First Fruits
by Joey Carroll Corinth Missionary Baptist Church
God is a God of order. He created a distinct order in the beginning of all things. He designed the Church to function with order, and we are called to recognize and maintain that order in the Church (1 Corinthians 14:40). He has also made known to His people that there is a distinct ordering of events in the end of all things.
Because our Lord was raised from the dead, He is referred to as the “first fruits” (15:23).
If you were raised in the South, that is something you can certainly understand.
I still remember going to the garden as a boy and trying to find those first few ears of corn that were ready to pick.
It was a big deal to me because I loved sweet corn.
I loved the smell and the taste.
Not so much all the work that came with picking several hundred ears of corn, but the payoff was well worth it.
Those first few ears that I would pick came with great promise.
I knew that there would soon be a garden full of corn to harvest.
Our Savior is known as the first fruits because it reminds us of the hope that the other fruit will soon be ready, and it will come with great abundance.
We do not have to guess when our bodily resurrection will take place.
“But each in his own order:
Christ the first fruits, after that those who are Christ’s at His coming, then comes the end, when He hands over the kingdom to the God and Father, when He has abolished all rule and all authority and power” (15:23-24, NAS95).
When Christ returns, we shall be raised bodily from the dead.
And the world that we enjoy will be free from sin and death.
That will certainly be a happy day. But since we know these things to be true, how now should we live?
Paul’s answer to that question for the church at Corinth was a sharp rebuke.
“Become sober-minded as you ought, and stop sinning; for some have no knowledge of God. I speak this to your shame” (15:34, NAS95).
It was true then, and it is true today.
There are too many who profess faith in Christ and live as though they do not know Christ.
There is no difference between them and the world around them.
And one of the reasons that they must stop sinning, Paul gives here, “some have no knowledge of God.”
How can we every speak to a lost world of the difference Christ has made in our lives when there simply is no difference?
How can we tell others of the joys of being born again when we continue to behave as those who do not know Christ?
One of the greatest blessings, as well as one of the greatest responsibilities we have as faithful followers of Christ, is that we recognize now His sovereign rule and reign as Lord.
We do that by living according to His Word.
We no longer live according to our own standard or our own thinking.
We know that the Father has crowned His Son Lord and King over all, and so we live on bended knee in joyful submission to our King.
And we do so knowing that very soon, “at the name of Jesus every knee will bow of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father (Philippians 2:10-11, NAS95).
