Resurrection What-If

A Small Group Leader sent me this email question and I wanted to pass it along to you all. It made me think of a "what if" question. What if Jesus hadn't been raised from the dead?

Here's the email and my response:

Mike,

Why did Jesus need to be raised from the dead?

Meaning, I get that Jesus needed to die to pay the penalty of our sins, but why all the hoop-la about Jesus being raised from the dead? All the way to the point of Paul saying our faith is futile if he didn’t raise from the dead.


Here are 9 reasons that the resurrection is important. I'm sure there are many more:

1. Jesus’ resurrection demonstrated that God accepted Jesus’ sacrifice on our behalf.
2. It proves that God has the power to raise us from the dead.
3. It guarantees that those who believe in Christ will not remain dead, but will be resurrected unto eternal life as Jesus preached throughout His ministry on Earth.

In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul explains in detail the importance of the resurrection of Christ. In this chapter Paul gives six consequences if there were no resurrection:

1. Preaching Christ would be senseless (verse 14)
2. Faith in Christ would be useless (verse 14)
3. All the witnesses and preachers of the resurrection would be liars (verse 15)
4. No one would be redeemed from sin (verse 17)
5. All former believers would have perished (verse 18)
6. Christians would be the most pitiable people on the earth (verse 19). But Christ has risen from the dead and “has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen sleep” (verse 20).