Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 218, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 September 1912 — Denial of Christ’s Resurrection and Its Results [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Denial of Christ’s Resurrection and Its Results

By Rev. William Evans, D. D.

Director Bible Com. es Moody Bible Instate ■*

TEXT-1 Cor. 11:14-18, 29-32: “And if Christ.be not risen then Is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Yea, and we are'found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ; whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. For If the dead rise not, then is not Christ and if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet ; in your 'sinse.—l Cor. 15:14-18, 29-32. VI. It the Apostle is indeed a False Witness, the Greater Part of the

New Testament, With All Its Revelation of God and Christ and the Future Life, Is Utterly Unreliable. Just think of what this means. The revelation contained in fourteen out of the twentyseven books of the New Testament cannot then be relied upon. Romans and Galatians with their great doctrines of Justification by Faith;

Ephesians, Philippians and Colossians, and possibly Hebrews, with their great doctrinal discussions on the person and work of the Redeemer; the Epistles to the Corinthians, together with the pastoral Epistles to Timothy and. Titus pregnant with their teaching regarding the church; the Thessalonian* with their comforting doctrine of the future life of blessedness for the saints —all these books which have been the cause, inspiration and power of the finest moral achievements of the ages; the truths revealed in these books which have been courage to the living and strength to the-dying, these writings are not to be depended upon, they are not what they profess to be; they are vain, empty, delusive. Is this credible? But this is the result of denying the resurrection of Jesus Christ. If God, who supposedly spoke through the writers of both the Old and New Testaments is a party to a false witness; if the apostles themselves have been a party to this false witness — then, also, we have no Bible at all; we have no revelation of the mind and will of God. 2. Christianity is Barren in its Results. (a) “Ye are yet in your sins.” It is here acknowledged that Christ alone can save from sins, but if he could not save himself from sin’s power, how can he save the sons of men. from its guilt and dominion? Christ himself distinctly taught that his death had redemptive value, and that his resurrection from the dead would be proof positive of this fact. The apostle Paul, also, says that “Christ died for our sins, and was raised again for .our justification” (Rom. 4:25). But if Christ himself is still under the power of death, which is the wages of sin, how then can he release others from th® payment of that debt? Then his death had no redemptive value. If Christ remained in the grave, then humanity has no redeemer, man has no Saviour; the guilt and power of sin has not been removed, men are not pardoned, sinners are not justified, the sinning and sinful race is still under the guilt and condemnation of sin and exposed to the just wrath of a righteous God against sin and sinners. Then freedom from condemnation is unreal, the • sense of forgiveness is a sham, and the consciousness of pardon for sin is the greatest delusion. Then Christ’s death has wrought only imaginary changes, and deluded its most faithful adherents. (b) Then Christianity bias no incentive power to a life of self-denial and godliness. It has no power for immortality. “And, if Christ hath not been raised . ... then they also that arg fallen asleep in Christ have perished." Thia is not an appeal to mere sentiment; but a statement with regard to a moat harrowing fact. The care of the Corinthians for their dead was characterized by the greatest tenderness. They had laid their loved ones, small and great, big and little, beneath ths ground with the hope of meeting them again in the world beyond. Indeed, those who had fallen asleep in Christ had themselves cherished this hope oi a glorious immortality. They had surrendered all to Christ in this life that they might have communion with him here, and fellowship with him in the life to come. They had lived as pilgrims and strangers; they had denied themselves to fleshly lusts and worldly pleasures; they had not resigned themselves to the dreams of earthly joys as others, nor had they given themselves over to the enjoyment of sinful pleasures; they had not bowed the knee to the god of this world foe riches or earthly emolument; they had borne life’s load uncomplainingly, and had endured all maimer of suffering for righteousness sake; they bad lived sacrificial lives—and all this in happy expectation of a glorious awakening In a future life of bliss. But, ah, what fools they had been; for if Christ be not risen, they perished at the moment they died; when the spirit left the body they ceased to be, they soft fared dead loss’*