Trinity XI Sermon 2026

August 16, 2026 | Fr. Glenn Spencer

For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures…

In First Corinthians Paul takes on questions the Corinthians had dispatched to him by a letter of their own. But Paul also learned from Stephanas and Fortunatus that the Corinthians were in crisis - so severe that their identity with Christ and his Church was in peril. Divisions, self-confidence, regard for wealth, distain for the poor, sexual sin, gluttony and softness, and besides all that, some were saying Paul was in fact not even an Apostle! But to top it off, some Corinthians disputed the resurrection!

Now Paul was not one to fretfully wring his hands and wonder, “Oh my, what is to be done?” He was in Ephesus sometime before Pentecost early in 67 AD when he received this news. He seems to have wasted no time in writing the Corinthians. It appears to me that Paul had a list of what we call today, “issues,” and he sat down wrote out very specific directions on how to deal with these “issues” and bring about godly order. In addition to that, I think Paul, like many people I know, had “written works in progress” and he, moved by the Holy Spirit, wove these different pieces together producing what we call “First Corinthians.” And so parts of this letter pulsate with Paul’s infused agitation (he’s a little scary); while other parts, like Chapter Thirteen – the Hymn to Love – are so lofty, so well-ordered, that the reader herself may wonder just what is going on here? Chapter Fifteen (our Chapter today) is another high moment in the letter. I don’t know how long he had been working on this resurrection document, but once he had finished answering the questions he decided to interlace this document with his letter. Sign it. And send it off to the Corinthians.

For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the

Scriptures…

Paul puts first things last, and by doing so he places before this tittering parish an existential either/or. God corners them in on every side. 

This is the end of a very long and hard letter – probably hard to write and even harder to hear! Nor was it well received! Paul places before them the most fundamental, elemental belief of the Christian Gospel. Our translation for the first clause is not the best – the idea is not “For I delivered unto you first all that which I also received,” as in a sequence of time. As in, “The first thing I did.” No. A better translation is, “For I delivered unto you, as of first importance, of prime importance, that which I also received.” What Paul delivered to the Corinthians was “en protois” – first things, those things of prime importance, that which is most decisive.

And what is that? This is important. It is that which Paul himself received — not his personal insights nor the result of his own or Luke’s investigations and spadework. No. Paul himself insists that what the Corinthians received from him is what he himself first received from the Church, through her Apostles – her central tradition, her core beliefs, her kerygma – her Gospel. “I have freely given you exactly what was freely given to me:”

that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures…

Paul does not attempt to prove to the Corinthians Christians the reality of our Lord’s resurrection. He offers no proofs. He simply makes the case, saying in so many words, “This is the Pearl of Great Price that you have already received from me — Paul! This is not my Gospel. This is the primal truth of the Church. This is not of human origin. I, Paul, stand in a River of Living Water that flows from the font of the Resurrected Lord of Life – and it is that Living Water that I brought to you Corinthians!”

First of all, “Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures.” This is the foundation stone of the primitive Church’s Gospel. In his Second Letter to his wayward parish Paul writes about the meaning of the death of Christ. “On behalf of our sins, God made Christ Jesus to be sin who knew no sin, so that we might become the righteousness, the uprightness of God himself.” This is very close to the Patristic slogan: “God became Man, that man may become god.” The Son of God became son of man that the children of man might become Children of God. “Christ died for our sins, according to the scriptures.”

The next stone placed upon the foundation is very short – “and that he was buried.” This second element of the Gospel stresses the reality of Christ’s death. Faith in the resurrection of Christ and the proclamation of the resurrection are set in the context of his death and burial. “He died and was buried.” All four Gospels record his burial after his horrific death.

Dead people have to be buried. One of Jesus’ dearest friends, Lazarus, died and was buried. When Jesus reached him he was in his fourth day in the tomb. Jesus wept and told the men to roll the stone from Lazarus’ tomb. “But Lord,” Mary plead, “it has been four days. There will be a stench!” Even though Lazarus’ body would have been carefully washed and covered with spices and oil, that would not have delayed decomposition. When Jesus died Joseph of Arimathaea and Nicodemus did the best they could in the short time they had to care for his dead body. Once they received Pilate’s permission, they came and took the body of Jesus down from the cross. Nicodemus brought a hundred pounds of spices and he and Joseph took the body of Jesus and “wound it in linen clothes with the spices.” And then they laid him in a sepulcher where no one had ever been buried. That place was close to Golgotha. And as you know, the women who love him and followed him watched everything closely and on the morning of the third day, they came back to the sepulcher with more spices and linens. Imagine the love that drove them back to the man! They were bringing spices, not Easter dainties! They were expecting to find a swollen and probably reeking corpse.

And that brings us to the capstone of the Gospel – “that he rose again the third day according to the scripture.” The word used here for “rose again” means “raised up exalted.” It is specifically not to be compared to Lazarus who was resuscitated to mere physical life only to die again. The Gospel is that Jesus was raised from the dead, body and all, transformed and exalted. Resurrected never to die again, not resuscitated only to have to face death a second time. When the women arrived at the tomb Easter morning there was no body to be found. They smelled only the sweet spices they had brought along and the flowers and herbs growing in the garden. According to some of the Church Fathers they even smelled the Angels and the resurrected Lord who exuded an odor of sanctity. St. Paul builds on this notion of odor, aroma, and smell when he writes the Corinthians a second time: “For we are to God a sweet smell of Christ, in them that are saved…” Christ has an odor? Maybe Paul was thinking of the time Mary, the sister of Lazarus, broke an alabaster jar of spikenard and poured it over his feet and then wiped his feet with her hair. According to John the odor of the perfumed oil filled the whole house. The same word is used for the incense of the altar that was offered up in the Holy of Holies. These folk lived in a world back then – and so do we – in which some things stink and some things smell holy. The difference is that we have forgotten what holiness smells like.

But I want to move on to one other point. Note that the gospel states that, “Christ died for our sins” and that he was “raised from the dead according to the scriptures.” Kata tas graphas – “according to the Scriptures,” a standard Greek formula used in the Greek translation of the Old Testament. But here’s the rub: you will search the Old Testament in vain to find one verse that states: “the Messiah will die for our sins” or “the Messiah after dying will be resurrected.” Not there! Not if we are stuck with the Historical-Critical Method! The frequently cited Isaiah 53 is not about the Messiah – if authorial intention has the final word. What are we to make of this?

I love John Chrysostom, not only for his poetry, but for his honesty, his authenticity as a priest and as an interpreter of the Scriptures. In his sermon on this very passage he asked the question:

But where have the Scriptures said that He was buried, and where have the Scriptures said on the third day he shall rise again?

Chrysostom fearlessly pursues the Gospel truth. Fearlessly, because he believed he had nothing to fear from the truth. And fearlessly, because he

had not read Benjamin Jowett, Regis Professor of Greek at Oxford, who wrote: "Scripture has one meaning — the meaning which it had in the mind of the Prophet or Evangelist who first uttered or wrote it.” But even if Chrysostom had read Jowett he would have reminded the Oxford Don that the Holy Spirit is the author of the Scriptures and his intentions are not exhausted by the human author. The Holy Spirit intended to show Christ, albeit by way of foreshadowing. Thus the Old Testament is haunted, obsessed with Christ who, for them, was yet to come. Christ’s resurrection has a family of words, a bloodline of imagery, poetry, history and narratives from the Old Testament. The story of Israel is the context – a field always white for harvest – where God first revealed himself to mankind. And that is exactly why St Paul would declare the same to Church of God under his care:

For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures…