1 Corinthians - Week 27

0:00 I don't often get to reuse material. I've only been doing this about seven and a half years or so, so I don't often get the chance to reuse material. So when I get the opportunity, I really like to do it. And actually today I get to reuse material, not from my time in Glen Abbey, but actually from 20 years ago in my P6 class in Mosley Primary. Because whenever I taught P6, one of the topics we taught was trees. Who here went to Mosley? Was there anybody here? Bethany, did you go to Mosley?

0:30 No, you didn't. Your brothers went, but you went somewhere else. I'm sure there's a few others that went and maybe remember this. So I'm going to reuse. I've dusted off an old topic, an old PowerPoint from 20 years ago, and I'm going to start with this, a little trees and seeds quiz to work out just how good you are with your knowledge of seeds. So let's throw up the first one first of all. This is audience participation. So shout out.

0:53 This is the seed of what tree? That's an oak tree. Good start. Very good. That's the easy one. It gets harder. There's the oak. Here's the next one.

1:02 What's this one? This is the seed of horse chestnut. Does anybody play conkers anymore? I don't know how to do it. That's the horse chestnut. Yeah, next. Sycamore. Very good.

1:15 Super. Show the sycamore tree there. Two more. Next one. Shout it out. Shout it out. Now we're starting to come down. Oh, ash, very good, with the ash keys of the ash tree.

1:28 And then finally, a little trickier one maybe. Shout it out. Beech tree, that's a beech tree. Absolutely, well done. It started off so well, and then it went downhill, to be honest with you. We've got a few very good naturalists in the room, no doubt about it. naturalists, I said. Hold those images of seeds, though, and trees in your mind, as Al's already set that up already, and that's going to be key, of course, to what we're going to be talking about later.

2:01 But before that, let's just orient ourselves. Let's just work out where we are. Remember, this is the third week. This is the third part of Paul's argument, and it's reaching its conclusion today. He has responded in this letter to all sorts of problems in this dysfunctional church. And now here in this chapter, he is addressing what he sees as a core problem that many of those other problems are actually stemming from, that some in the church are denying the resurrection of the dead and that those in Christ who have put their faith in Christ as Lord and Savior will not actually experience a bodily resurrection in the future. And the whole chapter that we've been looking at is Paul building this compelling rhetorical argument in response to their denial. That in the goal that, in his words last week, they would come back to their senses and place this essential belief at the foundation of their faith.

3:03 And at the foundation of the motivation of their behavior in the here and now. So, so far, what's Paul done? Well, he's reminded them of the gospel he preached to them and they received and took their stand on, which included those words, remember Christ was raised on the third day according to the scriptures. He's taken them on a journey of the what if there is no resurrection of the dead and shown them the logical outworking of that premise. And then he's outlined, this is what we looked at last week, this gospel truth timeline to them. that Christ's resurrection has set in motion this unstoppable chain of kingdom events. Christ putting everything under his feet. Then what we sung about Christ returning.

3:49 Then all those who belong to him being raised from the dead and the final enemy death being defeated. And then Christ handing over that renewal of all things kingdom to God so that God might be all in all. That's the timeline. And just before we get into our passage this morning, I want to pick up on something that I didn't address last week. And it's an important point on that timeline that we see in verses 20 to 28, where it is the turn of those of us who belong to him to be raised from the dead in the new resurrection bodies. Note when that happens. We talked about that. It will happen when he comes.

4:30 And we have just sung that magnificent song, what he's done. And I am fully behind us singing that song. But there is that line in it, my future is heaven. And there's a little bit of a danger in that, in that it might for us compress the timeline. And that it doesn't fully reflect what Paul is talking about here in the timeline that he gives out in this proper order of all things. That idea of my future is heaven. Absolutely, let me be clear here. I fully believe that's the reality right now for our loved ones who have, in Paul's hope and assurance-filled words, fallen asleep in Christ.

5:13 The Bible doesn't give us a lot to go on, though, on this part and what that is like or what it will be like for us, but it does give us more than enough. In Philippians 1, remember what Paul declares, to die is gain. It's gain, whatever that is, that to die is to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far. He says that in Philippians 2. He talks in 2 Corinthians 5 about being absent from the body and present with the Lord. And in Revelation, John gives us this picture of those who have died in Christ, worshiping and praying and waiting for him to bring his kingdom reign to fulfillment. We don't have a lot, but we have the absolute certainty of this. On our death, we will be with Christ.

6:03 And that is more than enough. But that's not the end of the story. That's the story before the end of the story. The end, the telos, the goal that we talked about last week of the story of Christ is him returning from heaven. We eagerly await a savior from there, Paul says in Philippians 3. The Lord Jesus Christ, who by the power that enables him everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body. Our telos, our goal is not spiritual presence with Jesus in heaven. It is new resurrection, bodily, physical presence with Jesus in his renewed, restored, healed, liberated kingdom, eternal kingdom on earth.

6:58 And we need to, and this is what we've been talking about for these three weeks, we need to fill our imaginations with this truth, with this reality. And allow God by his spirit to encourage us and excite us and motivate us with what God's word has to say about that, just as much as those in Corinth at the time needed to. We need to get a really strong grasp on this picture, Not a wishy-washy ethereal one, but a really strong grasp on it so that we can live non-wishy-washy lives in the here and now. And Paul helps us to do that in the rest of this chapter. And that's my single point of application this morning, is this. Let's fill our imagination with this truth. So, let's get stuck in. And like last week, we're just going to work through it bit by bit as we follow Paul's building argument.

7:58 Let's begin verses 35 to 41. But someone will ask, Paul says, well, how are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come? How foolish. And that's Paul saying that to the Corinthians, not the other way around. He's basically saying, how stupid are you? What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or of something else.

8:27 But God gives it a body as he has determined. And to each kind of seed, he gives its own body. Not all flesh is the same. People have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds have another, and fish another. We see that in creation, how all the design of creation is so perfectly set up for different species and so on in different environments. There are also heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies, but the splendor of the heavenly bodies, that's the bodies in the heaven, the sun, the moon, the stars, is one kind and the splendor of the earthly bodies is another. The sun has one kind of splendor, the moon another, the stars another, and stars differ from star in splendor. A few years ago, I was doing some part-time theological study over in St. Andrews, and one of my modules was medical ethics.

9:24 And during the week of classes, we were invited to this lecture on resurrection, but we weren't invited to the normal place, St. Mary's School of Divinity. We were invited to turn up that day at the medical school. And we went into a lecture room, and we were given a sort of introductory little talk on resurrection. And then there was going to be another part afterwards. But in between, we were shown into this room, probably something similar to this size. And in the room, there were a number of cadavers, a number of corpses, of people who had donated their bodies to research. There are no pictures, don't panic. But one of the purposes of showing us and letting us experience these corpses was to let us see, even with these bodies that had been preserved and so on, the idea that resurrection could only be some sort of resuscitation, breathing new life back into this old body.

10:28 Even with those ones, that idea as we experienced them was ridiculous. It was ridiculous. never mind a body that had been in the grave for a year or decades or centuries or whatever. The idea that resurrection is resuscitation as these Corinthians were really thinking about didn't make any sense and that's what Paul is doing here really. He's picking up on a similar theme. He is presuming these objectionable questions of some in Corinth to his insistence on the resurrection of the dead and he basically calls them out as stupid because they are thinking of resurrection in crude and simplistic terms as just this resuscitation of corpses. And Paul's saying, come on. If that's the image that you're conjuring up, then it's no wonder you're averse to it.

11:20 But your concept of resurrection is so far from reality. In fact, it's so small. It's so narrow-minded. This is the creator God that we're talking about here. You need to broaden the horizons of your imaginations of what is possible with him. And so he begins by giving this little analogy that we began with, this little parable of a seed being sown in the ground. You understand, he says, the principle. You understand the concept of transformation yet continuity in this picture from nature.

11:59 You accept that. You grasp that. You grasp that little packet of genetic information is put in the ground and it dies and it later emerges as something transformed and something more glorious according to God's design, yet it's still in absolute continuity with the seed planted. The acorn only ever turns into an oak tree. The beech nuts only ever turn into a beech tree. And so on, radical transformation and organic continuity held together. if we were talking about resuscitation well that would just be the seed going into the ground dying and then coming back out again that doesn't that doesn't make any sense that's not what it's getting at we're talking about transformation into a new physicality with new properties who we who belong to Christ will be transformed yet in that transformation we will remain fully ourselves. That's what Paul is getting at here.

13:04 And let's be clear what he's saying. He's saying, none of this relies on our ability to conceive any of this. Because that's what the Corinthians are saying. Well, no, I can't get my head around a bodily resurrection, so it can't actually be possible. He's going, it doesn't matter whether you can conceive of it or not. What matters is the ability of a creator God, the capability of a creator God to actually bring about new life and give us bodies as he has determined. And look at how he's proved his ability so far, Paul said. He's given birds and animals and fish and people different flesh, different material, different stuff, like I said, exquisitely designed for their earthly environment.

13:43 He's given the sun, the moon, the stars, the material that make up that they need for their environment, different flesh of splendor. Paul's bringing the Corinthians here and us back to the creation story in Genesis, where humanity is the pinnacle, of course, of that creation. And he's saying, can the same creator God, who has done all of this, not do so much more than resuscitation? Can he not transform our lowly bodies, the seeds, into new, glorious, eternal bodies for his new kingdom on earth, in his full and glorious presence? And of course the answer is yes, of course he can. Have some imagination, Paul is saying. And so he goes on, so will it be with the resurrection of the dead, the body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable, it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory, it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power, it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, There is also a spiritual body.

14:56 So it is written, the first man, Adam, became a living being, a living soul. The last, Adam, a life-giving spirit. The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that, the spiritual. The first man was of the dust of the earth. The second man is of heaven. As was the earthly man, so are those who are of the earth. And as is the heavenly man, so also are those who are of heaven. And just as we have borne the image of the earthly man, so shall we bear the image of the heavenly man.

15:29 I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. I don't know whether you saw a story in the news this week, an article which was about a thing called the German Aging Survey. It's a survey that's taken place over a number of years basically to highlight how perceptions of what age is old changes over time. So let me ask you, does anybody want to tell me what age they think is old or do they value their lives based on the people that are beside them? This study's averaging out, it says it's 75. It's a bit of a misleading headline, but what is it? What's the age? I would imagine it's different based on where we are on the scale.

16:26 I'm not going to pin my colors to the mast at all on that one. But here's the thing, whatever we decide on that, whatever we think that reality is, here is the reality that our bodies actually begin to die, supposedly, well, according to WebMD, where I looked it up anyway, in our 30s. In our 30s, cells begin to die off. That happens. Organs work a little less well. Brains start to shrink. Muscle mass starts to decrease. Eyes start to weaken.

17:01 And yet, ears keep on growing. If that isn't something of the fall, I do not know what is. But that's the reality. And Paul makes that very point as he gets to the core of his argument here. As he highlights contrasts between the bodies we have now, the acorns. and the bodies we will be given at the return of Christ, the oak tree. Given at his return for the age to come. Paul, again, he's stirring imaginations here with this imagery.

17:36 He's saying resurrection is not an appalling prospect as the Corinthians are saying it is. It's in fact the most wonderfully appealing prospect if you open your minds to what God is actually going to do. So let's take a look at these contrasts here and let these just seep in. Let these stir your imagination. Let these thrill you. Let these exhilarate you. Let your imagination run wild with what this might mean. First, these bodies that will be sown are perishable.

18:06 They will be raised imperishable. Or another way to put that is these bodies are sown in decay. They will be raised in decay's reversal. These bodies that we have, these still glorious bodies, yet lowly bodies, as a result of the fall, are subject to time and sin. Time and sin. They have a built-in obsolescence. They are in the process of decay towards death, towards mortality. But they will be transformed to follow a process.

18:42 And that's what Paul's getting at here, a process into increasing life and power and vitality and immortality. So in that way, as we decrease now, who's to say that our resurrection bodies in the new kingdom won't increase? In terms of brains increasing in size, eyes getting sharper and sharper, organs getting more and more efficient. What are the possibilities in the eternal kingdom? Second, they are sown in dishonor or humiliation, but they will be raised in glory. Anyone who has cared for someone in the final throes of a terminal illness knows only too well the dishonor of the enemy, of death. That's why places like the hospice and so on are such amazing places and the way that they bring as much dignity as possible into those situations. Our bodies too, though, are sown in dishonor in the sense that they've been indelibly impacted by our sin, our actions, our words, our attitudes over the course of our life.

19:56 But the promise we have is this. They will be raised in glory. And it's hard to get our heads around what that means, but that really means fully human as God intended. It's sort of what Al was touching on when he was talking about the story with Ian there. Without sins tarnish, without any impediment reflecting the glory and the majesty of the king of glory himself. So glorious, in fact. And that famous Lewis quote sort of picks up on that. If we saw our resurrection selves now, we would be tempted to bow down and worship.

20:32 That's how glorious. Third, they are sown in weakness. they will be raised in power. Our current weak bodies with all their injuries and scars and fragility and pain and frustration and susceptibility to the tiniest little particles of a virus will be transformed into bodies of power. Unbreakable, full of unimaginably boundless energy and strength, ready and capable to carry out the work God has for us in his new kingdom on earth. And I was thinking about that, raised in power. What's that new environment going to be like? We read in Revelation 21 about the fact that there's not going to be any need for sun in the eternal city because the light will come from God himself.

21:33 I'm sort of thinking, imagine the vitamin D equivalent of that. Our resurrection bodies will be getting from the unhindered face of God himself. And then you just extrapolate those sorts of ideas and thinking out and where you get to. And then fourth, and this is the one, the core one, this is the one in which the other's hinge. It tells us how those other three, immortality, glory, and power are empowered, are animated. It is sown a natural body, Paul says, it is raised a spiritual body. Now we've got to be careful at this point, because rip this verse out of context and we start to get the wrong idea. We could easily read it, this verse says it is sown a physical body, And it has raised a spiritual, a non-physical, non-material body.

22:26 But that wouldn't make any sense in what Paul has said so far. Our resurrection bodies, the whole point of his argument is this. They will absolutely be physical. They will be material. That's the whole point. That's all he's doing here, challenging their platonic, non-bodily belief in this group in Corinth. But he goes on then and gives them a key to understanding this. And he says the key to understanding the distinction between what he means by a natural body and a spiritual body is to look at the natural body prototype, the first Adam, and then the spiritual body prototype, the last Adam, the first for its resurrection spiritual body of the risen Jesus.

23:11 In Adam, our present natural bodies are from, are out of the earth, are out of the dust, and are for this current earthly existence. In Christ, our future spiritual bodies are from. They will be out of heaven and brought out of heaven to the new earth by the risen Christ at his return for that new earth, new kingdom existence. Our current bodies, they bear the image, they bear the stamp of the natural earthly first Adam. Our resurrection body will bear the image, the stamp of the heavenly last Adam, Christ. So when Paul is talking spiritual here, he's saying your physical resurrection body will be spiritual in the sense that it will be a body fully animated, fully powered by the unbroken, unceasing, unstoppable, uninterrupted, incessant, transforming power and activity of the Holy Spirit of God in your whole entire being. Not simply what we experience now, which is still wonderful, but it is interrupted. It's marred by sin and rebellion and defiance.

24:43 And it's an influence on our inner beings, the presence of our inner beings of the Holy Spirit. What we have in our resurrection bodies will be totally, totally different. And it's that holy spiritual that empowers the imperishability and the glory and the power. When he's saying spiritual, he means powered, animated by the Holy Spirit. He doesn't mean non-physical. Let's be careful of that. And then it's only that holy spiritual body that is able to inherit the kingdom that it has been designed for. The natural Adam prototype, sinful, mortal, flesh and blood bodies we have right now, they're not capable of inheriting a kingdom such as that.

25:29 We need those new, holy, sinless, uncorrupted, immortal spiritual bodies for the holy, sinless, uncorrupted, eternal new kingdom. And the risen Christ is the prototype of that. The risen Christ is the prototype of that holy spiritual body and we can enjoy looking through the New Testament, looking through the new gospels for the little clues there about his prototype body, his prototype body, risen body of continuity and transformation. You should do that maybe this week in your home groups. Jesus' scars still visible. Him eating a barbecue breakfast on the beach with his disciples, him being able to be physically touched and physically touched. Yet, from what we can read, able to travel effortlessly, able to appear in a locked room.

26:38 But here's the thing. As we ponder his resurrection body as a focus, as a sort of catalyst for our imaginations, let's remember these are only clues. Because we need to remember this, that he appeared in his new resurrection body in the old environment. of this current fallen groaning creation. In a sense, he was running the new resurrection body program in the old earthly operating system. So the question is this then, what will it be like running 2.0 bodies in the new 2.0 heaven and earth system that they have been purpose designed for by God? That's where the possibilities get incredibly exciting. And that's what Paul's talking about here.

27:36 And he goes on. Let's get to the end of this. Listen, I tell you a mystery. We will not all sleep. We will not all die, but we will all be changed in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. for the perishable must clothe itself, another beautiful metaphor, with the imperishable and the mortal with immortality. Paul assumes again a question here that the Corinthians might ask at this point.

28:08 He doesn't actually call this one stupid. And really the question is this, well, if that's what you're saying, Paul, if that's the story, what if Christ returns while I'm still alive in this body? If I haven't died, If my body hasn't been sown in that sense, am I just left hanging in this sort of earthy, dusty, fleshy, mortal body? And therefore unable to inherit the kingdom with all those who have died in Christ. Because remember, these guys would have been thinking this might happen tomorrow, this might happen the next day. It was right in front of them all of the time. And Paul basically says this. Relax.

28:52 here's the mystery that God's revealed to me all those who belong to Christ whether asleep in him or awake in him at the moment of his return will all be changed all of us not in a drawn out process but in an instant the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet that declares that the day of the Lord has finally arrived, we will be given these imperishable, immortal clues. This Chris Cook, or this Benji Kays, or Al Bennett, or whatever, whether awake or sleeping at the last trumpet, will not be destroyed, will not be scrapped as a as a project that didn't work and replaced with something else. No, this same person, this same self, this same Chris Cook will be transformed, will be given the new clothes of the new body for the new kingdom, continuity and glorious transformation. Let's go on, verse 54 to 57, When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written that we've sung about this morning will come true. Death has been swallowed up in victory. Where, O death, is your victory?

30:25 Where, O death, is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law, but thanks be to God, he gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. This last trumpet, this blink of an eye transformation, Paul says, as he brings together these quotations out of Isaiah 25 and out of Hosea 13, will be the moment in which God's redemption story comes together and reaches its goal. Our resurrection bodies, in that sense, will be this final whistle, heralding Christ's ultimate victory over the last enemy of death. This enemy, this enemy of God's, this enemy of Christ, this enemy of ours that has swallowed everything in its path up to this point will itself at last be swallowed up in Christ's victory, never to be seen again, never to be heard from again, never to be experienced again, and so never to be feared again. that's the resurrection of Jesus guaranteed future that we in him have to look forward to death will be swallowed up in victory that process has begun it's a matter of time and thanks be to God Paul cries out that what is true for Christ will be true for us and so for this time for today for the here and the now we live in this sure and certain hope of that victory of that victory process being brought to its end.

32:08 But we also live in the reality that today, that right now, because of the cross and because of the resurrection, death has already had its sting removed. Jesus took that sting of sin and judgment for that sin on himself. That's what we looked at in the run-up to Easter in the Messiah series. and so now that sting can't be used in us again it's like that image of a of a honeybee isn't a honeybee is the only one that stings and then it leaves its sting behind and then it actually dies after that it's that same idea sin no longer or sorry death no longer opens its doors onto judgment for sin for us but again as we've sung into the presence of Jesus that's where death brings us to. And then ultimately into eternal resurrection life. Death is still the enemy. It is still the enemy. And it is right that we hate it.

33:17 And it is right that we grieve it. And we absolutely must do that. And we absolutely must walk alongside others as they do. but in that grieving with hope the first Thessalonians talks about because it's now a stingless enemy a toothless enemy so in Christ just absolutely the process the lead up to the struggles in the process of dying of course they are horrendous at times but death itself as a follower of Christ has nothing for us to fear. That's the reality that Paul's talking about here. Therefore then, finally, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you.

34:10 Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. Paul then brings all of this glorious truth about the future all back, as he does so often, to right here, right now, what does that mean for us today? And this Isaiah 25 passage that he's quoted from a few verses before, that passage gives us imagery to finish off this morning. To help us get our finite minds around and to begin to grasp the edges of the resurrection life that will be ours in God's restored, eternal, all things new kingdom. We often read from Revelation 21, which comes out of this, but let's just read from here to finish off. On this mountain, the Lord Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples. Imagine that. A banquet of aged wine, the best of meats and the finest of wines.

35:11 What will that be like? How sensitive will and distinguished will the taste buds in our new bodies be, for example? On this mountain, he will destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations. He will swallow up death forever. The sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears from all faces. He will remove his people's disgrace from all the earth. The Lord has spoken. Your hope, Paul says to the Corinthians and us, Guaranteed by the bodily resurrection of Christ is a transformed, eternal, Holy Spirit-powered body designed and manufactured in heaven,

36:02 modeled on Christ's body as the prototype with all the inexhaustible energy and vitality and power and glory and honor and immortality and Christ-likeness. That's the key thing. no sin, no lives marred by sin no environment marred by sin and so that's the body that we get to take our place in and contribute to and work in and enjoy and thrive in and glory in and worship in the fulfilled kingdom where God will be all in all that's where we're moving towards And this is, as we've talked about over these weeks, this is a hope that has got to change the way we think about the here and now. It just has to if we take hold of it. That's what Paul's saying here. Paul's point is this. There will be continuity between who we are and what we do in the here and now with who we will be and what we will do in our eternal future.

37:16 God in his grace and in his love will somehow weave the threads of those together. And we don't know exactly how he's going to do that, but the promise here is that he absolutely will. What does that mean in our lives in the here and now? Well, it gives value. gives value to my life today and my body, to your life today and your body. Because of the resurrection, Paul's saying, all that we work for and strive for in Christ and for his kingdom will last and will have eternal significance. And that doesn't just mean what we do in church. That means our whole lives focused in worship to him.

38:04 Everything, our home life, our work life, our relationships, everything. God will weave that tapestry together from the here and now into the eternal future we've got to understand that this now here now is not some sort of temporary post while we wait for the permanent one nor is it permanent in the sense that it will end at the end of our 60 or 70 or 80 years or whatever it is here it's our permanent eternal life eternal kingdom post is happening right here, right now in this warehouse in your home, in your workplace in this body and so the way to live a life full of meaning, of value, of purpose of significance is not to search for it in all of these other places, but is to stand firm and live a life of obedience to Christ, a life in continuity with and towards that goal of our resurrection life, knowing that all of that, none of it will be in vain.

39:26 All of it will be used. and all of it will have value into eternity. That's the promise that is ours in the resurrected Christ. Let's pray together and the band can come back up. Father, we fill our imaginations with this truth. Help us to just let it Let us ponder it, let it roll around in our minds, let us think through the implications of that. The implications of those threads, that our work here will have eternal significance in your eternal kingdom.

40:17 That our relationships, that our teaching, that our music, that our art, that our engineering even, all of those things, every aspect of our life in the here and now can have eternal value because you are weaving the threads of that tapestry together. Help us see that, help us live our lives in the light of that, help us come to our senses in the reality of the truth of what your word teaches us here in this passage. And Father, for those of us who might be in this room this morning still contemplating whether following Christ is the best way to live life, is a decision, a choice that we should make, speak through your word here into those hearts and minds too with this message of hope and just excitement and exhilaration and we have no words for it. So Father, by your Spirit, speak where you need to speak, who you need to speak to now in Jesus' name. Amen.