Sermon Notes — February 23, 2025
1 Corinthians 15:1-21
The Gift of Resurrection
Dr. Craig Goff
February 23, 2025
I am going to do my best not to preach an Easter Sunday sermon today, but given our text, that may be a challenge. Our passage today speaks to the heart of Easter.
Actually, it’s probably okay if I do preach an Easter sermon, because in reality, every Sunday is a “little Easter.”
The season of Lent begins in two weeks, beginning with Ash Wednesday and many of us will begin a Lenten discipline, however many people don’t observe their Lenten discipline on Sundays because, Sundays are days of celebration. Feast days.
Paul is definitely celebrating Easter and the resurrection in our passage today.
If I was pressed or challenged to pick a favorite passage from the Bible, it might very well be this one.
Let’s take a look at what Paul says in verse three:
In our first church council meeting for the year, I spoke to my belief that Bethlehem is in a good place and that I am committed to working hard and doing what I can so that it is in an even better place when we transition to a new pastor.
We are in a good place, but we are going to be in an even better place through this time of transition.
Some transitions are smoother than others.
I once heard about a pastor who moved to a new church, the pastor who was leaving told him that he left 3 letters for him in his desk.
He said, “everything is going good here, but I prepared these letters just in case anything happens…”
He said, “If you do hit any bumps in the road, just open the first letter.” Things were going really good for a few months and then there was a little bit of friction at one of the church council meetings. The pastor thought, “That wasn’t bad, but I am going to go ahead and open that first letter.” He opened the first letter and it simply said, “Blame the previous pastor.” That seemed simple enough and so at the next church council meeting he said, “I realize we hit a little bit of a snag at our last church council meeting, but I want you to know that is all because of things the previous pastor did.” It worked. They blamed everything on the previous pastor and everything went great for a pretty good while. But then, there was some disagreement among the leaders of the church and things got heated. The pastor remembered the second letter the previous pastor had left in his desk. He went to his desk, opened the second letter, and it simply said, “Blame the District Superintendent.” So he did, he said, “you know we have been having some heated discussions about certain issues, but they really all stem from pressure from the District Superintendent and things the Bishop wants us to do.” That also worked well, whenever there was a problem the pastor just blamed the District Superintendent and it calmed everybody down. But eventually there was another sort of blow-up. The pastor blamed the District Superintendent, he blamed the Bishop, nothing worked and so he thought, I better open that third letter. He went to his desk, opened the letter and it simply said, “Prepare three letters.”
For the record, Ryan did not leave me three letters, but some transitions are smoother than others. I am grateful that we are in such a good place, but there are some questions I have mentioned in other contexts that I think will be helpful for us to reflect on in the coming days and months.
They are questions Adam Hamilton has suggested are helpful for any church to spend some time pondering.
The first is “who is Jesus.”
That is a supremely most important question.
Different people obviously answer that question in different ways.
For me, drawing from our text today, what is of most importance is that Jesus is the one who died for our sins who God has raised from the dead. The one through whom everything has been created and who is the divine Son of God who will fulfill everything in every way.
Which leads to the second question: Why is Jesus important?
Jesus is important because we can’t save ourselves. Jesus is important because we were created for a relationship with God.
And what Jesus did on the cross (somehow) restores our relationship with God.
Geneva Vance whose service of death and resurrection will be this Saturday was a faithful member of our church for many years.
We will commend her soul to God and we will pray this prayer from the Book of Worship
Into your hands, O merciful Savior,
We commend your servant, Geneva
Acknowledge, we humbly beseech you,
A sheep of your own fold, a lamb of your own flock
A sinner of your own redeeming
Jesus is important because we can’t redeem ourselves.
The third question Hamilton identifies for any church to ponder is: “why is the church important?”
A lot of people will affirm that Jesus is important, maybe even that he died for our sins but see no value in the church. The church is kind of a bad guy.
If we believe the church is important, it is important to think about why the church is important.
To me, the church is important because the church is faithful to the story of Jesus. We know about Jesus because of the church.
After we reflect on why the church is important it is equally helpful to ask “why is this church is important?”
I believe this church is important because Jesus Christ is the Son of God and has been raised from the dead and we are part of the church that celebrates that his death provides us abundant, full, and eternal life
I also believe this church is important because we are a congregation that allows people who don’t have all the answers and who may even have some doubts to be fully included
We are a congregation that accepts one another even if we don’t agree with one another on every point of Christian doctrine and practice.
I believe we are living in a time when it is going to be more and more important to have a place and to be part of a community where it is okay to disagree.
I believe it is going to be more and more important to find a place where we are held together by something/someone above and beyond ourselves, someone who loves us enough to die on a cross for us.
Someone who became like us, so that we might become more like God and the people God would have us to be.