The Christ of God was to be the conqueror of death and the spoiler of
14. Thou art the Resurrection and the Life
The Christ of God was to be the conqueror of death and the spoiler of the grave. Through Him the old sentence of death was to be reversed, and life both for soul and body was to be restored. He came to abolish death, and bring life and immortality to light: to bind the strong man, and to spoil his house; to destroy death, and him that had the power of death; and to lead captivity captive. The expression 'I am the resurrection and the life' carries us to the apostle's statement as to the dead and living saints at the Lord's coming. 'He that believeth in me,' says our Lord, 'though he were dead, yet shall he live,' is similar to the words, 'The dead in Christ shall rise first.' 'He that liveth and believeth in me' (i.e. the living saints, or 'we who are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord') 'shall never die,' resembles 'We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,' or as it is written again, 'We that are alive and remain shall be caught up together into the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we be for ever with the Lord' (see 1 Cor. 15 and 1 Thess. 5).
Very great importance is attached in Scripture to resurrection; redemption is incomplete without it. The work of Christ fails in one main part of its reversal of Satan's work, if it do not accomplish this. Hence He Himself reiterates the words so often, 'I will raise him up at the last day.' The theological tendencies of our day are either to deny it or to undervalue it. And hence the special value of our Lord's peculiar refutation of the Sadducees, when he quoted the words, 'I am the God of Abraham,' in proof of resurrection, and added, 'God is not the God of the dead, but the God of the living' (Matt. 22:32).
Some have wondered why our Lord should select such a passage as proof in this case. But first of all, it was needful in arguing with the Sadducees to look back to Moses for his proof; and secondly, it was needful to take words which should go down to the very root of the doctrine, and exhibit its basis as resting on the very being of God, on His relationship to His creatures, on His character as the living One,
on the impossibility of His being the God of the dead. As Abraham's God, He was as much pledged to deliver Abraham's body as his soul. Resurrection was as essential a part of redemption as forgiveness and regeneration. The restoration of every good thing that man had lost was necessary to the fulfilment of God's eternal purpose, and was inseparably connected with the character and work of Him who came not simply as our propitiation, but our substitute, taking on Him our infirmities that He might deliver us from them, going down into our grave that He might pluck us thence, and purchase for us bodies like His own, glorious and incorruptible.
Whether we are able just now to apprehend the full value of resurrection or not, matters little. God evidently lays great stress upon it, and seems to intimate that, without this, His great scheme would be mutilated. Many say, Oh, if we be eternally blest, what matters it whether we have bodies or not? Nay, but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God, undervaluing thy body which God created, and thereby affirming that this material part of creaturehood was a needless act of power, or perhaps a mistake?
It is a curious phenomenon, that in proportion as philosophic materialism makes progress in our day, resurrection is underrated or ridiculed. One would have thought that materialism would have welcomed the doctrine of resurrection as in sympathy with itself. Not so: it dislikes resurrection; specially, no doubt, because the superhuman and supernatural are thus called in; but also because, while affirming the existence of matter, resurrection assumes the existence of spirit. In other words, the material is based upon the spiritual; and resurrection implies a totally different kind of materialism from that which modern scepticism has advocated.
The connection of resurrection with Christ renders the reconciliation of resurrection with materialism impossible. 'Jesus and the resurrection' was what the apostles preached (Acts 17:18). The two things are so linked together, that they who might be inclined to take the one without the other cannot. They must take both or none.
It is difficult to see why resurrection is so little dwelt upon by Christians. If the soul is safe, they say, we need not care what becomes of the body. God's thoughts, however, on this matter are not ours. His estimate of the body is not low and poor. When He shall transform and glorify us, then it shall be seen what the body is, to what honour it can attain, and what high functions and services to the soul it can perform. As the 'vile body,' or 'body of humiliation' (Phil. 3:21), it may often seem now a hindrance, a drag, and a deformity; but in the day when it shall be made like unto the glorious body (or body of the glory) of Him who is the resurrection and the life, it will be seen in its full serviceableness, and perfection, and beauty; the handmaid of the soul and the minister of God; the golden link or communication between the material and the spiritual, the visible and the invisible; that wondrous agency by which the will draws all precious things out of what we call nature,—music from the air by touch, sweetness from substances by taste, beauty out of the stone by sculpture, power out of the fire, and fertility out of the barren soil. For the uses of the body, in its different members and senses, are beyond number, and altogether wonderful; and what we see of their uses now, is nothing in comparison with what we shall see hereafter, when God Himself takes up the human frame, and as from a well-tuned harp draws out of it the melodies of the everlasting age.
We should prize resurrection. It is the true day of meeting and reunion; the day of perfection and blessedness. Then that which is sown in weakness shall be raised in power. Voices long dumb shall speak again. Eyes long dimmed shall look into each other again. Hands shall once more clasp each other,—and the long, long day of human fellowship shall begin, never to change or end. 'Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust; for thy dew is as the dew of herbs' (Isa. 26:19).
Of this fair prospect the Christ of God is the centre. 'Because I live, ye shall live also.' We rise because He has risen. We live because He liveth. His incorruption is ours; arid His glory is our glory. All that
we shall have in that resurrection-day we shall owe to Him alone who died for us, and who rose again. Faith knits us to His cross. Faith links us to His grave. Faith connects us with His resurrection in the fulness of its eternal love and power. Through Him who is our resurrection we shall know what it is to have death swallowed up in victory, and to sing the song of triumph:
O death, where is thy sting?
O grave, where is thy victory?
The sting of death was sin;
The strength of sin was the law.
But thanks be to God,
Who giveth us the victory,
Through our Lord Jesus Christ.
It is of the resurrection unto glory, honour, and immortality that the apostle sings so triumphantly, inviting us to join in his song. It is the song of the first resurrection, like that which Moses and Miriam sang when the Red Sea was crossed; the song of victory over death and the grave; to which song we may add this as its completion:
Blessed are they that are called
To the marriage supper of the Lamb;
Blessed and holy is he
That hath part in the first resurrection:
On such the second death shall have no power;
But they shall he priests of God and of Christ,