01.01. Introduction
Chapter 1 - Introduction An "honest doubter" said recently that ministers were all wrong. Instead of presenting facts and arguments to prove the Bible true, they were preaching the Bible as if it were true. He thought the process should be reversed. But he was mistaken. Christian evidences are of great value in their place, but it is a question whether that place is before a man is converted to Jesus Christ or after it.
There is no use in presenting facts and arguments to dead men, and unconverted men are dead men, "dead in trespasses and sins." What they need before evidence is life. And the "Word of God is life, and begets life". It is "living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing even to the dividing of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and quick to discern the thoughts and intent of the heart" (Hebrews 4:12). "Of His own will begat He us with the Word of truth," says James, writing to the Christians of his day (James 1:18); and that is normally the way in which all men are begotten, or obtain life. The application never was more pertinent than when we come to consider the enchanting subject of physical resurrection. Every Christian preacher fitted for his calling knows that this is as much a fact as physical creation; and he is a wise master-builder if he brings all the force of that conviction to bear upon his fellow men. He does this only when he expounds the Scripture just as it is. "The prophet that hath a dream, let him tell a dream," saith the Lord; "and he that hath My word, let him speak My word faithfully" (Jeremiah 23:28).
There were some in the young church at Corinth, led astray by false teachers, who denied the resurrection of the body. They were not questioning the immortality of the soul which even paganism taught; but, like them of Athens, they were ready to mock at the resurrection from the dead.
"We may be thankful for this error because of the good that has come out of it, for", as Dean Alford says, "we have thus obtained one of the grandest and most precious portions of the apostolic writings". To quote his words: "For record of the appearances of our Lord after His resurrection; for cogent argument binding His resurrection to ours; for assertion and implication of the great doctrine of His inclusive humanity; for revelation of holy mysteries imparted by special inspiration; for triumphant application of the phenomena and analogies of nature; no extant writing can compare with this chapter in its value to the Church; its power of convincing the mind and awakening Christian hope; and its far-seeing confutation of the cavils and scoffs of all after-ages against the doctrine of the resurrection."