Sermon Tone Analysis
Overall tone of the sermon
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Let's play the "what if" game for a few moments.
Have you ever wondered what the world would be like if certain events had happened differently?
For ex-ample:
What if the assassin's bullets fired by Lee Harvey Oswald had missed President John F Kennedy in 1963?
If President Kennedy had finished his first term, he probably would have been re-elected for a second term.
Would we have involved our-selves in the war in Vietnam?
there have been an arms race with the Soviet Union?
What if the Titanic hadn’t hit that iceberg?
What if the terrorists had been foiled on September 11?
What if Adolph Hitler had died of a childhood disease?
History would have been different in many ways!
Let’s come closer to home.
What if you had never met or married your spouse?
What if it had been some-one else?
You wouldn’t have these children.
You’d have others, or maybe none at all!
What a vastly different life you’d be leading!
But all of this is senseless contemplation", someone will complain.
Those bullets did find their target in 1963.
You and your spouse did meet, and marry…and your life has gone this way.
What’s the good of asking “WHAT IF?” Just this.
Sometimes we take for granted the good things we have.
Sometimes we don’t appreciate what we have until we are in danger of losing it.
We take for granted our good health.
We take for granted a faithful and loving spouse.
We take for granted that we have a steady job.
Every Easter Sunday we will sit in church in church doing what we do each year.
We will sing resurrection songs.
We will hear the same story.
Perhaps we will take it all for granted, waiting for tomorrow’s routine to resume.
But let's stop and think about something.
WHAT IF THERE HAD BEEN NO EASTER?
What if Jesus hadn’t risen to life on that spring morning 2000 years ago?
What would the world be like?
There would be no Easter parades.
There would be no Easter baskets, no Easter Bunny stories, no Easter lilies, and no Easter Easter egg hunts.
But those are superficial things.
Let's get serious.
What would your life be like?
What would be your HOPE?
What would be your reason to live?
This is no child’s game of “let’s pretend.”
Let's look at the Bible for a moment.
Paul raised it in the section I read a moment ago.
His world scoffed at the idea of the dead coming to life.
Apparently the church at Corinth had some members in the congregation who had trouble with this part of the Christian message.
To them and to us, Paul poses this startling question: WHAT IF Christ did not rise from the dead?
One after another, Paul draws out a string of 5 sobering answers.
I. Our Fundamentals are Flawed (1-4)
If Christ is not alive the fundamental truth of the Gospel is flawed.
It is missing the most important ingredient.
Later on Paul says that if Christ is not raised, then our preaching is vain.
In other words, it is empty.
All of the sermons being delivered today by preachers are empty words.
There is no reason to go soulwinning.
It is like your boss handing you a pay envelope and when you take your money to the bank, you find that it is full of Monopoly money.
How embarrassing would that be.
You couldn't pay your bills with that kind of money.
Without the resurrection there is no Gospel.
One preacher years ago said that "the body of Jesus Christ still lies in a nameless tomb, but his deathless spirit marches on."
This message of a crucified Savior who has come back alive is the heart of all we preach and teach.
But if there is no resurrection, then our message is meaning-less because our fundamentals are flawed.
II.
Jesus' Followers Were Fraudulent (5-11, 15)
Notice what Paul said in verse 15: "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."
Paul is not saying that we are mistaken.
He's saying that we are fraudulent.
We are just as guilty as the Roman soldiers who paid people to say that the disciples stole the body of Jesus (Matthew 28:11-15).
A false witness is someone who goes into a court-room and willingly lies.
He commits perjury.
He tells a lie.
He knows better.
That's what Paul says we are without the resurrection.
We are misrepresenting God.
Preachers, evangelists, missionaries, are liars.
The church is one gigantic fraud.
As one preacher said, it is "a cathedral built on a foundation of whipped cream."
If Jesus is not alive let's close the doors of our churches.
Let's stop our evangelistic efforts.
Let's call our missionaries home.
Let's find better uses for the money we spend on tithes and offerings and stop using money on a useless cause.
Let's stop passing out tracts and all soulwinning efforts.
Preachers, evangelists, and missionaries should resign and get an honest job.
We're wasting our time and money.
Flawed Fundamentals and Fraudulent Followers are bad enough but there is something worse.
III.
Our Faith Is Futile (16-17a)
Faith rests upon what is preached.
What if you had been an investor who, in good faith, put your life savings into a fund managed by Bernard Madoff.
Your faith is futile because it was built on what has become commonly known as a Ponzi Scheme.
You lost all of your money.
Paul says that if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile, and you are still in your sins.
The peace that supposedly passes all understanding?
It is an illusion.
It's like a prisoner who awakens from a beautiful dream, only to realize that he is still in chains.
Think about all of the temptations you resisted.
Think about all of the money you gave to your church, to missions, to building programs, and other worthy causes.
Think about all the time you spent in church worship services.
Think about the prayers you offered up to heaven.
Think about all of the time you spent witness-ing to others about what you believe.
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