It often happens that men accept certain notions without realizing what they involve. So it seems to have been with those Corinthian Christians who lent too willing an ear to the false teachers who denied the resurrection of the dead. The apostle was justified in pointing out to such that their surrender of this great doctrine and revelation involved virtually the denial of the resurrection of Christ, and that this involved the denial of some of their most cherished beliefs and hopes. What the Lord Christ was to them he was because he was the risen and triumphant Saviour. To take away their faith in such a Saviour was to render their faith vain.

I. FAITH IN CHRIST'S DEITY LARGELY RESTS UPON THE FACT OF HIS RESURRECTION.

1. If Jesus had not risen from the dead, his own recorded predictions would have been falsifed. On several occasions he had foretold that his violent death should be followed on the third day by his resurrection. Had this not taken place, his word would have been discredited, and all confidence in his Deity would naturally have been destroyed.

2. If Jesus had not risen from the dead, he would have been proved inferior to death. The argument of the apostle was a very powerful and effective argument - that, being not only David's Son, but David's Lord, it was not possible that he should be holden by death, that his body should see corruption. But had he remained in the grave, a very different impression concerning his nature would necessarily have been produced upon the minds of his disciples, and the world could never have been convinced of his Messiahship and divinity.

II. FAITH IN CHRIST AS A SAVIOUR RESTS UPON THE FACT OF HIS RESURRECTION.

1. This appears in the customary publication of the gospel by the inspired apostles. They preached that Jesus was "raised to be a Prince and a Saviour, to give repentance unto Israel, and remission of sins."

2. The resurrection of Christ is a token of the acceptance by the Father of that redemptive work of Christ whereby forgiveness is secured to those who believe. And it is the condition of the exercise of those mediatorial functions which are still discharged in the court of heaven, the presence of God.

3. The resurrection is a spiritual power in the hearts of those who believe it, a power of newness of mind, of holiness, of life immortal. They who die with Christ unto sin, and are crucified with him unto the world, risen with Christ, live in his heavenly and resurrection life.

III. FAITH IN CHRIST AS THE FIRSTFRUITS OF THE GENERAL RESURRECTION RESTS UPON HIS RISING FROM THE TOMB. There is observable a marvellous contrast between the hopelessness of the heathen and the confidence of Christians in the prospect of death. To those who believe the gospel, the victory of Immanuel over death and the grave is the pledge of the final triumph of the good, is their consolation when they are bereaved of their Christian kindred and associates, is their confidence and inspiration in the prospect of their own departure to be with Christ. - T.

If human life, redeemed by Christ, be limited to this world, God has committed a cruel mistake in creating man. The greatness of man becomes a terrible charge against God. He has created appetites which He cannot satisfy, excited hopes which must perish, built a great ship and must destroy it because He cannot create a sea in which it can float. What would be thought of a man who built a splendid chariot and could not get it out of the workshop? A man believes in Christ, and so becomes identified with all that is known of purity, joy, and hope. He rejects the promises of the world; he gets all that the world can give and finds that it is a stone, not bread; his whole life becomes a hunger after something higher. Having thus developed he is told that his grave is dug, and that into it must be thrown every dream, hope, desire. This world is enough for creatures destitute of aspiration — for the lion and the eagle. They cannot hope, pray, aspire. One life only is an argument against —

I. GOD'S GOODNESS. Take men like the psalmists. They often sang as if they had laid hold of eternal life. They declared Jehovah to be all their salvation and all their desire. To all this God's answer is extinction. Can a more revolting blasphemy be conceived?

II. HIS WISDOM. Could not man have been made so as to be satisfied with the present world? We know how our generosity may become a pain and temptation to those upon whom we have bestowed it. Our gifts may be large enough to create dissatisfaction with our daily lot, yet too small to secure contentment with another. If it is not God's purpose to continue the consciousness with which He has endowed us, He has, so to speak, overbuilt Himself in creation. He should either have gone farther, or not so far.

III. HIS POWER. But herein is God unlike His creatures. Impair one of God's attributes and you overturn the whole Godhead. Man may have special excellences and redeeming points of character; but in the case of God every point must be of equal strength and glory. Suppose His goodness to be infinite, and His power limited; then He is Jehovah no more. When He created man, did He not know that His power was incomplete? Has He been taught the insufficiency of His strength by results which He failed to foresee? Conclusion:

1. We have before us, then, a strong presumptive argument in favour of another and higher life. That life suggests itself as the required complement of our present existence, and urges itself upon us in vindication of all that is Divine in God. Whatever speculative difficulties may arise in connection with immortality, the practical difficulties of the negative theory are insurmountable.

2. The theory of our life only bears more vividly up m the mediation of Christ. How bitter the irony of His appeals, how wasteful the sacrifice of His life, if a few pulsations be the measure of our existence. He spoke much of the life eternal: did it all mean that His most loving followers must be blotted out of existence? If so, His attempts at redemption aggravated the original injustice of our creation.

3. Granted that you never doubted the existence of the future life, this discussion is of the first importance. We may be called upon to give to others a reason for the hope that is in us, and we may feel more keenly the obligations which another life imposes on us to live nobly in this present world. If there is another life —(1) In what relation does our present existence stand to it? Is it disciplinary?(2) What will be its effect in regard to, the moral confusion and restlessness of our present existence. Here virtue is often undervalued and vice successful. Is the glory of the Divine righteousness to shine through all the obscurities of the Divine government? Christian hope answers, Yes!(3) Can they be wise who exhaust themselves within the limits of the present world? What a fool is the mere money-gatherer! How deluded is he who mistakes the part for the whole.(4) Is not he the wise man who regulates the present by all that is solemn and sublime in the future?

(J. Parker, D.D.)

I. WHAT THE TEXT IMPLIES.

1. That there is misery amongst men on this earth. This is obvious. "Man is born to trouble." But great as it is —(1) It is not as great as man deserves. All suffering springs from sin. Misery does not grow out of the constitution of things.(2) It is not as great as man's happiness. For days and weeks of affliction he has months and years of happiness.(3) It is not as great as the good it will ultimately work out.

2. That misery amongst men exists in different degrees. Paul speaks of the "most miserable." There is a great inequality of suffering here. There must come a day for eternal justice to balance these accounts.

3. That the degree of misery is sometimes regulated by hope. Paul speaks of "hope" as having to do with making men "most miserable." Man is ever living in the future; he seldom turns willingly to the past; his past sins terrify him, and even his past pleasures depress him. The present satisfies him not. His home is in the future. It is obvious that a principle so powerful must exert a wonderful influence, either for weal or woe. If the hope is directed to right objects, and rightly founded, it will be as a firm anchor, holding his ship securely amidst the tumultuous billows of his stormy life. But should his hope be not rightly directed and grounded, it is clear that though it may afford him for a time some amount of enjoyment, it will ultimately end in his confusion and distress.

4. That the hope of a Christian, if false, will make him of "all men most miserable."

II. WHAT THE TEXT MEANS.

1. Not —(1) That apart from the resurrection of Christ, man has no evidence of a future state. All the Jews except the Sadducees believed in the existence of a future retribution; and Paul as a philosopher knew that human nature and human history prophesied a future state.(2) That on the supposition that there is no future life, the practice of virtue here would place man in a worse condition than that of vice. This would not be true; the life of virtue as embodied in Christianity would give a man considerable advantage even in this world.(3) That apart from a future state a godly life is not binding on man. Were there no heaven, no hell, man's obligation to love his Maker "with all his heart, soul, strength," would still remain.

2. Two things must be distinctly kept in mind in order fully to apprehend the idea of the apostle.(1) That he is speaking of himself and his evangelical contemporaries. The sufferings which they brought upon themselves in consequence of their faith in Christianity, and their efforts to extend it through the world, were unique in their enormity. In this age our faith in Christianity, and our endeavours to propagate it, entail little or no inconvenience.(2) That he supposes the disappointed to survive the discovery of the delusion. The very first flash of the terrible truth, that there was no future blessedness, would scathe their spirits into everlasting annihilation, and there would of course be no misery at all in the case. We must suppose the apostle therefore having the idea that there was a future state, in which he should live in vivid memories of the past. Up to the time of discovery, however great their suffering, Christians could not be "most miserable." An enthusiast, whatever his physical affections, is happy; he revels amidst the hallucinations of his own brain, and requires none of your pity if he survive not the discovery of his delusion.

III. THESE SUPPOSITIONS ENABLES US TO SEE THAT THE MISERY OF WHICH THE APOSTLE SPEAKS IS THE MISERY OF A TREMENDOUS DISAPPOINTMENT. Note —

1. The power which the blighted hope had obtained over the whole soul. There are some hopes that take but a slight hold upon the heart: But there are hopes like the tree that strikes its roots deep into the very fibre of our nature. When such hopes are torn away, it is as the "giving up of the ghost." Imagine the case of a man who had thrown his whole being into Christianity, being met at the moment when his hopes were at their zenith, and when his death was at hand, with the conviction that all was a delusion; and you have a man of all men "most miserable." Imagine that man still further fixed in a future state of deep despair, and regarding himself as the hopeless victim of a life of folly. Would he not say, Fool that I have been in spending a whole life in aiming at objects that were purely visionary. Had I been wise I should have adopted the maxim, "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die."

2. The deception which the blighted hope prompted its subjects to practise. The apostle declares that on the assumption that Christ rose from the dead, they were "false witnesses of God." Most assuredly if there be no future state of blessedness, the whole life of the Christian is a living lie. His deception is —(1) Earnest. He "counts not his life dear unto him," if he can only make men participate in his creed.(2) Systematic. It is not an occasional or spasmodic effort; it is the organised purpose of his being. He rears temples, forms societies, circulates books, preaches discourses, in order to win men over to his views.(3) Influential. He succeeds in his proselytism. Such is the deception Christians practise on the hypothesis that there is no future life in Him. How much would the memory of their deception heighten the misery of their disappointment on the discovery of their own terrible mistake! The feeling that they themselves had been deluded would be well-nigh intolerable; but the feeling that they had deluded others would be crushing.

3. The destitution in which the departure of the hope would involve the soul. Christianity works a most radical change in a man. It effects a "regeneration." Under its influence man becomes "a new creation"; old things pass away, all things become new; what he once loved he loathes, what he once sought he shuns, what he once valued he despises, what things were gain to him he counts loss. On the discovery therefore of the delusion, he would be left in possession of tastes and desires for which there was no provision. A thousand times worse is the state of such a soul than that of a parched traveller, who, beneath the agonising fires of thirst, falls prostrate on the Oriental sands, many leagues away from the refreshing streams. Conclusion: Thank God this is only hypothetic. The apostle does not speak as if he had any doubt, but in order to bring out the glorious fact on which it rests with greater fire and force. "But now is Christ risen from the dead," etc.We have hope in a blessed future, and therefore —

1. When bereavement snatches from our embrace the dearest objects of our heart, let us not sorrow as do others.

2. Let us not envy the wicked in their prosperity, but bear up with fortitude, knowing that "our light afflictions which are but for a moment," etc.

3. Let us labour earnestly to indoctrinate all within our reach with the soul-saving principles of the everlasting word.

(D. Thomas, D.D.)

These words have been a cause of much distress. Christians have felt that their hope in Christ made this life joyful to them. No doubt the very name "hope" implies a looking forward. But they do not find that the mere thought of a change in their position constitutes their blessedness. "Lo, I am with you always"; "My peace I give unto you"; there, they say, is the secret of it. Certainly they have a right to claim St. Paul in general as the witness and highest authority for their persuasion. "All things are yours," etc., he said to these very Corinthians. He speaks of himself as "rejoicing in tribulation." He wished that Aguippa, Festus, and Bernice, and all who heard him, "were both almost and altogether such as he was, except those bonds." Was, then, that so terrible an exception, that he regarded the worshippers of false gods less miserable, as far as this life went, than he was? Does any one who knows anything of St. Paul's life and words believe this? Those very bonds became a cause of exultation to him, because through them Christ's name was made known in Rome. He counted, not some future promised felicity, but his office as an apostle of the Gentiles, which caused him to be the offscouring of all things, the highest privilege ever bestowed upon a mortal. Is this a man who was likely to say, "I am utterly miserable here; but I can endure my lot, for I shall he well paid hereafter"? But if that is not the meaning of the words, what is it?

1. The Corinthians had heard him say, "We are risen with Christ." A party of them had built on this the conclusion that their spiritual resurrection was all that Christ had procured for them. St. Paul shows them that they were turning this half-truth, not to the destruction of the other half merely, but of itself. If they were not to rise in their bodies, Christ their Lord had not risen in His body. The very ground of the spiritual resurrection, of which they boasted, was their union with Him. God had justified them in Him. The new doctrine, in effect, disclaimed, his relation between them and Him. It left them a set of poor, separated, unredeemed creatures; "yet in their sins." It was very miserable to believe such a contradiction as this would be.

2. Christ had broken through the barriers of death, had brought the visible and the invisible world into one. Those who said "The Resurrection only concerns us here," established this separation again, and treated Death as to all intents and purposes the ultimate ruler, Life as shut up within threescore years and ten of conflict. This was to confound the dim hope of all nations. When the sense of present misery was very acute, there was a prophecy, arising in some minds almost to a conviction, that the other side of death might offer a compensation. Had not St. Paul a right to say then "If we possess all that Christ came to give us, He has taken from us something which He has not taken from any others. That which has never been altogether a blank to them, in which there have been some bright Elysian spots, has become entirely a blank to us." But it may be said, "The apostle speaks of a hope in Christ. What could such a hope have to do with dreams of Greeks or Goths respecting an Elysium or a Walhalla? Being heathens, they certainly could not hope in Him." But the principle which underlies all the apostle's teaching is that when Christ took flesh and dwelt among men, He declared Himself to be that King, whose manifestation in His own true and proper nature all had been desiring. If this be so, I cannot imagine how he could describe any hope which had ever been entertained by any human being, except as a hope in Christ. The gods whom Greeks or Goths worshipped could have kindled no hopes in them, only a vague, inconceivable dread. Whatever hope they had came from a secret source, a hidden root. The apostle, then, might truly say, that if the Corinthians who professed to believe that Jesus was the Christ, made His work upon earth an excuse for not looking beyond the earth, they had parted with some of the hope in Christ which their heathen brethren possessed.

3. But there is an ampler justification of the apostle's words. He had a much deeper impression of the misery of the world around him than any person who did not believe in the gospel could have had. The devil-worship and the sin which prevailed was revolting to him who worshipped a God of love, and who believed that the Spirit of Christ had come among men to make them after His image. Feeling as he did their misery, it would absolutely have crushed him if in this life only he had had hope in Christ, if he could have measured the future of mankind merely by anything that he saw or had yet experienced. The thought which we should often bring before ourselves as we walk our streets, and as we read of what is doing in other parts of the world, is — Are our hopes in Christ, for those whom we see perishing in filth, in ignorance, in moral debasement, only hopes for this life? Is the wisdom of rulers, the godliness of teachers, the benevolence of societies, all which seems to us to intervene between them and utter, absolute ruin? Oh, then, surely we must be of all men most miserable! To think of all the wickedness which is crowded into the most fortunate corner of this earth, and not to feel something very like despair, is very difficult. It would be impossible, if we were not encouraged and commanded to place our hopes, not in what we are doing, but in what Christ has done by His death, resurrection, ascension, and gift of the Holy Spirit. If we think that nothing is given yet; that we are merely to look for something to come, we are most miserable. If we think that all has been given — that we have nothing to long for — we are most miserable. But if we accept the signs and pledges of a perfect sacrifice made once for all, the vision of Him who died once and reigneth for evermore will become brighter and clearer.

(F. D. Maurice, M.A.)

The apostle does not say that all men are now miserable if there be no hope of the world to come. There are very many who never think of another life, who are quite happy in their way. But he speaks of Christian people, who are known by this, that they have hope in Christ — hope in His blood for pardon, in His righteousness for justification, in His power for support, in His resurrection for eternal glory.

I. WE ARE NOT OF ALL MEN MOST MISERABLE. He who shall affirm that Christianity makes men miserable is an utter stranger to it. For see —

1. To what a position it exalts us! It makes us sons of God. Shall His foes have mirth, and His own home-born be wretched? We are married unto Christ, and shall our great Bridegroom permit His spouse to linger in grief? The Christian is a king, and shall the king be the most melancholy of men?

2. What God has done for us! The Christian knows that his sins are forgiven. And shall the pardoned offender be less happy than the man upon whom the wrath of God abideth? Moreover, we are made temples of the Holy Ghost, and are these dark, dolorous places? Our God is a God of love, and it is His very nature to make His creatures happy.

3. Their actual joy and peace. Our joy may not be like that of the sinner, noisy and boisterous. "As the crackling of thorns under a pot" — a great deal of blaze and much noise, and then a handful of ashes, and it is all over. The Chiristian's joy does not depend upon circumstances. We have seen the happiest men in the most sorrowful conditions. Every Christian will bear wines that he has found his sad times to be his glad times, his losses to be his gains, his sickness means to promote his soul's health. We can rejoice even in death.

II. WITHOUT THE HOPE OF ANOTHER LIFE WE SHOULD BE OF ALL MEN MOST MISERABLE. This is true, not merely of persecuted, and despised, and poverty-stricken Christians, but of all believers. Note that the Christian —

1. Has renounced those common and ordinary sources of joy from which other men drink. We must have some pleasure. Well, then, there is a vessel filled with muddy, filthy water which the camels' feet have stirred: shall I drink it? I see yonder a cool, clear stream, and I say, "I will not drink this; I will drink of that." But if it be but the deceitful mirage, then I am worse off than those who were content with the muddy water. So the Christian passes by the pleasures of sin, because he says, "I do not care for them, my happiness flows from the river which springs from the throne of God and flows to me through Christ — I will drink of that," but if that were proved to be a deception, then were we more wretched than the profligate.

2. Has learned the vanity of all earthly joys. We have chosen eternal things which are satisfying to the soul. Bat it is the most unhappy to know that this world is vain, if there be not another world abundantly to compensate for all our ills. There is a poor lunatic in Bedlam plaiting straw into a crown which he puts upon his head, and calls himself a king. Do you think that I would undeceive him? Nay, verily. If the delusion makes the man happy, by all means let him indulge in it; but you and I have been undeceived; our dream of perfect bliss beneath the skies is gone for ever; what then if there be no world to come?

3. Has had high, noble, and great expectations, and this is a very sad thing for us if our expectations be not fulfilled. I have known poor men expecting a legacy, and the relative has died and left them nothing; their poverty has ever afterwards seemed to be a heavier drag than before. Poverty is infinitely better endured by persons who were always poor, than by those who have been rich. The Christian has learned to think of eternity, of God, of Christ, and if indeed it be all false, the best thing he could do would be to sit down and weep for ever.

4. Has learned to look upon everything here as fleeting. Well, this is a very unhappy thing, if there be no world to come.

III. OUR CHIEF JOY IN THE HOPE OF THE WORLD TO COME. There is —

1. Rest.

2. Victory.

3. Happiness.

4. Perfection.

IV. THUS THE FUTURE OPERATES UPON THE PRESENT. Here is a man who has a machine for his factory. He wants steam power to work this machine. An engineer puts up a steam engine in a shed at some distance. "Well," said the other, "I asked you to bring steam power here, to operate upon my machine." "That is precisely," says he, "what I have done. I put the engine there, you have but to connect it by a band and your machine works as fast as you like; it is not necessary that I should put it just under your nose." So God has been pleased to make our hopes of the future a great engine wherewith the Christian may work the ordinary machine of every-day life, for the band of faith connects the two, and makes all the wheels of ordinary life revolve with rapidity and regularity. To speak against preaching the future as though it would make people neglect the present is as though somebody would say, "There, take away the moon, and blot out the sun. What is the use of them — they are not in this world"! Precisely so, but take away the moon and you have removed the tides, and the sea becomes a stagnant, putrid pool. Then take away the sun, and light, and heat, and life; everything is gone. Do you believe that apostles and martyrs would ever have sacrificed their lives for truth's sake if they had not looked for a hereafter? In the heat of excitement, the soldier may die for honour, but to die in tortures and mockeries in cold blood needs a hope beyond the grave. Would yon poor man go on toiling year after year, refusing to sacrifice his conscience for gain; would yon poor needle-girl refuse to become the slave of lust if she did not see something brighter than earth can picture to her as the reward of sin? The most practical thing in all the world is the hope of the world to come; for it is just this which keeps us from being miserable; and to keep a man from being miserable it is to do a great thing for him, for a miserable Christian — what is the use of him? But the man who has a hope of the next world goes about his work strong, for the joy of the Lord is our strength.

V. THIS WILL LET US SEE CLEARLY WHAT OUR FUTURE IS TO BE. There are some persons here to whom my text has nothing whatever to say. Suppose there were no hereafter, would they be more miserable? Why, no; they would be more happy. Do you see, then, this proves that you are not a Christian; for if you were, the taking away of a hereafter would make you miserable. Well, then, what have I to say to you? Why just this — that in the world to come you will be of all men most miserable. "What will become of you?" said an infidel once to a Christian man, "supposing there should be no heaven?" "Well," said he, "I like to have two strings to my bow. If there be no hereafter I am as well off as you are; if there be I am infinitely better off."

(C. H. Spurgeon.)

St. Paul, in this great passage, makes Christianity answer with its life for the truth of our Lord's resurrection from the dead (ver. 14). If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we have made a capital mistake, and are of all men most miserable.

I. WHAT, THEN, IS THE HOPE RESPECTING A FUTURE WHICH WE OWE TO OUR RISEN LORD? Is it the hope that we shall exist for ever? Is our continuous existence hereafter altogether dependent upon faith in and communion with the risen Christ? No, our immortality is not a gift of the Redeemer; it is the gift of the Creator. Belief in a future state does not begin with Christianity. It is as deeply rooted in the human soul as belief in God. In some sense it is wellnigh universal. The honour so widely paid to the graves of ancestors is a natural expression of belief in their survival after death. It was this belief which made an ancient Egyptian deem the embalming of his mummy the most important thing that could happen to him: it was this belief which built, the pyramids, which rendered the Greek mysteries of Eleusis so welcome to those upon whom the old popular religion had lost its power, and which made great thinkers, such as Plato, at least in their higher moods, capable of thoughts and aspirations which Christians, in all ages, have welcomed as almost anticipating their own.

II. BUT TO WHAT SORT OF IMMORTALITY DOES THIS ANTICIPATION POINT? It is not the immortality —

1. Of the race. How is this shadowy survival entitled to the name of immortality? A race of beings does not live apart from the individuals which compose it.

2. Of fame. How many of us will have a place in the public memory and live in history? For most of us life is made up of duties of so humble a kind that they hardly have a place in our own memories from day to day, much less in those of others. But if there is no life after death, what is to become of them, that is, what is to become of this kind of immortality in the case of the greater part of the human race? Is not this immortality only a perpetuation of inequalities which disfigure our earthly life, and of which a future of absolute truth and justice would know nothing?

3. Of our good deeds. To say that a man lives in his good actions may be Christian language (Revelation 14:13). To this day the saints of the Bible history live in the works which are recorded of them. But, there are actions in all true and saintly lives which are known only to God, and which, so far as we can see, have no certain consequences here. But if the soul perishes at death, in what sense are they immortal? And are our good deeds our only deeds? Have not our evil deeds — some of them — consequences; and do these consequences punish the agent, if he really perishes at death? Others than he are punished. No; the immortality of our actions is not an immortality which satisfies the yearnings of the heart of man, since this yearning is based always and especially on its sense of justice.

II. WHAT, THEN, IS THE HOPE IN CHRIST WHICH REDEEMS CHRISTIAN LIFE FROM THE FAILURE AND MISERY ALLUDED TO IN THE TEXT. It is the hope, that through His precious death and His glorious resurrection, our inevitable immortality will be an immortality of bliss. Of course it is not denied that He has "brought life and immortality to light." For multitudes before He came it was a vague and dreary anticipation: He has made it a blessed and welcome certainty. He has familiarised us with the idea that all live unto God (Luke 20:37, 38); and He has further taught the future resurrection of the body, as completing the life beyond the grave (John 6:40). He thus has altogether removed the question from the region of speculation into that of certainty, founded upon experience; since when He rose from death He was Himself but the first-fruits from the dead. But the hope in Christ is the hope of a blessed immortality. This He has won for us by His one perfect and sufficient sacrifice on the Cross, whereby our sins are blotted out, and the grace of His Spirit and His new nature is secured to us, so as to fit us, by sanctification, for His eternal presence. Apart from this conviction, Christianity is a worthless dream; the efforts and sacrifices of the Christian life are wasted; we are the victims of a great delusion; we are of all men most miserable. Conclusion:

1. There are signs in our day that faith in a future after death is less taken for granted than was the case a generation ago. One of these signs is the increased number of suicides all over Europe. There are not merely the pathetic suicides of the very wretched, there are the suicides of votaries of pleasure, who having exhausted all the facilities of enjoyment, throw it away like a toy which has ceased to please. Suicides like these mean that the opportunities for enjoyment have in certain classes outrun the power to enjoy. Suicides are only possible when through continuous enervation of the moral nature the awful realities of immortality have been lost sight of: and their increase is a serious symptom of what must be passing in large classes of minds.

2. Much seems to show that in the modern world two entirely different beliefs about man are confounded with each other. According to one of these man is really only the highest of the beasts that perish. Opposed to this idea is the Christian belief that man differs from the lower creatures altogether, except in the fact that he owns a body, which is governed by the same laws as theirs. For man, his body, instead of being the substantive and central part of his being, is an appendage. The soul of man no more dies when it leaves the body than the musical genius which makes that organ do so much to aid the devotion of God's people forfeits its knowledge and its skill when it ceases to touch the key-board. In man the central or substantive feature is the soul; and of the life of the soul, this earthly life in the body is but a very small portion indeed. It is related to what follows, as is a brief preface to a very voluminous book: it throws light on what is to come; it is relatively insignificant. "The things which are seen are temporal: the things which are not seen are eternal."

(Canon Liddon.)

These words

I. DEMAND EXPLANATION OF US.

1. Only the heavenly hope could compensate for the severity of their earthly experiences (2 Corinthians 6:11.). Speaking for himself, and having in view all of every kind that he was enduring for the sake of the gospel, he felt that all the peace and comfort which solaced other men's lives were absent from his own, and he concluded that without that grand compensation which was in store, he and they were the most to be pitied of all men.

2. In that case they were the victims of a miserable delusion. They were basing their whole life on a faith which was a falsehood; they were building everything on a rotten foundation; they were spending all their energies and surrendering all their opportunities to teach men that which their disciples were bound to disbelieve (ver. 14). They might well be pitied as the dupes of a dream.

II. PROVIDE SUGGESTIONS FOR US.

1. That there are consequences attending unswerving faithfulness we must all be prepared to meet. Not now the lash or the dungeon. It may be the biting sarcasm or the polite irony, etc. But it must be that "all who will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution" (2 Timothy 3:12).

2. That delusion is always pitiable. Men may be buoyed up by false hopes, and it may seem at a superficial glance that the cherishing of the error is positively gainful. But it is always better to walk in the light than to wander in the darkness. They who give way to plausible but unsound doctrine are to be pitied, however fair in the face these doctrines may be, however excellent be the spirit and intention of those that hold them.

3. That genuine piety has within it sources of pure and lasting joy (1 Timothy 4:8; 1 Timothy 6:6); and if the "Manor Sorrows" could speak of "His joy" so may we.

(W. Clarkson, B.A.)

Adam, Cephas, Corinthians, James, Paul, PeterCorinth, EphesusChrist, Hope, Hoped, Miserable, Nothing, Pitiable, Pitied, Present, Rest, Resting, Unhappy1. By Christ's resurrection,
12. he proves the necessity of our resurrection,
16. against all such as deny the resurrection of the body.
21. The fruit,
35. and the manner thereof;
51. and of the resurrection of those who shall be found alive at the last day.

1 Corinthians 15:19

     9613   hope, as confidence
     9615   hope, results of

1 Corinthians 15:12-28

     5110   Paul, teaching of

1 Corinthians 15:17-20

     5535   sleep, and death

1 Corinthians 15:17-22

     5288   dead, the

1 Corinthians 15:19-23

     9312   resurrection, significance of Christ's
     9315   resurrection, of believers

The Image of the Earthly and the Heavenly
Eversley, Easter Day, 1871. 1 Cor. xv. 49. "As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly." This season of Easter is the most joyful of all the year. It is the most comfortable time, in the true old sense of that word; for it is the season which ought to comfort us most--that is, it gives us strength; strength to live like men, and strength to die like men, when our time comes. Strength to live like men. Strength to fight against the temptation which …
Charles Kingsley—All Saints' Day and Other Sermons

Third Sunday after Easter Second Sermon.
Text: First Corinthians 15, 20-28. 20 But now hath Christ been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of them that are asleep. 21 For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. 23 But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; then they that are Christ's, at his coming. 24 Then cometh the end, when he shall deliver up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have abolished all rule and …
Martin Luther—Epistle Sermons, Vol. II

Fourth Sunday after Easter
Text: First Corinthians 15, 35-50. 35 But some one will say, How are the dead raised? and with what manner of body do they come? 36 Thou foolish one, that which thou thyself sowest is not quickened except it die: 37 and that which thou sowest, thou sowest not the body that shall be, but a bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other kind; 38 but God giveth it a body even as it pleased him, and to each seed a body of its own. 39 All flesh is not the same flesh; but there is one flesh of men, …
Martin Luther—Epistle Sermons, Vol. II

Fifth Sunday after Easter
Text: First Corinthians 15, 51-58. 51 Behold, I tell you a mystery: We all shall not sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. 53 For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. 54 But when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall come to pass …
Martin Luther—Epistle Sermons, Vol. II

Eleventh Sunday after Trinity Paul's Witness to Christ's Resurrection.
Text: 1 Corinthians 15, 1-10. 1 Now I make known unto you, brethren, the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye received, wherein also ye stand, 2 by which also ye are saved, if ye hold fast the word which I preached unto you, except ye believed in vain. 3 For I delivered unto you first of all that which also I received: that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; 4 and that he was buried; and that he hath been raised on the third day according to the scriptures; 5 and that …
Martin Luther—Epistle Sermons, Vol. III

Small Duties and the Great Hope
'But as touching brotherly love, ye need not that I write unto you; for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another. 10. And indeed ye do it toward all the brethren which are in all Macedonia: but we beseech you, brethren, that ye increase more and more; 11. And that ye study to be quiet, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you; 12. That ye may walk honestly toward them that are without, and that ye may have lack of nothing. 13. But I would not have …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

The Christian and the Scientific Estimate of Sin
"Christ died for our sins."--I COR. XV. 3. Nothing is more characteristic of Christianity than its estimate of human sin. Historically, no doubt, this is due to the fact that the Lord and Master of Christians died "on account of sins." His death was due, as we have seen, both to the actual, definite sins of His contemporaries, and also to the irreconcilable opposition between His sinless life and the universal presence of sin in the world into which He came. But it is with the Christian estimate …
J. H. Beibitz—Gloria Crucis

Outward and Inward Morality
OUTWARD AND INWARD MORALITY I Cor. xv. 10.--"The Grace of God." Grace is from God, and works in the depth of the soul whose powers it employs. It is a light which issues forth to do service under the guidance of the Spirit. The Divine Light permeates the soul, and lifts it above the turmoil of temporal things to rest in God. The soul cannot progress except with the light which God has given it as a nuptial gift; love works the likeness of God into the soul. The peace, freedom and blessedness of all …
Johannes Eckhart—Meister Eckhart's Sermons

April the Sixth First-Hand Knowledge of Christ
"Last of all He was seen of me also." --1 CORINTHIANS xv. 1-11. And by that vision Saul of Tarsus was transformed. And so, by the ministry of a risen Lord we have received the gift of a transfigured Paul. The resurrection glory fell upon him, and he was glorified. In that superlative light he discovered his sin, his error, his need, but he also found the dynamic of the immortal hope. "Seen of me also!" Can I, too, calmly and confidently claim the experience? Or am I altogether depending upon another …
John Henry Jowett—My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year

April the Seventh if Christ were Dead!
1 CORINTHIANS xv. 12-26. "If Christ be not risen!" That is the most appalling "if" which can be flung into the human mind. If it obtains lodging and entertainment, all the fairest hopes of the soul wither away like tender buds which have been nipped by sharp frost! See how they fade! "Your faith is vain." It has no more strength and permanency than Jonah's gourd. Nay, it has really never been a living thing! It has been a pathetic delusion, beautiful, but empty as a bubble, and collapsing at …
John Henry Jowett—My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year

Sudden Conversions.
"By the grace of God I am what I am: and His grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain."--1 Cor. xv. 10. We can hardly conceive that grace, such as that given to the great Apostle who speaks in the text, would have been given in vain; that is, we should not expect that it would have been given, had it been foreseen and designed by the Almighty Giver that it would have been in vain. By which I do not mean, of course, to deny that God's gifts are oftentimes abused and wasted by man, which …
John Henry Newman—Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VIII

Paul's Estimate of Himself
'By the grace of God I am what I am: and His grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain.'--1 COR. xv. 10. The Apostle was, all his life, under the hateful necessity of vindicating his character and Apostleship. Thus here, though his main purpose in the context is simply to declare the Gospel which he preached, he is obliged to turn aside in order to assert, and to back up his assertion, that there was no sort of difference between him and the other recognised teachers of Christian truth. He …
Alexander Maclaren—Romans, Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V)

The Unity of Apostolic Teaching
Whether it were I or they, so we preach, and so ye believed.'--1 COR. xv. 11. Party spirit and faction were the curses of Greek civic life, and they had crept into at least one of the Greek churches--that in the luxurious and powerful city of Corinth. We know that there was a very considerable body of antagonists to Paul, who ranked themselves under the banner of Apollos or of Cephas i.e. Peter. Therefore, Paul, keenly conscious that he was speaking to some unfriendly critics, hastens in the …
Alexander Maclaren—Romans, Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V)

The Certainty and Joy of the Resurrection
'But now is Christ risen from the dead ... the first fruits of them that slept.'--1 COR. xv. 20. The Apostle has been contemplating the long train of dismal consequences which he sees would arise if we only had a dead Christ. He thinks that he, the Apostle, would have nothing to preach, and we, nothing to believe. He thinks that all hope of deliverance from sin would fade away. He thinks that the one fact which gives assurance of immortality having vanished, the dead who had nurtured the assurance …
Alexander Maclaren—Romans, Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V)

Remaining and Falling Asleep
'After that He was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep.'--1 COR. xv. 6. There were, then, some five-and-twenty years after the Resurrection, several hundred disciples who were known amongst the churches as having been eyewitnesses of the risen Saviour. The greater part survived; some, evidently a very few, had died. The proportion of the living to the dead, after five-and-twenty years, is generally the opposite. …
Alexander Maclaren—Romans, Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V)

The Death of Death
'But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first-fruits of them that slept. 21. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.... 50. Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. 51. Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump, (for the trumpet shall sound;) and the dead shall …
Alexander Maclaren—Romans, Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V)

The Power of the Resurrection
'I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; 4. And that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.'--1 COR. xv. 3, 4. Christmas day is probably not the true anniversary of the Nativity, but Easter is certainly that of the Resurrection. The season is appropriate. In the climate of Palestine the first fruits of the harvest were ready at the Passover for presentation in the Temple. …
Alexander Maclaren—Romans, Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V)

On the Atonement.
"How that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures."-1 Cor. xv. 3. "For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him."-2 Cor. v. 21. "But God commendeth his love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."-Rom. v. 8. "The Lord is well pleased for his Righteousness' sake: he will magnify the law and make it honorable."-Isa. xlii. 21. "Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation, through faith in his blood, …
Charles G. Finney—Sermons on Gospel Themes

Victory Over Death.
Preached May 16, 1852. VICTORY OVER DEATH. "The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."--1 Cor. xv. 56, 57. On Sunday last I endeavoured to bring before you the subject of that which Scripture calls the glorious liberty of the Sons of God. The two points on which we were trying to get clear notions were these: what is meant by being under the law, and what is meant by being free from the law? When …
Frederick W. Robertson—Sermons Preached at Brighton

Thoughts on the Last Battle
When I select such a text as this, I feel that I cannot preach from it. The thought o'ermasters me; my words do stagger; there are no utterances that are great enough to convey the mighty meaning of this wondrous text. If I had the eloquence of all men united in one, if I could speak as never man spake (with the exception of that one godlike man of Nazareth), I could not compass so vast a subject as this. I will not therefore pretend to do so, but offer you such thoughts as my mind is capable of …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 1: 1855

"Alas for Us, if Thou Wert All, and Nought Beyond, O Earth"
We will try and handle our text this morning in this way. First, we are not of all men most miserable; but secondly, without the hope of another life we should be--that we are prepared to confess--because thirdly, our chief joy lies in the hope of a life to come; and thus, fourthly, the future influences the present; and so, in the last place, we may to-day judge what our future is to be. I. First then, WE ARE NOT OF ALL MEN MOST MISERABLE. Who ventures to say we are? He who will have the hardihood …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 10: 1864

A Leap Year Sermon *
"One born out of due time."--1 Corinthians 15:8. PAUL THUS DESCRIBES himself. It was necessary that Paul, as an apostle, should have seen the Lord. He was not converted at the time of Christ's ascension; yet he was made an apostle, for the Lord Jesus appeared to him in the way, as he was going to Damascus, to persecute the saints of God. When he looked upon himself as thus put in, as it were, at the end of the apostles, he spoke of himself in the most depreciating terms, calling himself "one born …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 46: 1900

Resurgam
I propose this morning, as God shall enable, to listen to that voice of spring, proclaiming the doctrine of the resurrection, a meditation all the more appropriate from the fact, that the Sabbath before last we considered the subject of Death, and I hope that then very solemn impressions were made upon our minds. May the like impressions now return, accompanied with more joyous ones, when we shall look beyond the grave, through the valley of the shadow of death, to that bright light in the distance--the …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 6: 1860

28TH DAY. A Joyful Resurrection.
"He is Faithful that Promised." "This corruptible must put on incorruption."--1 COR. xv. 53. A Joyful Resurrection. Marvel of marvels? The sleeping ashes of the sepulchre starting at the tones of the archangel's trumpet!--the dishonoured dust, rising a glorified body, like its risen Lord's? At death, the soul's bliss is perfect in kind; but this bliss is not complete in degree, until reunited to the tabernacle it has left behind to mingle with the sods of the valley. But tread lightly on that grave, …
John Ross Macduff—The Faithful Promiser

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