READING IN 1 CORINTHIANS 15
READING IN 1 CORINTHIANS 15
It is to be noted that resurrection is left for the end of this epistle. Whereas it is referred to immediately in the second epistle to the Corinthians in chapter 2, verse 9. This, no doubt, was because of the state of things at Corinth when the first letter was written. Here it is treated in its full bearing in regard of death as opposed to God, rather than involving the special privilege of Christians now, as in Colossians. It is a question of God’s power which the existence of death challenged, and that we could not know anything beyond the grave, was also challenged. “How say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?” The apostle takes occasion to show how the moral universe must be established in resurrection. It is presented therefore in relation to the general testimony of God rather than showing the special position of Christians now. In Colossians it is: “ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead”. (Colossians 2: 12) But here it is a question of [p. 68] the testimony as Paul preached it in its full bearing. “But I make known to you, brethren, the glad tidings which I announced to you, which also ye received, in which also ye stand, by which also ye are saved ... ... unless indeed ye have believed in vain. For I delivered unto you, in the first place, what also I had received, that Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures; and that he was buried; and that he was raised the third day, according to the scriptures”. I think it is well to see that he is dealing with the thing, as you might say, in its entirety. It is the subject itself being dealt with, although the effect should be that we are “Steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not vain in the Lord”.
The burial of Christ, clears the ground entirely of the man who was offensive to God, in view of a new beginning for God; He having in grace taken the place of man according to the flesh. It reminds us of 2 Samuel 21 where all the bodies of the offenders had to be buried. It was after the burial that God was entreated for the land and was propitious. As if man has to learn what it says in the Psalms. “They die, and return to their dust”. (Psalm 104: 29) Speaking, I suppose, in irony of man’s natural origin, he has to return to his dust, to the source of his being as regards his body, a very humbling thought. Christ has died vicariously, and was buried, and has submerged the offending man. “But now is Christ risen from the dead”. It suggests Genesis 6, “The end of all flesh is come before me”. All flesh was submerged. If He was buried, all flesh was removed from before the sight of God, nothing left of man according to the flesh. Crucifixion would be the character of His death which was public; but burial is putting wholly out of sight. Abraham said: “that I may bury my dead out of my sight”. (Genesis 23: 4) It is a remarkable statement.
[p. 69] Though he loved Sarah, yet as dead she should be out of his sight. There is no revival of that kind of man so “God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him”. It is a question now of resurrection.
Resurrection is not resuscitation. The triumph of God has been secured in a Man. The Man who comes out of death first is the Man who glorified God on earth. Resurrection involves that what comes up pleases God. The going down refers to what displeases, hence His burial is part of His vicarious work and the coming up is on account of what He is. “Christ the firstfruits” is the Man who glorified God on the earth. In Christ’s resurrection something is introduced the like of which had never existed before. Lazarus, and the young man of Luke 7 and others were signs. They did not set forth the new order of man; they were brought back to the natural life. In Christ we see a Man invading the whole domain of death and bringing everything that Satan had plunged into it out of death, so that even the wicked dead will have to say to that Man. A Man will dispose of everything for God, both those who are of His order and the wicked.
A complete triumph for God has been secured in a Man. It is really a world out of death we come into It is well to take account of the fact that Christ had glorified God on earth before He died vicariously. His burial is the counterpart of His vicarious death. “Christ the firstfruits”; He begins the new order of things and all are brought up according to that, so the development of the teaching is; “As is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly”. Only “It is raised in incorruption ... ... it is raised in glory ... ... it is raised in power ... ... it is raised a spiritual body”. All these are details emphasising the character of the resurrection; but the fulness of it is: “As is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly”. Thus we are made to correspond with Christ, “What and if ye shall see the Son of man ascend up where he was before?” He came from heaven and went to heaven.
There is a connection here with Leviticus 23. There we have Christ the firstfruits; without that there could be no place for the feast of weeks; that is, Pentecost. The one necessarily depends on the other. The sheaf waved before Jehovah by the priest, refers to Christ out of death; and afterwards the “two wave loaves were offered”. God virtually says, ‘This is what I am going to populate My universe with’. Here we have “Afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming”. It is a question of kind, of order, the grain of wheat. The Lord felt death fully; He says prophetically in Psalm 102: “take me not away in the midst of my days”. This shows that His death was not from weakness, but that He died in the vigour of manhood; but, then, He felt it: “Take me not away in the midst of my days”. It was a surrender. The “much fruit” from “the corn of wheat” would include all the redeemed. The full result of His death would be seen in all that are His.
When the Sadducees raised the question of the resurrection the Lord said, “Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God”. Then He cites that passage in Exodus 3: “I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. He is not the God of the dead, but the God of the living”. The revelation God made to Abraham involved this, and then He made a covenant with him; namely, that of circumcision. The sign of circumcision in the body, typically involves the Holy Spirit. The presence of the Holy Spirit gives the certainty of resurrection. The Old Testament saints did not have that. Paul says, “For we are the circumcision which worship by the spirit of God, and boast in Christ Jesus, and do not trust in flesh”,
[p. 71] Philippians 3: 3. The Holy Spirit is the power by which are raised, so that we already have the victory. It is not only that we shall have it; but we have it. “Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory”. The truth of resurrection is taken up here only with the saints. Paul does not refer to the wicked dead here. Resurrection, as it is dealt with here, carries with it a moral thought; it is not resuscitation. The wicked dead shall be brought back; but the principle of resurrection results in a new order of things, that which is of God.
The first burial in Scripture is in the light of resurrection. Abraham bought a field in which to bury Sarah. It was bought in the light of resurrection. Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph had that spot in view. It is interesting that Isaac, as typifying Christ risen, was introduced before burial is mentioned. First, we have in Genesis 17: “I am the Almighty God; walk before me, and be thou perfect”. Then Isaac is brought in on that principle of God’s almightiness. Then he is raised from the dead; received back in a figure. There is the idea of a new order of things in Isaac. The man out of death comes into view, and then the burial of Sarah.
Death is looked at as an enemy as it affects the saints of God. It is a penalty in regard of the wicked. It was a penalty on man as having sinned. Viewed as a penalty it is not an enemy, it is God’s servant; but as Satan uses it against the people of God it is an enemy. It is dealt with in this chapter in regard of those who are affected by the power and life of Christ. “For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive”. That brings in the idea of headship. It does not include the wicked dead. Even as in Luke 20: 38 “for all live unto him” refers to those who had faith.
Resurrection is the annulling of death for us. When I am taken out of death it has no power over [p. 72] me; in fact, Colossians and Ephesians teach, that it has no power over us now; but it is annulled literally when we are taken out of the grave. An unconverted man is afraid to die; death is God’s penalty on him. After the redeemed are taken out of death the wicked are still retained there; for them hades and death are a penalty. No one really understands death save those who have the Holy Spirit. Such understand the consequences of death, they see it first of all as a penalty. This chapter shows that the saints get the victory from that point of view. The wicked dead never get victory.
We have a figure in Goliath who had a sword, a figure of death, and he wielded it over the Israelites for forty days, typical of the period in which Satan held men in terror by death. David took it out of Goliath’s hand and used it against him. Scripture teaches us that death is ours now; 1 Corinthians 3: 22. But although Satan had the power of death, that power was annulled when Christ went into death. Satan could use it only as God permitted, as in Job’s case he was not permitted to touch Job’s life; Job 2: 6. Satan has put many men to death; the martyrs witness to this.
The resurrection will apply to the wicked dead also. The Lord says, “The hour is coming, in the which all that are in the 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”, John 5: 28, 29. But they are simply brought back to be consigned to what is called “the second death”, the lake of fire. Death is ours now in the sense in which we can apply it against the flesh; besides, that too, it may be the means of our departing to be with Christ.
“The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death”. A condition of things will be brought to pass in [p. 73] which death will never have a footing again. Now, through faith, those “who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage” (Hebrews 2: 15) are delivered. Primarily death was a penalty. God said, “In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die”. (Genesis 2: 17) So that it says: “death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression”. (Romans 5: 14) It is thus seen extending over the whole race of men; but in the Jordan it is seen in a condensed form as acting against God. It was an enemy, it was between the people of God and the land of promise. It is in connection with the land we see the full idea of the enemy and there it disappeared. The Red Sea did not disappear. Death remains on the earth today as it always did, emphasised sometimes more than at other times; but when you come to the Jordan the thing disappears, it is cut off out of sight; in fact, when the people came to the Jordan there was no water in it at all; that is what has come to pass for faith, so that we have the victory now. The nearer you get to death the more you realise it is so.
“All that are in the grave shall hear his voice, And shall come forth”. (John 5: 28,29) Individual identity will remain in the glorified state. The principle in regard to the condition of the man inwardly, applies to the outward; that is, the thing as to its character; for instance, now that we are born of God, we are inwardly “as is the heavenly”. That refers to us as Christians already; but still we are known here on the earth as the same persons; there is no physical change; our identity remains. So, as regards the body, all that it shall be evidently comes out of heaven. “Raised in incorruption ... ... raised in glory ... ... raised in power ... ... raised a spiritual body”. Nothing of that comes out of the earth, but from heaven; it is a question of the character of the thing. We shall [p. 74] be recognisable as the same person. It is not that the body is brought down and formed at that moment; it is changed by the power of God; but yet it will be “our house which is from heaven”. (2 Corinthians 5: 2)
If it were a matter of God creating a new set of bodies in heaven, that would not convey the idea; that would take us back to the original thought of creation. The idea in resurrection is power, it shows what God can do, and in it there is testimony to God’s absolute triumph, not only in Christ but in the saints, Resulting from the working of divine power, the body of humiliation is transformed like unto Christ’s glorious body, “according to the working of the power which he has even to subdue all things to himself”, Philippians 3: 21. The subduing is being effected now in a moral way in the souls of the saints and the consummation of that will be when we get our bodies of glory. Paul says, “But God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him, and to every seed his own body”. God does it instantly. “We shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye”. (1 Corinthians 15: 52) So you can understand the force of the word; “the exceeding greatness of his power”.
The body in which we are raised could not be identical in a material sense, because it is spiritual in contrast to the natural; but identity involves that the same features are there, so that we are recognisable. The Lord after His resurrection said: “Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see”, (Luke 24:39) and yet it was a spiritual body. It is all set forth in the Lord. He is the pattern of what follows, only we must always guard what we say about the Lord going into death for He did not see corruption.
It is marvellous that God can do all this in a moment. “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye”. The question as to what bodies Moses and [p. 75] Elias appeared in is solved by the knowledge of God. The knowledge of God is the solution of all these problems; the Lord met the Sadducees by saying: “Do ye not therefore err, because ye know not the scriptures, neither the power of God?” (Mark 12: 24) We cannot naturally understand how Enoch was translated that he should not see death, nor in what body he was taken to heaven; but the knowledge of God in one’s soul sets us at rest about it. Moses and Elias were recognisable. As we grow old resurrection is more appreciated. You come to the top of a hill, so to speak, and then you are able to see over and down. It is an immense thing to apprehend the truth of resurrection. Of course, it should be seen at the outset, but I think it becomes greatly accentuated as we grow old. When the ark went into the Jordan it was two thousand cubits from the people; but the nearer they got to the river the more they perceived the effect of the Ark being there; they saw that the water had disappeared.
John 5 distinguishes between quickening and raising: “For as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them; even so the Son quickeneth whom he will”. If you take that in its application to us at the present time, as in Colossians, we are said to be “risen with him through faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead ... And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him”. (Colossians 2: 12, 13) Being raised with Christ through the faith of the operation of God gives you a new footing or status; quickening gives you the inward power viewed in the order in which they occur literally “at the end”. In Ephesians 2 we have quickening and then raising up; this latter, however, goes further than resurrection.
Verses 20 - 28 come in parenthetically as showing the full bearing of resurrection and then the end:
“[p. 76] When all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all”. (1 Corinthians 15: 28) That is what, I suppose, we may call the final, fixed order of things. The mediatorial kingdom of Christ is brought to an end so that God rests. He is all as the Object of the hearts of His creatures and in all as life.
The Spirit turning from speaking of the Lord as Christ to the Son in verse 28 brings out the workings of the divine Persons. It takes you back to John 5, where divine Persons are acting together: “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work”. Now the Father has given all things into the hands of the Son, so it becomes a mediatorial system and He works until all is brought to God, when there is no disturbing element. Verse 35 introduces the question, “How are the dead raised up?” The apostle enlarges his answer so as to bring out the character of the body as it comes up, and then he says: “Behold, I show you a mystery”; he opens up the mystery of all this to the saints: “We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump”.
Pages 77 - 157, “The Purpose of God in a Day of Small Things”, Detroit, 1919 (Volume 39).