CHAPTER III
When the Sadducees came to him and said, There were seven brethren: and the first took a wife, and he died childless. And the second took her to wife, and he died childless. And the third took her; and in like manner the seven also: and they left no children, and died. Last of all, the woman also died. Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife is she? For seven had her to wife. And Jesus answering said unto them, The children of this world marry, and are given in marriage: but they which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage: neither can they die any more: for they are equal unto the angels, and are children of God, being the children of the resurrection. Now that the dead are raised, even Moses shewed at the bush, when he called the Lord the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. For he is not a God of the dead, but of the living: for all live unto him; Luke xx, 29-37. See also Matt. xxii, 25-32; Mark xii, 20-27.
For a correct understanding of this text, like all others, we must know the premises. The Sadducees did not believe in any kind of resurrection; neither did they know what Jesus taught concerning it, but thought to confound him with the confusion that would necessarily follow a restoration of the present life and its relations. This is an important lesson brought out in the life of Christ, which forever refutes the common idea that the resurrection is a return to our present state in which we will recognize and reunite with our kin-rection in the future. It was the inconsistencies and the difficulties that they thought they saw in the resurrection that caused them not to believe it, and this is the common objection to the doctrine. After answering their question, he, with a single quotation that was a favorite with the Jews, put them to silence. If Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had no existence beyond this life, then the Lord is not their God. But they are alive unto God, and with God. Jesus adds further testimony to this statement when he says, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on Him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from death unto life;” John v, 24. Again, “Whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die;” John xi, 26. And finally on the cross he said to the thief, “To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise.” If Jesus taught anything, he taught the continued conscious existence in life of those who are born of the Spirit. And as the Spirit does not die, there can be no resurrection but of the body.
“Being born again,” “Quickened with Christ,” “Raised up together and made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus” might very appropriately be called a resurrection, but it is not the resurrection that Jesus contended for with the Sadducees.
There are those who contend that as Jesus spoke of the resurrection in the present tense, “are raised”; Luke xx, 37, he meant that it was then occurring, – a progressive work, but this is putting one part of this text against another, and against every text that speaks of a future resurrection, especially John v, 28. But established facts are often spoken of, using a verb in the present tense where the time of the occurrence is not in consideration, as in the following quotations: “Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received of the Lord’s hand double for all her sins;” Isa. xl, 2. “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given;” Isa. ix, 6. Here in two short quotations are four examples of future events spoken of in the present tense, although the events were more than seven centuries in the future. In a very vivid and accurate description of the life and sufferings of Jesus (Isa. liii), there are six verbs denoting present tense, and twenty-eight verbs denoting past tense. If we would make this prophecy conform strictly to the precedent given by those who speculate on the verb “are” in Luke xx, 37, we should have to change the thirty-four verbs referred to, and almost as many other words, for words expressing the future tense, or contend that the whole chapter, instead of being a prophecy, is simply a narrative of events which had just passed or were then transferring.
Jesus again spoke of the resurrection as future when he said, “For thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just;” Luke xiv, 14. In speaking to the Jews, after healing the impotent man at the pool of Bethesda to which they objected, Jesus said: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live.” Soon after this, he demonstrated his statement by raising from the dead the son of the widow of Nain. But following that statement he said, “Marvel not at this [bringing back to life those who have just died] for the hour is coming, [but it is not now] in the which all that are in their graves shall hear his voice and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.”
There are three very important things presented in this text: 1st. The time is future, and the tense is emphasized by being put in contrast with his miracles of raising the dead literally. 2nd. It declares that the dead shall be called from the grave. It is not to be “marveled” at that he should raise Lazarus and Janus’ daughter to natural life again, for the dead shall be called out of the grave, and since the body only is put in the grave, it follows that he is teaching that the body shall be raised up out of death. 3rd. He declares the resurrection of both the just and the unjust. It has been said by those who do not believe in a future general resurrection that the word “grave” is used figuratively in this text; but to say that for which we need proof – bare assertion-is, is presumptuous. Making alive from the dead alive is the subject, and the text is the premise laid, and then the subject immediately dropped without any argument or illustration, hence if it does not mean what it says, who is to tell us what it does mean? I should have as much right to put a construction on it as anyone else. But says one, “It was so revealed to me.” Shall I submit and say it is enough? Dare I trust his claim to revelation against the plain reading of the Scripture? Would he trust me if I should claim a revelation, which did not accord with his views on any subject? I would prefer one Scripture quotation that needs no construction to make it applicable to all the “special revelation” claimed by men since the days of the apostles.
But another says, “There is a literal and a spiritual meaning to the Scriptures.” Yes, but the one never contradicts or nullifies the other. There can be but one reason for not accepting the Scripture as written, and that is the objector does not believe it to be true.
One brother, in speaking of the Pool of Bethesda,” said there was no such troubling of the water with healing power. If he can challenge this text, may he not challenge any other, and how is he to answer those who might be disposed to challenge texts that he relies on for proof? I have even known the narrative of the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness disputed, saying that he was not separated from his friends. With such a course pursued by all the ministry, the Bible would be made a jumble of falsehood and contradictions, with no standard of test but each one’s own notion of what he thought it ought to say. My next letter will be on the testimony of the apostles.
CHAPTER IV
For a correct understanding of this text, like all others, we must know the premises. The Sadducees did not believe in any kind of resurrection; neither did they know what Jesus taught concerning it, but thought to confound him with the confusion that would necessarily follow a restoration of the present life and its relations. This is an important lesson brought out in the life of Christ, which forever refutes the common idea that the resurrection is a return to our present state in which we will recognize and reunite with our kin-rection in the future. It was the inconsistencies and the difficulties that they thought they saw in the resurrection that caused them not to believe it, and this is the common objection to the doctrine. After answering their question, he, with a single quotation that was a favorite with the Jews, put them to silence. If Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had no existence beyond this life, then the Lord is not their God. But they are alive unto God, and with God. Jesus adds further testimony to this statement when he says, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on Him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from death unto life;” John v, 24. Again, “Whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die;” John xi, 26. And finally on the cross he said to the thief, “To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise.” If Jesus taught anything, he taught the continued conscious existence in life of those who are born of the Spirit. And as the Spirit does not die, there can be no resurrection but of the body.
“Being born again,” “Quickened with Christ,” “Raised up together and made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus” might very appropriately be called a resurrection, but it is not the resurrection that Jesus contended for with the Sadducees.
There are those who contend that as Jesus spoke of the resurrection in the present tense, “are raised”; Luke xx, 37, he meant that it was then occurring, – a progressive work, but this is putting one part of this text against another, and against every text that speaks of a future resurrection, especially John v, 28. But established facts are often spoken of, using a verb in the present tense where the time of the occurrence is not in consideration, as in the following quotations: “Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received of the Lord’s hand double for all her sins;” Isa. xl, 2. “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given;” Isa. ix, 6. Here in two short quotations are four examples of future events spoken of in the present tense, although the events were more than seven centuries in the future. In a very vivid and accurate description of the life and sufferings of Jesus (Isa. liii), there are six verbs denoting present tense, and twenty-eight verbs denoting past tense. If we would make this prophecy conform strictly to the precedent given by those who speculate on the verb “are” in Luke xx, 37, we should have to change the thirty-four verbs referred to, and almost as many other words, for words expressing the future tense, or contend that the whole chapter, instead of being a prophecy, is simply a narrative of events which had just passed or were then transferring.
Jesus again spoke of the resurrection as future when he said, “For thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just;” Luke xiv, 14. In speaking to the Jews, after healing the impotent man at the pool of Bethesda to which they objected, Jesus said: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live.” Soon after this, he demonstrated his statement by raising from the dead the son of the widow of Nain. But following that statement he said, “Marvel not at this [bringing back to life those who have just died] for the hour is coming, [but it is not now] in the which all that are in their graves shall hear his voice and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.”
There are three very important things presented in this text: 1st. The time is future, and the tense is emphasized by being put in contrast with his miracles of raising the dead literally. 2nd. It declares that the dead shall be called from the grave. It is not to be “marveled” at that he should raise Lazarus and Janus’ daughter to natural life again, for the dead shall be called out of the grave, and since the body only is put in the grave, it follows that he is teaching that the body shall be raised up out of death. 3rd. He declares the resurrection of both the just and the unjust. It has been said by those who do not believe in a future general resurrection that the word “grave” is used figuratively in this text; but to say that for which we need proof – bare assertion-is, is presumptuous. Making alive from the dead alive is the subject, and the text is the premise laid, and then the subject immediately dropped without any argument or illustration, hence if it does not mean what it says, who is to tell us what it does mean? I should have as much right to put a construction on it as anyone else. But says one, “It was so revealed to me.” Shall I submit and say it is enough? Dare I trust his claim to revelation against the plain reading of the Scripture? Would he trust me if I should claim a revelation, which did not accord with his views on any subject? I would prefer one Scripture quotation that needs no construction to make it applicable to all the “special revelation” claimed by men since the days of the apostles.
But another says, “There is a literal and a spiritual meaning to the Scriptures.” Yes, but the one never contradicts or nullifies the other. There can be but one reason for not accepting the Scripture as written, and that is the objector does not believe it to be true.
One brother, in speaking of the Pool of Bethesda,” said there was no such troubling of the water with healing power. If he can challenge this text, may he not challenge any other, and how is he to answer those who might be disposed to challenge texts that he relies on for proof? I have even known the narrative of the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness disputed, saying that he was not separated from his friends. With such a course pursued by all the ministry, the Bible would be made a jumble of falsehood and contradictions, with no standard of test but each one’s own notion of what he thought it ought to say. My next letter will be on the testimony of the apostles.
CHAPTER IV
The apostles believed and taught the resurrection of the bodies of the saints, and they predicated their resurrection on the resurrection of Christ’s body; so that if the body that Jesus’ disciples handled and the soldiers nailed to the cross came up, even so must our bodies which have suffered and must die, as a result of sin, have part in his glorious victory, or else the victory over sin is not complete. What can Paul mean when, in I Cor. xv, 51, he says, “We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed?” The word “sleep” unquestionably means death. We shall not all die. We shall not all be “hid in the grave,” but we shall be changed.” The same change or resurrection is necessary for both the dead and those who “are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord.” Here, a time in the future is indicated, and the time is so definite that the event will occur “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye at the last trump; for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.” So certain is it that this is one event to all, that Paul said that, “We [the living] shall be caught up together with them” [the risen dead]; I Thes. iv, 17. “For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality;” I Cor. xv, 53. This text should forever put to silence every one who contends that the corruptible and the mortal are cast off and return to the earth forever, for the text plainly declares that this corruptible, mortal body, must and will be raised up and clothed in incorruption and immortality.
What will be the effect of this change from corruption to incorruption, and from mortality to immortality? Answer: The victory for which Jesus fought will be complete. For “Death is swallowed up in victory.” “The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.” Can it be said, “O, grave, where is thy victory” if all that it receives remains with it forever? The victory of all things that held us bound under the law comes to us “through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
It is evident that the apostles consider the resurrection of prime importance in the gospel, for they selected one, in Judas’ stead, to witness with them “of his [“Jesus’] resurrection:” (Acts i, 22), and they were careful to preach it from the start; and that it pertained to the body is evident from the fact that it is often affirmed of the body and never affirmed of anything else.
“The priests, and captain of the temple, and the Sadducees came upon them, being grieved that they taught the people, and preached through Jesus the resurrection of the dead;” Acts iv. 1, 2. Paul said to a Jewish council, “I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee; of the hope and resurrection of the dead I am called in question;” Acts xxiii, 6. “But this I confess unto thee, that after the way they call heresy, so worship I the God of my fathers, believing all things which are written in the law and in the prophets: and have hope toward God, which they themselves also allow, that there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and the unjust;” Acts xxiv, 14, 15. Paul did not complain that they misrepresented, but frankly admitted believing in the resurrection both of the just and the unjust.
“So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man has not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you;” Rom. viii, 8-11. I wish to call special attention to this text. Paul, in the context, argues that our service to God is not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, and reasons from this that the bodies of the saints are dead because of sin from which the body has not yet been redeemed, in the sense of personal deliverance, of which he speaks in the twenty-third verse: “Waiting for the adoption; to-wit, the redemption of our body.” Until this redemption is accomplished, our bodies will remain dead to the service of God and can only be used as “instruments of righteousness” in our service. But in the redemption of our bodies, they will be quickened into life, – spiritual life, – by the same Spirit that raised up, or quickened, the body of Jesus, and in the same nature, or in the likeness of his quickened body.
In I Cor. xv, is found the clearest and most convincing argument that has ever been recorded on the subject. The writer first establishes the resurrection of Christ with such an array of testimony that there is no room left for doubt, verses 4-8. Then he rebukes those who say “there is no resurrection of the dead,” and shows that our resurrection depends on his, and is just as certain to occur as his occurred, and that as one is, so is the other. “If there be no resurrection from the dead, then is Christ not risen,” as much as to say Christ rose that we might rise, and if we shall not rise, Christ died and rose in vain. “But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of them that slept,” verse 20. This clearly shows that the resurrection of Christ and that of his people for whom he died are similar. His resurrection is a sample or forecast of what shall follow in the general resurrection. As to the use of the word “first fruits,” see also Ex. xxiii, 19; Num. xv, 20, 21; Deut. xviii, 4; xxvi, 2; Ezek. xliv, 30.
“For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead;” I Cor. xv, 21. The principle of similarity is again shown in this. Death came through Adam to all his posterity, and their death was just like his death. So life, the resurrection from death, comes to each of the chosen of God through the one man, Christ, and that resurrection is like his as certainly as their death is like Adam’s death. For it is to man and by man that death came; so it is to man and by man (Christ Jesus) that the resurrection comes. “But every man in his own order: “Christ the first fruits (or sample); and afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming. Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death;” verses 23-26. The events spoken of here as future are still in the future. Death still reigns and will reign until the resurrection. The destruction of death will be the resurrection. The remainder of this chapter is a reply to criticisms and some illustrations on the subject.
A seed is used to illustrate the subject – a live grain, a grain of wheat, or some other grain. This grain is Christ, as is also presented in St. John xii, 24: “Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.” This Jesus says concerning his own death and resurrection: “It (this grain, Jesus,) is sown in corruption;” “in dishonor;” “in weakness,” and “it is sown a natural body.” All this is true of Jesus in his incarnation, and it produced death. He was planted in the earth, therefore in corruption. He was made under the law with our sins upon him, therefore in dishonor. He was in the flesh the seed of Abraham, therefore, he was weak in himself, and of himself could do nothing. And as the multitude of grains at the harvest is like the bare grain that is planted, so shall the “much fruit” (the multitude of bodies at the resurrection) be like the risen Jesus, blessed with the glory that he had with the Father before the planting or incarnation.
Some have thought because Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life,” that there is no resurrection except his. The same might be said of all spiritual blessings, even of life, for it is coupled with the resurrection in the text, and as certainly as we shall experience the life, we shall experience the resurrection: “Knowing that he which raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise up us also by Jesus, and shall present us with you.” This text is conclusive proof that we shall each of us personally realize and experience the resurrection even as Jesus did. The raising up in this text is the same as that spoken of in Rom. viii, 11, and if our raising up is not like that of Christ’s, then the comparison has no force or meaning.
Paul, in writing to the Philippian church (3rd chapter), speaks in strong faith of the resurrection in the future, and in verses 20 and 21 he says, “For our conversation is in heaven; from whence we look for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ; who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself”. That which is changed is not destroyed or discarded. The butterfly that flits in the air, on gaudy wings, is the same that before crawled in the dust at our feet, a repulsive worm; but it is now raised up to a higher order of life. It has no resemblance to its former self, yet it has not lost its identity. Our vile bodies, now polluted with sin, will be changed (not cast off). Although they will not be as they are now, the identity will be the same. The fashion of it will be that of Christ’s glorious body.
That the resurrection is at one certain time in the future, is clearly presented in I Thes. iv, 15-18: “For we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words.” This text teaches that the Lord has a set time to visit the earth, and that when he comes some of the elect will have died (will be asleep in death), and some will yet be alive; “for we shall not all sleep.” It also teaches that the dead will rise before those that are alive shall be changed; and that those who come up from the dead, and those who have not died, will be “caught up together to meet the Lord in the air.” If this is not its meaning, how are we to know its meaning, and how are we to “comfort one another with these words?” If these words are so obscure that we need an inspired interpreter to tell us their meaning, how are we to know that his inspiration is of the Lord?
I wish, in conclusion, to call attention to some relative proof recorded in I Cor. vi: “Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord; and the Lord for the body. And God hath both raised up the Lord, and will also raise up us by his own power;” verses 13, 14. The words “both” and “also” show that there is no distinction between the nature of his raising up and theirs. It will be by the same power, from the same death, and to the same life. “Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of a harlot? God forbid;” verse 15. Will Christ cast away his members? “No man ever yet hated his own flesh.” Will Jesus hate the members of his body? “What? Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own, for ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are his.” Will God destroy his temple? Will he reject that which he hath bought with a price? “I pray God your whole spirit, and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ;” I Thes. v, 23. No distinction is made between the soul, body, and spirit. What Paul asks for the soul and spirit, he asks for the body.
May the Lord keep us all from evil and lead us in the way of truth is the earnest prayer of one who has hope toward God that he shall have a complete victory over sin through Jesus, who died for us and rose again that we also should be exalted with him in glory.
What will be the effect of this change from corruption to incorruption, and from mortality to immortality? Answer: The victory for which Jesus fought will be complete. For “Death is swallowed up in victory.” “The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.” Can it be said, “O, grave, where is thy victory” if all that it receives remains with it forever? The victory of all things that held us bound under the law comes to us “through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
It is evident that the apostles consider the resurrection of prime importance in the gospel, for they selected one, in Judas’ stead, to witness with them “of his [“Jesus’] resurrection:” (Acts i, 22), and they were careful to preach it from the start; and that it pertained to the body is evident from the fact that it is often affirmed of the body and never affirmed of anything else.
“The priests, and captain of the temple, and the Sadducees came upon them, being grieved that they taught the people, and preached through Jesus the resurrection of the dead;” Acts iv. 1, 2. Paul said to a Jewish council, “I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee; of the hope and resurrection of the dead I am called in question;” Acts xxiii, 6. “But this I confess unto thee, that after the way they call heresy, so worship I the God of my fathers, believing all things which are written in the law and in the prophets: and have hope toward God, which they themselves also allow, that there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and the unjust;” Acts xxiv, 14, 15. Paul did not complain that they misrepresented, but frankly admitted believing in the resurrection both of the just and the unjust.
“So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man has not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you;” Rom. viii, 8-11. I wish to call special attention to this text. Paul, in the context, argues that our service to God is not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, and reasons from this that the bodies of the saints are dead because of sin from which the body has not yet been redeemed, in the sense of personal deliverance, of which he speaks in the twenty-third verse: “Waiting for the adoption; to-wit, the redemption of our body.” Until this redemption is accomplished, our bodies will remain dead to the service of God and can only be used as “instruments of righteousness” in our service. But in the redemption of our bodies, they will be quickened into life, – spiritual life, – by the same Spirit that raised up, or quickened, the body of Jesus, and in the same nature, or in the likeness of his quickened body.
In I Cor. xv, is found the clearest and most convincing argument that has ever been recorded on the subject. The writer first establishes the resurrection of Christ with such an array of testimony that there is no room left for doubt, verses 4-8. Then he rebukes those who say “there is no resurrection of the dead,” and shows that our resurrection depends on his, and is just as certain to occur as his occurred, and that as one is, so is the other. “If there be no resurrection from the dead, then is Christ not risen,” as much as to say Christ rose that we might rise, and if we shall not rise, Christ died and rose in vain. “But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of them that slept,” verse 20. This clearly shows that the resurrection of Christ and that of his people for whom he died are similar. His resurrection is a sample or forecast of what shall follow in the general resurrection. As to the use of the word “first fruits,” see also Ex. xxiii, 19; Num. xv, 20, 21; Deut. xviii, 4; xxvi, 2; Ezek. xliv, 30.
“For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead;” I Cor. xv, 21. The principle of similarity is again shown in this. Death came through Adam to all his posterity, and their death was just like his death. So life, the resurrection from death, comes to each of the chosen of God through the one man, Christ, and that resurrection is like his as certainly as their death is like Adam’s death. For it is to man and by man that death came; so it is to man and by man (Christ Jesus) that the resurrection comes. “But every man in his own order: “Christ the first fruits (or sample); and afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming. Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death;” verses 23-26. The events spoken of here as future are still in the future. Death still reigns and will reign until the resurrection. The destruction of death will be the resurrection. The remainder of this chapter is a reply to criticisms and some illustrations on the subject.
A seed is used to illustrate the subject – a live grain, a grain of wheat, or some other grain. This grain is Christ, as is also presented in St. John xii, 24: “Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.” This Jesus says concerning his own death and resurrection: “It (this grain, Jesus,) is sown in corruption;” “in dishonor;” “in weakness,” and “it is sown a natural body.” All this is true of Jesus in his incarnation, and it produced death. He was planted in the earth, therefore in corruption. He was made under the law with our sins upon him, therefore in dishonor. He was in the flesh the seed of Abraham, therefore, he was weak in himself, and of himself could do nothing. And as the multitude of grains at the harvest is like the bare grain that is planted, so shall the “much fruit” (the multitude of bodies at the resurrection) be like the risen Jesus, blessed with the glory that he had with the Father before the planting or incarnation.
Some have thought because Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life,” that there is no resurrection except his. The same might be said of all spiritual blessings, even of life, for it is coupled with the resurrection in the text, and as certainly as we shall experience the life, we shall experience the resurrection: “Knowing that he which raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise up us also by Jesus, and shall present us with you.” This text is conclusive proof that we shall each of us personally realize and experience the resurrection even as Jesus did. The raising up in this text is the same as that spoken of in Rom. viii, 11, and if our raising up is not like that of Christ’s, then the comparison has no force or meaning.
Paul, in writing to the Philippian church (3rd chapter), speaks in strong faith of the resurrection in the future, and in verses 20 and 21 he says, “For our conversation is in heaven; from whence we look for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ; who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself”. That which is changed is not destroyed or discarded. The butterfly that flits in the air, on gaudy wings, is the same that before crawled in the dust at our feet, a repulsive worm; but it is now raised up to a higher order of life. It has no resemblance to its former self, yet it has not lost its identity. Our vile bodies, now polluted with sin, will be changed (not cast off). Although they will not be as they are now, the identity will be the same. The fashion of it will be that of Christ’s glorious body.
That the resurrection is at one certain time in the future, is clearly presented in I Thes. iv, 15-18: “For we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words.” This text teaches that the Lord has a set time to visit the earth, and that when he comes some of the elect will have died (will be asleep in death), and some will yet be alive; “for we shall not all sleep.” It also teaches that the dead will rise before those that are alive shall be changed; and that those who come up from the dead, and those who have not died, will be “caught up together to meet the Lord in the air.” If this is not its meaning, how are we to know its meaning, and how are we to “comfort one another with these words?” If these words are so obscure that we need an inspired interpreter to tell us their meaning, how are we to know that his inspiration is of the Lord?
I wish, in conclusion, to call attention to some relative proof recorded in I Cor. vi: “Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord; and the Lord for the body. And God hath both raised up the Lord, and will also raise up us by his own power;” verses 13, 14. The words “both” and “also” show that there is no distinction between the nature of his raising up and theirs. It will be by the same power, from the same death, and to the same life. “Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of a harlot? God forbid;” verse 15. Will Christ cast away his members? “No man ever yet hated his own flesh.” Will Jesus hate the members of his body? “What? Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own, for ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are his.” Will God destroy his temple? Will he reject that which he hath bought with a price? “I pray God your whole spirit, and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ;” I Thes. v, 23. No distinction is made between the soul, body, and spirit. What Paul asks for the soul and spirit, he asks for the body.
May the Lord keep us all from evil and lead us in the way of truth is the earnest prayer of one who has hope toward God that he shall have a complete victory over sin through Jesus, who died for us and rose again that we also should be exalted with him in glory.
W. N. THARP LIBERTY, IND. (Article published in pamphlet form)
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