(I Corinthians 15:19)

The word of God opens up to us the possibility of hoping in Christ for this life only. Our
first reaction may be one of complete disbelief. How can there be such hope as pertains to
this life only? Christianity is about the promise of eternal life. The very nature of hope
itself seems to carry us away from this life into something better and greater that is yet to
be. The gospel is the announcement of good news to all people because it tells us in this
life how to prepare for the life to come. God’s salvation is salvation from sin and the
consequences of sin. The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ
Jesus our Lord. What is a hope in Christ that applies to this life, and this life only?
Whatever it is, it cannot be worth very much. Who would want such a hope? If this is the
hope we possess, the apostle Paul pronounces us the most pitiable of all people.

Nevertheless, the possibility is held out that hope for this life may be the only hope some
people have. We may be role models of religion and morality, yet hope in Christ for this
life only. We may make a bold and confident confession of faith in Jesus Christ, and yet
hope in him for this life only. We may sincerely believe that we know all that we need or
care to know about the gospel plan of salvation, but still have hope in Christ for this life
only. It may even be true of us that we believe as a matter of principle the doctrine of the
resurrection, while in practice we deny it by living as if we have a hope in Christ for this
life only. It is a fatal mistake to entertain such a hope. To have hope for this life only is to
have no hope at all. It is not even a false hope. If there is anything worse than a false
hope, this would be it. “If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied
more than all men.”

God’s word tells us to “always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you
to give the reason for the hope that you have” (I Peter 3:15). What is the hope that we
have as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ? What answer will we give those who ask us
the reason for it? If it turns out to be a hope in Christ for this life only, it would be better
if no one asked us the reason for it. Let us examine ourselves about our hope. Is
Christianity about this life only? Is our testimony that we are interested in Christ only
insofar as he will help us to make money, be successful, have a happy marriage, and keep
our children away from drugs? Do we have a hope in Christ? Is it for this life only? Or is
it a hope that testifies by word and deed that it is rooted and grounded in the resurrection
of Jesus Christ? Gospel hope is not for this life only. The hope of the believer is a true
hope if it sets its affections on things above, not on things on the earth. Gospel hope is
heavenly minded. Gospel hope is spiritually minded. A true hope in Jesus Christ is not a
hope for this life only. Let us seek to discover what the word of God has to say about the
hope that is for this life only.
What does it mean to have hope in Christ for this life only?

It means to believe a gospel that is not true (verses 12,13). The resurrection of Christ is
declared in the gospel. This is the gospel that was preached by the apostles and believed
in Corinth. It was through belief of the gospel that people became Christians. Essential to
that message is the resurrection of Christ. To deny the resurrection is to deny that Christ
was raised from the dead. This can only mean that the gospel is not true. But if the gospel
is true, then to deny the resurrection of Christ is to deny the gospel (verses 1-4, 11,12).
Some in Corinth were saying that there is no resurrection. Worse still, they were living as
if there is no resurrection (verses 33,34). They thought that the physical body was the
cause of all our troubles, and the sooner we are released from it, the better. But to say
this, whether in principle or in practice, is to say that Christ is not raised. You cannot
believe a gospel that proclaims the resurrection of Christ and at the same time believe
that there is no resurrection. These are contradictory beliefs and cannot both be true. But
this is your dilemma if you have hope in Christ for this life only. The resurrection of
Christ and the doctrine of the resurrection are inseparably bound together. You cannot
have it both ways. If there is no resurrection, then “Christ has not been raised” (13). If
Christ was raised, there is a resurrection. The joyful message of the earliest Christians
was a message about Jesus and the resurrection (Acts 4:1,2; 17:18,31,32).

It means to have a Christianity that is not real (verses 14-18). The part that verse 19
plays in the teaching of this chapter is to give us the grand total of all the ways the gospel
is proven to be untrue if there is no resurrection. If the gospel is not true, then Christianity
is not real. It is all a sham and no better than any man-made religion. The gospel is the
basis of the Christian faith and of the faith of Christian believers. Without the gospel
there is no Christianity. Without the gospel there are no Christians. Without the gospel
there would have been no church in Corinth or anywhere else. The apostle Paul insisted
that the church in Corinth owed its existence to the preaching of the gospel. He said, “I
became your father through the gospel” (I Cor. 4:14-16). It was the gospel that brought
them “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ” (II Cor. 4:1-6).
Christianity is the product of the gospel.

A Christian is someone who believes the gospel. A Christian believes that Christ died for
his sins, that he was buried, and that he rose again. A Christian does not believe in Christ
for this life only. He comes to Christ to be free from the burden of his sin. He is not
someone who has simply been upset and discouraged about problems with money, his
marriage, his career, or his relationships. His hope in Christ is for the forgiveness of his
sins and the gift of eternal salvation. Nothing less than this is offered to us in the gospel.
To have hope in Christ for this life only is to hope that Christ will take care of the
symptoms without having to deal with the disease itself. So a Christianity that lives in
denial of the resurrection of Christ as proclaimed in the gospel is no Christianity at all. It
is nothing different than a child’s game of “pretend.” Just as children at play will create
for themselves an imaginary world, so those who have a hope in Christ for this life only
create for themselves an imaginary Christianity. This is what the apostle outlines in the
following verses:

“Our preaching is in vain or useless” (14). It was the preaching of the gospel that gave
rise to the gospel church in Corinth (1:20-25; 2:1-5). If preaching is in vain, it means it is
for nothing or of no effect. It is empty and accomplishes nothing. The same idea of
“uselessness” is illustrated in verses 10 and 58 of this chapter. The very foundations of
gospel preaching are swept away if we have hope in Christ for this life only. What is
preached in the gospel is that Christ died as a sin bearer and rose from the dead. If it is a
message that offers a hope in Christ for this life only, it is empty and useless.

“Your faith is vain or useless” (14). Faith is based on preaching (verses 1-3). It is the
response that God expects to the message preached. Gospel faith is looking away from
self to Jesus Christ crucified, buried, and risen. If we have hope in Christ for this life
only, we have believed in vain. A Christ who has not risen from the dead is a Christ who
has not paid the debt for our sins. If he has died for our sins, he is under them still if he
has not risen from the dead. “Useless faith” means we have trusted him to do something
he did not and could not do.

“We are false witnesses of God” (15). The reputation and character of God are at stake.
When the gospel is preached, it is preached as the gospel of God. Only the power of God
could raise Jesus from the dead. If God is represented in the gospel as having done
something that he did not do, and you believe that falsehood, you have believed a false
witness. Worse still, the person who presumed to so represent God is a false witness of
God. The apostle Paul well understood the seriousness of such a charge (Deut. 18:20-22).

“You are still in your sins” (17). The sin problem is still unsolved if Christ is not risen.
If Jesus is not risen, either he was a sinner who received the wages of his own sin, or God
did not approve of or accept his attempt at atonement for the sins of others. If Christ died
for our sins but is not risen, he remains under the guilt and penalty of our sins. Christ
became so closely identified with our sins that he regarded them as his own. Yet they
were not his own, but the sins of his people.

In Psalm 40:11,12 he said, “Do not withhold your mercy from me, O Lord; may your
love and your truth always protect me. For troubles without number surround me; my
sins have overtaken me, and I cannot see. They are more than the hairs of my head, and
my heart fails within me.”
“He himself bore our sins in his own body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and
live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed” (I Peter 2:24).

If Christ is still in our sins, so are we. We are joined to him by faith, and we can never be
in a better condition than he is in.

“Those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished” (18). A Christianity that offers
a hope in Christ for this life only is of no value in the face of death. If there is no
resurrection, then Christ has not been raised. For those who believed in Christ when they
lived there is no hope after death. The apostle pronounces them “lost,” not because they
will never exist in their bodies again, and not because they will never exist at all, but
because they died with the guilt of their sins still upon them. Their faith availed them
nothing, and they are forever lost if they had hope in Christ for this life only. This hope
cannot save from sin. Such a hope is a complete contradiction of the believer’s hope in
death (I Thess. 4:13,14).

What are the characteristics of a hope in Christ for this life only?
The characteristics of such a hope can only be stated in the negative, because the hope of
which the Bible speaks is entirely positive. Biblical hope is positive because it is not
merely for this life, but for the life to come. Hope for this life only is not the hope of the
Bible.

It is not a living hope. The hope of the Christian is hope in the living God. It is hope in a
“promise for both the present life and the life to come (I Timothy 4:8-10). It is “the hope
of eternal life” (Titus 1:2; 3:7). A hope for this life only cannot be a living hope. It is only
a dying hope. But the hope of the Bible is the hope into which we have entered by being
born again, and it looks to “an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade – kept in
heaven for you…”(I Peter 1:3,4).

It is not a heavenly hope. The hope of the gospel is “the hope that is stored up for you in
heaven” (Colossians 1:5). This does not mean simply that Christians think about going to
heaven, but that the hope is heaven itself. Genuine hope is the inheritance of God’s
people. It is the promise of the kingdom of God. A hope in Christ for this life only is one
that may think about heaven, but its primary concerns are for this present life. It is not a
heavenly hope.

It is not a confident hope. A hope in Christ for this life only cannot give confidence
about the life to come. It leaves everything in doubt and can only produce a false
confidence about this life. The confidence of the believer arises from our hope in Jesus
Christ and the heavenly calling we have in him. We know Christ as the one who has
brought us into God’s house, not only for this life, but for all eternity (Hebrews 3:1-6).
This “faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see”
(Hebrews 11:1).

It is not a purifying hope. The apostle Paul chided the church in Corinth about this. The
hope in Christ for this life only is a hope that does not deal seriously with sin. Bad
teaching leads to bad living, and he had to admonish them to “stop sinning” (verses
33,34). A hope in Christ that is for this life only is more concerned about getting along in
life than it is about being rid of sin. It tries to deal with the fruits of sin but does not want
to deal with the roots of sin. It is a hope that Christ will provide emergency services for
the problems of this life. But it is not a hope that engages in a relentless battle against sin
in the heart. What is a purifying hope? “Everyone who has this hope in him [Christ]
purifies himself, just as he [Christ] is pure” (I John 3:3).

It is not a rejoicing hope. The hope of the Christian is always a hope that has more than
sufficient reason to rejoice (Romans 5:2,4,5; 12:12). It is a hope that is based on what
God has said and done about eternal realities. The things that pertain to our hope can
never be taken away from us. “We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and
secure” (Hebrews 6:19). But the hope in Christ for this life only can never sustain a
joyful outlook in the heart of a child of God. It is not focused on God’s ultimate purpose,
but upon the problems of the present. Its ability to rejoice is too dependent on the shifting
and changing currents of this life. Hope in Christ for this life only depends for its
happiness on the circumstances of this life, not on the promises of God. It does not
understand that:

“Fading is the worldling’s pleasure,

All his boasted pomp and show;
Solid joys and lasting treasure
None but Zion’s children know.”

It is not a Scriptural hope. The true hope of the believer can never be separated from
the holy Scriptures. It is “through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures
[that] we might have hope.” Christians should be people who “overflow with hope by the
power of the Holy Spirit” (Romans 15:4,13). We must take great care when it comes to
the basis of our hope. A hope in Christ that is for this life only is not rooted and grounded
in the word of God. Very often it is based on the wisdom of men and the counsel of the
ungodly. It is a hope that is more interested in the “how” than the “what.” It is impatient
to find out how Christ can fix whatever the trouble is but it has no interest in finding out
the true nature of the trouble itself. It is a hope in Christ for this life only.

It is not a gospel hope. It hardly needs to be said that the hope of the Christian is the
hope of the gospel. The hope held out in the gospel is not for this life only. It is the hope
of being reconciled to God through the death of Christ and of finally being presented to
God “holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation” (Colossians 1:21-23).
But the hope in Christ for this life only hopes for lesser things. It is the hope of a gospel
of lesser things, the things of this life only.

It is not a good hope. The apostle Paul spoke of a good hope when he challenged the
believers in Thessalonica to stand firm in the faith. He reminded them that God has given
us “eternal encouragement and good hope” (II Thess. 2:16). A hope in Christ for this life
only is not about eternal things, and so it is not a good hope.

It is not a blessed hope. The hope of the Christian is a hope that waits for “the glorious
appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:13). It is hope that waits in
anticipation of complete redemption and purification from sin. The hope that is for this
life does not like to wait. It is a hope that often demands its inheritance now. It is
concerned about the issues of this life only, and it impatiently wants those issues
resolved.

It is not a saving hope. In the end, this is what we have to say about the hope in Christ
for this life only. It does not hope for the complete and eternal salvation promised in the
gospel, and it does not receive it. The hope held out in the gospel includes the redemption
of our bodies, and the word of God is that “in this hope we were saved” (Romans 8:22-
25). “By faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope,”
God’s final verdict that we have been justified by faith (Galatians 5:5). We must put on
“the hope of salvation as a helmet, for God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but receive
salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ” (I Thess.5:8,9). “The helmet of salvation”
(Ephesians 6:17) is the covering for our heads as we march through this life in the hope
of eternal salvation. A hope in Christ for this life only is a partial covering at best.

What is the consequence of having a hope in Christ for this life only?
We are to be pitied more than all men. We are of all men most miserable. This means
that we are a fitting object of pity because of the unparalleled misery that comes from this
hope. We are like the church in Laodicea. They thought they were rich and did not need
anything, but did not realize that they were “wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked”
(Revelation 3:17). Why should we be objects of such pity if we have a hope in Christ that
is for this life only? Is this an exaggeration? Is it melodramatic? It would be if the issue is
the resurrection of our bodies. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.
To be present with the Lord, even without our bodies, would not make us of all men most
miserable. Likewise, if the issue is our immortality it would seem that the apostle is over
stating the case. Even if there is no existence at all after death, we have at least had a
hope in Christ in this life. We have had the comfort and guidance of hoping in Christ at
least for this life, and so have been better off than other men. But the issue at stake here is
neither of these. This is about the hope of our being saved from our sins. And if we have
had such a hope in this life only that turns out to be a delusion in the end, we are to be
pitied more than others. If there is no resurrection, Christ is not risen. If Christ is not
risen, then he who died for our sins is under them still. Our sins are still upon him and
have kept his body in the dust of the earth. There is no atonement for sin, and we are not
saved.

We are to be pitied if we have a hope in Christ for this life only that says there is no
resurrection in principle. This was the issue confronting the church in Corinth. They
had believed the gospel, but some were saying that there is no resurrection. They thought
they could believe that Christ was raised from the dead, but that they would not be raised
from the dead. But the resurrection of Christ settles the matter and proves that our bodies
will be raised also. Many people today might say that there is no resurrection. They do
not care one way or the other if Jesus physically rose from the dead. To them it is sheer
speculation. But they do not believe that for them there is any existence after they die.
This is their way of hiding from God. If there is no resurrection, there is no judgment.
They think that, if they cannot hide from God in life, they can hide from him in death.
Maybe this is your view, that Christ and Christianity may be all right for some people to
help them get through their day. But when you’re dead, you’re dead, and it doesn’t make
any difference after that. As far as you are concerned, you become space dust, a ghost, an
angel, or some kind of reincarnated life form. This is just a step beyond having a hope for
this life only.

We are to be pitied if we have a hope in Christ for this life only that says there is no
resurrection in practice. This is the hope you have if you believe and expect that there
will be a resurrection, but you live as if you don’t believe it at all. This is not a theoretical
denial, but a practical denial. You do not practice what you preach. You preach
resurrection, but you practice this life only. Jesus Christ is not your sin bearer, but your
handy man. You hope he will fix all your problems. You hope he will help you to be
successful, to be liked, to be popular, to be healthy, to be wealthy, to be happy. You hope
he will put the spark back into your marriage. You hope he will keep your kids off drugs
and in school. You hope he will help you to get your piece of the American dream. You
hope he will be your friend. In other words, you hope in Christ for this life only. Your
hope for the forgiveness of your sins is not built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and
righteousness, because it has not yet occurred to you that sin is all that big a problem. You
think just about everybody is going to heaven, so your hope in Christ is not for
deliverance from the wrath of God. Your Christian experience is not about battling and
overcoming sin in your life. It is not about the image of Jesus Christ being formed in you
by faith. It is not about living no longer under the dominion of sin. It is not about daily
presenting your body as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God. These are not your
desires and goals, because you have a hope in Christ that is for this life only.
There is a hope in Christ that is Personal. If we have it, we are not to be pitied by
any man. It is a hope for this life, and for eternal life. It is all of the things that the other
hope is not. People who come to Christ for this hope come to him as the Person who is
offered to us in the gospel. We come to him with our burden of sin. We hope in him as
our Savior from sin. We hope on the basis of the promise of God that we may have
forgiveness because our sins have been charged to Christ and his righteousness has been
credited to us. We come for a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. This hope is not a
shortsighted hope, because we “hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto
you at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (I Peter 1:13). It is a hope that understands our
calling and knows that our destiny is secured by the power of God that raised Jesus from
the dead (Ephesians 1:18-20). This is the only true hope of the believer (Ephesians 4:4). It
is a hope that is entirely and exclusively in Christ as the crucified, risen, and reigning Son
of God (Col. 1:27; I Thess. 1:3; I Tim. 1:1; I Peter 1:20,21). This is the hope of all who
have entered by faith into a spiritual union with Jesus Christ. In him we have died to the
dominion of sin, and in him we have been raised to live a new life to God (Romans 6:1-
11). Our hope in Christ is so personal that out goal is that his own image will be formed
in us by faith. Our hope is that when we see him , we shall be like him, for we shall see
him as he is. This is the hope of the Christian. It is the hope of the gospel. It is the hope of
the resurrection. It is the hope of eternal life.

April 11, 2004

Easter Sunday
 My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness;
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
But wholly lean on Jesus’ Name.

When darkness veils his lovely face,

I rest upon unchanging grace;
In every rough and stormy gale
My anchor holds within the veil.

His oath, his covenant, his blood

Support me in the whelming flood;
When all around my soul gives way,
He then is all my Hope and Stay.

When I shall launch in worlds unseen,

O may I then be found I him;
Dressed in his righteousness alone,
Faultless to stand before the throne.

Chorus:

On Christ, the solid Rock, I stand;

All other ground is sinking sand.

(Edward Mote)