There are two very distinct ways in which resurrection is viewed in Scripture, not only in the person of Christ, but also as affecting us. In the first portion that was brought before us, (1 Cor. 15:20-2820But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept. 21For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. 22For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. 23But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming. 24Then 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. 25For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. 26The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. 27For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith all things are put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted, which did put all things under him. 28And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all. (1 Corinthians 15:20‑28),) we have one of these aspects, and in the verses just read, and still more in John 5, and elsewhere, we have the other. Now it is exceedingly comforting to our hearts to know this kind of twofold witness that the grace of God has given us to the blessed manner in which He has secured our title. But I refer to it, not merely as a question of our title, but of Christ's glory; for we are here to exalt His name. And there is no one way in which He more shines out, and the glory of God in Him, than in the character of the raiser of the dead. In John's gospel it is presented thus—He is the Son; He is life, everlasting life; and as we read in the epistle, “He is the eternal Life that was with the Father, and was manifested unto us.” Before there was any creature, He was with the Father, and in Him was life. Death consequently had no power, and yet we know that He came to die. But in this point of view, He came to show the triumph of the power of the life that was in Him over that death which He was pleased to undergo. So that we could not know the special character and power of the life that was in Christ, not merely unless others had died, but unless He had died Himself. And it is in this way that St. John loves to regard it, and was led by the Holy Ghost to do so. Hence, as our Lord Himself said, “destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” And so again, when He was not thus speaking figuratively, (though we have the Holy Ghost's own interpretation of the figure,) in the well-known passage in John 10, where He shows that as the good Shepherd He was about to lay down His life, and to lay it down for the sheep. Again, He tells us that He lays it down that He might take it again. Now, there He speaks as the conscious Son of God, who had such power of life in Himself, that death was only met to be forever defeated.
And the truth of this appears both in John 5 and in chapter 10. In chapter v. death is viewed as taking its course. We are told there that as truly as now we have the words of the Son of God, and we believe in Him that sent Him, and receive His testimony about His beloved Son, so truly we have life, everlasting life. Nor is this, as He shows, to be marveled at, because the hour is coming when it will be so proved; when it will be no longer a matter of faith for our souls to rejoice in, but when it will be evident to every eye: in His own words, “the hour is coming, when all that are in the graves shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and “shall come forth,” &c. It is the all-important thing for soul and body; for soul now, for body then. “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 judgment.” There, death's force is not shown us as so completely broken, but what at first sight it might appear that the saints were all obliged to submit themselves to it, in some shape or other. So that a further revelation of the truth of God was necessary in order to bring out the full power of the life that was in Christ; and He has given it us in the verses that were read from chapter 11. There, says the Lord, “I am the resurrection and the life.” So that it was simply the question of His own will, and of the purpose of God, though He came to do His will, and He only put forth that power at God's bidding. “I am the resurrection and the life.” The full power of victory over death was in Him. “He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live; and he that liveth and believeth in me shall never die.” Observe, that in all this there is no thought of the work of Christ, no presenting His sufferings, no allusion whatever to His manhood, He speaks solely and simply as a divine person. And before the power and glory of His person, death must disappear. Whoever believed in Him—whoever heard His voice—shared the blessing that flowed from the glory of His person. Death was defeated in principle. This was true now for faith, and it will be proved true by and by. He has only to come, and whoever then lives and believes in Him will never die. Death for such, was completely gone.
But, moreover, in 1 Cor. 15 we have another and an equally beautiful view which our souls need to keep along with the other. And here comes to view the utter ruin of those who receive this eternal life, and who are destined to be raised out of their grave to share the glory of everlasting life with Christ; or who, if living, will be taken up at once without passing through death at all, for the participation of His quickening power. Those that so rise were sinners; they were lost sinners, they were guilty and dead. What can meet this? It is blessed and glorious to know that Christ can meet it. But how has He done it? He has become a man. It was man that wronged God. It would not be a sufficient answer to God that He Himself as such should come down in power, and put an end to all the sin and misery that is in the world. It is no question of power, but there was more that was needful, according to the counsels of God. He has deigned to become man; and thus it is man is now the very vessel and object of the thoughts and counsels of God. Man is no longer the object of the judgment of God merely, but the scale is turned, and in and through Jesus man is the blessed object of the favor of God; man now is what He is occupied with, and it is in man that the great scene is being wrought out before all heaven. No doubt the great secret of it is that blessed Man who is on the throne; and on the throne as the One that was humbled and suffered here. But He owns the relationship He has with us that are here in all our weakness, and trouble, and difficulties. In all our sorrowing, toiling course, His heart is toward and with us. He is there in glory, yet He owns us fully here. How different is this from our spirit who love to think of something that will exalt ourselves, that is, or looks great, something that is outside us, yet connected with our own power, or honor, or worthiness! But what Jesus owns is His tie with us, and with us in the hour of our greatest weakness. We are here slowly going onwards, very slowly. We walk here most unworthily of Him; but He recognizes us fully, and, besides, has given us the joy of knowing that in that very nature where we feel our weakness which wrought ruin and was so rebellious against God, and which is still seeking to drag us down and bring in vanity and folly, in this very nature, and in nothing so much, though, of course, without its taint and evil condition, has Jesus brought all honor to God. The divine nature needed nothing. No testing was required there. But He became a man as perfectly as he who sinned and died: and “as by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.” And thus it is that He has shown us now, not merely that He is a divine person who has this life that baffles and destroys death, but that as man He has done it. He won a title for us in that death in which He bore the judgment of our sin and put it away. But He is risen, and therefore we come together not on the day of the death—that showed our shame, and sin, and ruin, though we do remember Him there—but on the day of His resurrection. But what we have here now, is not merely that as a divine person He raises Himself, (He does not raise Himself as a man,) but it is as a divine person, that we read in John: that He had power to lay down His life and had power to take it again; but as man, God raises Him. And there comes in the righteousness part. It is a question of God being true to that blessed One who had brought such honor to Him through His life and death; and therefore it would not have been according to the glory of God if He had raised Himself as man. It was a part of God's righteousness, so to say, who has an obligation, by reason of the work of Christ: and therefore there is this discharge of it—God must raise. There is the first act of the righteousness of God. He could not leave His Son in the grave. He sets Him at His own right hand, and has brought us into the joy of knowing that we shall be with Him there. And, O, that during the little time of waiting for Him, our ways, our lives, our heart, may be true to Jesus. We have not many more opportunities of glorifying and serving Him. We have, alas! and easily, the sad opportunity of dishonoring Him. It takes a little while, a very little moment, to put our shame and dishonor on Jesus. And we have but a little while. Oh, may it be turned to the praise of His name. And may we treat the world, not as an enjoyable scene, or a place where there is anything to desire, but as a system that is crucified to us through the cross of Christ. Has the Lord given us deliverance from sin and from hell, that we may be happy in this present evil world? Does His cross warrant the thought, that we may seek to enjoy Christ and the world too? Does not “the whole world” lie in wickedness, yea, in that wicked one who led it on to cast Him out and crucify Him? A baser desire, or a more impossible one, never entered the heart of a believer, than to love Christ and the world at the same time. And let us remember, that it is not only in great things that the world may become a snare to us. Its spirit may enter in the mere things we put on ourselves or our children; in the least matters we desire, allow, or cultivate. Do not suppose that we have to beware of the gross world only. Of course we have to keep ourselves clear from that at all cost; at the cost, if it must be so, of a right hand or a right foot. Better go maimed with the Lord, than the whole body be cast into hell. And if souls deliberately turn away from Christ to the world, what possible ground is there to think that they have any part or lot with Christ? It is one thing to slip and hate oneself for it; it is a very different thing to abandon the Lord and Savior because present things are preferred. We may see a poor soul with strong prejudices and feeble intelligence walking in the world and even in its worst form, the religious world; and yet we may trust that the heart is with Christ. Doubtless such have been found where Satan's throne is; and even Jezebel, the false prophetess, plies her cruel and adulterous trade, that is, even in Popery. But this marks them in spite of their ignorance, and their false position—whoever is born of God seeks after the height of his faith, and clings to the truth, to the best of his light. Are we perverting the truth to our own self-destruction? or cleaving to the Lord for His glory and for our soul's good? I do not say that in every single act a person does thus walk; but this is the character of every one that is born of God, “he doth not commit sin.” And as to persons who deliberately allow that which they know to be contrary to the Lord as their character and course of action, there is no eternal life there. There are none so blessed, but none in such danger, if the Lord has caused the light of His glory to shine upon us. If He has shown us Christ as the victorious man—victorious over death and every enemy—He has done it that we should witness for Him in increasing devotedness and in growing power against the flesh, the world, and every enemy of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord make and keep us faithful, but in the dust.