Good morning. And if Christ has not been raised, then our
preaching is vain, your faith also is vain. That makes sense. Moreover we are
even found to be false witnesses of God, because we testified against God that
He raised Christ, whom He did not raise if in fact the dead are not raised. Is
your head beginning to swim? For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ
has been raised, and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless;
you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ
have perished. From what he says later, they must have had great concern about
their friends or relatives who were Christians and had died earlier. But now
Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits (The first sheaf of the
harvest given to the Lord as a token that all of the harvest belonged to the
Lord and would be dedicated to Him) of those who are asleep. Jesus was just the
first to be raised from the dead, not the only one. We will see next time that
Paul amplifies this concept for a few verses. Father thank You that Christ was
the first, not the only one to be raised from the dead. We can be confident
that we will follow Him one day.
Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me
Good morning. Paul then gives a list of a lot of things that he has gone through as an apostle. I do not write these things to shame you, but to admonish you as my beloved children. For if you were to have countless tutors in Christ, yet you would not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. There could be many people that you listen to either in church or through the Internet or other means; but there was only one person (as a general rule it was a person) that lead you to Christ. Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me. He was saying that just like a child imitates his or her father, they were to imitate him. He says that again seven chapters later. Since it is easy to forget some things about people we have not seen in a while, Paul says that he sent Timothy to them to remind them of his ways which are in Christ, just as he taught everywhere in every church. Some have become arrogant, as though I were not coming to you. I shall find ou...
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