1 Corinthians 15:12-20, Consequences and Results

The Reading of 1 Corinthians 15:12-20 and the Question of Resurrection

1st Corinthians 15 be reading for verses 12 to 20 here the word of the Lord. Now if Christ is proclaimed is raised from the dead. How can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead then not even Christ has been raised and if Christ has not been raised.

Then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. We are even found to be misrepresenting God because we testified about God that he raised Christ. Whom he did not raise if it's true that the dead are not raised.

For if the dead are not raised not even Christ has been raised and if Christ has not been raised your faith is futile. And you are still in your sins. Then those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished.

If in Christ we have hope in this life only we are of all people most to be pitied but in fact Christ has been raised from the dead the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. May the Lord add his blessings to the reading of his Holy Word.

The Law of Unintended Consequences in Everyday Life and Culture

Well, have you ever done something? I made a decision to change in life something you thought would be good for you and Found it came with some very unpleasant unintended consequences. Maybe you change jobs yet a comfortable but not a well-paying maybe a government job and you change it something private job and.

Well, you thought would be a more lucrative career, but then it's less stable and you end up the consequences you're unemployed. Our decisions often come with unintended consequences. For example over the last 30 years It became popular for local governments to enact laws that require bicycle riders to wear safety helmets.

While this has brought about a reduction in the number of head injuries. There also appears to have been an unintended reduction. Now this assumes that Correlation is causation there. There has been a reduction in the number of children riding bikes.

Because assume it's because many of them don't like the way the helmets look. So now that fewer kids are cycling because they don't want to wear the helmets. They're getting less exercise, which makes them less healthy.

One study showed that the unintended consequence of helmet laws was a net health cost of up to five billion dollars per year in Australia. Britain the Netherlands in the USA. Kudzu is an example of the law of unintended consequences.

It was introduced into the US from Japan to help prevent erosion in earthworks. But it has now become a major problem in the southeastern US where we are. Displacing native plants and effectively taking over large portions of land, you know.

If you're outside don't stand still in the spring you might get devoured by kudzu. Other unintended consequences are more personal. Some people decide to become a little too close to someone of the opposite sex.

They're not married to they they intend maybe only at first just to have another friend and that's someone to talk to but then one thing leads to another and the relationship gets closer and then sexual and then it gets found out and then they're divorced and The family is broken and it just spirals out of control all of it.

Ideas Have Consequences: Nietzsche, the Nazis, and Corinthian Greek Philosophy

Unintended consequences ideas. Also come with unintended consequences. Often the consequences are the opposite of what those propagate them intend. They may intend on the idea of bringing more freedom and it produces the opposite.

In 19th century Germany a philosopher named Friedrich Nietzsche taught that religion but which meant Christianity was the tyranny of the weak. Constraining the truly great it was a slave morality. He said that enslaved the powerful and if we could just throw that off throw off Christianity.

We would be free and the church taught an idea of God. He said to frighten those who are superior and to serving the inferior. But now in his time the 1800s since fewer and fewer people were really believing in God.

He taught that it was time for people who who knew they were the superior. What he called the supermen and in German the uber binch. It's time for them to rise up to free themselves. Free themselves of Christian morality and impose their own morality on the world.

He is famous for saying God is dead and we have killed him with God being dead. Now the supermen can now rise up they can take over and Impose their vision their values of right and wrong. It's right because I say it's right.

They said impose their views on the world. Nietzsche eventually went insane. Maybe he was already insane, but he eventually went insane due to syphilis was put in an asylum and died that way but his philosophy caught the attention of many people especially a group of people in Germany a Group that thought that they could be the race of the so-called supermen.

Imposing their ideas of right and wrong on everyone else. Unrestrained by religion the teachings teaching your Christ that they could just throw that off impose their values. What or just throw off what many most people thought were just.

You know just playing decency those people were of course the Nazis. So the ideas of a demented man produced the consequences of millions of people being killed. The idea that he thought would bring greater freedom.

Brought.

One of the worst tyrannies that the world has ever seen as the supermen tried to rule the world ideas have Consequences here the idea some are expressing is a common one in the Corinthians Greek culture.

They they hadn't Renewed their minds. Yet not only completely anyway, they had seen life differently from what they've been trained in as Greek people instead. They've imported into their new Christianity some of the ideas.

They have been inculcated in its Children as Greek children in their in their Greek pagan culture. And we too have to be aware of the ideas in our culture that we can import into our faith and to the church unwashed with the words ideas have Consequences.

And so when people bring the ideas of their culture into the church unchecked by the word. We encounter problems. Fundamental assumed ideas about things like Individualism individual autonomy, you know that we are islands unto ourselves.

Those kind of ideas we bring them into the church. It distorts the church can visually destroy the church by undermining its undermining what it is. What is supposed to be the idea of church membership like people just you know, they think they're just autonomous.

Why why should we believe in a church covenant? Why should we really believe in church membership? Why should we believe in being dedicated? Why should I keep my word. Why should my yes be yes my no be no.

Everyone else around us in our culture says one thing and then later we'll do another. They don't keep their word. And so they import these practices into the church. Why shouldn't we have a church? That's just for our kind of people never mind about there being one body.

Why shouldn't we assume the worst about our leaders? You know like we do in a American culture and our politics to bring that into the church guess what happens we why shouldn't we just go where we get the best?

Service, you know like we do for restaurants. Why shouldn't we do that? Ideas like individualism racism consumerism have Consequences that can destroy the church. The idea here Imported into the church.

Unwashed by the word was that there was no resurrection in verse 12. The dead do not rise they already Thought their preconceived idea that is was that the body was only a prison for the soul. That's what their Greek philosophy taught them.

It's just part of their culture that to die they thought was to be released from the prison of the body. And so it was a good thing. Why would anyone even want? Dead bodies to rise. That was their idea.

That's what they had been trained in. They thought that they had thought that through. But here Paul shows them the unintended consequences of that idea. Last week we saw why the resurrection must be true.

Here we see why it must not be false. The Apostle Paul lists for them seven dire Unintended consequences of the idea that there is no resurrection. First in verse 13 if there's no resurrection. Well, then that applies to Christ too.

That sounds like common sense. But it appears that the wise people of Corinth had never thought it through that far.

Sure.

It is the first and most logical consequence of the idea that if there is no resurrection If there's no resurrection then of the dead then Jesus wasn't raised when he was dead. He's still in the grave.

Although no one could present his body, but people aren't so logical. They often don't think through the consequences of their idea today the atheists, you know will say well You know say there's no God.

But if you try to reason with them, what are the consequences of this idea? This is your faith. You can't prove there's no God. You just believe it. What are the consequences if there's no God? Well, there's no God.

There's no creator. So everything that exists must either be eternal. Which what today's science shows is not true. Science says the universe had a specific beginning and it will have again end. So if there's no God, how where did it come from or it's or it's self created the universe created itself.

How did it when it before it existed? How could it have created itself because it didn't exist. So it's just an absurdity. It makes no sense. Something that doesn't exist can't create its can't make itself come into being because before it comes into being it doesn't exist to make itself.

Obviously seems a pretty common sense. It's unreasonable. In other words. Since there is no creation There is a creation. Excuse me. There must be a creator if there's a watch. There must be a watchmaker somewhere right this thing didn't just come about Falling together some randomly and I found it somewhere and put it on my wrist.

Someone made it if you try to reason with most atheists like this today, you know what the answer is.

No.

That's that's about it. It really doesn't get much deeper than that. They refuse to follow the consequences of their ideas. So to summon Corinth was saying well, there's no resurrection. But hadn't yet applied that to Christ and thought it through very far.

The message was the thing of first importance. Remember from last week that Christ rose from the dead. Then the reason tells us if Christ rose from the dead then there must be a resurrection. Obviously he started it if there's no resurrection then Christ did not rise from the dead.

Paul here is saying that you must follow the consequences of your ideas and the first dire consequence of the idea that there is no resurrection is That Christ has not been raised and The next six dire consequences just flow out of this monumentally bad idea.

And there's no resurrection and thus no resurrection of Christ. Then he says in verse 14. Our message is in vain. It's important theme throughout all this chapter. What's in vain? Otherwise useless. It's meaningless.

It comes to nothing the message off the message. They're often translated as the preaching here is like last week remember not referring to a kind of style of communication like preaching in Contrast of teaching or sharing or writing the message the preaching is the content the teaching.

That Jesus lived without sin. He was the Messiah who was crucified for our sins and he was raised for our life. That's the message and if the dead are not raised and so Jesus is not raised the consequence on That message is dire.

Now.

They would not have admitted that. They would just want to say there's no consequences to it. Like the atheists say no. Just like some of over the last couple of centuries who want to deny miracles, especially the miracle the resurrection.

They want to avoid the consequence of their idea. They would want to say that the message. The preaching the message the gospel is still a sweet story. It's still life transforming. It's still hope giving.

It's still life giving that it still makes us feel good about our future about God even though it's. It's factually false the message. Even though we modern people with our electrical lights, you know.

And our our knowledge about how the body works our medicine how it's impossible to bring dead tissue back to life that message. It's still encouraging, isn't it? I mean even though it's not really true.

It lifts us up.

It's still does something for us. So it's true kind of in a way and supposedly spiritual way. No, I mean, you don't really believe in a resurrection physically literally, but you believe it's kind of a metaphor For a new life, right?

It is spiritually true. And even though it's factually false. They say That in essence is the point of view of some of the most prominent theologians over the last century or more the most read theologian of the 20th century was a man named Rudolf Bultmann who famously said that you cannot use electrical lights and Believe in the resurrection.

I don't know we're doing it right now Rudolph. I don't know what but In other words for him science had proven that the natural world Works according to its natural laws. And if there's one thing that we know about nature is the dead do not rise when something something is dead.

It's dead. You can't you can't bring life back to it, but you could still believe in the resurrection. He would say as sort of a spiritual Reality a sunrise in your heart say a metaphor for a spiritual reality.

For him the idea that the dead do not rise was a truth for the natural realm. For the world physical world we live in the world of science where God Does not do miracles if there was a God. I mean after all in his view, you know, like Nietzsche said God is dead and we have killed him but for the spiritual realm There is a resurrection a sunrise in your hearts a new hope a new cheery outlook on life Hope Springs eternal.

It's a it's a symbolic story of how life will win out over death eventually how spring comes after a hard winter. How love conquers all you know, love wins a good bumper sticker. It is then a spiritual truth built on a factual.

Falsehood.

He could both say That the resurrection was not something you know if you could go back in time through some kind of time machine with a camera and you could be right outside the Tomb as Jesus was raised from the dead on that on that resurrection day He would say you wouldn't have anything to take a picture of.

No body came out of the tomb.

But.

You don't get a picture of Jesus, but the spiritual result he would say it's still the same. You still get hope you still get a some kind of Spiritual something happening to you, whatever it is. The idea that there is no resurrection he says and the idea that Jesus raised from the dead are Are separate in an odd way.

The idea is he says is that there is no resurrection and that idea he says Has no consequences to our spiritual life. Does that make sense? We think well, come on, that's I mean you got you spend too much time in seminary that's kind of abstract sophisticated academic theology it's just so remote and irrelevant to us.

We're either too simple to waste our time with such highfalutin theology or we're just too well grounded. To be deceived by people who are educated beyond their intelligence, right? We're we won't be fooled by that kind of stuff, right?

Well, really the first week that I was here moved down here from Pennsylvania in 2007 I had to attend the funeral of a church member a man I had only briefly seen struggling for life a few days earlier at that funeral a so-called pastor.

Really a rebellious Sunday school teacher playing playing pastor a man helping perform it and from this area with no theological education or academic training that I know of told a story actually in the In the cemetery just about a half mile from here down the road and he said in this story.

He said he said it an angel had come down from heaven. Looking for a soul to take home. Apparently God sends angels to go look for souls. But not with vague instructions. The angel came upon a little girl.

But the Lord told the angel no, it's not her time yet. The angel came upon a middle-aged man working for his family and but the Lord told the angel did. Oh, no, he had many more years to go. And the angel came upon an older woman and thought, you know a grandmother and thought she must be the one to take but the Lord told the angel know that she had many more years to enjoy her grandchildren and Finally the angel come upon the man who's now laying in the casket and said yes.

That's the one my fateful servant now being summoned to his reward. You know free of the prison of his body. I guess he could have added that Oh, what a wonderful Heartwarming story and a pile of lies.

Lies.

What did the man do at a funeral? He told a story you got a myth that he had fabricated. There's no silly angel going around day and they'll confused about which soul to pick up and what a horrible reality.

That would be you know, I might accidentally get the wrong one. The Bible doesn't say anything like that and where does he get off making up a story like that? I mean who gave him the authority that he can make up stories about angels picking up souls.

What do you think you are that you can make this kind of stuff up the Bible to say that kind of thing? Of course, the answer is obvious. The story made some people feel good. And so it is then because it made people feel good.

It's in a way True, isn't it? I mean if it made people feel good, does it make it true? That is factually false. Of course. It's not really important. At least not to them and All that is important is that it it warms our hearts and so right here.

Right here right among the average people is is the idea that there's the realm of facts either the dead don't rise as Bultman said or even here that the fact that everyone really knew that there's really no angels going around looking for which soul to take and There's that realm over there of facts and then there's the realm of the spirit where we are uplifted by stories.

Whether they're true or not who cares and those two realms the factual and the spiritual are.

Detached.

But what Paul is saying here is that they are not detached that ideas have consequences that to tell a Myth a fictional story you made up at it for a funeral to make people feel good. It says something horrible.

That's totally an un-christian thing to do that. You can't deny the resurrection without denying the resurrection of Christ. And if you do that, our message is in vain. It might make you feel good for a while.

Telling a story at a funeral great story may make you feel good for a while, but it's just numbing you to reality. It's like like a drug that numbs you so you don't feel. Your hand is being burned on a hot stove that you're leaning on the anesthesia.

It's not letting you know the consequences of what's happening to you. You feel fine. Well. While that drug is lying to you. Well, it's basically cutting off the realm of facts from the you know. The fact your hand is being burned from the consequences of what's happening to you.

But when it wears off you you'll be in pain. So he is saying that you we can't separate the world of facts from the world of spiritual truth if Christ is not raised our message is Empty it depends on being true.

Faith, Truth, and the Consequences of Denying the Resurrection

Well, the third dire consequence in verse 14 is that our faith is in vain. Here again modern people have a difficult time understanding this. What do you mean? Our faith is in vain faith is for nothing.

They want to say that doesn't matter what you believe in as long as you're sincere. Right a lot of people Americans now believe that if it helps you out more power to you. Then whatever you believe is good if it's good for you.

But here Paul is saying that if there is no resurrection and so Christ has not been raised that faith that you had in him.

It's useless.

It's of no value to have faith in a falsehood. The fourth dire consequence in verse 15 is that we have been misrepresenting God. We've been lying. In other words, we've been telling people that God raised Christ from the dead.

We made every Sunday. We meet today the first day of the week because that is the day in which we say Christ Rose from the dead was Jesus rose we sing about it. We teach it we preach it. But if Christ has not been raised all of that is a lie.

Either Jesus rose or we are liars or maybe for us. Maybe we're maybe we're just the stupid people. Stupid enough to believe those original liars. That's the choice. There's no there's none of this idea.

That even if you couldn't take a picture of it. If you went back in time that it's still uplifting and so it's still true in a way. It still makes me feel better about my life. Please remember. Our message is not simply good advice on how to live and that if you follow these secret steps you know you stop hating and you stop fornicating and you stop getting drunk and you tithe and you're a little bit religious and You're well, then you're gonna prosper and you're gonna have a better happier life and you're gonna have your best life now.

Even and so it doesn't really matter what inspires you to get you start to living differently as long as something inspires you to do that if We tell you that not to be naughty because Santa Claus will put a lump of coal in your stocking instead of giving you gifts.

And if that lie works to improve your behavior. Well, then that's great. If we puff you up with flattery about how terrific you are. You're smart. You're amazing. You're the you're a Superman and you'll be motivated by that to live better.

Well, that's creating a myth to inspire you. That's not the Christian idea. We're not saying that's the sacrifice of Christ on the cross and the resurrection is just a great Inspiring story and it will motivate you to change and that change will just improve your life.

We're saying it's true and the truth of that reality is. Is what has the power to change you. Our message is that something real happened. Jesus rose from the dead and if that didn't happen.

We're lying.

No Resurrection, No Atonement, No Hope for the Dead

The fifth dire consequence and verses 16 and 17 is That we are still in our sins. In verse 16. He reminds us of the original bad idea. That has all that produces all these dire consequences. That is that there's no, you know.

If Christ if there's no resurrection then Christ did rise from the dead now. They did not intend on destroying the foundation of their faith when they continue to believe that the dead are not raised.

Right. Remember that's what their culture taught them. They continued to believe that. All right, they didn't change that in light of the what they supposed to believe in the Jesus rose from the dead.

That's just what the that's the idea that they were taught as Greek children. It was it was assumed. No one questioned it. Just like people here in the u .s Didn't intend on destroying the church when they imported their individualism and consumerism into it when they made it into another service provider.

Like a movie theater all about putting on the best show for the consumer of religious entertainment. They didn't intend on destroying the church when they did that but they did. Here they are reminded if the dead are not raised then Christ has not been raised and the consequence of that is again.

Your faith this is futile. It's empty. It's it's it's good for nothing. That it entertained you for a while. Only means that it distracted you from the miserable reality that you are still in your sins if there is no resurrection the consequence.

Then is there's no payment for your sins. We're still guilty. We're still under the power of sin we're still damned. If Jesus stayed dead for whatever reason the payment to atone for our sins was then not acceptable to the father.

So there was no triumphing over death. So the consequence of teaching that there is no resurrection is to teach. That there's no atonement. There's no pardon. There's no justification. There's no right standing before God.

There's no salvation. There's no hope. The sixth dire consequence in verse 18 of the idea that there's no resurrection. Is that those Christians who have died? Are dead and that's all they will ever be.

There's no more life for them. It's it's over for them. It's through the resurrection of the body that we have eternal life. It's not just we're not just gonna be a spirit floating around sitting on a cloud.

Plucking on a spiritual harp. So if there's no resurrection if the body lies cold in the ground forever. Eventually just disintegrating back into the earth and then the earth but eventually dissolves then there's no more life forever.

All the comforting talk about death triumphing over death. Where's your sting? All that kind of stuff is only empty words. If Christ is not a living Savior if he's only a Dead guru. The seventh dire consequence last one verse 19 is that we are of all people most to be pitied.

People should feel sorry for us for all we've given up and sacrifice for this this story. If it's not true, if you couldn't take a picture of Jesus coming out of the tomb on that first resurrection day.

Then the whole thing is a fraud. The so-called joy and the peace we talked about just a psychological trick. We played on ourselves. We could have had the same thing with another religion. It didn't ask so much from us or Maybe just living for ourselves, you know living for the dollar money could have made us happy.

But we followed Jesus who said you can't serve God in money. So, you know, we lost we serve to Jesus who's dead. That didn't that's not very good. And that's ends up being nothing. We took up our cross.

We sacrificed pleasures. We gave when we could have splurged on ourselves. We read a Bible when we didn't feel like reading it. We trudged through Leviticus. I mean have you ever read that book? Oh and We've denied ourselves the pleasures of the flesh when we really wanted them.

We stayed in church listening to boring sermons when we could have been doing something fun. We could have slept late on Sunday morning and not sacrifice our Sunday afternoons or evenings or Saturday afternoons.

Trying to reach sometimes unappreciated people. We could have spent more on ourselves. We could have had more sexual experiences. We could have all kind of all kinds of fun. We could have followed Nietzsche's advice and just imposed our own ideas of right and wrong.

Whatever suits us. We could have made ourselves the supermen instead of the stupid sheep. We could have killed God and done as we pleased. If there was no resurrection we sacrificed for nothing. Nothing is something in this chapter.

Vanity emptiness utility. It's a repeated theme over and over again in verse 2. They are warned that if they do not hold fast to the gospel, then they may have bleed in vain. Otherwise had a faith that comes to Nothing if they don't persevere in verse 10.

Paul points to the work of grace in his life. How it's made him work all that great all the all that grace has done in him. He points to that as proof that the grace of God has not been In vain, it's not been for nothing.

It's produced something in verse 14 the consequence of the bad idea that there is no resurrection is that it makes our message. It makes the gospel in our faith.

Vain.

Empty.

Here futility is the alternative to the resurrection. We either have the resurrection or we have Nothing. He had shown us before why the resurrection must be true. Here he is showing why it must not be false.

If it is false we're living a life of utter of Utility. I mean everything we think is meaningful is actually meaningless. It's profitless. Useless, it's fruitless. It's powerless. It's worthless everything just wasting our time.

It's hollow and void we are like syphilis the man in Greek mythology who's condemned to an eternity of rolling a Huge boulder uphill and just before he reaches the top Just before his job is about to be finished He has to let it roll back down again to the bottom and start all over and that's our life without the resurrection.

One of the Nazis methods of torturing prisoners in their camps was to get a group of men to move a large pile of dirt From one place to another and then when they had finished Move it back again then again and again.

For no reason whatsoever. After a while some prison would just go out of their mind and just throw themselves on the barbed wire. You know what with machine guns there from the tower preferring to be machine gun to death rather than to continue to live with such futility and Here he's shown us that if Christ has not been raised Then all of this all our faith the gospel our lives our church.

Everything you think is precious. It's just all empty. It's all worthless. It's nothing. It's moving piles of dirt from one place to another and back again. There's just nothing to it. But he proclaims in verse 20.

Christ Has Been Raised: The Intended Results of the Resurrection

Christ has been raised in Fact that's the reality and it turns those seven sad negatives into seven happy positives. His resurrection is the great reality that turns those seven dire consequences into glorious intended results.

What are the results of?

Christ resurrection the intended results. Well first he is the first fruits. That is he's the beginning of the resurrection. There's this harvest of the dead and he's the first one. His resurrection is in the past.

So that we can know that ours is in the future. The intended result of Christ's erection is that we do not have to live a feudal life. Just as eating and drinking and dying and going back into the ground again like any other animal.

We have a future and a hope to look forward to being raised with him.

Second.

Our message is full. It's not empty. The message that Jesus lived a perfect life. He he taught living truths. He died for our sins rose from the grave. He sent us Holy Spirit for us. That's not just a fairy story made up to make us feel good.

It's not just a drug and not an anesthesia to numb us to the realities of life. So we'll do our duty, you know get through life. I'm not feeling the pain as much as it really is. Hurry up and die. No, the result of the resurrection is there.

A message is is full and Powerful that the Holy Spirit can use. Use that message to breathe life into our dead bones. That is the most interesting and most meaningful message that there is. Third because our message is full and powerful our faith is Not fruitless.

Our faith because it is faith in something real and what God has done for us. It's not just a warm feeling that helps us endure the hard realities of life. It's not just a charming story. We're told in a graveside to make us feel better.

Something made up by a good storyteller to help us get by. It is faith in a real God who sent his real son who really rose from the dead. It's something solid and secure. Because he who gave it to us Secures us with it.

Fourth.

Since Christ was has risen from the dead then we are testifying about God. Accurately, we are telling those kids who come from Jim jr. The truth when we tell them the gospel. We're telling the youth who come here for for Jim.

Absolute realities when we tell them about Christ. Why then would we exchange the absolute that absolute truth that reality that can transform lives. For mere moralizing, you know about how to be better boys and girls.

How to be well-mannered how to address and talk properly. How to be religious rule keepers. Rules that are empty of the power. To change people things that will eventually become to nothing. Why why would we do that?

We have in the gospel the absolute truth of what God did for us so that's what we should be telling.

Fifth.

Because Christ has been raised We're no longer in our sins. Sure, we have we still have sin to wrestle with still lingering in our lives, but we are no longer is slave. And before the father we are not seen in our sins.

But dressed in the righteousness of the Living Son. We are forgiven and have been pardoned. The punishment we deserved was unleashed on the Sun on The cross and God showed us that he accepted that sacrifice By raising him from the dead.

So Nietzsche. Nietzsche was half right, you know. When he said that God was dead and we have killed him God's not dead. He was wrong about that. But we did kill him. We killed him when we killed the son with our sins.

Then the father raised him up proving that he had made atonement for our sins. And that God is not dead. He is alive.

Six.

Because Christ has been raised those Christians who have died Aren't really dead. They've fallen asleep. Not in the sense. They're unconscious, but that their body is lying down now waiting to be raised up.

They are alive and they're waiting for that resurrection of which Christ was the first. That the intended result of the resurrection of Christ is that now we are living in the era of The resurrection.

It began with the resurrection of Jesus and it will end with our own resurrection. We are now living between.

Resurrections.

Seventh. Because Christ has been raised We are most to be envied. We have benefits for a better life now and a sure hope of our best life. Later, we have a life now worth living. The joy and the peace of the love that we claim come from being right with God.