ignominy. And therefore let us not for a moment cease to connect resurrection with faith, with hope; therefore with conflict. We cannot, if we connect Christ’s resurrection with ours, if we judge of ours by His. He set His face as a flint, His garments were the garments of One who trod the wine-fat. It was an agony, though it was the agony of submission. His sweat was as drops of blood, though the issue was, "Father, not My will, but Thine be done." Therefore God gave Him the victory, the perfect victory of spirit and soul and body.
F. D. Maurice, Sermons, vol. iii., p. 299.
References: 1Co 15:57.—G. B. Ryley, Christian World Pulpit, vol. vii., p. 116; H. W. Beecher, Ibid., vol. xxiv., p. 402; G. Brooks, Five Hundred Outlines, p. 112; J. J. S. Perowne, Contemporary Pulpit, vol. ii., p. 230.
1Co 15:58
I. The duty which is connected with our being steadfast and unmovable in the faith of the resurrection, and of the resurrection life, is (1) to be about the work of the Lord; (2) to abound in it; (3) to abound in it always.
II. The motive—your labour is not in vain. It is in the Lord that your labour is not in vain—empty, or void of result and issue. You enter into the work of the Lord as the Lord Himself entered into the work given Him to do. It belongs to Him to see that your labour in His work shall not be in vain. His labour is not in vain, (1) because He has gone, in that very body, the same man precisely that He was on earth, the same man complete, to present Himself before the Father whose will He has done and whose work He has finished, saying, "Behold, I and the children whom Thou hast given Me." He asks sentence to be passed on Himself in that body, and on what He has done and suffered in that body. He asks for a judicial award. The mere bettering of His condition, as a natural consequence and gracious owning of His past and forgotten history, will not suffice. He asks for a verdict on that history, as a history not buried in oblivion’s indulgent tomb, but raised for righteous judgment. (2) And then, secondly, His labour is not in vain, since not only in His risen body does He challenge judgment on Himself and His work, but, with that same risen body, He takes the work up and follows it out. He carries on in heaven the work which He had on hand on earth. He resumes it that He may carry it out to its endless issues of blessedness and glory in the new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. And as the Lord’s own labour in the work is thus not in vain, so yours is not in vain in Him; and that for the same twofold reason.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 346.
The truth concerning the resurrection is of vital moment. It touches the very essence and heart’s core of the gospel of Christ. The view which you take of it, whatever that may be, must colour the whole of your Christianity—your whole Christian faith and your whole Christian life. So the Apostle teaches.
I. Thus, in the first place, it touches the credibility of those on whose testimony your faith rests. "We are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified of God that He raised up Christ, whom He raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not." This of itself is surely a very serious consideration.
II. Not only is the Lord’s authority, or Divine authority, thus involved in the question of the resurrection; the reality also of His great work of propitiation is at stake. If there is, and can be, no such thing as a resurrection of the body; if the very notion of it is to be contumeliously dismissed with a sneer, as a resurrection of relics, a resurrection of corruption—then Christ is not risen. What took place on the third day after His crucifixion may have been some mysterious removal or annihilation of that which was buried. It follows, either, on the one hand, that death is not to men the penalty of sin, and, on the other, that Christ has not redeemed men from the penalty of sin.
III. Our standing as believers, our justification, our peace, is intimately connected with that doctrine of the resurrection, in the faith of which you are exhorted to be steadfast and unmovable. It is a doctrine as essential to your completeness in Christ as it is to His completeness for you.
IV. Lastly, for its bearing upon your holiness of character and your diligence in duty, you do well to be steadfast and unmovable in your belief of the doctrine of the resurrection.
R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Saviour, p. 325.
References: 1Co 15:58.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xix., No. 1111; T. T. Munger, The Freedom of Faith, p. 193; Christian World Pulpit, vol. vi., p. 198; J. B. Heard, Ibid., vol. xiii., p. 216; D. Burns, Ibid., vol. xxiii., p. 88; Dean Bradley, Ibid., vol. xxix., p. 225; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. iii., p. 412. 1Co 16:1-4.—E. Bersier, Sermons, 1st series, p. 91. 1Co 16:1-9.—F. W. Robertson, Lectures on Corinthians, p. 247. 1Co 16:2.—E. M. Goulburn, Thoughts on Personal Religion, 1Co 16:3.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. ii., p. 249. 1Co 16:6.—W. Morison, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxi., p. 24. 1Co 16:7-9.—H. P. Liddon, Church Sermons, vol. ii., p. 225.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
F. W. Grant 1903 · Public Domain On v1 Division 3. (1Co 15:1-58.)
Division 3. (1Co 15:1-58.)
Resurrection the perfecting of the individual and the Church.
Read full note →
We are come now to the third division of the epistle, which is easily manifested as such by its topic, resurrection. The connection with what has gone before is evident and beautiful. Resurrection is, of course, the basis of the Church. Christ risen is the rock upon which He has been building His assembly. The resurrection of Christ is the basis of the truth for us at all times and which he insists on here as that; but the resurrection also of His people is that which he insists upon in connection with it, and which has beautiful significance in the place which it has here in reference to the other truth of the epistle. The Church is not looked at in Corinthians so much in its heavenly character as we find it in Ephesians, for instance, and even in Colossians. As the body of Christ it is, of course, heavenly, but what we are occupied with is its place in the world and its practical workings, always as remembering the needs which the being in the world ever supposes. Thus, how suited now, that we should be lifted at the close into another plane and made to realize the sphere to which the Church belongs by the contemplation of this doctrine of resurrection, -of that which will at last bring her, not out of her place as the body of Christ, but, on the contrary, into the place which is hers from the beginning, and which, therefore, is to be enjoyed in eternity! This third division is, therefore, as already said, that which lifts everything to a higher plane and connects the doctrine of the Church in the present epistle with the doctrine of the Church as we find it elsewhere.
(1) The apostle begins here, therefore, with the fact of the resurrection of Christ, the manifestation of the power of His blessed work, and without which all would be indeed but shadow for us. It is, therefore, the gospel that he preached that he here insists upon, the gospel which they had received and wherein they stood. Outside of it there was no salvation; and salvation at the end could only be theirs who held fast that word which he had preached. We see, too, what place the Old Testament Scriptures had in connection with the gospel, and that even apostolic teaching was not expected to be taken for granted apart from that earnest search of these for which the Bereans are commended. Thus, if Christ died for our sins, it is according to the Scriptures. Startling to the Jew as the cross might be, the Scriptures were many which announced beforehand that which condemned the Jew for his unbelief of it. Even in his unbelief he was the custodian of the Scriptures, -Scriptures whose whole aim and purport were really Christ, from the beginning to the end. Thus he had preached that "Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures." The many living witnesses, one would say, were ample to establish the truth, but he will not separate it from the testimony which God had given through all the previous ages, and which makes that wondrous death the centre of history.
How thoroughly the strangeness of such a death on the part of so glorious a Person is set aside by this continuous testimony of the Old Testament! Christ’s death is, in fact, the opening up of this, a confirmation of it which sets everything in a new and glorious light, while it gives the New Testament, put in its place thus in connection with the Old, to have its distinct force and supremacy.
"Christ died," then, "for our sins according to the Scriptures." "He was buried," -a fact which shows how true a death it was He died, and how little His disciples expected even that resurrection which was all necessary for them. "We thought," as one of them said, "that it was He that should have delivered Israel"; as if that thought were almost of necessity buried in the tomb in which they had laid Him. His burial has also for us, as we know, a spiritual application which the epistle to the Romans, as well as that to the Galatians, make known to us. This too, then, is part of the gospel. The least fact in this connection is of immense importance, but the resurrection is the crown of all. He was raised the third day according to the Scriptures. It might have been said, according to His own words, which His enemies could quote, and which were therefore commonly known: "After three days," they quote "the deceiver" as saying, "I will rise again." He has risen again, to the confusion of His enemies; but the Scriptures, as we see, are again appealed to, and their evidence put in line with all other as most important in its place.
Here the witness to the resurrection, the testimony existing, was of the most complete character. The apostle enumerates the witnesses, leaving out in a remarkable way that of Mary Magdalene and the women, so important now in the eyes of rationalists as giving birth to the doctrine itself. Important as this was in its place, this testimony of theirs, suited as this first presentation of the spoils of death to the weakest of His people, the non-combatants, as we may say, -yet here he is busy with the testimony of those more manifestly intended as witnesses to the facts of the gospel preached.
Everything is put, therefore, in order. First, He was seen of Cephas -the sweet witness to us of unforgetting love which could thus bring out of all possible despondency the soul of one who had dishonored Him by his denial. Peter must be seen first of all, so that when he sees Him among the twelve directly afterwards, he shall not be ashamed nor afraid, nor in the distance in which that denial might seem to put him.
He was then seen of the twelve, spoken of as that, although the number, in fact, was deficient, sadly deficient, at that time; but God’s grace was not going to accept the deficiency, as we know, and the twelve were to stand again as the witness of a grace which could not lack the full competent witness to itself.
Afterward He was seen of above 500 brethren at once. We have no account of this elsewhere, but it was doubtless in Galilee, where, as we know, the Lord had made a special appointment to meet His disciples, and where there would be naturally, upon the mere hint of that, a gathering of as many as could by any means be present. As the apostle wrote, the larger part of these were still in life, though some had fallen asleep. No opportunity here for conspiracy, as is clear! There were too large a number for fraud of any kind, -five hundred false witnesses will surely soon fall out amongst themselves and bring the truth to light, but there never was a hint of this. The resurrection, on the other hand, was that which rallied every faint-hearted disciple to the standard of Christ, and filled them with a boldness which no trouble, no persecution could in any wise check.
He was seen then by James, probably the brother of the Lord, afterwards spoken, of as such; one of those brethren of whom it had but too lately been said: "Neither did His brethren believe in Him." He thus has, as we may believe, a representative place here, one of a class of those who were brought into faith, or at least fully so, by the resurrection itself.
Then He was seen by all the apostles, evidently the last gathering at Olivet when He was taken from them, and who were thus witnesses of His ascension into heaven. Apart from all these in time and in character, "last of all," "as of one born out of due time," as he says, when the number of the apostles might seem to have been closed, and from the midst of those who were filled lull with Jewish enmity, He was seen by Paul himself, a notable witness of divine (trace, the grace that he was to be, above all, the witness of. "The least of the Apostles," as he calls himself, not fit even to be called an apostle, because he persecuted the assembly of God. Nevertheless grace here gained its completest expression, Christ His sweetest victory. "By the grace of God," he says, "I am what I am, and His grace which came to me was not in vain, but I labored more abundantly than they all." Still, that was grace. He claims nothing for it. What else could he do as one who had received a grace like this? But still it was grace that wrought through him to the end. But here, then, was the complete testimony. It was of one character, however various the witnesses. "Whether it were I or they," he says, "so we preached, and so ye believed."
(2) He goes on now to insist upon the resurrection of Christ as establishing the fact of the resurrection of His people. The one was no more true than the other. If the one were not true, the other was not Yet there were some saying that there was no resurrection of the dead. So early came unbelief as to such cardinal points! Very likely they took resurrection in its spiritual application, as the apostle himself applies it elsewhere, and denied that anything more was to be expected. The saints were risen with Christ. Here, they might have said, was the whole thing; but the apostle turns upon them with the assurance that if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ Himself was not raised; they could not hold the one and deny the other. If they denied the resurrection of Christ, then both the preaching they had received was vain and their faith in it was vain; -the apostles, also, were turned into false witnesses, for their testimony had been that God had raised up Christ, whom He did not raise up if the fact is that the dead are not raised; for if the dead are not raised, neither has Christ been raised. "If Christ is not raised, your faith is vain, ye are yet in your sins." Every hope, therefore, is gone. Those that are fallen asleep in Christ have perished. He does not mean, as some strangely put it, annihilated, but that all that with which they had identified themselves, which they built upon for blessing, was gone, and what was the value of a faith which put men only in the suffering condition in which Christians manifestly were, most pitiable, in losing not only their hope for eternity, but their enjoyment of time itself?
(3) Thus, except the gospel is altogether false, Christ is risen, and that from among the dead, -the sample of His people in this respect, the first-fruits of those that are fallen asleep. Manifestly, Christ rose by Himself. There was no general resurrection along with Him. It was the "resurrection," as said in Philippians, "out from among the dead;" here simply the first-fruits of those that were to rise from among the dead in after times. This is, as we already know, the character of resurrection as it applies to the Christian. Of a general resurrection of the dead, saint and sinner all at one time, Scripture knows nothing.
God does not fail to manifest in this way what His people are to Him, and to separate them from that world out of which He has called them. They are those of whom the apostle could say they were fallen asleep. Death had lost its character of terror for them, as it had lost its real power.
Thus, as by man death had come into the world, by man also had come the resurrection of the dead. It was suited that by him who thus might seem altogether to have lost the place in which God created him, by man, should the resurrection come. Man as seen in Christ is true Man, the truest Man that possibly could be. Christ assumed not another manhood, whatever dignity He might communicate to it. He is not only Man, but even the Son of man; and thus the woman herself, through whom sin entered and who yielded to the power of the serpent, has her part in the victory through Him. The woman’s seed was to bruise the serpent’s head. It is the victory of man, truly that, although it is indeed the grace of God through which this has come about; but we must not discredit the manhood of Christ by the thought of His deity. These were in one Person, one blessed Person, who would not be what He is to us if either failed; but thus in Him we find, as we are meant to find, the Creator-God, Victor still through man whom He created, over that which might have seemed the setting aside of all His thoughts with regard to him. Not only are His thoughts not set aside, they are brought to the full, and gloriously developed. The second Man shows us manhood as God intends it, Himself at the same time the Lord from heaven.
"As then in Adam all die, so also shall all in Christ be made alive"; not all men, but "all in Christ." The death in Adam is indeed universal, for all Adam’s, children are naturally in Adam, but it is "all in Christ" who are to be made alive. This does not deny, of course, the resurrection of the wicked, but that which they receive is not truly to be called life. The apostle will not give it that term. All true life is in Christ and thus in the saint, and "all in Christ" shall be brought into the full power and realization of this.
He speaks, as we shall find, of no other here. He does not mention, in fact, the resurrection of the wicked, although he leaves place for it, but "each in his own rank," he says, -"Christ the first-fruits; afterwards they that are Christ’s at His coming.;Then cometh the end, when He shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father." Here is the order; but, as already said, we find nothing about the resurrection of the wicked. We have plenty of assurance of it elsewhere, and even here place is manifestly left for it. Death is to be abolished completely, but it is simply, as many other Scriptures assure us, "they that are Christ’s" who are raised "at His coming." The whole thought of resurrection, as we find it in the chapter here, is applied to this alone. It is only the saint, who sown in weakness is raised in power, who sown in corruption is raised in incorruption. There can be no possibility of applying such expressions to the resurrection of the wicked, or, therefore, to a general resurrection. It is "they that are Christ’s at His coming" to whom all this applies.
But he adds, "then, cometh the end, when He shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father." The special kingdom put into His hands as Man is to he delivered up. Nay, He takes it only for the purpose of bringing everything into subjection to God. That which He taught His disciples to pray, that the Father’s kingdom might come, is that which He accomplishes in power by taking Himself the kingdom. It is not for eternity, it is not even for a long period of time, and those who would tell us that the millennium is in fact but the commencement and threshold, as it were, of His kingdom, which is to continue for a long, perhaps indefinite period after it, mistake altogether the purpose of the kingdom itself. The One who takes it is, in it all, the Minister, as He ever was. He takes it, not for His own glory, but for the Father’s glory. God indeed must honor the One who has glorified Him, and will put every enemy under His feet. That is right and necessary, but His own thought in it is that He must accomplish that which is in His heart; He must be, as Isaiah expresses it, "the Father of eternity." He must bring things into that condition in which they will abide eternally. Having accomplished this, for Him all is accomplished. He desires no kingdom separate from that of the Father; while, on the other hand, the throne will be ever "the throne of God and of the Lamb." It will never cease to be characterized by the One who now sits upon that throne.
Christ has manifested God for all eternity, and that manifestation abides, but the purpose of the separate kingdom is to bring everything into subjection to God as God. He must reign until He puts all His enemies under His feet, not after He has put all enemies under His feet, but until this is perfectly accomplished, -and the last enemy which is abolished is death. Thus, then, the final resurrection, the resurrection anticipative of the judgment of the great white throne, is implied here; and all things thus being put under Him, the Son also Himself becomes "subject to Him that put all things under Him, that God may be all in all." For the perfection of eternity, there can be nothing separate and distinct from this divine rule. The establishment of it according to this perfection is just the glory of Christ to accomplish. The Father’s kingdom is the kingdom of God in this character, where all the subjects are children, and God is seen in that place in which the epistle to the Ephesians characterizes Him, "the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ," thus "the Father of every family, whether in heaven or earth." All these families are drawn near to God in a perfect relation which Christ has established, and to which He, therefore, gives its full and eternal character.
(4) We now come to a passage as to which there is great difficulty in the minds of many, and which has, therefore, furnished occasion for a multitude of opinions. It does not seem really so difficult after all. The apostle, in speaking of the character of the Christian life as a life of trial, of suffering from persecution, gives the endurance of this as a proof of a common faith in the resurrection of the dead. With regard, therefore, he says, to those "who are being baptized for the dead," (or in place of the dead,) "what will they do if the dead rise not at all? Why are they then baptized instead of the dead? and why do we too stand in jeopardy every hour?" An old belief interpreted this as a mere superstitious baptism of the living in place of those who might die unbaptized. This is worth mentioning as being founded upon a mistake so prevalent, that baptism has in some way to do with the future life instead of being entirely for the present. Baptism is the mark of discipleship. It is no introduction to heaven, but simply to the kingdom of heaven, that is, to the company of disciples upon the earth. The thought of baptizing child or adult to carry them safe through to heaven is one of those false ideas which so early tended to build up the Romish system. The sacrament was supposed to minister in some way the grace of which it spoke. All this is destroyed to the root by simply keeping baptism in the place for which God has designed it, -a remission of sins indeed on the part of men, not necessarily on the part of God at all, a salvation in figure, not in fact. It is a New Testament type, and to be treated like all other types, as that which of necessity is infinitely lower than the thing of which it speaks, -yet it had and has its place as a confession of Christ, His title to Lordship over His people; that is, it introduces into the kingdom, and thus we can understand without much difficulty the text here. Christians were dying in how many different ways, and living, as the apostle speaks of himself, in constant view of death, -in that sense, "dying daily." What advantage was it to him, he says, to have fought (as after the manner of men, one might say,) with beasts at Ephesus, as a gladiator in the arena, if there was to be no resurrection of the dead? Yet men crowded into the ranks that were thus being thinned, took their place by baptism among those who were soldiers in this warfare. Was it all a dream, or were they justified in this faith in resurrection? The apostle has already identified the resurrection with Christianity itself. If there were no resurrection of the dead, Christ were not risen, and if Christ were not risen, those who had faith in Him were deceived and were yet in their sins. Thus we are not to think simply of the one point of doctrine, but of that as implying all else. The resurrection spoke, of necessity, with tremendous power, to those facing death all the time. Even the very body that dropped in the struggle would be taken up again, and taken up in a more glorious fashion. To weaken here would be to weaken all the power over sin, all the energy of the Christian life. "Let no one deceive himself," says the apostle. These things are not to be tolerated. They are not to be thought lightly of; for "Evil communications corrupt good manners." He quotes the heathen poet Menander in this last saying. That was the truth, and they must take heed to it. They must come to sobriety in righteousness and not sin. There were amongst them, evidently, some who had not the true knowledge of God. It was their shame that such should be in their midst. We see, in fact, how, in the decline of Christian vigor, the world comes in.
(5) But people would ask questions still. They must know all about the process of resurrection, and he able to predicate the character of it. They must be able to reason it out. "How are the dead raised?" they ask, "and with what sort of body do they come?" If that were meant for objection, after all it was only folly to argue in that way. The common operations of nature were sufficient to disprove their arguments. What did they know of the mystery of the seed they sowed? They sowed it that it might die, yet without that death it would never live according to that for which it was designed. In order to understand what he is saying here, we must have the true idea of human death, that it is not extinction, but separation, dissolution, the tie between spirit and body being dissolved, the body corrupting indeed, as a consequence of this, but the result, the evolution of the new thing in which the seed manifested that for which it was designed. They sowed but bare grain, whether wheat or any other, but they knew quite well that that grain was not to continue grain, but that it would soon be clothed with a body very different from that which it had when sown in the earth. God gave it the body that He had willed for it, and to every seed its own kind of body. Thus, the individuality of what was sown was maintained all through, spite of disorganization. God in it, as in so innumerable cases in nature, has stamped things everywhere with His own stamp of resurrection. Things are in His hand. You may call the process natural because you are so familiar with it, because it is so constantly taking place under your eyes. All the same, God is working in it and through it. That which looks so merely lifeless has, nevertheless, in itself the determination of its future life. No seed produces anything else but its own kind, and yet how different is that which springs out of it from the seed out of which it springs!
Look again, says the apostle, at the various kinds of higher bodies, the flesh of men, the flesh of beasts, and birds and fishes. All these differ from one another. Is it possible to decide as to how these differences take place, to follow the process by which, out of that which seems in the first place so similar, almost identical, these different kinds arise? There are bodies celestial too, and bodies terrestrial. The analogy is less perfect here, and he does not enter into it; only he makes us realize in how many different spheres God works, and how completely He is Master of the creature everywhere. The glory of the celestial is a very different thing from the glory of the terrestrial, and yet each has a distinct glory of its own. If it be only the human body, how marvelously is it made, how perfect is its fitting of part to part! How delicate everywhere the wonderful embroidery by which it is all united together! Good it is indeed to inquire with reverence into all this, and to behold what may be permitted to us of God’s ways and workings; but how foolish to dictate to Him how He shall work, or to question His power to work that which is beyond us, even to understand! The glory of the sun differs from the glory of the moon and the glory of the stars, and "star differeth from star in glory. So is it with the resurrection of the dead." A mistake is often made with regard to the application here. He is not speaking of the difference of degrees of glory among those who are to be raised from the dead. He is speaking of the difference between the body sown and the body raised, as is plain from what follows. It is quite true that there will be different degrees of glory, but that is not his topic here. It is that which is sown in corruption which is raised in incorruption. Here is the difference, a wonderful contrast indeed. That which is sown in dishonor is raised in glory. That which is sown in weakness is raised in power.
We see, as already said, that the apostle has no thought here of the resurrection of the wicked at all. Little is said about this. We have the fact, but Scripture does not enter into details as to that which is merely sorrowful, and a self-perversion from that which God intended as to men. Scripture does not linger on the awful sufferings of the lost, nor enter at large into their condition. For the Christian indeed, it is well-nigh enough to know that those who have refused Christ lose Christ, and that is the most awful penalty, for one who knows Him, that can be conceived. But it is plain that he is speaking here of the resurrection of the saint simply. It is only the saint who is raised in incorruption, in glory, in power. He gives us in what follows a hint at least of the character of the resurrection body. If people ask, "With what body shall they come?" He answers: "It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body and there is a spiritual body." The word "natural" is the same word that we have seen elsewhere in the epistle used with regard to the natural man. The natural man, as we have seen, is the psychical man. We have no better word in English. It is the man governed by his psyche or soul simply; therefore by his instincts, appetites, senses, without the due effect upon him of that which is invisible. So with the natural body here. It is the psychical body, the body fitted to the soul, man being made a living soul. That is his characteristic. He has a spirit, but he is not, as he will be, yet characterized by his spirit. The spirit is under limitations, under constraint, as we may say. It works and manifests itself, but it manifests itself through that which is lower than itself. The very material of our thoughts is drawn from that which is seen and tangible. We learn to apply the terms derived from this to that which is unseen and spiritual, but it is, after all, a laborious process, and, as the apostle has told us but a little while ago, we see, as it were, "by a mirror in an enigma." The discipline is, no doubt, a discipline helpful for us and with eternity in view, but it seems for the present to hind us down very much to earth. This bond will be loosed, says the apostle, not by a loss of the body or of the soul. Spirit, soul and body will always make up the man. God’s original thought for him will never be set aside, but the body will be fitted perfectly, as now it is not, to the uses of the spirit, and this is the meaning of a spiritual body.
We cannot enter into it in detail, clearly, but we can, nevertheless, understand quite what that means. The body of the resurrection is not spiritual in its material, but it is spiritual in its adaptation to the spirit. There will be nothing any more to weigh upon this. Every part of the man will be in complete harmony. Every part will be in its fullest vigor, a help and not a hindrance to the other. He looks back to creation as he says this. The first Adam became a living soul. With a living soul a natural body is in keeping in the sense in which we have taken this natural body. But for us there is now another Adam, a last One, never to be superseded as the first has been. The last Adam is not characteristically a living soul. He is a quickening Spirit. The life which we derive from Him is life of a higher quality than anything that naturally even, when yet unfallen, we could derive from the first Adam. God’s original thought is now capable of being told fully out. "That is not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; afterwards that which is spiritual." The first man, not necessarily as fallen, is of the earth, made of dust; and characterized in that sense by his lowest part; but the second man is of heaven, is characterized by a heavenly nature. Thus, then, as he that was made of dust, such also are they his offspring who are made of dust; and as is the heavenly, Christ, so also are the heavenly ones, His people. The image of the dust-made Adam is that which we have borne. We shall bear the image of the heavenly.
(6) From this the apostle draws the necessary inference, that "flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God." This does not seem to be the same in meaning as if he said, neither flesh nor blood can inherit the kingdom of God. It is of the connection of the two that he is speaking. The blood applies to the present life. It is the vehicle of change. It is that which implies the need of continual sustenance and renewal. A body which needs no renewal cannot need blood to renew it, and thus the Lord speaks of Himself as risen from the dead, not as having flesh and blood, but as having flesh and bones. "A spirit hath not flesh and bones," He says, "as ye see Me have." He has poured out His blood and left it with the earthly life that He had lived. He has entered upon a new sphere, retaining all that makes Him truly man, but not the conditions of the old earthly life. The conditions are changed. Flesh and blood are not suited for the kingdom of God in this sense of it. He is not, of course, in the least implying that there is any evil in flesh and blood. It was that which was the original creation, as to which God pronounced that it was all very good; but it was good for its own sphere, not good for a higher one. It was good for man in the state of discipline for which God, for his own blessing, designed him at the beginning; but it is part, therefore, of the school-existence, as we may say, which, when the schooling is over, is done away. Still less can that which is corruptible inherit incorruption; so that he says, although we shall not all sleep, yet we shall all be changed. The body must, with us also, be transformed from its present condition, not merely putting off mortality or every trace of weakness and disease, but transformed to a higher condition altogether.
How suddenly will this be accomplished! Think of it, "in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump!" The last trump was that which in its military sense stood for departure. It was the signal to march, and that is the thought here. God is taking us into another place, and at the last trump, which sounds for this, we shall be changed into a condition corresponding with that which is implied in it. The trumpet shall sound, the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and the living shall be changed. The "corruptible must put on incorruption." There he is speaking of the dead. "The mortal" (here he speaks of the living) "must put on immortality." Here will be every way the complete triumph over death. "When this corruptible shall have put on incorruption and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then will come to pass the word that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory." Everything here applies, as we see again, to the resurrection or transformation of the saints simply. There is no thought of anything besides.
It is here that at last the triumphant appeal can rise: "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" The apostle answers: "The sting of death is sin." It is that which makes it what it is for man. For the animal it has no such sting as it has for him; but "the strength, too, of sin is the law" -a vigorous statement quite in keeping with the fearlessness of the apostle. Romans has shown us fully in what way we are to interpret this. The law gave sin its strength in two ways; first of all, by there being in it no power of deliverance, but power of condemnation only. Thus sin, according to it, reigned and must reign in death. But again, law gave sin its strength by the very tact that in prohibiting it, it aroused all the evil nature of man to resistance. The doer of his own will refused the curb of that which restrained it, and the result was that the evil under this treatment became not only the more manifest but the more intensely evil, -open rebellion against God his Maker. Law for us is past, with the reign of sin also. At the time that is contemplated here sin will have passed entirely. What a deliverance! "Thanks be" indeed "to God, who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!" The result of our contemplation is to be the turning, in the meantime, with energy, to the work of the Lord that is in our hands. Every shadow has been removed from our path. Only the sure recompense of everything done for Him remains for us. What trial can daunt one who is in the full energy of this? "Be steadfast therefore," says the apostle, "immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord."
F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On vv3, 4, 6, 10, 11, 20, 21 1 Corinthians
1 Corinthians
THE POWER OF THE RESURRECTION
Read full note →
1Co 15:3 - 1Co 15:4.
Christmas day is probably not the true anniversary of the Nativity, but Easter is certainly that of the Resurrection. The season is appropriate. In the climate of Palestine the first fruits of the harvest were ready at the Passover for presentation in the Temple. It was an agricultural as well as a historical festival; and the connection between that aspect of the feast and the Resurrection of our Lord is in the Apostle’s mind when he says, in a subsequent part of this chapter, that Christ is ‘risen from the dead and become the first fruits of them that slept.’
In our colder climate the season is no less appropriate. The ‘life re-orient out of dust’ which shows itself to-day in every bursting leaf-bud and springing flower is Nature’s parable of the spring that awaits man after the winter of death. No doubt, apart from the Resurrection of Jesus, the yearly miracle kindles sad thoughts in mourning hearts, and suggests bitter contrasts to those who sorrow, having no hope, but the grave in the garden has turned every blossom into a smiling prophet of the Resurrection.
And so the season, illuminated by the event, teaches us lessons of hope that ‘we shall not all die.’ Let us turn, then, to the thoughts naturally suggested by the day, and the great fact which it brings to each mind, and confirmed thereafter by the miracle that is being wrought round about us.
I. First, then, in my text, I would have you note the facts of Paul’s gospel.
‘First of all . . . I delivered’ these things. And the ‘first’ not only points to the order of time in the proclamation, but to the order of importance as well. For these initial facts are the fundamental facts, on which all that may follow thereafter is certainly built. Now the first thing that strikes me here is that, whatever else the system unfolded in the New Testament is, it is to begin with a simple record of historical fact. It becomes a philosophy, it becomes a religious system; it is a revelation of God; it is an unveiling of man; it is a body of ethical precepts. It is morals and philosophy and religion all in one; but it is first of all a story of something that took place in the world.
If that be so, there is a lesson for men whose work it is to preach it. Let them never forget that their business is to insist upon the truth of these great, supernatural, all-important, and fundamental facts, the death and the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. They must evolve all the deep meanings that lie in them; and the deeper they dig for their meanings the better. They must open out the endless treasures of consolation and enforce the omnipotent motives of action which are wrapped up in the facts; but howsoever far they may carry their evolving and their application of them, they will neither be faithful to their Lord nor true stewards of their message unless, clear above all other aspects of their work, and underlying all other forms of their ministry, there be the unfaltering proclamation-’first of all,’ midst of all, last of all-’how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,’ and ‘that He was raised again according to the Scriptures.’
Note, too, how this fundamental and original character of the gospel which Paul preached, as a record of facts, makes short work of a great deal that calls itself ‘liberal Christianity’ in these days. We are told that it is quite possible to be a very good Christian man, and reject the supernatural, and turn away with incredulity from the story of the Resurrection. It may be so, but I confess that it puzzles me to understand how, if the fundamental character of Christian teaching be the proclamation of certain facts, a man who does not believe those facts has the right to call himself a Christian.
Note, further, how there is an element of explanation involved in the proclamation of the facts which turns them into a gospel. Mark how ‘that Christ died,’ not Jesus. It is a great truth, that the man, our Brother, Jesus, passed through the common lot, but that is not what Paul says here, though he often says it. What he says is that ‘Christ died.’ Christ is the name of an office, into which is condensed a whole system of truth, declaring that it is He who is the Apex, the Seal, and ultimate Word of all divine revelation. It was the Christ who died; unless it was so, the death of Jesus is no gospel.
‘He died for our sins.’ Now, if the Apostle had only said ‘He died for us,’ that might conceivably have meant that, in a multitude of different ways of example, appeal to our pity and compassion and the like, His death was of use to mankind. But when he says ‘He died for our sins,’ I take leave to think that that expression has no meaning, unless it means that He died as the expiation and sacrifice for men’s sins. I ask you, in what intelligible sense could Christ ‘die for our sins’ unless He died as bearing their punishment and as bearing it for us? And then, finally, ‘He died and rose . . . according to the Scriptures,’ and so fulfilled the divine purposes revealed from of old.
To the fact that a man was crucified outside the gates of Jerusalem, ‘and rose again the third day,’ which is the narrative, there are added these three things-the dignity of the Person, the purpose of His death, the fulfilment of the divine intention manifested from of old. And these three things, as I said, turn the narrative into a Gospel.
So, brethren, let us remember that, without all three of them, the death of Jesus Christ is nothing to us, any more than the death of thousands of sweet and saintly men in the past has been, who may have seen a little more of the supreme goodness and greatness than their fellows, and tried in vain to make purblind eyes participate in their vision. Do you think that these twelve fishermen would ever have shaken the world if they had gone out with the story of the Cross, unless they had carried along with it the commentary which is included in the words which I have emphasised? And do you suppose that the type of Christianity which slurs over the explanation, and so does not know what to do with the facts, will ever do much in the world, or will ever touch men? Let us liberalise our Christianity by all means, but do not let us evaporate it; and evaporate it we surely shall if we falter in saying with Paul, ‘I declare, first of all, that which received,’ how that the death and resurrection were the death and resurrection of the Christ, ‘for our sins, according to the Scriptures.’ These are the facts which make Paul’s gospel.
II. Now I ask you to look, in the second place, at what establishes the facts.
We have here, in this chapter, a statement very much older than our existing written gospels. This epistle is one of the four letters of Paul which nobody that I know of-with some quite insignificant exceptions in modern times-has ever ventured to dispute. It is admittedly the writing of the Apostle, written before the gospels, and in all probability within five-and-twenty years of the date of the Crucifixion. And what do we find alleged by it as the state of things at its date? That the belief in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ was the subject of universal Christian teaching, and was accepted by all the Christian communities. Its evidence to that fact is undeniable; because there was in the early Christian Church a very formidable and large body of bitter antagonists of Paul’s, who would have been only too glad to have convicted him, if they could, of any misrepresentation of the usual notions, or divergence from the usual type of teaching. So we may take it as undeniable that the representation of this chapter is historically true; and that within five-and-twenty years of the death of Jesus Christ every Christian community and every Christian teacher believed in and proclaimed the fact of the Resurrection.
But if that be so, we necessarily are carried a great deal nearer the Cross than five-and-twenty years; and, in fact, there is not, between the moment when Paul penned these words and the day of Pentecost, a single chink in the history where you can insert such a tremendous innovation as the full-fledged belief in a resurrection coming in as something new.
I do not need to dwell at all upon this other thought, that, unless the belief that Jesus Christ had risen from the dead originated at the time of His death, there would never have been a Church at all. Why was it that they did not tumble to pieces? Take the nave out of the wheel and what becomes of the spokes? A dead Christ could never have been the basis of a living Church. If He had not risen from the dead, the story of His disciples would have been the same as that which Gamaliel told the Sanhedrim was the story of all former pseudo-Messiahs such as that man Theudas. ‘He was slain, and as many as followed him were dispersed and came to naught.’ Of course! The existence of the Church demands, as a pre-requisite, the initial belief in the Resurrection. I think, then, that the contemporaneousness of the evidence is sufficiently established.
What about its good faith? I suppose that nobody, nowadays, doubts the veracity of these witnesses. Anybody that knows an honest man when he sees him, anybody that has the least ear for the tone of sincerity and the accent of conviction, must say that they may have been fanatics, they may have been mistaken, but one thing is clear as sunlight, they were not false witnesses for God.
What, then, about their competency? Their simplicity, their ignorance, their slowness to believe, their stupor of surprise when the fact first dawned upon them, which they tell not with any idea of manufacturing evidence in their own favour, but simply as a piece of history, all tend to make us certain that there was no play of a morbid imagination, no hysterical turning of a wish into a fact, on the part of these men. The sort of things which they say that they saw and experienced are such as to make any such supposition altogether absurd. There are long conversations, appearances appealing to more than one sense, appearances followed by withdrawals, sometimes in the morning, sometimes in the evening, sometimes at a distance, as on the mountain, sometimes close by, as in the chamber, to single souls and to multitudes. Fancy five hundred people all at once smitten with the same mistake, imagining that they saw what they did not see! Miracles may be difficult to believe, they are not half so difficult to believe as absurdities. And this modern explanation of the faith in the Resurrection I venture respectfully to designate as absurd.
But there is one other point to which I would like to turn for a moment; and that is that little clause in my text that ‘He was buried.’ Why does Paul introduce that amongst his facts? Possibly in order to affirm the reality of Christ’s death; but I think for another reason. If it be true that Jesus Christ was laid in that sepulchre, a stone’s throw outside the city gate, do you not see what a difficulty that fact puts in the way of disbelief or denial of His Resurrection? If the grave-and it was not a grave, remember, like ours, but a cave, with a stone at the door of it, that anybody could roll away for entrance-if the grave was there, why, in the name of common-sense, did not the rulers put an end to the pestilent heresy by saying, ‘Let us go and see if the body is there’ ?
Modern deniers of the Resurrection may fairly be asked to front this thought-If Jesus Christ’s body was in the sepulchre, how was it possible for belief in the Resurrection to have been originated, or maintained? If His body was not in the grave, what had become of it? If His friends stole it away then they were deceivers of the worst type in preaching a resurrection; and we have already seen that that hypothesis is ridiculous. If His enemies took it away, for which they had no motive, why did they not produce it and say, ‘There is an answer to your nonsense. There is the dead man. Let us hear no more of this absurdity of His having risen from the dead’ ?
‘He died . . . according to the Scriptures, and He was buried.’ And the angels’ word carries the only explanation of the fact which it proclaims, ‘He is not here-He is risen.’
I take leave to say that the Resurrection of Jesus Christ is established by evidence which nobody would ever have thought of doubting unless for the theory that miracles were impossible. The reason for disbelief is not the deficiency of the evidence, but the bias of the judge.
III. And now I have no time to do more than touch the last thought. I have tried to show what establishes the facts. Let me remind you, in a sentence or two, what the facts establish.
I by no means desire to suspend the whole of the evidence for Christianity on the testimony of the eyewitnesses to the Resurrection. There are a great many other ways of establishing the truth of the Gospel besides that, upon which I do not need to dwell now. But, taking this one specific ground which my text suggests, what do the facts thus established prove?
Well, the first point to which I would refer, and on which I should like to enlarge, if I had time, is the bearing of Christ’s Resurrection on the acceptance of the miraculous. We hear a great deal about the impossibility of miracle and the like. It upsets the certainty and fixedness of the order of things, and so forth, and so forth. Jesus Christ has risen from the dead; and that opens a door wide enough to admit all the rest of the Gospel miracles. It is of no use paring down the supernatural in Christianity, in order to meet the prejudices of a quasi-scientific scepticism, unless you are prepared to go the whole length, and give up the Resurrection. There is the turning point. The question is, Do you believe that Jesus Christ rose from the dead, or do you not? If your objections to the supernatural are valid, then Christ is not risen from the dead; and you must face the consequences of that. If He is risen from the dead, then you must cease all your talk about the impossibility of miracle, and be willing to accept a supernatural revelation as God’s way of making Himself known to man.
But, further, let me remind you of the bearing of the Resurrection upon Christ’s work and claims. If He be lying in some forgotten grave, and if all that fair thought of His having burst the bands of death is a blunder, then there was nothing in His death that had the least bearing upon men’s sin, and it is no more to me than the deaths of thousands in the past. But if He is risen from the dead, then the Resurrection casts back a light upon the Cross, and we understand that His death is the life of the world, and that ‘by His stripes we are healed.’
But, further, remember what He said about Himself when He was in the world-how He claimed to be the Son of God; how He demanded absolute obedience, implicit trust, supreme love, how He identified faith in Himself with faith in God-and consider the Resurrection as bearing on the reception or rejection of these tremendous claims. It seems to me that we are brought sharp up to this alternative-Jesus Christ rose from the dead, and was declared by the Resurrection to be the Son of God with power; or Jesus Christ has not risen from the dead-and what then? Then He was either deceiver or deceived, and in either case has no right to my reverence and my love. We may be thankful that men are illogical, and that many who reject the Resurrection retain reverence, genuine and deep, for Jesus Christ. But whether they have any right to do so is another matter. I confess for myself that, if I did not believe that Jesus Christ had risen from the dead, I should find it very hard to accept, as an example of conduct, or as religious teacher, a man who had made such great claims as He did, and had asked from me what He asked. It seems to me that He is either a great deal more, or a great deal less, than a beautiful saintly soul. If He rose from the dead He is much more; if He did not, I am afraid to say how much less He is.
And, finally, the bearing of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ upon our own hopes of the future may be suggested. It teaches us that life has nothing to do with organisation, but persists apart from the body. It teaches us that a man may pass from death and be unaltered in the substance of his being; and it teaches us that the earthly house of our tabernacle may be fashioned like unto the glorious house in which He dwells now at the right hand of God. There is no other absolute proof of immortality than the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.
If we accept with all our hearts and minds Paul’s Gospel in its fundamental facts, we need not fear to die, because He has died, and by dying has been the death of death. We need not doubt that we shall live again, because He was dead and is alive for ever more. This Samson has carried away the gates on His strong shoulders, and death is no more a dungeon but a passage. If we rest ourselves upon Him, then we can take up, for ourselves and for all that are dear to us and have gone before us, the triumphant song, ‘O Death, where is thy sting?’ ‘Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain On v1 (f) The Fact and the Doctrine of the Resurrection…
(f) The Fact and the Doctrine of the Resurrection of the Dead
Some Corinthians disbelieved in the resurrection of the dead—not, apparently, in Christ's Resurrection, though St. Paul felt this would soon follow, but in their own future resurrection. This occasioned him to write this grand chapter, which has cheered the hearts of so many mourners, read, as the greater part of it is, at the burial of the dead. He first (1Co_15:1-11) repeats the historical evidence for Christ's Resurrection, a truth taught by all Christian teachers to all their converts; then shows (1Co_15:12-19) that the denial of the resurrection of the dead leads logically to the denial of Christ's Resurrection, thus overthrowing the whole Christian faith. He next (1Co_15:20-28) speaks of the consequences of Christ's Resurrection; and (1Co_15:29-34) the influence of the hope of resurrection upon Christian life and practice.
Read full note →
He then throws light on the nature of the resurrection-body (1Co_15:35-44), by using the analogy of seed and plant, and reminding his readers of the differences now existing between various bodies. So the resurrection-body will spring from the earthly one, but be far more glorious, a spiritual body, not like Adam's earthly body, but like Christ's glorified one (1Co_15:45-49). The bodies of the living (1Co_15:50-52) will experience a similar change. This resurrection change is the final victory over sin and death (1Co_15:53-58). The Apostle's teaching is to be distinguished from the doctrine of the immortality of the soul taught by the great heathen thinkers like Socrates and Plato. It includes that doctrine, but adds to it the doctrine of the redemption of the body (Rom_8:23); and bases the whole doctrine of the resurrection-life upon the fact that Christ is risen from the dead.
The doctrine of resurrection and future life was not clearly revealed in OT. times. Death was commonly regarded not as the end of all things, but as followed by a shadowy existence, not worth calling a life, cut off from all its joys and even from God Himself (Psa_6:5; Psa_88:5, Psa_88:12; Isa_38:18). So the rewards and punishments set before Israel in the Law were temporal ones (Deuteronomy 28). But God gradually led His people on to clearer light. (1) Their consciousness of communion with God was so strong that they felt death could not end it (Psa_73:24-26). (2) They felt a future life was required to vindicate God's justice. Isaiah (Isa_26:19) speaks of a national resurrection (cp. Ezekiel 37); Daniel (Dan_12:2) of an individual one. The hope gradually grew stronger; in our Lord's day the Pharisees held to it firmly, though the Sadducees denied it (2 Maccabees and the Psalms of Solomon, probably written by Pharisees about 45 b.c., show the prevalence of this hope). But our Lord's Resurrection changed what was previously only partially revealed into a 'sure and certain hope': cp. 2Ti_1:10. Not only did it (1) prove the truth of His claim to be the Son of God (Rom_1:4), and (2) assure men that His sacrifice had been accepted (Rom_4:25); it is (3) appealed to by St. Paul as a call to Christians, in virtue of their mystical union with Christ, to live no longer to sin, but to God (Rom_6:4, etc.); and (4) it is the pledge that we too shall rise again (here, and 2Co_4:14; Rom_8:11, etc.). And what we gather as to the nature of Christ's resurrection-body (Luke 24; John 20) throws light upon the change in ours, which will be conformed to the body of His glory (Php_3:21 RV). It was a real body, bearing the marks of His former 'natural' body (Joh_20:27); capable of receiving food (Luk_24:43), and of being recognised by those who had formerly known Him, though apparently only when He willed to be recognised: cp. Luk_24:15-16, Luk_24:31. Yet it could be transported mysteriously from place to place, passing even through the closed doors. St. Paul uses the analogy of plant and seed to explain the relation of the resurrection-body to the present one. We may infer that the glorified body will have some relation to the natural body, thus preserving personal identity; but will not be composed of the identical material particles of the body laid to rest; it will be free from its limitations and imperfections, a fit abode for the perfected spirit.
i-ii. The historical evidence for Christ's Resurrection. St. Paul reminds his converts of his original teaching at Corinth—how the Resurrection was one of the essentials of his gospel message. As at Athens (Act_17:18) he preached 'Jesus and the Resurrection,' and their position as Christians rests upon their adherence to this truth. His great message to them was Christ's atoning death, His burial, and His return from the grave. He mentions five separate appearances of Christ after His Resurrection, and finally mentions the Lord's appearance to himself. He reminds them that, although unworthy to be called an Apostle on account of His former persecution of the Church, God's grace has made him a true Apostle. And he concludes by pointing out that in the matter of proclaiming the Resurrection of Christ he and the other Apostles are at one.
2. Are saved] i.e. are in the way of salvation (see on 1Co_1:18), by faith in the crucified and risen Saviour. Keep in memory] RV 'hold fast.'
Have believed (RV 'believed,' i.e. at your conversion and baptism) in vain] i.e. without consideration, and so without stability.
3. I delivered.. which I received] see on 1Co_11:2, 1Co_11:23. Probably he 'received' the accounts of these appearances of the risen Lord on his visit to Jerusalem (Act_9:27-28; Gal_1:18-19), when he saw Peter and James. First of all] As most important. For our sins] i.e. to atone for them.
According to the scriptures] Not by accident, but in fulfilment of God's plan: cp. Isaiah 53; Luk_24:44-46.
4. Buried] This proves the reality of both Death and Resurrection.
5. He was seen] RV 'appeared to.' Not a complete list. Mary Magdalene, e.g., and the two at Emmaus (Luke 24) are omitted. He mentions those personally known to himself, and whose authority would have weight at Corinth.
Cephas, then of the twelve] Luk_24:33-36.
6. Above five hundred brethren at once] probably on the mountain in Galilee (Mat_28:16-17). Some are fallen asleep] i.e. dead. Twenty-five years at least had elapsed. Sleep is used of death often in OT. (e.g. 1Ki_2:10), but Christ, by using it of those He was about to restore to life (Mat_9:24; Joh_11:11-13), and by His own Resurrection, which is the assurance of ours, has given new meaning to it, viz. not merely cessation of the work of life, but a sleep from which we shall awake to new life.
7. James] The Lord's brother (Gal_1:19; Act_15:13). This appearance is not mentioned in the Gospels.
All the apostles] probably just before the Ascension, Act_1:4.
The present passage is the oldest account of the appearances of the risen Lord, written years before any of our Gospels, and only about twenty-five years after the events, while hundreds of witnesses were still living. It is thus a most valuable piece of evidence as to the certainty of our Lord's Resurrection, which would remain firmly attested even if the authenticity of our Gospels were denied.
8. Of me also] on the road to Damascus, at his conversion (Acts 9). Born out of due time] Suddenly, without the gradual training of the rest; as inferior as an immature birth is to a mature one.
9. The least of the apostles] cp. 1Ti_1:12-16.
10. I am what I am] i.e. an Apostle. Not in vain] i.e. was justified by its results. His apostolic work, as well as his apostleship itself, was due to the grace of God.
11. Or they] i.e. the other Apostles; Christ's Resurrection was taught by all Christian preachers, accepted by all believers.
12-19. Denial of the resurrection of the dead logically involves the denial of Christ's Resurrection, which would overthrow the whole Christian Faith. The belief in the resurrection of the dead is bound up with the Resurrection of Christ. But His Resurrection shows that resurrection is not an impossibility, and as He is Son of man, 'the spiritual head of humanity,' His Resurrection does not stand by itself; it is man's resurrection also. The Corinthians accepted the truth of the Resurrection of Christ, and the Apostle asks them how they can logically deny the truth of the resurrection of the dead. He then proceeds to establish the truth of the resurrection of the dead by the method of indirect proof, showing the awful consequences which would result from its denial. The first of these impossible consequences is that Christ is not risen; another is that they are still unforgiven sinners, their faith being useless; a third is that the Apostles are proclaiming falsehoods; and a fourth is that their beloved dead are hopelessly lost to them. He concludes, therefore, that if their hope in Christ has reference only to the present life they are in a pitiable state, for they are cherishing a mere delusion, if there be no truth in the resurrection of the dead.
12. How say some among you, etc.] Their unbelief probably sprang from the philosophical idea that the matter was essentially evil, so that the soul would be better off when set free from the body; thus the doctrine of the Resurrection was to them a needless difficulty: cp. also 2Ti_2:17. The Corinthians, however, accepted the Resurrection of Christ as a fact, and the Apostle argues that they cannot logically deny the fact of the resurrection of the dead, as Christ's Resurrection is a particular case of it.
13. Then is Christ not risen] For if a thing be altogether impossible, there cannot be even one instance of it. In this and the following vv. (see summary) the Apostle shows the logical consequences of disbelief in the resurrection, or, rather, the consequences that would follow were there no resurrection. These consequences, he concludes, are unthinkable or absurd, and, therefore, he argues that the premises which produce them are false.
14. Vain] i.e. there is nothing in it.
15. False witnesses] not merely empty talkers, but positive liars. No thoughtful sceptic now-a-days regards the Apostles as impostors. Their character, as well as their sufferings, forbids this; but he would say they were victims of a mistake—merely imagined they saw the risen Lord. But the idea of this never enters St. Paul's mind; it was to him perfectly impossible that they could have been mistaken.
17. Yet in your sins] not justified from them (Rom_2:25); unforgiven, unrenewed. 'Christ's Resurrection is the seal of our justification and the spring of our sanctification' (Findlay). If there be no resurrection, of what avail are forgiveness and salvation?
18. They also which are fallen asleep] The Apostle here argues from the natural affections of the human heart. It is impossible to believe that those who died in faith in Christ perished utterly. The inference is: 'But we are sure these things are not so; therefore Christ has risen; therefore the resurrection is possible.' He argues from Christian experience.
19. If in this life only we have hope in Christ] If our hope in Him does not reach beyond this life, we are most miserable (RV 'pitiable'), because the hope of future joy and blessing which inspires our toils and sufferings is a mere delusion.
20-28. The fact and the consequences of Christ's Resurrection. Christ is risen as the firstfruits of those who sleep. As death came on all through Adam, so resurrection-life will come to all through Him. But this will only be at His coming, which will be followed by His handing over the Mediatorial Kingdom to the Father, now that all things, even death itself, have been subjected to Him.
20. The firstfruits] The first sheaf accepted by God is a pledge of the coming harvest: cp. Lev_23:10-11;
21, 22. The Apostle, as in Romans 5, contrasts Adam, from whom by natural descent we all derive a corrupt nature, with Christ the second Adam, the Son of man, our spiritual head, by union with whom we receive spiritual life. All.. all] The first 'all' means, of course, all mankind. The second may mean the same, in which case shall be made alive simply refers to resurrection, whether to life or to judgment (Joh_5:28-29 cp. Dan_12:2; Act_24:15). But perhaps more probably it means only, 'all those who are Christ's' (1Co_15:23), who shall enjoy the 'resurrection of life.' Cp. 1Co_15:23, 'Christ the firstfruits: then they that are Christ's.'
23. In his own order] i.e. rank, or place. Christ comes first, the rest long after.
24. Then cometh the end] Christ's Advent and the Resurrection conclude this dispensation. When he shall have delivered up the kingdom] The purpose of the Incarnation will have been accomplished; Christ will have recovered for His Father the dominion over all things. 'This is no ceasing of Christ's rule, but the inauguration of God's eternal kingdom'(Findlay). All rule] i.e. every opposing power.
25. He must reign] according to prophecy (Psa_110:1).
26. The last enemy] 'The first enemy of Christ and of Christians is the devil, who was conquered by Christ on the Cross; the second is sin, which through the grace of Christ is conquered by Christians in this life; the third is death, which, as the last of all, will be conquered at the Resurrection' (quoted by Sadler).
27. For he (God) hath put all things under his (Christ's) feet] cp. Psa_8:6; Heb_2:8; Php_2:9-11. The Father has bestowed upon Him as Son of man dominion over the whole universe. When he saith, etc.] RM 'when he shall have said, All things are put in subjection (evidently excepting him that did subject all things unto him), when, I say, all things,' etc.; i.e. when Christ announces His complete victory, which is no infringement of God's sovereignty.
28. Then shall the Son also himself be subject] see on 1Co_15:24. The Son will continue to be subordinate to the Father, as now. This is involved in the very idea of Sonship: cp. 1Co_3:23; 1Co_11:3. That God may be all in all] The universe, with all it comprises, will wholly answer to God's will and reflect His mind.
29-34. The practical effects of the doctrine of the Resurrection. The Resurrection alone gives an adequate motive for (a) baptism for the dead; (b) running risk of death in Christian work; or indeed (c) abstaining from a life of self-indulgence.
29. Baptized for the dead] a very obscure allusion. There was somewhat later a practice, among certain sects of vicarious baptism; when a man died unbaptised, a friend would receive baptism in his stead. This may have already existed and be meant here. St. Paul mentions 'baptism for the dead,' without expressing his approval; but some think the practice sprang up later from a perversion of this passage. Two other views seem possible. (1) That of St. Chrysostom: 'Before baptism we confess our faith in “the resurrection of the dead,” and are baptised in hope of this resurrection.' (2) That of Godet, who regards the baptism as the baptism of suffering, the baptism with which those were baptised who have by martyrdom entered the Church invisible. But it can scarcely be denied that, as Dr. Dods says, 'the plain meaning of the words seems to point to a vicarious baptism, in which a living friend received baptism for a person who had died without baptism.'
31. By your rejoicing] RV 'by that glorying in you,' i.e. as surely as I am proud of you: cp. 1Th_2:19-20; I die daily] am daily in danger of death, and my daily sufferings must end in it: cp. 2Co_11:23.
32. After the manner of men] i.e. from ordinary human motives, for applause or money; and with no hope of reward in the resurrection life. I have fought with beasts] probably a strong metaphor (cp. 1Co_4:9) for some plot of the Jews or attack of the mob. His Roman citizenship and influential friends (Act_19:31) would have saved him from actually having to fight wild beasts in the theatre; and this, if it had really happened, would probably have been specially mentioned (2Co_11:23).
If the dead rise not] RV takes this with the next sentence. Let us eat and drink] Isa_22:13. The natural though not the necessary consequence of disbelief in a future life is to care only for self-gratification.
33, 34. Do not associate with those who deny this vital truth. You are in great danger of being corrupted by them. Be aroused to a sense of your condition, and cease from sin. I trust that my words will shame you out of your folly.
33. Evil communications] RV 'evil company,' a quotation from a Greek poet, Menander, warning the Corinthians against the influence of heathen ideas about the future life. The line had probably in St. Paul's day become a proverb, as it is still.
34. Some have not the knowledge of God] hence both unbelief in resurrection, and low moral tone. To your shame] i.e. to shame you; for you ought to surpass the heathen.
35-44. The nature of the Resurrection and the Resurrection body. St. Paul here uses several illustrations of (a) the possibility (b) the nature of the resurrection change. The seed sown in the ground decays, but gives birth to a new plant. So from the body laid in the grave a nobler one will arise. There are in the world many varieties of animal life, each suited to its surroundings, and, moreover, bodies of heavenly beings as well as earthly far more glorious than they. Moreover, sun, moon, and various stars have different degrees of brightness. So our resurrection body will be far more glorious, adapted to its surroundings. Our body sown in corruption, dishonour, weakness—a mere natural body—will be raised in incorruption, honour, power—a spiritual body: see intro. to this c.
36. Thou fool] RV 'thou foolish one.' The Apostle is somewhat impatient of objections to his doctrine of the Resurrection, which the analogies of nature readily refute. That which] i.e. the seed which. Is not quickened, except it die] cp. Joh_12:24. In nature, death leads to higher life.
37. Not that body that shall be, but bare (RV 'a bare') grain] The actual seed sown does not reappear, but something higher, a complete plant, springs from it.
38. His own body] RV 'a body of its own,' i.e. a plant of the same kind as the seed.
39. There are many different forms of animal life; so there may be of human life.
40. Celestial bodies] probably this refers to angels, not to sun and moon, etc. But this leads him in the next v. to speak of degrees of glory. Bodies terrestrial] i.e. creatures of the earth.
41. One star differeth] The primary meaning is the literal one. Some stars are brighter than others. There are great differences between things of the same class; so also between the natural and the spiritual body.
44. A natural body] (cp. 1Co_2:14, 'the natural man') endowed with natural life and fitted for an earthly existence. The spiritual body will be filled with spiritual life and adapted for a spiritual existence. The word 'natural' is literally 'soulish,' and suggests the possession of an ordinary human personality; while the word 'spiritual' suggests a relation to the divine. Man possesses the spiritual life through his union with Christ, and the Apostle asserts that there is a spiritual body fitted for the requirements of this spiritual life, and that he will come into possession of it in the resurrection life
45-49. Our bodies will be like Christ's, no longer like Adam's. Adam, made from the earth, became 'a living soul'; Christ, who is from heaven, is constituted a life-giving Spirit. We belong to both, and so share the nature of both; we have borne the image of the earthly man, we shall bear that of the heavenly Man.
45. Was made a living soul] (Gen_2:7). Life was given to him, while Christ is the Giver of life. The last Adam was made] RV 'became' (i.e. at His Resurrection). A quickening (RV 'lifegiving') spirit] bestowing resurrection as well as spiritual life: cp. Joh_5:21-29; Joh_11:25, Joh_11:26. The last Adam] the new Head of the human race: cp. Joh_11:21-22, Romans 5.
47. Of the earth, earthy] hence subject to decay and death: cp. Gen_3:19, 'out of it' (the ground) 'wast thou taken; for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.' From heaven] and so, spiritual and eternal.
49. Have borne the image] i.e. have been made like. Our present body is Like Adam's, but it will be conformed to the body of Christ's glory (Php_3:21).
50-53. The necessity of this change, in which the living will share. Our earthly perishable nature cannot take possession of God's imperishable kingdom. All men will not pass through death, but all alike will be instantaneously transformed. Our mortal nature must clothe itself with immortality.
50. Flesh and blood] i.e. human nature in its present material and perishable condition. Inherit] take possession of; have rightful entrance upon. The argument is, that such a spiritual body as he has been speaking of is absolutely necessary in the kingdom of God.
51. Not all sleep] for some will be living when Christ comes again.
52. At the last trump] cp. Mat_24:31; 1Th_4:16;—a signal which all will hear: cp. also Exo_19:18. We] i.e. those still living; the quick.
Shall be changed] The Apostle hoped Christ would return in his lifetime.
53. This mortal (body) must put on immortality] cp. 2Co_5:1-5.
54-58. The Resurrection is the final triumph over sin and death. When this glorious body has been received, then will be the end of death and the grave. Sin, too, shall have disappeared, and the Law will be no longer necessary. Over all God gives us the victory through Christ. Let us therefore praise Him, and seek to abound in His work, which is not in vain if done in Christ.
54, 55. Death is swallowed up, etc.] Isa_25:8. O death, where is thy sting, etc.] from Hos_13:14.
56. The sting of death is sin] which brought death into the world (Rom_5:12), and gives it its bitterness: cp. Heb_2:14, Heb_2:16. And the strength of sin is the law] which reveals sin and, indeed, 'intensifies its power,' without giving power to overcome it (Rom_7:7-13; Rom_8:2, Rom_8:8). But God giveth us the victory over sin now (Rom_8:1-2), and hereafter over death (Rom_8:11).
Through our Lord] because Christ has overcome sin, and through faith in Him we, inspired by His Spirit, overcome it also.
58. Unmoveable] not shaken by false teaching. Not in vain] contrast 1Co_15:16-19. In the Lord] Christ is regarded as the atmosphere, so to speak, in which their work is done. It is inspired by Him and done for Hi sake: cp. 1Co_9:1.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain On vv1–32 [The response in this section also is rather to…
[The response in this section also is rather to a condition of the church than to a question. In the eyes of the Greeks the body was the prison-house of the soul, and death was a release of the soul from its captivity. The resurrection of the body, therefore, was regarded by them as a calamity rather than as a blessing, and so contrary to all sound philosophy as to excite ridicule ( Act_17:32 ). While Paul was present in Corinth, his firm faith, full understanding, and clear teaching, had held the church firmly to the truth; but in his absence the church had grown forgetful of the precise nature of his teaching, and, attempting to harmonize the gospel doctrine of a resurrection with the theories of their own learned teachers, the Greek Christians of Corinth had many of them come to look upon the resurrection promised to Christians as a mere resurrection of the soul, and hence as one which, as to the dead, was already past ( 2Ti_2:18 ). They flatly denied the possibility of a bodily resurrection. The chapter before us is a restatement of the truth as opposed to this error, and a general discussion of the doctrine of a resurrection tending to remove all the erroneous views which the Greeks held with regard to it. This chapter has been read as an antidote to the pain of death at millions of funerals.] Now I make known unto you, brethren, the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye received, wherein also ye stand ,
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On vv2, 3, 5, 8, 17, 22, 24, 29 (See Scofield "Rom 1:16").
saved
(See Scofield "Rom 1:16").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain On v1 1. Resurrection and the Hope of the Church.
III. RESURRECTION AND THE HOPE OF THE CHURCH AND CONCLUSION:
CHAPTERS 15-16
Read full note →
1. Resurrection and the Hope of the Church.
CHAPTER 15
1. The Gospel and the Resurrection of Christ. (1Co 15:1-11.)
2. If Christ were not raised--then what? (1Co 15:12-19.)
3. Christ the Firstfruits and what follows. (1Co 15:20-28.)
4. Further practical arguments about Resurrection. (1Co 15:29-34.)
5. Concerning the Resurrection of the Body. (1Co 15:35-49.)
6. The Coming of the Lord and the Victory. (1Co 15:50-58.)
The third section lifts us higher and brings us to the summit of this Epistle. We have seen the church in relation to the world, the church as the body of Christ and now we see the consummation, the destiny of the church in resurrection glory. From this chapter we learn that some members of the Corinthian church said “there is no resurrection of the dead” ((1Co 15:12). The denial of this fundamental doctrine of the faith brought forth this blessed portion of the Epistle concerning resurrection and the coming of the Lord.
The first thing mentioned in opening up this subject is the gospel which Paul had preached to the Corinthians, which they had received and wherein they stood. This is the order: The preaching of the Gospel, the good news, its reception by faith, followed by the standing in salvation and the enjoyment of it. By this Gospel is salvation as it is so fully revealed in the Epistle to the Romans. The Apostle Paul had delivered unto them, which he himself had received from the Lord (Gal 1:11-19). The three great facts according to the Scriptures (the Old Testament Scriptures) are: (1) Christ died for our sins. The death of Christ, the cross and the mighty work accomplished there, is the great foundation. The entire Old Testament revealed in many ways this fundamental fact without which there would be and could be no redemption. (2.) He was buried. He expired as to the body on the cross. The death of Christ was real and not a deception. And His burial also has a meaning in the Gospel (Rom 6:4). And the third great fact of the gospel, “He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.” This is the great truth of this chapter, a truth, if denied, must result in the complete collapse of the gospel. And His resurrection had been foretold by Himself as well as by the Scriptures. (See Gen 22:4 and Heb 11:17-19; Psa 16:1-11). This great truth, the enemy has always hated. The lying inventions of the Jews are well known to every reader of the Gospel (Mat 28:11-15). In Corinth this truth was being denied, and in our own days those who deny the physical resurrection of the Lord Jesus are ever on the increase in the professing church. They occupy leading pulpits and are prominent in institutions of learning.
The Apostle brings forth a number of witnesses, but he does not mention the women who play such an important part in the resurrection account of the Gospel. He gives only a number of witnesses, all men, who furnish an unanswerable evidence. Unbelievers have often attempted to trace the belief in the resurrection of our Lord to the women. Cephas is mentioned first. “But go your way, tell His disciples and Peter,” had been the angelic instruction on the resurrection morning. And Peter who had so shamefully denied Him had seen the risen One. “The Lord is risen indeed and hath appeared unto Simon” (Luk 24:34). On the day of Pentecost he became the wonderful witness of the risen Christ. That He appeared first to Simon Peter shows His infinite grace. Then He was seen of the twelve. Luk 24:36-48 speaks of the eleven; the twelfth had gone to his awful place. But the passage in Luke also informs us that others were with them when the Lord appeared. The eleven were gathered together, and those that were with them. (Luk 24:33). Probably Matthias, the one added to the Apostolate (Act 1:26), was in that company. “After that He was seen of above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto the present, but some are fallen asleep.” This was probably in Galilee. And how could such a large number of men be deceived together, or concoct a falsehood? It is an impossibility. Sooner or later, if they had all agreed to deceive the world, the fraud would have been discovered. He was also seen by James and by all the Apostles. Last of all he was seen by the Apostle Paul on the road to Damascus, where as the blind persecutor of the church, the chief of sinners, He beheld Him in the glory light. He was like one born out of due season. He was an untimely birth. He was in his experience a type of the nation to which he belonged. As he saw Christ in glory so will the remnant of Israel behold Him at the time of His second coming. He was therefore a firstfruit of the nation.
(The correct meaning of the Greek word “ektroma” seems to point to a child born from a dead mother, by what is called the Caesarian operation. The dead Jewish system gave birth to the chosen vessel who was to become what Israel should have been, and yet will be, when the mystery of the present dispensation is complete.--Rom 11:25-27).
The Apostle Paul is one of the greatest witnesses to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. The argument which follows ((1Co 15:12-19) is so clear and powerful that no comment is needed. If Christ is not risen from the dead, if it were true what some said in Corinth “there is no resurrection of the dead”--then what? The answer is fearful, for it strips the Christian of everything. “Your faith is vain; you are yet in your sins; your loved ones who died in Christ are perished, gone forever; we are of all men most miserable.” And into this terrible pit the men who deny this fundamental doctrine are leading those who accept this damnable heresy (2Pe 2:1).
But triumphant is the uncontrovertible fact, “Christ is risen from among the dead”; and more than that, “He is become the firstfruit of them that slept.” As He was raised, not as we have it in the authorized version “from the dead,” but “from among the dead,” so will there be in the future an “out-resurrection from among the dead,” which is the first resurrection of all those who are Christ’s. A general resurrection is no more taught in the Bible than a general judgment. By man came death (the first Adam) by man also is the resurrection of the dead (by the last Adam, Christ). (1Co 15:22 does not teach a universal salvation. Those who will be made alive are those who are “in Christ.” But only such are in Christ, who have believed on Him and were born again.
(1Co 15:20-28, unfold the successive stages in the accomplishment of God’s purposes. (1) The Resurrection of Christ, then after the purpose of the present age is accomplished. (2) His second coming ((1Co 15:23). (3) The Resurrection of those who belong to Him. (4) The overthrow of all His enemies and the establishment of His kingly and glorious rule over the earth. (5) His delivering up the Kingdom to God that God may be all in all.
(1Co 15:29-34 continues the reasoning on the fatal results if there were no resurrection. (1Co 15:29 connects with (1Co 15:19 and what is between, (1Co 15:20-28, form a parenthesis. What then is the value of Christian suffering, self-denial, trial and persecution if there were no resurrection? This connection with the previous argument helps us to understand the much disputed statement “else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? Why are they then baptized for the dead?” It is said that some thirty different interpretations of this statement are in existence, most of them so fanciful and strained that they merit no further mention. Some say it meant those who were about to be baptized and others believe it has a meaning concerning those who had relatives who had died unbaptized. There is no need of inventing these theories. If we look at it in the most simple way the difficulty disappears. They had been baptized and taken the place as being dead with Christ. In this sense they had been baptized for the dead. But if the dead rise not, then this ordinance, which is so closely connected in a symbolical way with death and resurrection, has no meaning and value at all.
“Baptized, then, for the dead is to become a Christian with the view fixed on those who have fallen asleep in Christ, and particularly as being slain for Him, taking one’s portion with the dead, yea, with the dead Christ; it is the very meaning of baptism (Rom 6:1-23). How senseless if they do not rise! As in 1Th 4:1-18, the subject, while speaking of all Christians, is looked at in the same way. The word translated ‘for’ is frequently used in these epistles for ‘in view of,’ ‘with reference to.’“ (Synopsis of the Bible)
Then those who had been affected by these doubts about resurrection asked questions concerning the resurrection of the body and the process of resurrection. How are the dead raised? And with what body do they come? But he brands as folly their doubting reasonings. There are of course, difficulties for reason but none for faith. If God’s omnipotent power is admitted and believed every difficulty vanishes. Their difficulties and objections were not of faith. Nature and God’s works give abundant evidence of the resurrection of the body. There will be in resurrection a continuity of identity.
“They sowed but bare grain, whether wheat or any other, but they knew quite well that that grain was not to continue grain, but that it would soon be clothed with a body very different from that which it had when sown in the earth. God gave it the body that He had willed for it, and to every seed its own kind of body. Thus, the individuality of what was sown was maintained all through, in spite of disorganization. God in it, as in innumerable cases in nature, has stamped things everywhere with His own stamp of resurrection. Things are in His hand. You may call the process natural because you are so familiar with it, because it is so constantly taking place under your eyes. All the same, God is working in it and through it.
“And what advantage would it have, if there were no resurrection, by dying daily, denying self, passing through all kinds of trials, suffering persecution and fighting, as Paul had done at Ephesus, with wild beasts? If there were no resurrection, then man is like the beast: let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. That which looks so merely lifeless has, nevertheless, in itself the determination of its future life. No seed produces anything else, but its own kind, and yet how different is that which springs out of it from the seed out of which it springs!” (Numerical Bible)
True from all this we learn that the resurrection of the same body is promised and while its identity is preserved it will be a different body at the same time. So then is the resurrection of the dead.
(All through this resurrection chapter only the resurrection of believers is in view. Nothing is said about the resurrection of the wicked dead. They too will be raised as to the body to exist forever in the dreadful condition of eternal punishment.)
It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption. It is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. What kind of a body will it be, this spiritual body? Scripture gives the answer. “Who shall change our body of humiliation that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body, according to the working whereby He is able even to subdue all things unto Himself” (Php 3:21). We shall be like Him for we shall see Him as He is.
Now our blessed Lord was not raised from the dead with an ethereal, airy body. His was a real human body of flesh and bones. He ate in the presence of His disciples; He was able to take food, though He needed none. He was capable of passing through closed doors and was in nowise limited by earthly conditions, such as space. And even so will be the spiritual body of the risen believers. Not a spirit phantom, but a spiritual body in its adaptation to the spirit. As we have now a natural body which is suited for an earth-life, so the believer shall have a body suited for a glory-life. We shall be like Him to be with Him in eternal glory and in these wonderful bodies we shall rule and reign with Him.
“Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption” ((1Co 15:50). It simply means that man as he is here below cannot inherit God’s kingdom. It does not mean the kingdom which will some day be established on earth in which converted Israel and converted nations will be the subjects. It means the kingdom of God on the other side of death. The kingdom on earth for a thousand years will be an earthly thing; the kingdom mentioned in this verse is the kingdom of God in glory.
“The blood applies to the present life. It is the vehicle of change. It is that which implies the need of continual sustenance and renewal. A body which needs no renewal cannot need blood to renew it, and thus the Lord speaks of Himself as risen from the dead, not as having flesh and blood, but as having flesh and bones. “A spirit hath not flesh and bones,” He says, “as ye see Me have.” He has poured out His blood and left it with the earthly life that He had lived. He has entered upon a new sphere, retaining all that makes Him truly man, but not the conditions of the old earthly life. The conditions are changed. Flesh and blood are not suited for the kingdom of God in this sense of it. He is not, of course, in the least implying that there is any evil in flesh and blood.”
And what a change it will be for God’s redeemed people to receive these wonderful bodies of glory and enter into the kingdom of God in glory! And when will it come? Paul writes of a mystery.
(The teachers who say that there is no such thing as a Coming of the Lord for His Saints may well pause at this word “mystery.” They teach that this coming here, when the dead shall be raised and living believers shall be changed, is the visible Coming of Christ at the end of the great tribulation. But this visible Coming is the revelation which is found in the entire Old Testament prophetic Word. It was and is not a mystery. But the Coming of the Lord for His Saints, who are to be caught up in clouds to meet Him in the air, is a new Revelation, unknown in former ages.)
We shall not all sleep (die), but we shall be changed. It will be a sudden thing. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye. It will be at the last trump. This trumpet has nothing whatever to do with the seventh trumpet in Revelation. Before any trumpet has sounded, before the Lamb of God, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, opens the seals, He comes for His Saints “in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye.” The trumpet is a military term. The first trumpet bade the armies to arise and be ready; the last trumpet commanded them to depart, it was the signal to march. When that shout (1Th 4:13-18) comes from the air and He comes for His Saints, the dead (the dead in Christ, only those who believed) will be raised incorruptible. And “we shall be changed.” The Apostle did not write “they” shall be changed. He expected not death, but the blessed Hope for himself and the Corinthians was the change in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, which means translation and not death. He speaks of the dead when he writes “for this corruption must put on incorruption.” He speaks of living believers in these words: “this mortal must Put on immortality.” This gives the true meaning of Rom 8:11. The coming of the Lord is the Hope of the church. And then we have the shout of victory. And what manner of lives we should live and what manner of service should be ours in view of such a destiny, such glory, which in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, may burst upon us! “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labor is not vain in the Lord.”
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On vv1, 12, 20, 29 Of the Resurrection of the Dead.
Of the Resurrection of the Dead.
The facts of Christ’s resurrection:
Read full note →
v. 1. Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the Gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand
v. 2. by which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain.
v. 3. For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures;
v. 4. and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures;
v. 5. and that He was seen of Cephas, then of the Twelve;
v. 6. after that He was seen of above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep.
v. 7. After that He was seen of James, then of all the apostles.
v. 8. And last of all He was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time.
v. 9. For I am the least of the apostles, that am not meet to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the Church of God.
v. 10. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all; yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me.
v. 11. Therefore, whether it were I or they, so we preach, and so ye believed.
There were, it seems, false apostles or very ignorant members at Corinth, men that claimed there was no resurrection of the dead. St. Paul, therefore, includes a detailed defense and exposition of the doctrine in his letter. The section is the crowning glory of the epistle, a demonstration of the truth of a future resurrection. The doubt which the apostle here combats is one that strikes at the root of Christianity, which concerns the fundamental fact of the Gospel-truth. In a burst of lofty and sustained eloquence the patient teacher again gives the Corinthians instructions concerning the first things, the doctrine without which Christianity would be a riddle: But I make known to you, I declare to you, brethren, the Gospel which I proclaimed to you. The words convey a measure of censure, of blame, that it should have become necessary for him so soon to repeat some information which belonged to the fundamental tenets of their faith. Mark that Paul here, as elsewhere, does not refer his readers to human feelings or opinions, but to a fixed fund of Christian knowledge, to the Gospel, the good news of the redemption of mankind as it was being carried out into the world by all the apostles. Of this Gospel he says: Which also you received, in which also you stand fast, through which also you are being saved. These are the steps in Christian life: Faith is kindled in the heart, the Gospel news is accepted; faith continues in the heart, the believer places all his hope for salvation in the Gospel day by day, and thus the benefits of the Gospel, being continuous, are also progressive, salvation is altogether certain to the believer, he has its benefits, he enjoys them day by day. The Gospel is the means of our salvation; it is the beginning, middle, and end of our redemption unto eternal life, since it appropriates to us the riches of the grace of God in Christ Jesus. Faith in the Gospel, belief in the resurrection of Jesus, was still found in the congregation at Corinth, otherwise the apostle could not have built up his great argument on this historical fact.
But the Corinthians needed a warning: In what word I preached to you, if you hold fast, unless you believed idly. He had given them the content of the Gospel, as they well knew if they were adhering to it as they should. The power of that word was such as to work conviction in their minds, to give them the continuous benefit of the salvation appropriated to them. It surely could not be that they had believed idly, that their acceptance of the Word of the Gospel was a mere external acceptance, in heedless levity, without serious apprehension of the issues involved! The fullness of salvation and all its benefits is given through the Gospel, but foolishness and frivolousness will lose its glories.
With great emphasis Paul refers to the authenticity of his Gospel, to the fact that God alone was its Author: For I delivered to you in the first place, among the things first in importance, as belonging to the weightiest articles of faith, what also I have received. Whether Paul refers here to direct revelation or to his first lessons in Christian faith from the mouth of his teachers, is immaterial. These first and most important articles of faith are that Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He arose on the third day, according to the Scriptures. Note the repetition of the reference which shows that the vicarious death of Christ, His burial, and His glorious resurrection were the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy and type, just as Christ was wont to point back to the written Scriptures as telling of His suffering, death, and resurrection, Luk 24:46-47. By His death Christ paid the debt of sin and transgression in full, His burial placed the certainty of His death beyond doubt, and His resurrection on the third day proved the completeness of His redemptive labors. If as much as one sin had not been paid for, as much as one transgression had not been expiated, the resurrection of Christ could not have taken place, the righteousness of God would not have permitted the return to life of Him who had failed in redeeming the world. But His resurrection is a fact, and therefore also our salvation is a fact.
And for this fact the apostle brings the testimony of the eye-witnesses, of men that had seen the risen Lord, for He had been seen by Cephas, Peter, some time on Easter Day, Luk 24:34, probably in the afternoon. Then He had been seen by the Twelve, that is, by the eleven disciples or apostles, on the evening of Easter Day, Luk 24:36; Joh 20:19, the appearance of the following Sunday evening being included. Sometime after that Christ was seen by more than five hundred brethren at once, at one time, in one big gathering, probably in Galilee, by the entire number of men and women that had come to faith in Him during His earthly ministry. See Mat 26:32. The hundred and twenty that were present about the time of Pentecost include the brethren that lived in and around Jerusalem. Of those five hundred fortunate eyewitnesses to whom Paul refers, the majority were still living when he penned this letter, some twenty-five years after the event so prominently emphasized here, but some had fallen asleep; as children of the resurrection they had closed their eyes to this world, knowing that they would presently be with their Lord forever. After that Jesus had been seen by James, the brother of the Lord, afterwards associated with Peter as a pillar of the congregation at Jerusalem, Gal 1:19; Gal 2:9-12: then He appeared to all the apostles, for the last time, on the day of His ascension, Act 1:1-13. And every one of these disciples was a witness to the truth of the resurrection of Christ.
Paul adds his own testimony: But last of all He appeared also to me, to the abortion, as it were. His great humility causes the apostle to refer to himself in this uncomplimentary way, as an unfit and repulsive creature, brought into the world before the proper time. As one commentator says, Paul describes himself thus in contrast with those who, when Jesus appeared to them, were already brothers or apostles, already born as God’s children into the life of faith in Christ. And he repeats this depreciatory opinion of himself, with a confession of his own unworthiness: For I am the least of the apostles, who am not fit to bear the name of apostle, because I persecuted the Church of God. The fact that he had, in the blindness of his Pharisaic pride, been a blasphemer and a persecutor and injurious always caused the apostle deep distress, Gal 1:13; 1Ti 1:13-16, made him protest his unworthiness, his lack of moral qualification, of fitness, of competence. Nevertheless, he adds his word of testimony to that of the other disciples, since he actually saw the risen Christ, Act 9:5; Act 22:7-9; Act 26:15. And he praised and magnified the Lord for accounting him worthy of being a witness of the resurrection and its glorious benefits: But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace which was shown to me was not vain, void of actuality. As a mercy, as an utterly undeserved favor, Paul considered the fact that he had been summoned into the ranks of the apostles, especially since this implied previous forgiveness and adoption. Of himself, of his own personal achievements, he did not glory, but had only one thought, to magnify the grace of God, Rom 1:5. And the result was that more abundantly than they all did he labor. It was hard, painful, exhausting toil, but it also brought rich returns; by his continuous, systematic application Paul had achieved more in the extension of the kingdom of God than all the other apostles up to this time. And yet, once more, he dismisses the thought of personal worth or merit: But not I, the grace of God, rather, which was with me. Paul was but the instrument of the mercy and power of God for the benefit of many people, Jews and Gentiles. So he can conclude this passage with the cheerful words: Whether, then, it was I that did the preaching or they, the other apostles that had been placed into this office: so we preach, and so you believed. There was a perfect agreement among all the apostles as to the need of presenting the great facts of man’s redemption first of all, of presenting the fundamental doctrines first. And the Corinthians themselves, in accepting the doctrine as preached by Paul and by the other apostles, testified to its soundness by their faith.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 3, 5, 8, 10, 12, 15, 18, 20, 22, 24, 27, 29, 31 Connecting Statement:
Connecting Statement:
Paul reminds them that it is the gospel that saves them and he tells them again what the gospel is. Then he gives them a short history lesson, which ends with what will yet happen.
Read full note →
remind you
"help you remember"
on which you stand
Paul is speaking of the Corinthians as if they were a house and the gospel as if it were the foundation on which the house was standing. (See: Metaphor)
you are being saved
This can be stated in active form. "God will save you" (See: Active or Passive)
the word I preached to you
"the message I preached to you"
translationWords
good news
preach
receive
save
word
preach
believe
vain
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 14, 19, 20, 21, 24, 25, 27, 29, 30, 32 15:1-58 Some people in the church had doubts about…
15:1-58 Some people in the church had doubts about a future resurrection of the dead. Paul reassures them and, perhaps in response to their skeptical questions, discusses the nature of a resurrection body.
15:1-11 Paul summarizes the Good News that he preached.
Read full note →
15:1 At the heart of the Good News stands the message of the atoning death and resurrection of Christ (see 15:3-4; Rom 5:8-10; 6:5-11).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.