gospel: resurrection

Recently, we did a bible study on 1 Corinthians 15:1-21 in small group, just before Easter. This passage includes a condensed version of what the gospel is:

"For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve." - 1 Corinthians 15:3-5

A major part of the discussion revolved around the verses 12-17, where Paul speaks about the importance of the resurrection in our faith (if the resurrection did not happen, then our faith is futile). So we were trying to determine why was the resurrection of Jesus so essential to our faith, and we came up with several points:

• we have faith in a living Christ
• Christ is our mediator (it does not make sense if He is dead)
• Christ overcame death (wages of sin is death) to makes us free
• Christ is supreme, even over death, so that proves He is God
• Christ resurrected with a living body, to give a foresight that we will also have resurrected bodies in the restoration

Then an interesting verse came to play:

" It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord,  who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification." - Romans 4:24-25

So the main question we struggled about was, how does the resurrection of Christ leads to our justification (to declare us righteous in front of God's eyes)? Many of us, understand that the death of Christ was necessarily as propitiation (taking away the wrath of God) for our sins. Christ is sinless, hence His sacrifice is perfect and sufficient to pay for our sins. The great exchange happens so that the Christ suffers the punishment of our sins, and His righteousness is imputed into us, making us righteous (justification).

But then, how does resurrection leads to our justification? Shouldn't the death of Christ be enough to accomplish this?

So we have to do some readings from theologians to understand more:

• Wayne Gurdem in Systematic Theology, points out that "When Christ was raised from the dead, it was God's declaration of approval of Christ's work of redemption. Because Christ 'humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross' (Phil. 2:8), 'God exalted him..' (Phil. 2:9). By raising Christ, from the dead, God the father was in effect saying that he approved of Christ's work of suffering and dying for our sins."
• R.C. Sproul writes an article "Resurrection and Justification": stating that the resurrection serves as a demonstration (so to assures us that He is God) but also as a vindication that God the Father validates the authenticity of Christ. And also that God the Father approves of the work of Christ.
• John Piper states on his book "50 reasons why Jesus came to die" on page 100-101: "The resurrection of Jesus is God's gift and proof that his death was completely successful in blotting out the sins of his people and removing the wrath of God. You can see this in the word "therefore". Christ was "obedient to the point of death, even on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him" (Philippians 2:8-9). From the cross the Son of God cried, "It is finished" (John 19:30). And by means of the resurrection, God the Father cries, "It was finished indeed!". The great work of paying for our sin and providing our righteousness and satisfying God's justice was finished in the death of Jesus."

Pretty awesome stuff, glory to God!