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If There Be No Resurrection - Charles Spurgeon (December 18, 1892) 

“Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say
some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if
there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen: and if
Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also
vain. Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we
have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not
up, if so be that the dead rise not. For if the dead rise not then is
not Christ raised: and if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye
are ye m your sins. Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ
are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all
men most miserable.-1 Corinthians 15:12-19.

OUR religion is not based upon opinions, but upon facts. We hear persons sometimes saying, “Those are your views, and these are ours.” Whatever your “views” may be, is a small matter; what are the facts of the case? We must, after all, if we want a firm foundation, come down to matters of fact.  Now, the great facts of the gospel are that God was incarnate in Christ

Jesus, that he lived here a life of holiness and love, that he died upon the cross for our sins, that he was buried in the tomb of Joseph, that the third day he rose again from the dead, that after a while he ascended to his Father’s throne where ho now sitteth, and that he shall come by-and-by, to be our Judge, and in that day the dead in Christ shall rise by virtue of their

union with him.

Now, very soon, within the Church of God, there rose up persons who began to dispute about the fundamental and cardinal principles of the faith, and it is so even now. When those outside the Church deny that Christ is the Son of God, deny his atoning sacrifice, and deny his resurrection, we are not at all astonished; they are unbelievers, and they are acting out their
own profession. But when men, inside the Church of God, call themselves Christians, and yet deny the resurrection of the dead, then is our soul stirred within us, for it is a most solemn and serious evil to doubt those holy truths. They know not what they do, they cannot see all the result of their unbelief; if they could, one would think that they would start back with horror, and replace the truth, and let it stand where it ought to stand, where God has put it.

The resurrection of the dead has been assailed, and is assailed still, by those who are called Christians, even by those who are called Christian ministers, but who, nevertheless, spirit away the very idea of the resurrection of the dead, so that we are to-day in the same condition, to some extent, as the Corinthian church was when, in its very midst, there rose up men,

professing to be followers of Christ, who said that there was no resurrection of the dead. The apostle Paul, having borne his witness, and recapitulated the testimony about the resurrection of Christ, goes on to show the horrible consequences which must follow if there be no

resurrection of the dead, and if Christ be not risen. He showed this to be a foundation truth; and if it was taken away, much more