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Weekly Word

Entries in Hope (12)

Tuesday
Sep182012

Our Present Life

We continue our walk through the New Testament book of First Peter and will look at chapter one verses 13-15 today. 

After reminding believers of the testing trials of this life, Peter then moves to encourage them in their everyday life.  Starting in verse 13 we have three exhortations that appear to be commands.  However, only one of them is commanded, where the other two are put out as descriptions of how to do the main command.  Can you figure out which is which?  By consulting other versions you can discover that the main command has to do with our Hope.

We Must Hope To The End

Is that correct?  Is Peter really commanding them to Hope?  Is that possible?  It is just as possible as our other command to love.  We tend to think of love and hope as feelings.  Peter is not commanding them to have “hopeful” feelings.  Rather he is talking about an action that we can choose to do.  Thus, just as love is a decision, so Hope is a decision too. 

Hope always has a future thing for which it is waiting.  So the decision here is not even about deciding to feel.  Rather it is the decision to keep waiting for that promised grace that is to be revealed at the second coming of Jesus.  The object of our hope can change because of difficulties and trials in life.  We can give up and even place our hopes on other things (perhaps even things that are not godly).  That is the decision we have to make every day in the midst of tough times.  Will I keep hoping in the grace I will receive at Christ’s coming, or will I hope for something “realistic.”  Though we are daily receiving grace from God, it is still only a portion of the fuller grace that has been promised.  There is a wonderful day ahead of us where our status as children of God will be not just revealed, but we will also receive immortal bodies that are not tainted by the sin nature.  Peter commands them to not give up that hope.  The challenge is not just to fully hope in that grace as if we had a “hope-ometer” that needs to be pegged at 100% all the time.  Rather the picture is that of a finish line or a goal.  If we are going to obtain the grace then we need to keep our hope pinned on it until we reach it.

So how can we not lose hope in God’s amazing promise in the light of this world’s trials and reminders that we are not there yet?  This is where the phrases, girding up the loins of the mind, and being sober come into play.

Girding up the loins, or waist, of your mind is a strange phrase.  It is a picture of first century clothing.  The robes they wore would have a tie or belt that kept them held shut.  If you were going outside you would tie your robe shut.  Or if you were going to do some physical labor you might even need to hike up the robe and tie it off in a way that would not encumber your feet and legs.  When this is used of the mind it is clear that a mental issue is involved.  It speaks of preparation.  What mental preparations do I need to make so that I will not be tripped up and restricted in this challenge to hope to the end?  First I need to recognize that my own desires can pull me away from it.  Also, the schemes of our enemy, satan, are focused on aiding this.  Mentally I need to be aware of those things that would keep me from the grace God has for me and prepare for them.

The phrase “be sober” also points to preparation.  However, the issue is different.  In the first I need to make preparations.  In the other, I need to refrain from things that could affect my ability to hope adversely.  Think of how alcohol affects a person in the natural state.  It causes people to lose their inhibitions and self control.  It causes people to lose their awareness of things around them.  It can even eventually lead to losing consciousness and death.  Though the believer should stay away from drunkenness, Peter is speaking spiritually and mentally here.  We need to be sober in the sense that we are not “drunk” from drinking in the lusts of our flesh.  Those who live to please their flesh, will become spiritually drunk.  They will begin to lose inhibitions and eventually any control on their fleshly appetites.  This will lead to a loss of awareness of their true spiritual condition.  They will think everything is alright.  But to any sober minded person they will be clearly out of control.  Eventually a loss of spiritual consciousness can occur.  This is where a person is unable to receive any stimuli from the Lord, whether through the cautions of others, injunctions in the Scriptures, or the pressings of the Holy Spirit.  Such a person will lose sight of the hope and degenerate into only hoping for the “next fix” for their fleshly appetites.   Let’s face it.  Satan uses the love of our flesh for the desire of this world to get us spiritually drunk.  This tactic is quite effective on those who are not mentally prepared.

We Must Be Holy

The next two verses focus on how we need to be a reflection of the one we are following.  If God’s promised grace at the coming of Jesus is what we are hoping FOR, then Jesus himself is what we are IN or ON.  We can have hope for the future because of the one on whom our hopes are placed.  There is a relationship between faith and hope.  Whatever you are putting your faith in will affect what your hope is.  Yet Peter is more focused on how the enemy derails our faith and hope.  Satan uses the impure desires of our flesh for the things of this world.  Ife we are to truly follow Jesus then it will involve a focus on being holy.  So what does that mean?

The simplest understanding of holy is the idea that something has been set apart for a divine purpose.  It is not to be used for ordinary purposes even though it may be very ordinary.  It is not the inherent quality of the thing but the fact that it has been set apart that makes it holy.  If you have put your faith in Jesus then through him God has decreed that you are for His holy purposes.  In the Bible we see Belshazzar of Babylon using the holy cups and bowls of the temple for a drunken party.  This angers God and he loses his kingdom.  However, when it comes to people, we are not inanimate objects.  We can make choices to be involved in purposes that are contrary to God’s purposes.  We don’t pursue holiness as if we could attain it.  Rather we cooperate with the holiness that God has given to us in Jesus.  We can either walk in harmony with that holiness or we can fight against it.

This is why Peter gives the analogy of an obedient child.  A child doesn’t always understand why mom and dad won’t let it do whatever its little heart desires.  It has a choice.  Obedience is not a matter of becoming a son or daughter.  It is a matter of cooperating with the reality that I belong to God because I AM his child.  If we please ourselves then Satan will succeed in getting our hopes pinned on the lusts of this world and eventually robbing us of our heavenly inheritance.  Are you about your father’s business?  Or are you in the business of pleasing your flesh?

When Scripture says, “be holy for I am holy,” it is reminding us of our nature.  We were created to reflect God.  God is holy therefore our lives should reflect that holiness.   This is not out of some puritanical prudishness.  But rather out of protection against the spiritual unconsciousness that results in the life of those who pursue the lusts of the flesh.  Those are the things we pursued in our former ignorance, before we knew Jesus and God’s love for us.  But now that we know what he has done for us and is bringing us to we need to watch our lives guardedly and keep our hopes fixed on Jesus who brings the completion of God’s grace with him.  Maranatha!

Our Present Life Audio

Thursday
May102012

Hope for the Church

For centuries since the Age of Enlightenment/Reason men have predicted the demise of Christianity , the Bible, and its institutions.  Others have tried to promote change in the church so that it can survive the modern era.  Both of these come from the overall impression that the Church will not survive as it is.

Let’s first recognize that there is a difference between “The Church” and “a church.”  The Church is the group of people from all generations, and all ethnic groups who have put their faith in God and believed on Jesus’ death to cover their sins.  It is a reference not to an earthly institution, but an invisible tie of faith between people of very different societies.  “A church” is a local gathering of a small subset of The Church.  Either way, it is good to distinguish that though we call the building they meet in a church, it is only because a church meets in that building.  A church does not need a building to be the church, though it is quite convenient.

When we question whether there is hope for the church, we generally have in mind denominations, buildings, real estate holdings, and such things.  But even if a local church disbands and closes its door, it does not mean there is no hope for those individuals.  They can still meet together or join other groups of believers.  They can still be a church without buildings, projectors, and instruments.  These things do not provide hope.  They only make it more pleasant to do what churches do: worship God, encourage each other, and share Jesus with those who do not know him.

We Already Have All We Need

In Acts 20:25-32 Paul knows that he is going to be imprisoned and eventually killed.  He knows that he will not see the elders of Ephesus again.  So, he meets with them and gives his last word.  It is interesting to see that he makes a huge point that they have all they need.  It won’t be easy without Paul, but Paul has given them everything they need, which he himself received from Jesus.

He had preached to them the kingdom of God, how they could be a part of it, and what it really was.  Jesus had said in Luke 17:21 that the kingdom of God did not come with observation, but was within our hearts.  One became a citizen in this new kingdom of God not by living in a particular geographical area or having a particular genetic link, but by simply having faith in the Lord, Jesus as God’s Anointed One (Christ) who has saved us from our sins.  Not only were they citizens, but Paul had given them the “whole counsel of God.”  (vs. 27)

The counsel of God is an amazing concept.  Can you imagine if there was a, for real, God.com that you could go to and put in your problem.  Then the instructions from God would come back to you.  God wants us to live wisely and so has given us counsel.  But they also had the "Whole" counsel.  The point being that they were not lacking anything.  There was no hidden instruction to be found in the 21st century.  Neither was God only giving the first century counsel, but saying to us today that we have to figure it out on our own.  God knew the church would need wisdom and through Christ and his apostles that wisdom was delivered once and for all to His Church.  We have all that we need.

We Need to Guard Our Hearts

Those who have everything have to guard it or thieves will break in and steal it.  So it is in the spiritual.  Precisely because the Church has been given such great wisdom, salvation, and Hope, the enemy seeks to steal it, kill it, and destroy it.  Paul compares The Church to a flock of sheep and the elders to shepherds.  As shepherds over God’s flock, they need to “take heed” and “watch.”

The term “take heed” means to bring something near for inspection.  Notice in verse 28 Paul tells them to inspect themselves and the flock.  If we don’t inspect ourselves first then we cannot do a good job inspecting others.  The reason this is so important is because of two threats.  The first is pictured as “savage wolves” from outside.  The second is believers who rise up from within and twist the truth in order to gain disciples after themselves.  The shepherds are to be introspective and inspective in order to ward off these threats. 

The term “watch” means to rise up as opposed to sleeping and lounging about.  To do a good job guarding the sheep, the shepherds would need to rise up and be vigilantly on the lookout.  This parallels with the “false teachers.”  Both parties “rise up,” but for very different reasons.  One leads in order to protect.  The other leads out of self motivation and with twisted teaching.  They draw disciples after themselves instead of after Christ.  These people think they are a church following Jesus.  But, sadly, they have become a lost group following the wisdom of a man.

Paul knew that this danger was so great that he warned them night and day with tears.  It concerned him greatly.  That is why in verse 20 he says, “I kept back nothing that was helpful, but proclaimed it to you.”  Jesus has given us good shepherds to watch over the flock but they need to watch over their own hearts lest they pervert the truth of God and mislead the sheep.

Lastly Paul commends or entrusts them to God and His Word of Grace.  Grace is a gift.  Thus God’s word is a gift to us that has the power to build us up (strengthen us).  It also has the power to give us an place among his people both now and in the age to come.  So is the church going down?  Jesus said, I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.   He wasn’t talking about buildings, cathedrals, and denominations.  He was talking about his true believers regardless of where they were.  Let’s quit looking at the natural and begin trusting in the one who has given us all that we need for life and godliness.

Hope for the Church audio

Tuesday
May012012

Hope for Your Job

Most people will spend about a third of their life getting ready for, going to, and doing work.  It clearly is a huge part of our life.  Yet many people do not think about what the message of the cross might have to say to them about their profession.  How can the cross relate to building houses or cleaning them?  How can the cross relate to serving hamburgers or making computer programs?  It seems too vast to stretch across such a distance.

Today we will look at a passage in Ephesians 6:5-9.  In it Paul is giving instruction to both slaves and their masters.  You may think, "well, I'm not a slave so this doesn't impact me."  However, in this passage Paul gives us principles that go beyond being a slave.  In fact, it would be best if we take a bit of time to discuss what it means to be a slave and why slavery ever came into existence.  First of all, the essence of slavery is not being the property of another.  This is definitely a part of the history of slavery.  So I don't mean to diminish its reality.  However, the real concept behind being the slave of another had to do with the "master's" claim upon the work of another.  How that claim comes about can be varied.  But no matter what, every economic system and every people group has had to deal with the reality that some people do not do well and end up owing others.  When you owe somebody they have a claim upon your production.  How we go about satisfying that claim has as many possible ways as there are people to dream them up.  If we were to creat a continuum that has on the one side a picture of deeply, depraved slavery, such as that pictured in Alex Haley's mini series "Roots," and on the other side a system like we have today where people are physically free but are still in debt to others, then we can recognize that there exists between them a multitude of "systems" that could be devised.  One side values the freedom of the owing individual over the claims of the other.  Whereas the other expression values the claim of the owed individual over the freedom of the individual.  Not everyone ended up as a slave due to owing someone something.  Some were attacked by other nations or tribes and forced into slavery.  This is a clear wrong.  However, how many of us do not recognize we are somewhat "slaves" to our debts?  Some have stated that the Bible is clearly flawed because it does not emphatically denounce slavery.  The Bible denounces dehumanizing slavery, but let it never be forgotten that it was the teaches of Christ that fueled the energy of the anti-slavery movement.  We can fight our whole life against a system of slavery and finally win only to find out that another system of slavery comes in to take its places.  Those who think we can even yet again tear down the current system and build a better one are deluding themselves concerning the heart of men.  Man will create nothing but systems that enslave.  It is only men who fear the Lord who will restrain themselves from this bent in our nature.  So God speaks not to the hopeless fight of destroying slavery, but to the hopeless heart of the slave.  God has something better for them that goes beyond this life and God has something better for you that goes beyond this life.

No matter what, if you need a paycheck from an employer than you are in an indebted situation.  You are providing a service for someone or some company who has become your "master."    Let us look at this passage today in that light.

Jesus Is Our Boss

 Paul in verse 5, 6, and 7 hammers home that we should work as if Jesus were our boss.  It is not in those terms, but that is the intent.  Many of you are scratching your head thinking, "my boss is nothing like Jesus."  But this is nevery mentioned.  The simple principle is work as if you were doing it for Jesus.  Think about that principle alone for a moment.  If you worked like that, I don't think there is a single employer who wouldn't want you on the job unless you were just not talented for it.  This is a revolutionary concept.  In verse 5 it calls them "masters according to the flesh."  The word master is the same word used of Christ which is always translated "Lord."  Now Paul goes on to give some practical instructions for followers of Jesus.  If you were working, as if Jesus were your boss, you would work like this.

Show Respect for Authority.  To obey with fear and trembling is a picture of a healthy respect for the authority and position of the one who is over me.  Would I talk back to my boss if he were Jesus?  Would I ridicule him behind his back if he were Jesus?   Would I work to try and get him fired?  To respect the position and authority of the person over us is impossible if we do not first respect the position and authority of God over our lives.  How might this kind of attitude improve your relationship with your boss?

Be Sincere.  This is to have a single heart and devotion towards the job.  That means you give your whole heart to the job instead of working half-heartedly.  Need I ask? 

Don't work only when supervised.  In verse 6 it it is called eyeservice.  It is pretty obvious that when we know we are being watched we work much harder.  Paul challenges them that this is the path of those who are man-pleasers.  This isn't intended to be a good thing.  We ought to work in order to please God not men.  Those who work to please men only worry about when they are watching.  It is insincere and false.  Am I trying to manipulate my boss instead of working hard for him?  God can always see us.  So If I am a God-pleaser, I know there is no time when I can "do whatever I want."

Be willing and "good-minded."  To have a good mind and heart about the job is easier said than done.  But it starts with remembering that Jesus is our real boss.  How we serve our earthly bosses says volumes about where our heart is before God himself.

God Always Has the Final Say

In verse 8 Paul begins to pivot by reminding the slave that both the slave and the free man will stand before God one day.  If I serve well in this life than God will reward me with good.  In fact, Scripture even teaches that to the degree we do good in life is the degree that God will reward us back.  That might change your motivation.  Salvation may be by grace but reward and punishment will be based upon our deeds.

Paul then gives a caution or warning to the masters / lords / bosses.  Bosses have bosses.  But ultimately all bosses have to answer to the big Boss in heaven.  He tells them in verse 9 that they should follow the same advice he had just given to their slaves.  This a verse that many a slave owner in the south neglected to ponder.  God does not play favorites.  Literally God is not enamored with your face and all it represents.  You might be the greatest "master" in all the world.  But God will judge you in the same way as the lowliest slave.

In our society we generally picture justice as blindfolded.  It is intended to demonstrate that it is blind to the individuals involved and only gives the truth.  However, justice is never blind to the facts of the situation.  For justice to be truly done then it must see not just the surface but even the intents of the hearts of those involved.  God himself is the ultimate justice.

When Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. gave his "I have a dream speech," he talked about judgment and justice.

"I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."  What most miss is that Dr. King most certainly wanted his children judged.  However he longed for a judgement that was based upon truth and not the lies of men.  Lies that say worth can be seen by the color of someone's skin, or even the ability of their mind and body.

Do I approach my job as if it were a calling from God?  Even if you work for yourself, do you recognize that you still work for God?  When your job becomes a ministry to Jesus it will bless your employer, the customers and yourself.

Perhaps you are reading this today and you are thinking, "I wish I had a job."  Let this time be a time of reflection.  Perhaps you took previous jobs for granted.  Perhaps the Lord is teaching you to trust in him.  In the end if you will choose to be an employee like is mentioned in Ephesians 6 then you will find a job and God will bless you in it.

 

Sermon Audio

Wednesday
Apr112012

Hope Raised

We talked last week about how God is the source of this idea called hope.    Specifically the hope that in the future all that is wrong with our world and people will be fixed.  We also talked about how important the target of your hope is and how important the basis or foundation of your hope is.

In the weeks ahead we are going to talk about how the Resurrection of Jesus gives us hope in our relationships, job, hard times and good times, successes and failures, and throughout all aspects of our life.

However, on this day we are going to look at how the Resurrection gives us hope that we have the Truth.  This can be a very fragile thing at times.  It was just like this when Jesus came on the scen in the first century.  There was very little hope that Truth had been obtained, both in the Roman world and in Israel.  Truth is something many of us desire, however, at times we find ourselves doubting we can ever truly obtain it--and if we did we couldn't truly be sure.  Through the Bible God tells us that he himself is the embodiment of Truth and that he wants us to have Truth, to have him.  This is where the Resurrection is so important.  It is one of those events wherein God gives us something concrete on which to build a foundation of Hope.  The Resurrection of Jesus gives us the hope of having obtained Truth.  Let's look at 1 Corinthians 15 in the Bible.

The Resurrection gives us Hope of the Truth

Jesus made some great claims before he was crucified and it stands to reason that people today would have some questions and even bear some cynicism towards those claims.  Jesus claimed that he was the Son of God and that he had come down from heaven.  He claimed that he was the Truth from God.  He claimed that those who believed him would have eternal life and be resurrected at the end of the age.  There is so much deception in the world today and there was in the days of the followers of Jesus.  In this passage Paul deals with some questions and cynical rejections of the concept of a day in which people are Resurrected.  Paul says in verse 3 that he is giving to them exactly what was given first to him.  As I said earlier, God wants us to have Truth.  Truth is not something that we arrive at purlely through reason.  But reason can help us to analyze that which we receive.  God himself is the source of Truth.  There are other sources out there that purport to have truth, but these sources always pervert truth to their own ends.  So let's look at some common accusations or objections to the claims of Jesus and his disciples.

Jesus Never existed? The first objection is a basic denial that Jesus existed and the resurrection happened.  Of course we live in a day that loves to "correct" the historical record.  However, if you love truth, you don't just change history to make yourself feel better.  You have to have some sense of humility that you weren't there.  It is safe to say this, there is enough evidence for a rational person to recognize that Jesus did exist and that he was executed.  To believe else is to stretch reality.  I will mention first that the New Testament itself is a witness or evidence that Jesus existed and was executed.  However, since its claims are what we are questioning then let's move elsewhere.  There are historical records that were written by non-Christians, which give evidence that Jesus existed.  Josephus was a Jewish nonChristian historian who wrote while the apostle John was still alive.  He gave testimony that Jesus existed, was executed, and that his disciples claimed he had been resurrected.  A Roman, nonchristian historian named Tacitus wrote within 80 years of the cross.  He mentions Christ who was crucified in Jerusalem under Pontius Pilate.  He also mentions many followers who existed in his day of this Christ.  We also have the verification of archaeology.  The Bible gives places, events and people that continually are verified by archaeological finds.  Many "objections" of the past that accused the Bible of false information have been proven unfounded by new archaeological finds.  So it is difficult to explain these things without creating a highly unlikely web of conspiracy.

Miracles, Death, Resurrection All a Lie?  Another objection or accusation is that the miracles were made up, the body was stolen, and the resurrection is a lie.  I put these together simply because they do not deny Jesus existed, however, they do question the Bible's presentation of the facts.  If we wanted to change the historical record of what the Sumerian culture did, there would not be any Sumerians around to object to our changes.  There might be some students of history that would object, but they would be objecting on the principle of Truth.  Historians are supposed to hold Truth as a foundational principle.  But as we become more and more cynical about Truth, then we become more and more likely to accept wholesale historical revision as long as it makes us feel better.  Historical revisionism could happen if the history in question is in the far past.  But it is simply impossible at the same historical period when most of the eye witnesses are still alive.  Let me give you an example.  If I were to state that it is historical fact that during the Bush presidency he had declared martial law and taken dictatorial control over the country.  In fact he had suspended the election of 2008.  He almost got away with it, however, a young senator from Illinois named Barack Obama had led a contingent of Black Panther brigades up to the white house and had wrested control of the country away from Bush and had restored the USA back to a democracy.  Though many people may wish this had been true, it would be impossible for me to establish a "hero worship" cult around Barack Obama's supposed exploits within decades of the real events that took place.  Any one who followed such poppycock would be clinically insane (out of touch of reality). 

Within 2 months of Jesus death, burial, and "mysterious" disappearance, Peter was standing up in Jerusalem stating that Jesus had done miracles among them and the religious leaders had put him to death.  Peter also claims that Jesus had been resurrected and that he and the other disciples had witnessed this.  3,000 people believed from the crowd that assembled that day.  And, month by month, year by year, more people continued to believe that Jesus had been resurrected.  No one refuted the claims to miracles, nor the claims to death and burial.  The only dispute had to do with whether or not Jesus really was resurrected from the dead.   The only counter explanations for the "missing body" are that he wasn't really dead (swoon theory) or that his disciples stole the body and lied about his resurrection.  Let's deal with these claims.

To claim that the Romans were not successful in putting Jesus to death does seem to stretch reality.  The Romans had developed crucifixion into a torturous, killing mechanism.  The death of Jesus was never in question during the first century.  It is only today when the Roman soldiers cannot defend themselves that such accusations can surface.  Add to that the public action of being stabbed through the side into the heart seems to put this theory of "near death" in the arena of more than highly unlikely.  So the real issue is the idea that the body was stolen.  This brings up several problems.

How were the fishermen that followed Jesus able to steal the body of Jesus while a contingent of guards were at the mouth of the tomb?  It had a huge stone rolled over the mouth of it.  How were they able to move it without waking these slumbering guards?  These guards were under penalty of death if they "fell asleep."  Next we have the problem that hundreds of people claim to have seen Jesus and spoken with him after his death.  He had the wounds, but was able to appear and disappear within a group.  He appeared to individuals, small groups, large groups and not just once but many times over the course of 40 days, indoors and outdoors.  Paul explains some of this in 1 Corinthians 15:5-8.  Over 500 people saw him at once?  At what point do you give up the idea that Jesus would have to visit everyone in Israel at the time if you are going to believe?

Lastly, it is hard to explain why the apostles would be willing to die torturous deaths for something they knew was a lie.  One of the problems with torture is that eventually people will say anything in order to get the torture to quit.  Basically you can make the average person confess to being a twinkie if you inflict enough pain over a long enough period.  Thus if the Resurrection were true we would expect for there to be some individuals who would "recant" in the face of torture merely to stop the pain.  But who would be willing to be tortured and killed for something you knew was a lie?  It stretches belief.  The only logical conclusion is that these guys really did believe that they had interacted with a resurrected Jesus and they really did think they had seen him ascend into the sky and go out of sight through the clouds.  Now what are you going to do with that??

Resurrection Impossible?  The last accusation or objection I will deal with is the idea that a resurrection is impossible.  Bear in mind that we are not talking about a CPR situation, that is more like a "resuscitation." Let me just approach it this way.  If it were to be reported today that scientists have figured out how to freeze a person for as long as they want and then can bring them "back to life," some people might be sceptical.  But we would be sceptical that it is true, not that it is possible.  Most people have come to realize that through the scientific method, mankind is capable of doing "miraculous" things.  In a similar way if it were to be reported that through analysis of the human genome scientists have figured out how to fix a person's DNA so that they would never get sick.  Also, they have learned how to make the gene responsible for aging (maturing) to "switch" off once a person reaches their prime.  Many people would be sceptical, but they would be sceptical that it is true, not that it is possible.  It is somewhat hypocritical that we would believe that all manner of "improbable" things are possible when it comes to men doing it.  But we just cannot believe that the creator of all things, including life, is capable of bringing a person back to life?  Whether or not the resurrection was actual, it seems silly to persist with an argument that it is impossible.

Given the evidence that they had at the time, many followers of Jesus came to believe that Jesus had been resurrected.  Also, given the evidence of witnesses and what they had seen about Jesus, many others came to believe.

The resurrection itself became the proof to those who witnessed his life and teaching that Jesus had not been lying.  He really was the Son of God who had come down from heaven.  He really was paying the price for our sin through his death, burial, and resurrection.  Those who believed upon him really would be forgiven and saved from the punishment of their sins and be resurrected at the last day.  He really is coming back one day to rule upon the earth.  This really is what the Law and the Prophets of the Old Testament were pointing to all along.  These people believed because of the evidence that they saw and heard, the fuller understanding of the Bible they received, and the influence of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus himself emphasized that to believe on him was more than a mental event.  It really was accompanied by the presence and work of the Spirit of God himself.

Without the Resurrection our Hope is Worthless

In Verses 12-19, Paul points out that all of Christianity stands or falls upon the Resurrection.  This is why every year around this time of year there is a new attempt to disprove the Resurrection.  Last year a documentary purporting to have found the Tomb of Jesus and possible proof that he was not resurrected came out.  What is interesting is that most of the stuff in the documentary was discovered 20 years ago and had been dealt with by scholars.  It was not the "silver bullet" that it was made out to be.  Why would they do this?  Because they know that many people do not actually view the evidence.  Many people make decision for very emotional reasons.  Be careful of this.  The Resurrection is important because it is the proof that God had accepted the claims and statements of Jesus.  It is one thing for Jesus to say he can forgive sins by dying for us.  But how would we know that he is right?  The resurrection itself becomes the proof (vs. 17) that our sins are forgiven.

Here is the kicker.  For those who think disproving the Resurrection would solve the world's problems reread verse 17.  Notice that if the Resurrection is false then we have a bigger problem:  Our sin has not been dealt with.  Regardless of what you think about Jesus, if he was not resurrected then there is no answer for what is called "sin" in the heart of all people.  Religions in general tell you what you need to do in order to obtain freedom from the negative junk of this life.  But Christianity tells you that you simply need to believe in what God has done.  This is a big difference. One focuses on what men (myself) can do.  Christianity focuses on what God can do and has done.  If Christ was not resurrected than being a Christian is the dumbest thing in the world (vs. 19).  Jesus taught us to lay our lives down so that others might live.  This is a dumb thing to do if there is no life to come.  If there is no "after-life" then trying to live like Jesus is stupid. 

Paul closes his arguments with the Corinthians in verses 56-58.  The resurrection is what ensures us victory over death and the Law.  Why has God done it in this strange way?

False Hopes must Die For True Hope to Rise

In our humanity, we put our hopes on the wrong targets for all the wrong reasons.  God loves us too much to let us continue to hope in that which can never happen.  Our leaders will never figure out how to create a world in which we have Eutopia.  This False Hope will lead to the greatest tyranny this world has ever known.  At the cross the "messiah" of Israel and all the Hope that had been placed on him was executed on a cross.  The hopes died at the same time.  But when Jesus appeared in his resurrected form, he began to "retarget" their hopes and a new understanding arose upon a foundation that was no longer built upon a certain race, or a certain people.  It was a hope that was built upon God himself and cannot be shaken even when the people of Israel were kicked out of Jerusalem and scattered to the four corners of the world.

God sent Jesus to take your punishment upon himself.  God is not telling you to be a more perfect you.  He is telling you to die to your false hopes and to embrace the true hope that he is giving you.  What things in your life are you living for that are merely "wishful thinking?"   What flimsy reasons are you banking on to make it happen?  Think about this.  When your hopes are dashed might it be the grace of God to show you that your hopes are misplaced?  Could it be the love of God that tries to get your attention so that you might embrace a True Hope?  The resurrection of Jesus is God's way of trying to get your attention.  Has he succeeded?  Are you without Hope, today?  Good, now you are able to receive a real hope that God has for you:  A hope of freedom from your sins and failures, a hope of life everlasting, a hope that sees beyond the things of this world, a hope that can bring us through the worst that life has to offer.  Put your faith in Jesus today and ask him to forgive you of your sins and he will make you a part of his family.

Hope Raised audio

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