The subject of the resurrection, which occupies the fifteenth chapter, because of its special importance has been reserved almost to the last of the Epistle.
Without the resurrection of Christ there could have been no glad tidings of God’s grace to reach our ears, our consciences and our hearts; therefore the believers at Corinth, beguiled by Satan into doubting or denying the resurrection of the body, are reminded first of all of the gospel which had been announced to them.
They had received it, and in it they stood; by it they were saved (if they held fast the word announced to them as the gospel) unless indeed they had believed in vain, or lightly. In verse 2 Salvation is looked at as now going on in the life of the believer; it is so, frequently in the Epistles, but not always; for example, in 2 Tim. 1:9, and Titus 3:5, it is a thing long completed; both are, of course, true. Our souls are saved and we, believers, are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed. The righteous, referring to all true Christians, are with difficulty saved because Satan throws every hindrance in their path that he may, and there is an evil nature within us that delights in sin (1 Peter 1:9, 5, and 4:18).
“Able to save to the uttermost”, is our Lord Jesus, “seeing He ever liveth to make intercession for them” that come unto God by Him. Heb. 7:25.
“Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved” (Acts 16:31). So, in our chapter, the proof that it was a real work of God in their souls would be in their “holding fast”, as the marginal note correctly reads, not merely “keeping in memory” what they had heard.
Verses 3, 4. What Paul had received in the first place, that he passed on to his hearers for their faith to rest in, like his own; and it was this, that Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures; and that He was buried; and that He was raised the third day, according to the Scriptures.
The Old Testament witnessed to the necessity for His dying for our sins (plainly, but by no means only in Isa. 53), and to His rising again (Psa. 16:10, but many passages which foreshadowed His death indicated His living again).
What a burden is taken off the anxious, convicted before God of sin, when once it is apprehended that Christ died for our sins! Not every one’s sins, mark you, were laid upon Him.
“And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment, so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for Him shall He appear the second time without sin unto salvation.” Heb. 9:27, 28.
He died for the sins of all who put their trust in Him, not for those who reject Him.
“Come unto Me,” is His word, “all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart; and ye shall find rest unto your souls, for My yoke is easy, and My burden is light.” Matt. 11:28-30.
You are not in truth a Christian, unless you have made the 28th verse your very own; and you are not a happy Christian, unless you have made the 29th verse your own too.
Verses 5-7: The fullest proof is afforded of the fact of Christ’s resurrection. Mary Magdalene (John 20:14-18 and Mark 16:9,10) saw Him first, but her report (and that of others of her sex) was not given much acceptance then, as we learn from Mark 16:10,11. The first witness of His resurrection named in 1 Cor.15 is the better known Cephas or Simon Peter (see Luke 24:33,34), and the twelve are named next, passing by the two of Luke 24 who did not know Who the stranger was that walked with them, until He was about to vanish out of their sight. The third instance cited is of “above five hundred brethren at once”, of whom the greater part were living when Paul wrote. Of this meeting, and that with James, no account is given in Matthew, Mark, Luke or John’s inspired writings, though in Acts 1:3 it is said that the Lord “showed Himself alive after His passion by many infallible proofs, being seen of them (the apostles) forty days.”
“And last of all,” says Paul in the 8th verse, “He was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time.” The occasion was when he as Saul of Tarsus was going to Damascus, an open enemy of Christ, and suddenly there shone about him a light from heaven, and he fell to the earth, hearing a voice saying to him,
“Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?” Acts 9.
With becoming lowliness the apostle writes, “For I am the least of the apostles, who am not fit to be called apostle, because I have persecuted the assembly of God” (verse 9, N. T.). The twelve had never been guilty of that, but Paul before his conversion had passed all others in sin against Christ, as he says in 1 Tim. 2:15, 16... “sinners, of whom I am chief. Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth all longsuffering, for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on Him to life everlasting.”
And so in verse 10 of our chapter he says,
“But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace which was bestowed upon (or, was toward) me was not (or has not been) in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all; yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me.”
In the Acts there is little mention of the twelve apostles except Peter and John, and they only to the 12Th chapter, and again in chapter 15 where Peter is named. The risen Lord had given them a work to do, in Matt. 28:18-20, which it is evident they did not carry out, and we do not know from the Scriptures to what extent they really acted on those instructions. The Holy Spirit in the Acts, after the martyrdom of Stephen (chapter 7) by the Jews (“Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost; as your fathers did, so do ye”- verse 51), is concerned with the Gentiles much more than with the children of Israel who had both rejected and crucified their Messiah and rejected the Holy Spirit in Stephen whom they stoned to death. The salvation of God was therefore being offered to the Gentiles (See Acts 28:23-29). This is no doubt the reason why we are told so little about the twelve, whose mission was primarily to Israel.
Verses 11-14. Whether Paul or the twelve preached the message of salvation depended upon the resurrection of Christ. So Paul had preached at Corinth, and so they believed. Now, he says, if Christ be preached that He rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen; and if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.
Verses 15-17. It would necessarily follow then, that Paul and those with him, and all others who were making the way of salvation known, were false witnesses of God, because they had testified of Him that He raised up Christ, whom He raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. For if the dead do not rise, then Christ is not raised, and if He be not raised from the dead, the faith of the Corinthians (and of all others, necessarily) is vain; ye, says the apostle, are yet in your sins.
What a test of any new teaching we have here! How, we may ask, does it affect Christ, His person, His work, His glory? In denying a bodily resurrection, the bold advocates of human reasoning overlooked the vital fact of His rising from the grave everything depends upon His resurrection; take only one passage: Rom. 4:24-25,
“Who was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification.”
He was delivered up to the death of the cross, bearing our sins’ judgment; but His raising again is proof that He had exhausted that judgment, so that it can never fall upon the believer.
“God will not payment twice demand;
Once at my bleeding Surety’s hand,
And then again at mine.”
“He that raised up Christ from the dead, shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you.” Rom. 8:11. We who trust Him as Savior, will be raised as surely as He was raised.
But the resurrection of Christ has other aspects. It was the seal of the miracles He had performed, and of His grace Who had gone down into death to deliver men from Satan’s chains and from death.
Do not these verses show how fully Christ took His place with men-with his saints-
“If there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen” (ver. 13).
“If the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised?” (ver. 16).
He was taken out from among the dead, from the rest of the dead- the seal, as another has said, of His perfect acceptance; and we who believe shall be taken out from among the dead in the same manner; it is only a question of time. Beside this, the resurrection of Christ is evidence that all that have died shall rise again; not only the saints but the wicked; but each in his own order (John 5:28, 29).
Verse 18 speaks of those who have died in faith; they would be lost eternally if Christ is not raised; and verse 19 measures up the case of living believers, if there be then no hope beyond this life, they are of all men most miserable, because the world has no attraction for them; they are indeed spoiled for this world. But now (verse 20) is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of the sleeping saints. He, seated in glory, is my assurance that I shall be there also, through grace.