LIFE AND ETERNAL LIFE

LIFE AND ETERNAL LIFE

Although “life” and “eternal life” are used interchangeably, especially by the apostle John, yet in Romans they present different ideas. Eternal life is an end in view, whereas life in chapter 8 is connected with the Spirit, “the Spirit is life”, and so present. Life in this sense is power, it involves ability to be free from the flesh, so as to fulfil righteousness here.

There is also the springing up into everlasting life (John 4). The latter is clearly objective and outside (above morally) the present conditions. I do not think it is right to connect eternal life with our present mortal condition, and therefore I regard it as wrong to place it in the wilderness. It is the life of God’s purpose for man, and is necessarily the other side of death. The fact that it is said to consist in the knowledge of God and of Christ as the sent One only shows that the moral element is possessed by those who have it; that is, they know God as the supreme Object of veneration, and a Man tested in every way, and, in contrast to Adam, found to be infinitely obedient. All that entered into the cross was essential to this obedience being fully expressed; to apprehend rightly what sent involved we have to ponder Gethsemane and the cross. The light thus acquired has a great effect upon us, both as regards God and Christ, and negatively as regards the world, so that clearly eternal life belongs to another order of things; as it is said, “in the coming age life eternal” (Mark 10:30).