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Sermon

The Easter Gospel

Speaker
David Capoccia
Scripture
1 Corinthians 15:3-5

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Note: This transcript and summary was autogenerated. It has not yet been proofread or edited by a human.

Summary

The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the foundation of the Christian gospel and the only hope for a good eternal ending. 1 Corinthians 15:3-5 presents four core gospel truths: Christ died for our sins, Christ was buried, Christ has been raised, and Christ appeared to his disciples. We are reminded that every human being has sinned and fallen short of God’s perfect standard, deserving eternal punishment.

Yet God, in undeserved love, sent His Son Jesus to live a perfect life, die as a substitute for sinners, and rise again—proving that His sacrifice was accepted and that believers are justified before God forever.

Key Lessons:

  1. The gospel is not a human invention but a divinely delivered message of first importance, passed down through eyewitnesses commissioned by the risen Christ.
  2. Every person has sinned and falls short of God’s perfect standard, and no amount of self-righteous effort can make us acceptable before God.
  3. Christ’s death was substitutionary—He bore the penalty sinners deserve and credits His own righteousness to those who believe.
  4. Christ’s bodily resurrection is the vindication of God’s promises, the proof that His sacrifice was accepted, and the guarantee of eternal life for believers.

Application: We are called to stop trusting in our own goodness, repent of sin and self-rule, and place our faith entirely in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. This faith must take hold of our lives, showing up in how we live—not as mere intellectual agreement but as a life-transforming commitment to follow Christ.

Discussion Questions:

  1. How does the reality that God’s standard is total perfection change the way you view your own moral standing before Him?
  2. Why is Christ’s bodily resurrection essential to the gospel—what would be lost if He had only died but never risen?
  3. What does genuine repentance look like in your daily life, and how can you distinguish saving faith from mere intellectual agreement?

Scripture Focus: 1 Corinthians 15:3-5 serves as the core passage outlining four gospel truths. Supporting passages include Genesis 3:15 (the first gospel promise), Psalm 16:10-11 (foretelling the resurrection), Isaiah 53:5, 10, 12 (the substitutionary death and vindication of the Messiah), Romans 3:10, 23 (universal sinfulness), Romans 4:25 (resurrection for justification), and 2 Corinthians 5:21 (the great exchange of righteousness).

Outline

Introduction

All right, let’s go to the Lord in prayer as we prepare to hear from his word.

God, there is so much to rejoice about today, but chiefly what you have accomplished for sinners in Jesus Christ. Help us all, Lord, to put our attention on that. Not on what’s coming later today, not on what distractions might be going on around us, but on you, your word, and this very good news that demands a response. Help me to be able to explain it in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Amen.

How Something Ends Matters

Have you ever had something really good that was ruined by how it ended?

Maybe you’re having a delicious meal out at a new restaurant and it’s a great time, but before you leave, you notice there’s a problem with the bill and it results in an argument with the staff of the restaurant.

Based on that ending, would you go back to that restaurant?

Or maybe you’re working your way through a book or a movie or a TV show and you’re loving the story and the characters, but then you get to the ending and it’s so stupid.

Is that the kind of work that you would recommend to a friend?

Or maybe you’re hyped for a certain sports competition because your team, your favorite team, has made it to the championship game, but then they lose.

Wouldn’t you wish that they had never gotten your hopes up in the first place?

The fact is that we humans, deep down, we care about how something ends. We may tell ourselves in the beginning or in the middle that the end doesn’t matter so much. But when the ending arrives and it is good, we feel satisfied, even vindicated that all the trouble along the way was worth it for that good ending.

“We humans, deep down, we care about how something ends.”

And when the ending arrives and is bad, we feel regretful, even betrayed, that everything along the way is now meaningless because of how it ended.

And if such is true about trivial parts of our lives, how much more true are they about life itself?

We are all quickly coming to the final chapter of our stories. We are approaching death and what occurs after death.

But what kind of ending will death represent for you?

Two Questions About Your Eternal Ending

Two questions that we at this church often like to ask people in evangelism are relevant for us to consider today.

Those two questions are: number one, if you were to die today, where would your soul go?

And then number two, if you were to appear before God in heaven and he asks you, “Why should I let you into my heaven?” What would you say to him?

Your heart’s answers to those two questions are very revealing about what kind of ending you are heading towards.

“Your heart’s answers to those two questions are very revealing about what kind of ending you are heading towards.”

The tragic fact, a tragic fact of infinite proportions, is that many people, many dear souls made in the image of God, expect that they will arrive to a good ending when they die, but they will not.

Or they tell themselves that nobody can really know. Besides, who really cares? Just enjoy life now.

They certainly will care when they get there.

Because when your eternal ending is bad, then all the good, all the accomplishments of your life, all the enjoyment that you experience will seem incredibly hollow and meaningless, just fuel now for your eternal sorrow.

But when your eternal ending is good and all the suffering, all the sacrifice, all the shame that you endured on Christ’s behalf, it will be revealed to be worth it and it will only increase your joy forever.

Is there a way to be sure that your eternal outcome is going to be good and not bad?

There is. And it is through this thing that the Bible calls the gospel. The gospel is a word that just means good news.

It’s the good news of Jesus Christ.

This Easter morning, I want to look directly again at this gospel with you. This good news for people who care about or should care about the end.

If you’re in Christ this morning, then may this reminder of the good news, may this message today give you renewed joy in your sure hope of Jesus Christ and, as Greg was saying, in his resurrection and your coming resurrection too.

And if you’re not yet in Christ this morning, then may this message cause you a real change of heart. A change of heart about yourself, about your sin, about God, and about his son, Jesus Christ, so that you may be saved.

I want us to look at one main Bible passage today, though I’ll be making references to several others. If you would, please take a Bible and turn to the book of 1 Corinthians, chapter 15.

We’re going to look at 1 Corinthians 15:3-5 in this message that I’m calling the Easter Gospel. If you didn’t bring a Bible or are not super familiar with the Bible, that’s totally okay. We have some Bibles here that you can use in the pews or near you. Our passage can be found on page 1,152.

Let’s read the passage. It’s also on the screen. 1 Corinthians 15:3-5.

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.

To give you a little background, in chapter 15 of this first letter of the Apostle Paul to the Corinthian church in Roman Greece, Paul seeks to correct the church’s understanding when it comes to the coming resurrection.

Apparently, the new Christians in Corinth had started listening to some teachers who said that there would be no future resurrection of believers, at least not with physical bodies.

But the Apostle Paul confronts this wrong idea by way of simple reminder.

When it comes to the resurrection, Christians will have the same experience as their Lord. If Jesus was raised bodily, then his believers will be too.

But if believers will not be raised bodily, well then that must mean that Jesus was not raised bodily either.

1 Corinthians 15:1-11 is the beginning part of Paul’s argument on this issue. It’s a reminder of what Jesus’s gospel is as taught by Christ’s specially commissioned messengers.

Verses 3 to 5, which we read, is the core section of Paul’s gospel reminder.

Here, Paul presents an essential gospel outline, summarizing but not fully explaining the gospel.

I’d like to follow this outline with you and fill in the outline that Paul provides this morning.

Here’s going to be our guiding proposition: In 1 Corinthians 15:3-5, Paul presents four gospel truths that you must believe to be saved.

Now, before presenting these points, Paul gives an introductory statement at the beginning of verse three. That’s going to be an introductory point in my sermon outline.

Let’s walk through the verses now.

The Gospel Is of First Importance

Introduction: the gospel is of first importance.

Look at the beginning of verse three again. “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received.”

There’s the word “for” at the beginning of the verse. This word indicates that Paul is supplying a reason for what he just said in the previous verses. Namely, why it is important for the Corinthians to remember, believe, and remain committed to the good news that Paul had previously preached to them.

“Paul is supplying a reason why it is important for the Corinthians to remember, believe, and remain committed to the good news.”

The Gospel Was Delivered, Not Invented

Notice now the next phrase: “I delivered to you.” We could translate the verb “delivered” here as “handed down” or “passed on.”

As Paul says later in the verse, there was a message given to Paul that he received and then he handed down or passed on to the Corinthian believers.

In other words, the gospel message was not Paul’s idea. It was given to him to give to others.

Who gave Paul this message?

Well, it wasn’t other leaders in the church. Rather, as Paul says in verse 8, which is not part of the passage we’re looking at, but he also says this in the book of Galatians: the risen Jesus himself appeared to Paul and taught Paul the message that Paul was to teach to others.

Thus, Paul became an eyewitness of Jesus’s resurrection and a directly commissioned messenger of Jesus’s good news. In this way, Paul is just like Jesus’s other specially chosen messengers called apostles.

You ever heard that word “apostles”? That’s just what it means. They’re specially chosen messengers to deliver the good news of Jesus.

Peter, another apostle, declares about himself and his fellow apostles in 2 Peter 1:16: “For we did not follow cleverly devised tales when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.”

Say, “Pastor Dave, why are you emphasizing that point?” Well, it’s because the gospel has been frequently dismissed across time as merely the words and thoughts of men. Just a bunch of men in ancient times wrote this down.

But Paul and the others of the Bible flatly contradict this claim by telling us essentially, “We did not make this up. We are simply passing on to you what God gave to us.”

Consider how remarkable it is that such is the case. God chose to speak his word through men and not just one man. This is something that separates true Christianity from all other religions of the world.

“God chose to speak through a plurality of chosen messengers. Yet they have one united message.”

God chose to speak through a plurality of chosen messengers. Yet they have one united message. That’s because they all speak from God. They all speak by the Spirit of God.

First Importance: The Stakes of True Christianity

Notice now another phrase in verse three. He says, “As of first importance, for I delivered to you as of first importance.” That phrase is a good translation in the version of the Bible I’m using, New American Standard 95. The phrase is literally in the Greek “first” and could refer to either firstness in time or firstness in importance.

No doubt the gospel that Paul is about to describe was among the first items that he taught to the Corinthians.

But the content of the words as well as the context in which Paul says them—these words here in verse three—indicate that what he’s really talking about is what is of first importance.

These are the most important things for you to know and believe.

Paul’s message here then is central to what it means to be a Christian.

If you do not know, do not understand, or do not believe what Paul is about to say, then you may believe in something that you call Christianity, but it’s not actually the Christianity of the apostles. Which means it’s not the Christianity of Christ. Which means it’s a fake Christianity that cannot save you.

“If you do not believe what Paul is about to say, then you may believe in something you call Christianity, but it’s not the Christianity of Christ.”

Your case, if you believe in such a fake Christianity, if you rely on such a fake Christianity, your case will be like those poor persons that Jesus warns about in Matthew 7:22.

In Matthew 7:22, those who call out to Jesus say, “Lord, Lord, didn’t we believe in you? Didn’t we do all these things in your name?”

And he will reply to them, “I never knew you. Depart from me.”

We cannot afford a personally adapted version of Christianity, nor one that simply integrates the passing ideas of our culture.

Jesus through his apostles charges us to hold fast to and then pass on the original word that God delivered to us.

So what is this original word? What is this core message of the good news that we are to believe? That’s what the rest of our verses will tell us.

Core Truth #1: Christ Died for Our Sins

Paul begins outlining this core message specifically starting with the next phrase in verse three: Christ died for our sins.

So what is core truth number one of the Easter gospel? It is Christ died for our sins. Christ died for our sins. Now, this is a phrase we may hear a lot. We may say a lot, but what does it mean?

Notice that Paul adds at the end of verse three, “according to the scriptures.” Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures.

Now, that included phrase is important. It indicates that not only was Christ dying for sins—a truth foretold from ancient times and fulfillment of what previous scriptures declared about him—but there’s more.

Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures means that the meaning and significance of Jesus dying for sins is only truly understood in light of what the rest of scriptures teach.

“The meaning and significance of Jesus dying for sins is only truly understood in light of what the rest of scriptures teach.”

In the Beginning: God Created

This means to really understand and appreciate Paul’s statement here in verse 3, we need to go back to the beginning. And I mean the beginning.

Genesis 1:1, the first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

I don’t know how you feel about Genesis. Maybe one of you would say to yourself at this point, “Pastor Dave, I’m an atheist. I don’t believe in an all-powerful creator God, or at least if there is a God, nobody can know him. I’m pretty sure of that because I’m an agnostic.”

But if you are thinking such things, then listen to what the Bible itself says about that attitude. Deep down, you do know that there is a creator God and that he is the God of the Bible.

How do we know that? By the created order. By the world that you live in and by the conscience that God has given you.

The real explanation for the beauty, the complexity, the goodness evident in the natural world is not just some happy chance outcome. No, it’s God. It’s the God of the Bible. Also, your sense of right and wrong, the guilt you feel in your heart when you don’t do what you ought to do—that’s not just some sort of cultural imposition. No, that’s a testimony that the God of the Bible is real and that you are beholden to him.

“Your sense of right and wrong, the guilt you feel—that’s a testimony that the God of the Bible is real and you are beholden to him.”

The reason you don’t want to acknowledge this is, as the Bible says in Romans 1:18, you are suppressing the truth in unrighteousness so that you may live as you wish.

Don’t deceive yourself. There is a God, and he is the God of the Bible.

Back to Genesis 1:1: God created everything in his universe by his spoken word, including mankind. Since we are the creation of God and we live in God’s world, it is fitting that we should live according to God’s requirements.

God’s Perfect Standard

And what is it that God has required of mankind?

That we would love and worship God as our ultimate treasure. That we would trust and depend on God for life and for all that we need. That we would imitate and obey God before all his creation.

How closely are we to pay attention to these requirements from God?

Well, let God himself answer from the scriptures. God says in Leviticus 11:44, “For I am the Lord your God. Be holy, for I am holy.”

In Matthew 5:48, Jesus says, “Therefore, you are to be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect.”

In James 2:10, we read, “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.” In short, God’s required standard for his creatures is total perfection in reflection of himself.

James 2:10: “Whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.”

Any deviation from perfection by sin represents complete failure before God.

It’s not like you tried. No, you failed.

The Meaning of Sin

After all, consider what the word sin actually means.

We often think of sin as doing something totally evil, totally wrong. And that is true. But more basically, to sin means to miss the mark, to come short of the perfect standard.

Think of an archer shooting at a target.

Whether he is off the bull’s eye by a little or whether he entirely misses the target, unless his shot is perfect right in the middle of the bullseye, he has sinned. In a technical sense, so it is with our lives. A sin is any deviation from who God is and what God has required of us.

And that’s either internally in your heart, your mind, or externally.

“To sin means to miss the mark, to come short of the perfect standard.”

You must not murder. Yes. But you also must not get sinfully angry in your heart.

You must not commit adultery. Yes. But you also must not lust after another person in your heart.

You must not steal. Yes. But you also must not covet what is not yours, but be content.

And these are just a few of God’s negative commands. Positively speaking, God commands that you are to love him and love others perfectly 100% of the time.

Anything less is imperfection. Anything less is sin. Anything less is a rebellious affront to the good character and rules of God.

The Penalty for Sin: Death in All Its Forms

In fact, God warns that any departure from his perfect standard will yield the utmost punishment, which is death in all its forms.

Spiritual death means separation between God and man and enslavement to sin. Physical death is the decay and departure of life and spirit from our bodies. And eternal death is the unending torment of our souls in the dark fires and incomprehensible agony of that special place of punishment called hell.

God told the first man and women that the day they sinned, they would die. Genesis 2:17.

Romans 6:23 further says the wages of sin is death.

In Mark 9:48, Jesus says that suffering anything in this life is preferable to being thrown into hell for sin, where he says their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched as the holy creator God.

Mark 9:48: “Their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.”

God has the right to require perfection of us and the right to set the appropriate punishment for sinful imperfection. If we’re thinking rightly, we will confess that all God’s ways and rules are good.

It is right to be honest, to be faithful, to be pure, to be compassionate, to be just, and so on.

When the Bible commands us to do various things, I think we would all admit that we would like to fulfill those commands. They are good. Those things that they call us to be are the things that we would like to be.

We Are All Sinners

But we should ask, are we though?

Are we the things that God has commanded? Do we do what God has commanded? And do we refrain from what God has told us not to do?

If we are at all sane or honest with ourselves, we know that the answer is no.

Not only have you and I sinned at least once, our lives are characterized by sin. Maybe not in heinous and obvious ways before men.

But God looks at your heart and he knows what’s been going on in there.

You have not loved the Lord with all your heart. You have not loved your neighbor as yourself.

“You have not loved the Lord with all your heart. You have instead loved yourself, loved sin, and loved the treasures of the world more than God.”

You have instead loved yourself. You have loved sin. And you have loved the treasures of the world more than God.

Our Good Works Cannot Save Us

And as for your efforts to make up for your sins by doing different good works, obeying different commands from God, how will these be acceptable to God when even your good works are tainted by pride and self-righteousness?

Rather, as the prophet Isaiah confesses in Isaiah 64:6, “For all of us have become like one who is unclean, and all of our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment, and all of us wither like a leaf, and our iniquities like the wind take us away.” We all want to think that we’re basically good people. And the world tells us that we should think this way.

Have some self-respect. Learn to accept yourself. Nurture your self-esteem.

Actually, self-esteem is the problem.

We think too highly of ourselves and too lowly of God.

We want to be God. Really, we want to put ourselves in God’s place as king and thus we fall under condemnation.

Thus Paul says rightly in Romans 3:10, “There is none righteous, not even one.” In Romans 3:23, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”

Romans 3:10, 23: “There is none righteous, not even one… For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”

Consider what that means for you personally today.

It means that without some radical rescue, the anger of God hangs over you continually for your sin. And at any time, God may suddenly snatch you from this earth and throw you in justice into the fires of hell.

It’s what you deserve. It’s what I deserve. And it’s what will happen unless God provides a radical rescue.

The Hope: A Substitutionary Sacrifice

But there is hope.

Because what does 1 Corinthians 15:3 say? Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures. In the Old Testament, even right after our first parents sin in the garden, God already began showing man that there was a way.

There is a way in which God will save, can save even imperfect, hellbound sinners. And God revealed this by the picture of animal sacrifice, especially as he established it as an official rule in Israel.

God ordained that these ancient Israelites symbolically transfer their sins to an innocent animal like a lamb. And this animal was then killed, burned, and offered up to God as a sacrifice.

Now truly there is no saving power in the death or the blood of an animal. But God ordained this picture because of what it foretold that someone was coming who would accomplish in a real way what the animals only pictured.

Salvation by the substitutionary death of a righteous one.

“Someone was coming who would accomplish in a real way what the animals only pictured—salvation by the substitutionary death of a righteous one.”

Psalm 22, written around 1000 BC by King David, gives more specific details about what this coming one would suffer. This coming one would be utterly forsaken by God. He would be mocked by men. Men would pierce his hands and feet and they would divide his garments by lot.

And then later, the prophet Isaiah, writing around 700 BC, clarifies even more about how this coming one would take on his people’s sins. Isaiah 53:5: “But he was pierced through for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The chastening for our well-being fell upon him, and by his scourging, we are healed.”

How could these things be? How could a human come to suffer and save his fellow humans from sin? Aren’t all humans corrupt?

Well, the answer is that this special coming one, this man is not just a man. He is also God.

The Son of God Became Man

Behold, as the gospel writers wrote, the Son of God himself came into the world around 4 BC as a human baby.

Jesus was born by the Holy Spirit through the Virgin Mary in Bethlehem.

Colossians 2:9 says of Jesus, “For in him all the fullness of deity dwells in bodily form.”

No one ever expected that God himself would come as savior. God himself would become a man, grow up as a man, live as a man.

Yet, this is what God did. This is what Jesus did. He in his coming perfectly fulfilled God’s righteous standard in the way that you and I ought to do, but don’t.

“No one ever expected that God himself would come as savior—God himself would become a man.”

Jesus did love the Lord with all his heart and he did love his neighbor as himself 100% all the time. Jesus never refrained from doing, saying, or thinking what is right.

Though tempted, Jesus never sinned either internally or externally in his actions or words.

The True Agony of the Cross

But Jesus not only lived a perfectly righteous life, he also allowed himself to be betrayed to suffer an excruciating and humiliating death on the cross, which is a special Roman torture device.

Whenever we think of Jesus on the cross, we must understand that the real agony for Jesus on that cross was not the physical agony, not the nails, not the mocking of the onlookers, not the exhaustion of trying to hold yourself up to breathe.

Rather, the true agony of the cross was what the Bible describes in a mysterious way. On the cross Jesus was bearing all the sins of all those who believe in him and he was suffering the penalty for it.

He was suffering the holy anger of God against those sins once and for all.

And as we said, the penalty for sins is ultimately hell. That’s what Jesus experienced on the cross for his people so that his followers would never have to experience not even a taste.

“On the cross Jesus was bearing all the sins of all those who believe in him and suffering the penalty so his followers would never have to.”

As John 1:29 says, Jesus became the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.

Justification: The Great Exchange

He not only pays the full price of sin—the penalty, the debt that you and I owe—but he also gives his people his own righteousness. He doesn’t just cancel out the debt, but he puts infinite money in your account spiritually speaking.

As 2 Corinthians 5:21 says: “God made him who knows no sin, that’s Jesus, to be sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God in him.”

Theologians call what Jesus provided his people justification.

His death allowed us, those who believe, to be counted as acceptable, righteous, justified before God, and thereby wholly reconciled to God forever. Notice, counted righteous—not that he enabled you to do some good work so that you could actually be righteous. No, you are accounted righteous if you believe in Jesus. His record is put on your behalf and your record is given to him.

“His death allowed those who believe to be counted as acceptable, righteous, justified before God, and wholly reconciled to God forever.”

Why Did Jesus Do This? Love.

But why did Jesus do this?

We were rebels the whole time. We were sinners. We rebelled against him and God.

Why did Jesus do this for us when we clearly didn’t deserve it?

Romans 5:8. But God demonstrates his own love toward us, and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

It was love. It was undeserved love from God that sent Jesus to die for us.

Romans 5:8: “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”

All of this is packed behind that one sentence that we read in 1 Corinthians 15:3.

Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures.

If you are really a Christian, if you hold to the true gospel as given by the apostles, then this is what you must believe. You must believe that Christ died for your sins.

You deserve to die. You deserved hell, but he took your place and he gave you his life and his righteous record instead.

Core Truth #2: Christ Was Buried

Now, that is amazingly good news. But it doesn’t stop there. The next core gospel truth is closely tied to it. And that’s what we see in number two of the sermon outline: Christ was buried. Christ was buried. Look at the first part of verse four in 1 Corinthians 15.

And that he was buried.

You might ask, well, why is this phrase included in Paul’s gospel summary? Isn’t it kind of obvious? Doesn’t it go without saying that if you die, you get buried?

Well, in some ways it’s implied, but I believe Paul includes this description separately for two reasons. One, because it actually happened. Jesus really did die and was buried in a tomb near the cross.

And two, to emphasize that Jesus really did die. Jesus was buried for three portions of a day because he actually died.

“Jesus was buried for three portions of a day because he actually died.”

Evidence That Jesus Really Died

Say, why is that important? Again, because since Jesus’ death and resurrection, there have been those asserting wild theories to explain why Jesus’ body was not later found in the tomb without Jesus rising from the dead. One stack of theories asserts that Jesus never really died. He just fainted on the cross from all that blood loss and pain, or he merely pretended to die.

Later, being safely stowed away in the tomb, Jesus woke up and escaped. It’s why they never found him.

This idea is immensely silly because it fails to explain how a terribly weakened Jesus could have opened up the tomb from the inside and escaped without alerting the guards that were posted at the entrance.

Oh, and then there’s the fact that all the gospel writers plainly state that Jesus died on the cross. They write, “He gave up his spirit. He breathed his last. He died.” John even adds that one soldier pierced Jesus’ side just to make sure that Jesus was dead.

I don’t know if you’ve ever thought about that description. Piercing Jesus’ side doesn’t mean like he poked his spear into his waist. Rather, the soldier thrust his spear under Jesus’ rib cage and into Jesus’ heart. If Jesus wasn’t dead before, he would be dead then.

Even non-Christians in the first and second centuries AD plainly state that Jesus died. The writers of the Jewish Talmud who didn’t like Jesus, Josephus the Jewish Roman historian, and Tacitus the Roman historian all say this man Jesus died.

And as we’ve already covered, the fact is that Jesus’ death was foretold as necessary by the scriptures. And then it really did happen. He died bodily and was buried in a tomb provided by a certain rich man, Joseph of Arimathea, thus fulfilling another prophecy from the Old Testament: Isaiah 53:9.

“Even non-Christians in the first and second centuries plainly state that Jesus died.”

His grave was assigned with wicked men, yet he was with a rich man in his death.

Core Truth #3: Christ Has Been Raised

Only God could fulfill all these prophecies. So these are two core gospel truths: Jesus died for our sins and Jesus was buried. The third core gospel truth that you must believe appears at the end of verse four. That is number three: Christ has been raised.

Christ has been raised. Look now at the end of verse four.

And that he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures.

1 Corinthians 15:4: “He was raised on the third day according to the scriptures.”

There’s that phrase “according to the scriptures” again. Why is it there?

Same reason as before. There’s something about this three days later resurrection of Jesus that not only was foretold by previous scripture, but you also can’t understand its full significance without the previous scripture.

The First Gospel Promise: Genesis 3:15

You say, “Was Jesus’ resurrection foretold in the Old Testament?” Oh yes indeed. And the first and most directly informative scripture actually goes back to Genesis again because we not only hear about the creation in Genesis but also the fall of mankind into sin and how that happened. The serpent Satan deceived the first woman and she led her husband into sin. God then pronounced a curse on the serpent, on Satan. And in Genesis 3:15, listen to what God says.

Genesis 3:15, speaking to the serpent, Satan:

And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed. He shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel.

Theologians sometimes call this verse the proto evangelium, the first gospel, because in it God declares to Satan that Satan did not win. Satan has not won. He has not totally doomed the whole human race at the fall.

What God promises is that not only will a holy line of descent of those who believe in God persist and continue to fight spiritual war with Satan and his brood. There’s going to be a holy line of descent that doesn’t follow Satan.

But also, one from this line of believers, this holy seed, will eventually come and vanquish the serpent himself, will defeat Satan. Genesis 3:15 says this serpent would wound this coming one on the heel, which is a painful but not a mortal blow. At the same time, the serpent will be crushed in his head, which is a death-bringing strike.

Now, who is this ultimate seed foretold in Genesis 3:15? It is Jesus. He vanquishes death, sin, and all the designs of Satan.

Satan did his worst to Jesus. He tempted Jesus. He moved Judas to betray Jesus. He got Jesus crucified. But all this represented a mere bruising of the heel of that coming special seed because Jesus would return to life.

Indeed, without the resurrection, Genesis 3:15 makes no sense. The serpent would have seemed to have struck a mortal blow to the ultimate seed. Therefore, it is a matter of honor and victory for God that the holy seed of the woman be resurrected and prove that Satan is defeated.

It is a matter of honor and victory for God that the holy seed of the woman be resurrected and prove that Satan is defeated.

That was foretold in the beginning. This was foretold near the beginning of the world, probably around 4000 BC, later supernaturally recorded for us by Moses around 1450 BC. This is a long before prophecy and it’s already talking about the resurrection, but it’s not just there.

Psalm 16: God’s Holy One Will Not Decay

Another place where we see the resurrection foretold is Psalm 16, which is another psalm written by King David around 1000 BC. In this psalm, David declares his love for God and his confidence in God delivering him from all calamities, even the calamity of death. Listen to what David says in Psalm 16:10-11.

For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol, nor will you allow your holy one to undergo decay.

You will make known to me the path of life.

In those verses, David clearly articulates his confident hope in life with God after death.

But specifically, David anticipates that God will not even allow God’s holy one to undergo decay or be abandoned to Sheol. What is Sheol? That’s the Hebrew word for the grave, the realm of the dead. God won’t even allow your holy one to decay and stay in the realm of the dead.

That’s an interesting thing for David to say because, as the apostles themselves point out in the New Testament, David himself definitely did go into the grave and his body did undergo decay.

So if these words in Psalm 16 are true and not a lie, then they must be true of someone else. They must be true of David’s seed, a descendant of David, a royal descendant of David who would in fact be rescued by God from the grave.

So this one did not even undergo decay.

Now the Hebrews, the Jews, they thought of decay as setting in at about the third day after somebody died.

So by the third day, God would need to raise a future greater David from the dead. Psalm 16 demands it.

“By the third day, God would need to raise a future greater David from the dead. Psalm 16 demands it.”

And what do we see? That is exactly what happened.

Christ rose the third day. He who is the greater David, the coming seed of David, the Messiah, King of Israel.

Again, Christ’s resurrection is a matter of God’s faithfulness. Will he fulfill his word or not?

Hundreds of years before this, the word of resurrection was foretold and it was vindicated. It now vindicates all those who profess the same hope as David in Psalm 16.

God will ultimately bring us to life and not leave us in the grave because he didn’t leave Christ in the grave, just as he foretold.

Isaiah 53: The Messiah’s Vindication

But listen to one more passage. One more Old Testament passage foretelling Christ’s resurrection from Isaiah 53, written around 700 BC.

As I already told you, Isaiah prophesied about Jesus’s sacrificial death, but also prophesies about Jesus’s vindication in returning to life. Isaiah 53:10 and 12. I’m going to take portions of those verses: 10B, the second half of verse 10, and 12A, the first part of verse 12.

Isaiah says, “If he would render himself as a guilt offering, he will see his offspring. He will prolong his days, and the good pleasure of the Lord will prosper in his hand.

Therefore, I will allot him a portion with the great, and he will divide the booty with the strong, because he poured out himself to death and was numbered with the transgressors.

Now, did you hear that? Through Isaiah, God makes a promise to the suffering Messiah to come to Christ.

The promise is that if Christ will indeed give himself up in death as an offering for his people’s sins, then God will prolong the Messiah’s days. God will let him see his saved spiritual offspring and give the Messiah a glorious portion of treasure and blessing.

Now, how are those guarantees possible unless the Messiah returns to life? You can’t prolong your days if you’re dead. You have to come back to life.

And how can anyone see the acceptance of the Messiah’s sacrifice for sin without the Messiah being raised from the dead? I mean, can you imagine? Jesus proclaims it is finished on the cross. He dies and then that’s it.

We would never know if it worked or not. Are we really saved? Are we really covered?

But when he comes back from the dead, now we know. Now we know that Isaiah 53 is fulfilled. Indeed, he rendered himself as a guilt offering and God accepted it, for he prolongs his days.

“When he comes back from the dead, now we know that Isaiah 53 is fulfilled—God accepted it, for he prolongs his days.”

To say it one more time, in the resurrection, God’s faithfulness and honor are at stake because God foretold it. And our confidence in Christ’s offering being accepted demands it.

And what do we see? It did happen. Christ’s resurrection was foretold, and it did happen for God’s glory and for our good.

And we know it did happen, not just because it was foretold, but because all the writers of the New Testament keep telling us it happened.

The Ongoing Effect of Christ’s Resurrection

Paul is one of them right here in this passage. Paul, like the other writers of the New Testament, testifies that Christ was indeed raised. Three days later, on the first day of the week, on the original Easter Sunday or resurrection Sunday, Christ rose from the dead.

Actually, the way that Paul expresses that truth in 1 Corinthians 15:4 is special.

If you’re using the translation that I am, the New American Standard 95, the translation is “and that he was raised. He was raised on the third day.”

But a more literal translation of the original Greek uses the perfect tense and not the past tense. Not “he was raised,” but “he has been raised.”

What’s the difference? Well, both of these choices of verb refer to an action that takes place in the past. But the perfect tense, “he has been raised,” emphasizes that the past action continues into the present or has an ongoing effect in the present.

Does Christ being raised bodily from the dead have an ongoing effect in the present? Absolutely.

As the Old Testament scriptures foretold, Christ’s resurrection means lasting victory for believers over sin, death, and Satan. It means full confidence for believers in facing their own deaths by his new life. And it means that believers become forever saved and justified by Jesus before God.

Paul says explicitly in Romans 4:25: “He was delivered over because of our transgressions and was raised because of our justification.”

So Christ being raised—not merely raising himself, but Christ being raised by the Father—it proves that those who trust in Jesus alone for salvation are forever justified. They are counted righteous before God.

Romans 4:25: “He was delivered over because of our transgressions and was raised because of our justification.”

And that includes you if you believe in Jesus today.

This is more good news. This is astoundingly good news. We who were sinners doomed to perish forever find in Jesus’ death and resurrection full payment for sins and full justification resulting in eternal life.

This is the true gospel. This is the only gospel that saves. This is the gospel that you must receive, hold on to, and pass on to others.

Christ has been raised.

Do you believe this?

Core Truth #4: Christ Appeared to His Disciples

There’s one more core gospel truth and it’s closely connected to the third that we just looked at. We’ve seen that Christ died for our sins. We’ve seen that Christ was buried. We’ve seen that Christ has been raised. Now, finally, number four, Christ appeared to his disciples. Christ appeared to his disciples.

Look at verse 5 of 1 Corinthians 15.

And that he appeared to Cephas, then to the 12.

The name Cephas here is just the Aramaic version of the Greek name Petros, Peter. It’s just a name that means stone. The 12 here is a reference to the specially chosen group of disciples that Jesus taught and traveled with during his three and a half year teaching ministry. They’re usually called the apostles.

Paul therefore is saying here in verse 5 that immediately after Jesus’ resurrection, Christ appeared bodily to his closest disciples who then became the chief messengers of Jesus’ gospel to the world.

And this is important because what good would Christ’s vindicating resurrection provide if Jesus’ followers never knew about it? If they could do nothing to verify it.

But Jesus did not merely rise from the dead secretly. He presented himself alive to his disciples so that they might serve as eyewitnesses and declare his accepted sacrifice and resurrection to others.

“Jesus did not merely rise from the dead secretly. He presented himself alive so that his disciples might serve as eyewitnesses.”

Eyewitness Testimony and Historical Fact

And the 12 weren’t the only eyewitnesses. You read on in our passage, go to verses 6 to 9. Paul mentions that Christ appeared to many others, even 500 disciples at one time.

Paul says many of these witnesses were still alive at the time that Paul sent this letter to the Corinthians. He says, “You want? You can even go talk to these people because it really happened and they really testified of it.” This is a historical fact.

Again, this is important because as with Jesus’ death, many people have tried to come up with non-supernatural explanations for Jesus’ resurrection. Oh, he didn’t really rise from the dead. It was just a mass hallucination of all his disciples. It was a mere symbolic resurrection. Yeah, he didn’t actually die or didn’t actually rise, but in a way he did.

Or it was just some later tradition propagated by overzealous disciples.

No, that’s the opposite of what this text says and what the New Testament says. Really, based on what we’ve seen today and what Paul says later in this chapter, if Jesus didn’t really rise from the dead, then Christian faith is totally empty and all obedience to Jesus is totally wasted.

No, the resurrection of Jesus did happen. This was a truth so confidently held by Jesus’ original apostles that they were willing to suffer and die for Jesus and his gospel.

That’s what they all did.

They’re not stupid guys who would die for what they knew was a lie. As one Christian artist wrote, “No, they died for the gospel of Jesus because they knew it was the truth.” That Christ died for sinners and rose again for their justification is the best news ever. It is truly the gospel.

“They died for the gospel of Jesus because they knew it was the truth.”

The Call to Repent and Believe

But do you believe it?

This is a day for endless rejoicing, really. But only if you believe this gospel. Only if your sins are covered by the only savior because you’ve become attached to him in faith. You’ve taken him as your Lord and Savior.

You now follow him as a disciple. Is that true of you? Do you believe in Jesus in such a way that it’s taken hold of your life? Or is it just that thing where it’s like, “Oh yeah, I believe in Jesus,” and then you just go on about your life. That’s not saving faith.

That’s not going to protect you from the bad ending.

Do you truly believe? Do you believe to the point that you repent?

What does repent mean? The idea of repentance is turning. Are you turning from your sin? Are you turning from self-lordship—I’m the one in charge of my life? Nope. I’m giving that over to Jesus. Are you turning from self-righteous attempts to get yourself saved? “Oh, yeah, I haven’t been very good lately, but I’m going to work harder. I’m going to redouble my efforts and God will accept me.” No, you’ve got to turn from that. You’ll never be good enough for God.

Turn from your sin. Turn from your self-rule. Turn from your self-righteous efforts to save yourself and turn to Jesus as Lord and Savior.

And what does the Bible promise? What does Jesus himself promise? You will be saved. More than that, at the moment of faith, you have his eternal life. You have crossed over from the domain of death to the kingdom of life.

“At the moment of faith, you have crossed over from the domain of death to the kingdom of life.”

When you simply believe, salvation is free, but it will cost you everything. You have to deny yourself. You have to let go of everything so that you can have him. Have you done that?

It is showing up in the way that you live.

Paul discusses later in this chapter that for all those who repent and believe in Jesus, their end will be like his. He walked the road of suffering but was resurrected and glorified in the end. So it will be for all who trust in Jesus, including you today.

Don’t Wait Any Longer

If you have not yet repented and believed, don’t wait any longer. Don’t tell yourself, or rather let Satan tell you, “I’ve got time. I’m going to go enjoy things a little bit more and then I’ll come back to God.” There are many people in hell right now who said that to themselves.

You don’t know how much time you have.

Rather, heed what the scriptures say. Now is the day of salvation.

2 Corinthians 6:2: “Now is the day of salvation.”

The stakes are too high. Don’t risk waking up too late to the most terrible ending.

Hell is a real place. There are souls there right now who wished they had had a little bit more time and they had gotten right with God when they could.

Don’t let that be true of you, not when the invitation is clearly presented to you today and salvation is made free if you will take it.

If you’d like to know more about this gospel and how you can appropriate it, please come talk with me afterwards or talk with one of the elders.

Closing Prayer

Allow me to close in prayer.

Lord, this is a day of such good news. Everything else that goes on in this life does not matter as much as what we just talked about right now.

Lord, we are sinners and there is no way to be made right with you apart from this gospel, apart from Jesus’s work on behalf of sinners. Oh Lord, I pray that everybody in this room, everybody who’s listening to this message would repent and believe and they would know your eternal life. They would receive your Holy Spirit and they would walk after you in obedience and joy. Lord, would you be pleased to do that?

Holy Spirit, speak this word to the hearts of those who have heard it. Convict, encourage, instruct in ways that go beyond what I can do. Would you do that, Lord?

And for those of us who believe, let us rejoice and walk after you in greater obedience today and every day.

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