But Wait... There's More!

 

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“If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.

“But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death” (1 Corinthians 15:19–26).

Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ!

Many of you may remember Ron Popeil, an American inventor and marketer of various products, including the Popeil Pocket Fisherman. His innovative approach to marketing and sales made him a household name and a pioneer of infomercials. He is perhaps best known for the extra add-ons he would throw in if you acted now and then he’d say, “But wait … there’s more!”

Our readings from the Gospel and Epistle have a similar feel. Christ has defeated sin, death, and Satan by His death on the cross and His resurrection on the third day. But there seems to be even more ahead. Paul’s vivid language of death as the last enemy to be put under Jesus’ victorious feet is a strong assurance of the physical, bodily resurrection of Jesus and a powerful promise of the physical, bodily resurrection we look to and long for.

I’ve found lately that many people have a good understanding of the theology about how Christ’s death on the cross and resurrection on the third day won forgiveness and defeated death for us sinners, but quite a few people lose sight of the promise of the End Times Resurrection of the Dead. We understand Jesus’ promises for believers that at death He will bring us to Paradise, and we will be with the Lord. Those promises bring great comfort when we grieve the loss of a loved one or confront the reality of our own mortality.

With that sacrificial lens in mind, the author to the Hebrews can even call the death of Jesus a kind of victory: “Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death He might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery” (Hebrews 2:14–15). What good news! The crucified Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed! Alleluia! The price for your sin has been completely paid. Your sins are completely forgiven. You have an eternal inheritance in God’s Kingdom as His beloved child!

But wait… there’s more. There’s something even better than “dying and going to heaven.” There’s “the Resurrection of the Dead and the Life of the World to Come,” we confess in the Nicene Creed, “the Resurrection of the Body and the Life Everlasting,” we confess in the Apostles Creed.

In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul is trying to clear up some misunderstandings about the resurrection that had led the Corinthians to thinking and living contrary to the Gospel. There seem to be similar misunderstandings in our day. I recently heard this Randy Alcorn quote: “For the Christian, death is not the end of adventure but a doorway from a world where dreams and adventures shrink, to a world where dreams and adventures forever expand.”

Alcorn may have authored some popular books about Heaven, but that is not the way the Bible talks. Jesus is the Door. Your mouth is a door. An opportunity can be an open door. But death is not a door; it is an enemy. “The last enemy to be destroyed,” in fact (1 Corinthians 15:26).

Death-as-door language is as common today in the Church as “Heaven is my home.” Both miss the point of the Resurrection entirely. This robs us of our greatest hope. If we want to rehab our hope, we will need to find biblical ways of talking about death and resurrection. And the Day of the Resurrection of Our Lord seems like the perfect opportunity to talk of the Resurrection of the Dead.

A little bit later in 1 Corinthians 15 (v 35-44), Paul uses the metaphor of sowing and seed. Paul does not picture the deceased family and friends of the Corinthian church dancing in Heaven. He leaves them in the dirt.

This seems to make the death of your loved one way worse, but ultimately it makes the hope of the Resurrection way better. When we make out the enemy of death to be less horrible than it is, we also make the promise of eternal life far weaker and more limited than we need it to be. Death is not the continuation of an adventure. Death is being planted in the ground. The adventure comes later in the Resurrection of the Dead and the Life of the World to Come.

 Let me try to explain this with an appropriate illustration.

I have here a lily bulb and an Easter lily in full bloom. Notice the difference between the two. The bulb is small, hard, ugly, and smells like death. The lily, in contrast, is large, beautiful, vibrant, and smells like life.

If you have never experienced it, it would be hard to believe the bulb can be buried in the ground and, after a time, be transformed into a beautiful flower. Since we have not experienced bodily resurrection, it can be hard to believe Jesus was planted in the ground after a brutal and ugly death and just three days later was raised to new life.

The biblical witness is not that Jesus was put in the ground as a bulb and then came out of the ground as a bulb. The resurrection of Jesus was not a resurrection like the resurrection of Lazarus. Jesus is the “firstfruits” of the Resurrection of the Dead (1 Corinthians 15:21-23). Jesus goes into the grave as a bulb but comes out of the ground as a full-grown, blooming plant. With the resurrection of Jesus, the New Creation has begun.

The transformation from bulb to blooming flower can be difficult to believe. Even the first disciples did not expect an End Times resurrection on Easter morning. When they buried the body of Jesus, they prepared it for decomposition and decay. When the women came to the tomb on that first Easter morning, they expect to find a corpse. When the tomb was empty, their first thought was: Someone moved the body. And when they did see Jesus in full bloom, they did not recognize the flower… at least not at first!

Jesus is still Jesus, but He is not the same. Or it is the same Jesus, but He is different.

Paul says this is to be expected when you get the End Times Resurrection of the Dead. We will be the same, but different; still us, but not the same. With what kind of bodies will we be raised? Paul says, New Creation bodies are the same, but different, just like bulbs are different from full-grown flowers, and different plants bear different fruit (1 Corinthians 15:35-41).

The lily bulb brings forth the lily flower. The tomato seed brings forth the tomato plant, which bears rich, red tomatoes (not grapefruit). When you die, they will plant your body in the ground. And when Jesus calls you forth to New Creation life, your New Creation body will still be you. A watermelon vine, not a brussels sprout. But your resurrected body will be so much more alive and complete and full of life. You will be as different from what you are now as a full-grown lily is from a bulb.

And we will all be different from each other. Various kinds of seeds/bodies produce distinct kinds of fruits. The New Creation will not be uniform. Rather, the Word to Come will be full of vibrant variety (1 Corinthians 15:38-41). We will each be as different from each other as a muskmelon is from a cumquat, but we will all be bursting with life!

This is hard to believe when all you see is the bulb. If you start as a bulb and end as a bulb, then, “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die” (1 Corinthians 15:32). But that kind of fatalistic thinking and living is contrary to the promise of life. We live our lives under a sure and certain promise. It is not that, when we die, we will go through the door of death into a pleasant and disembodied existence. Your promise is much bigger than that. When you bury a loved one, when they plant your body in the ground, you can expect the seed to burst forth with abundant and glorious life which can never die again (1 Corinthians 15:42).

Death is an enemy, but that enemy will be destroyed. Death is a planting, but every planting has a purpose: More life than you could ever imagine.

“The body that is sown is perishable; it is raised imperishable” (1 Corinthians 15:42). It is buried in a fallen and sinful world. It is raised in the New Creation. It is planted as a bulb. It is raised a full-grown flower.

Christ is risen from the dead: the Son of God who became flesh and dwelt among us died indeed. But He was also raised from the dead, body and all. His victory over sin, death, and devil is complete.

Christ is risen from the dead. Because He is risen, He will return to judge the living and the dead. Therefore, the Law of God matters. We are not left to what we think is best, which always plunges the world into chaos and violence; rather, we give thanks that the living Lord still preserves His Law, and we seek to live according to it.

Christ is risen from the dead: therefore, He is present with you in His means of grace. His Word here is not just information but living, because Christ—the living Word made flesh—is present in His Word. Holy Baptism is not just a splash of water and a nice thought. Rather, Christ is present there, to join you to His death—and to His resurrection. Likewise, the Lord’s Supper is not just an inadequate meal in memory of one who died. Rather, it is the Lord’s Supper because the risen Lord is there, to give you His body and blood for the forgiveness of sins. Thus, the Lord walks with you. Risen, He thus fulfills His promise, “I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

Christ is risen from the dead, and we rejoice that He is the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. He has walked through the valley of the shadow of death so that He might guide you through to the gates of heaven. For now, you and I will witness and suffer grief, separation, mourning, and eventually our own death. But you do not mourn as those without hope—Christ is risen from the dead, the firstfruits. He has not risen for Himself, but for you. He is the beginning of the harvest—and you can be sure that He will raise you—and all who die in Christ—on the Last Day.

Christ is risen from the dead. Were it not so, you and I would be the most pitiable of all on earth. But it is so. You and I have been baptized into His death and resurrection, Therefore, we will not cease to proclaim both His death and His resurrection, for these are at the very core of the hope that we have in Jesus. Rejoice, dear brothers and sisters: your faith is not in vain. Christ is risen from the dead. And if Christ is risen from the dead, then you are forgiven for all your sins.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!