“THE FIRST RESURRECTION.”
Continued from Volume 1.
“Christ,” then, is “the first fruits” (1 Cor. 15:23); and “the first resurrection” embraces not only those who are asleep when He comes for His own in the air, but also the two classes of saints martyred during the awful troubles and great tribulation that will take place between that event and His manifestation in power to reign, the whole of the saints in fact who go into death from Adam to the millennium. These future martyrs will yield up their lives, like many saints of old, that they might obtain a better resurrection (Heb. 11:35.) The rest of the dead, that is, those who die in their sins, as we have already seen, remain in the grave until the close of the millennial kingdom, and the little season the end of the world when they shall come forth to the resurrection of judgment (John 5:29; Rev. 20:5.)
Daniel 12:2, has presented a difficulty to some: “And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.” If you read carefully the first verse you will see that it is not a question here of literal resurrection, but speaking figuratively of the restoration of the Jews, the deliverance of some out of the time of trouble—great tribulation—judgment being the portion of others. Notice that the words thy people occur twice (Dan. 12:1). This is not the only scripture where the restoration of Israel is spoken of thus. In Ezekiel 37, they are compared to dry bones coming to life, being brought up out of their graves, and placed in their own land (Ezek. 37:1-14). Also in Psalms 68:22: “I will bring My people again from the depths of the sea.”
“But some men will say, How are the dead raised up? and with what body do they come? Thou fool that which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die; and that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be, but bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other grain; but God giveth it a body as it hath pleased Him, and to every seed his own body.... So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption; it is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body” 1 Cor. 15:35-44.
With God all things are possible, and He who by His own mighty power raised from among the dead our Lord Jesus, will surely accomplish this mighty act, and raise all His own who sleep, to be with and like His Son in glory (1 Cor. 6:14.) It matters not by what means or where God’s people fall asleep, whether their bodies shall go into the grave or the ocean’s depth, “We know, that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens” (2 Cor. 5:1.)
How blessed for the Christian, as he stands by the open tomb, and sees lowered into it a coffin containing the corruptible remains of some dearly loved one who has fallen asleep in Christ, to be enabled to look beyond this scene of sorrow and death, and to know that the departed is “absent from the body and present with the Lord” (2 Cor. 5:8) To know too that at any moment the welcome sound of the Master’s voice may be heard in the air, when every sleeping and every living saint shall be caught up, in a moment conformed to His blessed image; so to be “forever with the Lord.” It is then that “shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor. 15:54, 57.)
How precious to have as the object of our hearts in the glory of God that Blessed One, who could say, “I am the resurrection and the life;” who could weep as a sympathizing man at the grave of Lazarus, but who could display the mighty power of God, for He was and is the Son of God, in raising him from the dead.
A Jewish sect, called the Sadducees, in the days of Christ on earth denied resurrection altogether. Our Lord’s answer to a question put by them is well worthy of note in considering this subject. He saith 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 the children of God, being the children of the resurrection. Now that the dead are raised, even Moses showed at the bush, when he calleth 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 20:34-38.)
Paul also in writing to Timothy, warns him to “shun profane and vain babblings; for they will increase unto more ungodliness; and their word will eat as doth a canker; of whom is Hymenaeus and Philetus: who concerning the truth have erred, saying that the resurrection is past already; and overthrow the faith of some” (2 Tim. 2:16-18.)
I cannot close writing on this wonderful subject without asking you my dear reader, If death were to overtake you this day, Are you ready to go? Would you be amongst those who would come forth at the first, the glorious resurrection? Or are you still in your sins, still under the judgment of God? If summoned from this scene in the latter condition, your portion must be to come forth at the resurrection of judgment, and to be cast into the lake of fire. There is only one way of deliverance from such a doom, and that is by faith in the Son of God, who was judged on the cross as the sin-bearer (2 Cor. 5:21.)
How bright the resurrection morn
On all the saints will break!
The Lord Himself will then return,
His ransomed church to take.
We cannot linger o’er the tomb;
The resurrection day
To faith shines bright beyond its gloom,
Christ’s glory to display.