What the Apostles preached was a resurrection that was unheard of anywhere in their Jewish tradition.

A bodily resurrection, an exaltation to God's right hand, and most importantly, they viewed this resurrection of Jesus not as an isolated resuscitation like Lazarus,

but as a first fruit of the final resurrection that was to come at the end of the age.

Why is the resurrection of Jesus precious to us as Christians?

That's the question John Piper answers from 1 Corinthians 1517 in this first episode of our new series, The Preciousness of Jesus.

The sermon was originally preached at Bethlehem Baptist Church on February 7, 1982.

Suppose that you went to visit a person who didn't know English very well, couldn't read it, and they were about to drink a bottle of iodine,

and your natural compassion and love of life, applied you to stop them.

Now to stop them without force, you need to persuade them of two things.

First of all, you need to persuade them that iodine is poison and might kill them.

And so you muster your arguments, and you say, look, this mark here on the label means this stuff is poison, this will hurt you.

This is not made to drink, this is made for the skin.

Look, here are the instructions. Take my word for it. I've got experience with this.

No, I've got no reason to lie to you, and you build your case to try to persuade them that they shouldn't go ahead and drink that iodine.

And you convince them, they're converted, they change their opinion, and they adopt your view of things, and then the person puts the bottle to his lips and begins to drink.

And you say, wait a minute, you want to kill yourself? And they say, yes.

And you realize that not just one thing must be told, they must not be persuaded of only that, that it will kill them, but a second thing, life is worth living.

You can convince them with your irrefutable arguments that if he drinks, he's dead, and if he doesn't, he's alive.

And none of those arguments will have any effect if he doesn't care.

If his depression is so great, and his heart is so heavy, and his mind is so stifled with frustration that life looks totally unworth living,

then all the proof in the world that iodine will kill you, and not drinking will keep you alive, will not persuade that person not to drink it.

Something else has got to happen.

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