Today’s Reading: 1 Corinthians 15-16; Acts 19:23-41; 20:1

Greetings brothers and sisters! Can you believe that we have started the month of December? The new year is coming upon us quickly.

The very first thing that was addressed in today’s reading was the resurrection. In Corinth, some teachers had gone into the church, followers of Christ and somehow convinced them that bodily resurrection does not exist. I’m sure that we could all understand how easily the church could be swayed if they were not holding fast to the the truth of God. We also flounder in believing what’s true of God when the world tells us otherwise, that is, unless we hold fast to God’s word.

So the teachers had caused a disturbance among the believers in Corinth and today we read Paul’s response. He starts by reminding them of the gospel which he preached to them from the beginning and also reminding them that they themselves decided to stand by it.

One of my favourite verses in the Bible is 1 Corinthians 15:3-4, which says this, “For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures…”

Those verses right there give the entire gospel in a nice little snippet. They are very powerful verses.

Paul gives the Corinthians the realization that if the teachers are right about resurrection, then even Jesus Christ has not risen from the dead and the gospel that they live for is obsolete. He reiterates several times that if there is no bodily resurrection, then Christ has not been raised.

But we know that there is resurrection because God’s word tells us so. We also know that there is bodily resurrection not simply because Paul says so, but because of the testimony of several who saw Christ after He was raised. They interacted with Him. They ate with Him. They saw Him eating. Some even touched His wounded body. Christ has been raised from the dead! Our hope is that one day our bodies will be raised also. We hold fast to the gospel of Christ.

Let me ask you something. What parts of the gospel are we making obsolete by believing what the world tells us instead of holding fast to the truth?