Maybe you’ve heard this analogy as well. It goes like this:

When Jesus was raised from the dead, it was God providing a receipt saying that the price for sins has been paid in full.

This is incomplete at best. We know as much based on 1 Corinthians 15:17 alone.

And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins

This strikes me as quite different than a receipt. A receipt is just a sort of proof that you paid for something. Whether or not you have it does not really change the fact that you paid. But this not so in the case of the resurrection. If Jesus hasn’t been raised, “you are still in your sins.” They are not paid for. The resurrection doesn’t seem to be merely a pointer to a separate external fact that the price has been paid. The resurrection is integral to the payment being able to be considered complete.

Why is this? Somebody once told me that it’s because a failed resurrection would reveal Jesus to be a false prophet. This also is a problematic explanation. You’re telling me the only reason that Jesus being raised from the dead has anything to do with us no longer being in our sins is because it would be a failed prophecy? So if Jesus would never have predicted his own resurrection, then what? We could be freed from our sins with a savior who has been dead for 2000 years?