Essay 5—Resurrection—(1) Message and Validity of Faith

Outline: 027-E5.1-Resurrection-Faith
Passage: 1 Corinthians 15:1-20
Discussion Audio (1h14m)

Without the bodily resurrection of Jesus,
nothing else in Christianity makes sense --
Not even the Cross.

Paul is addressing yet another problem and misunderstanding within the Christian believers of Corinth. Partly based on their disdain for the physical body (body-spirit dualism from Greek philosophy) they accepted the idea of a resurrection, but rejected a resurrection into a physical body. And possibly based on their overrealized eschatology, they may have believed that they were already “spiritually resurrected” with their baptism.

This is a passage that modern English readers can misinterpret due to our assumption that “how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?” (15:12b) means that there is no resurrection at all. But that is not what the Corinthians meant and not what Paul would have heard. What they meant was that “there is no bodily, physical resurrection of the dead.” The Corinthians still believed in at least the concept of a resurrection and some kind of existence after death. It is the nature of the resurrection and existence that was in question.

Paul’s first defense of the bodily resurrection is that all the apostles teach it. He reminds the Corinthians that when he first came to them, this is the gospel that he taught them and that one that they accepted and believed.

His second defense of the bodily resurrection is that if it is not true, then nothing about Christianity is true, because it all rises or falls on the veracity of the hundreds of witness accounts of the bodily resurrection of Jesus.

Here is another mistake modern Christians make with this passage. It is used as an apologetics for the resurrection against unbelievers. That is not the point of this passage. Paul writes with the assumption that there is a resurrection. He does not try to prove it. His argument is with the nature of the resurrection.

… Paul will next turn to a direct confrontation with the Corinthians over their denial of the resurrection of the dead. The nature of that argument makes it plain that the purpose of this opening paragraph is not to prove Christ’s resurrection but to reestablish that fundamental premise as the common denominator from which to argue with them… The reason for the catalogue of witnesses is therefore not to prove that Jesus rose but to emphasize that the resurrection of Christ, which they believed, had objective reality…

On the other hand, there are those who use this passage to try to prove the Resurrection to unbelievers. What they fail to recognize is that such “proofs” are valid only to those who believe.[1]

Paul explains the “essential” of the gospel in 15:3b-5a. It is the death, burial, resurrection of Jesus and the many witnesses to the events. The focus of the gospel is the resurrection, not the death. The focus of the gospel is not payment for sins, punishment for sins, or satisfying the “wrath of God,” but in the power of God to overcome and destroy the power of Sin, i.e., Death.

(See my previous post on why Paul does not teach the penal-substitution theory of the atonement.)

Kenneth Bailey writes:

This is another case where the third-party substitutionary theory of the atonement, with its focus on penalty, can lead astray. Imagine a scenario in which God takes Jesus to heaven seconds after the great cry, “It is finished.” Had that happened, would there be any salvation for believers? If the focus is on penalty, then of course there is salvation because “Jesus paid it all…” Does that not mean that the great work of salvation is completed? Not for Paul. For him, without the resurrection all faith is futile and believers are still in their sins. As noted, the central focus is rescue, not penalty. Without the resurrection the death of Jesus is like the death of John the Baptist. If there is no resurrection, Jesus is one more rabbi who tried to renew Israel and failed…

The resurrection affirms that sin and death do not have the last word. At the cross the finest religion of the ancient world (Judaism), and the finest system of justice of the ancient world (Rome), joined to torture this good man to death. These were not evil forces. They were the best institutions the ancient world had to offer, and yet together they produced the cross. But that was not the end. After the cross came the victory of resurrection…[2]

Rev. Russell Rathbun writes in his lectionary discussion on Lazarus’ resurrection (“When Resurrections Go Bad,” posted March 30, 2014; John 11:1-45):

The core of the Christian faith is the proclamation that, Christ has risen. It is way different when Jesus does it. Jesus defeats death—death no longer has power. Jesus ushers in the fullness of life for all. Jesus returns from the dead not to punish his murderers, but to redeem them. Jesus’ resurrection brings a new life. This is the gospel. [Emphasis mine.]

I’ve often felt that too much of modern Christianity is obsessed with the death of Christ, with sins, with the so-called payment for sins, with satisfying some kind of demand placed by the wrath of God, with hell and punishment. First Corinthians 15 and Paul’s writings should be seen in their proper light. The gospel is not about the cross, but about the resurrection. It is not about death, but victory over death. Humankind, fallen under the power of Sin and Death, killed Jesus, and tried to kill God. But the good news – the gospel – is that the power of God is greater than the power of Sin. The resurrection is proof of that power.

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[1] New International Commentary on the New Testament: The First Epistle, entry for 1 Cor. 15:11.

[2] Bailey, Paul Through Mediterranean Eyes, location 5203-5212.

Christus Victor in 1 Corinthians 15

What did Paul mean when he wrote, “Christ died for our sins”? [1 Cor. 15:3; italics supplied.] This is part of our study for this Saturday (March 29). As a preview, this is a little of what Ken Bailey writes in Paul Through Mediterranean Eyes.[1]

“Christ died because of our sins” is the preferred (legitimate) Arabic translation of this text…

Theologian Miroslav Volf has written,

“Let us beware that some accounts of what it means for Christ to have died on behalf of the ungodly—what theologians sometimes call his “substitutionary” death—are deeply problematic. If we view Christ on the cross as a third party being punished for the sins of transgressors, we have widely missed the mark…”

William Temple points out that the New Testament always starts with the love of God, not his wrath. He writes,

“… So the forgiveness that Christ wins for us is not chiefly a remission of penalty; it is the restoration to the affectionate intimacy of sons with their Father…”

God is angry at sin, but, as Temple argues,

“[God’s anger] is not anger, if by anger we mean the emotional reaction of an offended self-concern; it is anger, if by anger we mean the resolute and relentless opposition of a will set on righteousness against a will directed elsewhere… He seeks to abolish sinners by winning them out of their sin into the loyalty and love of children in their Father’s home… It is only through preoccupation with thoughts of punishment that people have come to invent doctrines of transferred penalty…”

Suffering is the divine choice in which we participate. Temple writes,

“There are two ways of expressing antagonism to sin; one is to inflict suffering on the sinner, the other is to endure suffering…”

The issue is the reform of the sinner. Temple concludes,

“Fear of punishment might deter me from sinful action, but it could not change my sinful desires… But to realize what my selfishness means to the Father who loves me with a love such as Christ reveals, fills me with horror of the selfishness and calls out an answering love… We plead His Passion, not as a transferred penalty, but as an act of self-sacrifice which re-makes us in its own likeness.”

What Bailey describes by quoting Volf and Temple is Christus Victor – where the atonement is not about paying the penalty but about love transcending the demands of the law, and where love transforms wrath into grace and mercy, so that sinners may recognize and accept the power to transform into Christlikeness. The resurrection is the most vital part of the gospel because it is proof that love has conquered death and the grave.

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[1] Bailey, locations 5118-5169.

Paul does not teach substitutionary atonement

I realize this entry jumps far ahead into 1 Corinthians, but as it has to do with the past Easter weekend I felt I had to post this. The following is from Kenneth Bailey’s commentary on 1 Corinthians, Paul Through Mediterranean Eyes. The excerpt is from the chapter on 1 Corinthians 15:1-20. Through it Dr. Bailey appears to affirm the Christus Victor model of the atonement.

Two works I recommend on further study of Christus Victor include Christus Victor: An Historical Study of the Three Main Types of the Idea of Atonement and Healing the Gospel: A Radical Vision for Grace, Justice, and the Cross.

Excerpts were taken from the Kindle edition of Bailey’s commentary, found at locations 5097 through 5121.

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It is impossible to deal with this text without noting the work of the medieval theologian Anselm (b. A.D. 1033), who developed the widely influential substitutionary theory of the atonement… For Anselm "Christ died for our sins" meant that Christ was a substitute for sinful humankind. One of the major difficulties with this theory is that it has allowed the word for to take on commercial overtones. [Examples of commercial exchange of goods for payment]…

Anselm developed this theory in the eleventh century… How then did Christians for the first millennium become believers when they did not have the substitutionary theory of the atonement to help them understand the cross? The simple answer is, the early Christians did not need Anselm… [Reference to parable of good shepherd, Lk. 15:4-7.] The focus is on the rescue, not the penalty.

The father in the parable of the prodigal son thought only of his love for his son when he humiliated himself in public by running down the crowded village street to reconcile his son before the son reached the hostile village. As he ran he was offering a costly demonstration of unexpected love. He was not paying a debt…

In Luke 15, along with other parables and dramatic actions, Jesus was indeed interpreting his own cross. The father in the parable was able to reprocess anger into grace and offer a costly demonstration of unexpected love to his yet self-confident son. The son planned to “work and pay” for his sins. He thought the issue was the lost money, and surmised that if he could get job training he would one day be able to pay back everything that he had squandered. It was only when he saw the depth of his father's suffering love that he understood the depth of his sin, and only then could he accept to be found and restored by an act of pure grace.

"Christ died because of our sins" is the preferred (legitimate) Arabic translation of this text. Our sins caused his death. The grave danger in much popular reflection on the atonement relates to the introduction of a third party. The theory, in its simplest form, is as follows: God is angry over sin, and he could justly punish us. But Jesus enters the picture and takes the punishment for us. So far, so good. In this sense Jesus is rightly understood as a substitute for us. But is Jesus a third party? Is God the Father a separate God from God the Son?

To affirm for this view is to create a strong whiff of Zoroastrianism, where there is a good god (Ahura Mazdah), and an evil god (Ahriman), a god of light and a god of darkness. The believer's task is to serve the good god, who protects us from the evil god. But not so the New Testament. Paul writes, "God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us" (Rom 5:8). He also wrote, "God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them" (2 Cor 5:19). There is no third party. God is the one who acts in Christ out of love to reconcile us to himself. There is no split in the heart of God, with God the Father opposing God the Son.