• I Believe in the Resurrection, 1 Corinthians 15:12-20    (see below)
  by Rev. Randy L Quinn
   

• Blessings and Curses, Luke 6:17-26, by PastorBeth  
   

• The Beatitudes: Matthew's Burbs and Luke's Warehouse, Luke 6:17-26 by Rev. Tom Hall
   

• The Road Less Traveled, Psalm 1, by Rev. Tom Hall 

 
 

• Beatitudes or Anti-Beatitudes? Luke 6:17-26, SueCan  
   

• A New Way of Seeing, Jeremiah 17: 5-10, Sue in Cuba, KS  
   

• Law and Love, Jeremiah 17:5-10, 1Corinthians 13:1-13, Luke 6:17-26, anonymous  

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I Believe in the Resurrection
A sermon based on 1 Corinthians 15:12-20
by Rev. Randy L Quinn

Most weeks we end our worship service by reciting the Apostles’ Creed.  I don’t know if that is important to you or not; in fact, I don’t even know if you like using it.

(By the way, if you have strong feelings about it one way or the other, I’d appreciate hearing from you!)

After doing some research on the Apostle’s Creed several years ago, I was reluctant to use it at all.  Almost every Creed was written to draw a line between “us” and “them.”  They were used to exclude people from participating in the life of the church.

Every Creed is aimed at one heresy or another, leading to division rather than unity.

Not surprisingly, when Creeds first appeared in the worship service, they were placed early in the service as a way to limit who was welcome and who was not.  If you could not agree with the Creed, you were asked to leave before the scriptures were read, before the sermon was preached, before prayers were said, before the offering was taken, and before communion was served.

Given that history, maybe you can understand my reluctance to use a Creed in worship.  Especially since I know that our church, the United Methodist Church, is not what is often called a “Creedal” Church.  By that, we mean that there is no one Creed that can be used to state our belief.  There is no one way to draw the line between “us” and “them” – and I’m glad there isn’t.

But some parents asked me to use the Apostle’s Creed in worship so their children would learn it.  They thought of it as an important historic document of the church and wanted their children to be able to recite it as easily as they could.

So after doing some more research, I found a tradition that placed the Apostles’ Creed at the end of the service where it reminds us that there is more to the Gospel than was heard or experienced during any particular worship service.  It serves as a way to ‘complete’ the story.

As I said, I don’t know how you feel about it, but at least you now know why I have kept it in our order of worship.

And like any memorized text, the more I recite it the more I hear in it, and the more it comes to mind.  As I was reflecting on our text for today, for instance, I kept remembering the final portion of the Apostles’ Creed:

“I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.”

Of all the lines in the Creed, this is the portion that raises the most questions in people’s minds – at least this is where I hear the most questions being asked.  Specifically, I am frequently asked about “the holy catholic church.”

How many of you have ever wondered about that phrase?

Many people think it’s referring to the Roman Catholic Church and wonder why we are proclaiming that we believe in the Pope.  The truth is that “catholic” in the Creed is not capitalized.  It’s a word that means universal or all-inclusive.  (In our hymnal there is even a footnote that tells us the meaning of the word.)

What we are saying is that we believe the Church is wider than this congregation or even our denomination.  We are saying that the Church includes all Christians everywhere, wherever the name of Christ is proclaimed.

But I’m digressing.  That wasn’t the part of the Creed I was thinking about this week.  I was remembering that we say we believe in “the resurrection of the body.”

How many of you are troubled by those words?   [continue]