"Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I show you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory." Paul here speaks of a bodily transformation flint is indispensable, certain, instantaneous, and glorious.
I. Here is a transformation that is INDISPENSABLE. "This I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God." Its indispensability is not for this state of things, but for the state of bliss in the celestial world. "Flesh and blood," of course, means our mortal nature. "Cannot inherit the kingdom of God," the heavenly world. He does not say why it cannot—whether the state of the atmosphere, or the means of subsistence, or the force of gravitation, or the forms and means of vision, or the conditions of receiving and communicating knowledge, or the nature of the services required. He does not go into reasons, but boldly states the fact that it could not be. "Flesh and blood" can no more exist yonder, than the tenants of the ocean can exist on the sun burnt hills. In such corporeal transformations there is nothing extraordinary, for naturalists point us to spheres of existence where they are as regular as the laws of nature.
II. Here is a transformation that is CERTAIN. "Behold, I show you a mystery." The word "mystery" here does not point to the unknowable, but to the hitherto unknown. What the apostle means is—I state to you as a fact that which has not hitherto been fully known, viz. that "we shall all be changed." "We shall not all sleep." Had Paul an idea either that he himself would escape death, or that the resurrection-day was just at hand? If he had, he here shows himself, as in some other places, not infallible, but otherwise; for he did die, and at that period the resurrection-day was far away in the abysses of the future. His words, however, clearly teach:
1. That some would be living when the day dawned. "As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the Son of man: they ate, they drank," etc.
2. That both those who were living in the earth and sleeping in the dust would undergo corporeal transformation. "We shall all be changed.
III. Here is a transformation that is INSTANTANEOUS. "In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye," that is, in the shortest conceivable period. At a moment when the living population least expects it, the blast of the "trumpet" shall be heard, and the transformation be effected. "The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night," etc.
IV. Here is a transformation that is GLORIOUS. "For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality." The transformation is from mortality to immortality, from the dying to the undying; "death will be swallowed up in victory." "The idea," says one, "may be taken of a whirlpool or maelstrom that absorbs all that comes near it." The sense is, he would remove or abolish death forever from mankind.
1 Corinthians 15:53
The mind exchanging the mortal for the immortal
"And this mortal must put on immortality," etc. Paul uses this language in relation to the body. What he means, I presume, is that the mortal shall be exchanged for the immortal. To lint on "immortality" upon mortality is scarcely conceivable. But the receiving of the immortal instead of the mortal is what we can appreciate, and what we may well desire. When the apostle calls upon us elsewhere to put on the "new man," he means exchange the "old man" for the new—the old moral character for the new and Christly character. It may be both lawful, I think, and perhaps useful to use the words in another sense than that in which Paul employs them. We may apply them not to the material part of human nature, but to the mental and moral. And because such an application may prove suggestive of practical thoughts, we shall now view them in this light. There is much in the human mind, in its ideas, principles of action, character, etc., that is essentially mortal, and that must sooner or later be exchanged for the immortal. We observe, then—
I. That what is mortal in its SYSTEM OF THOUGHT must be exchanged for the immortal. All errors of judgment are mortal; they are perishable, and sooner or later must perish. And what system of human thought is not intermixed with ideas not true to fact?
1. Look at systems of philosophy. Many old systems of philosophy have already died out, because of the errors that were found in them; and existing systems, because they are often contradictory one to another, reveal their errability, and consequently must die. What is changing is mortal. All schools of psychological science, the sensational, the idealistic, the mystic, and the eclectic, are shifting as the clouds. It will not, it must not be always so; the mortal must "put on" the immortal, the true must take the place of the false in the realm of thought.
2. Look at systems of theology. How contradictory one toward another in many things are most of the systems of theology now prevalent! And what is worse, how contradictory are they to some of the most vital things embodied in the life and teachings of Jesus as recorded by the four evangelists! Many of the old systems have died. Some are dying now, and all will sooner or later die; for they axe rotten with error. The mortal must "put on" the immortal. Human souls will one day have the "truth as it is in Jesus."
"Our little systems have their day;
They have their day, and pass away."
II. That what is mortal in the ELEMENTS OF HUMAN CHARACTER must be exchanged for the immortal. Analyze the character of unrenewed men—alas! the vast majority, not only of the human race, but even of professing Christians—and you will find moral principles that must die out if there be a God of justice and benevolence in the universe. Such principles, for example, as avarice, envy, pride, malice, ambition, and selfishness, which is in truth the root of all evil. The human mind was never formed to be inspired, or indeed to be influenced in any measure by these. The fact that they are antagonistic to the moral constitution of the human soul, to the character of the Maker and Manager of the universe, and to the order and well-being of all, show that they must sooner or later die out of existence. I have the hope that human souls will one day put off this mortal and "put on" the immortal—"Righteousness, joy, and peace in the Holy Ghost," etc. "Marvel not that I say unto you, Ye must be born again."
III. That what is mortal in the INSTITUTIONS OF HUMAN LIFE, must be exchanged for the immortal.
1. Our political institutions are mortal. Human governments are constantly dying. They spring up and flourish for a certain time, and then are swept from the earth. The unwisdom in their method of management, the unrighteousness of some of their laws, the avarice, the tyranny, and haughtiness of those in power, and their constant fattening upon the over-taxed millions, give mortality to governments. Man will one day put off these mortal governments and put on the immortal, the government of common sense, common justice, common benevolence. Men are craving not for the aristocratic or democratic, but for the theocratic, the reign of God, which is the reign of honesty and love. "The kingdoms of this world will one day become the kingdoms of our Lord," etc.
2. Our ecclesiastical institutions are mortal. Whether they are Papal, Episcopal, Wesleyan, or Congregational, they are more or less mixed with error and must die. The great "cloud of witnesses," the Church of the Firstborn, reached their blessed destiny before churches or chapels existed. "God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth." Indeed, whatever institutions, political, ecclesiastical, or social, that have in them a mixture of error, unwisdom, and injustice, must be exchanged for the immortal, namely, a "kingdom that cannot be moved."
IV. That what is mortal in the types of HUMAN GREATNESS must be exchanged for the immortal. In all men there is, in more or less intensity, a thirst for greatness, but their ideas or types of greatness widely differ. Some see the highest greatness in the millionaire, some in the triumphant conqueror, some in the man with a crown on his head, some in the fools who boast of their ancestry and their high-sounding titles. But such types of greatness as these are utterly false. They agree neither with reason nor the conscience of humanity. Because they are false they are mortal, and they will have to be exchanged for the immortal. The time will come when men will regard Christ as the only true type of greatness. They will give him the "Name above every name." In all things in their dally life and conversation, he will have the preeminence.
CONCLUSION. What a glorious change awaits humanity! St. Paul speaks of the resurrection of the body, an event which is confessedly mysterious: it may be far, far distant, and this we have no power to hasten or impede. But there is a more glorious resurrection—a resurrection of the human soul from the false, the unrighteous, the impure, to the true, the right and the holy—a resurrection, thank God, taking place every day in the world, and a resurrection which all men may either hasten or impede—their duty the former, their crime the latter. "Awake to righteousness and sin not."
1 Corinthians 15:55-57
Death in idea.
"O death, where is thy sting?" etc. These words, which are a shout of victory evoked by what has preceded, suggest to us the popular and the Christian ideas of death. Notice—
I. THE POPULAR IDEA. The language implies that the bulk of the race view death not as the writer did; that the idea to them had a "sting" a "victory," and a connection with felt guilt.
1. The popular idea has a sting. "O death, where is thy sting?" This is a vivid personification of the last enemy. The world sedulously shuts up its heart against the idea; but there is not an individual into whose bosom it does not force its way at times, and like a serpent it stings. There is no idea that stings an ungodly man like the idea of death.
2. The popular idea has a victory. It not only stings like a serpent, but crushes like a conqueror. I speak not of the victory which death obtains over the body, but I speak of a more crushing "victory" than this—a victory over the soul. Whenever the idea takes possession of a worldly mind, it is a victor; the soul is prostrated, the man is unmanned.
3. The popular idea has a felt connection with sin. "The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the Law." The sinner's sense of guilt will be according to his knowledge of Law, and the terror of death will be according to his sense of guilt. It is felt guilt that gives a "sting" and "victory" to the idea of dying. All that is horrific in the idea starts from a sin-stricken conscience. Such, then, is the popular idea of death. Wherever, whether in Christian or heathen lands, in ancient or modern times, Christianity is not received in its moral significance and spirit, you find it.
II. THE CHRISTIAN IDEA.
1. The idea has neither "sting" nor "victory." "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? By implication they once existed, but they are gone.
2. The Christian idea has, instead of "sting" and "victory," rapture and triumph. "Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory." The victor has become the victim; the anguish of the sting has given place to the ecstasy of the song.
3. The Christian idea comes to man through one medium. The old terrific and popular idea of death has given way to a bright and a glorious one, "through our Lord Jesus Christ." How does Christ give this idea? By awakening in the soul a new spiritual life. But how does a new spiritual life do this? Because it involves the following things:—
1 Corinthians 15:58
The work of works.
"Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord." "Therefore." This is the practical conclusion of the sublime argument which Paul had conducted on the resurrection, in the preceding verses. All true doctrines lead to practice. "Therefore"—because death is not your end, because you are to live body and soul in a future state—"be ye steadfast."
I. The work of soul restoration is SPECIALLY DIVINE. It is "the work of the Lord." The work of the Lord is illimitable. The universe is his handiwork, and all its movements are his operations. Providence is his work. But the "work" referred to in the text, viz. the spiritual restoration of mankind, is in a special sense his. It is his great work. Isaiah speaks of it as a creation that will eclipse in glory the material universe. Jesus always spoke of it as the great work.
1. Think of the preparation for this work. Four thousand years were occupied, involving a long series of sacrifices, priests, seers, miracles, as preliminary.
2. Think of the sacrifices made to accomplish this work. Christ came into this world, and the Incarnate lived, suffered, and died here, etc.
3. Think of the unceasing agency of the Divine Spirit in order to effect this work. He is always striving with men from age to age and in all lands.
4. Think of the wonderful results of this work. Millions of lost souls redeemed to the knowledge, image, fellowship, and service of Almighty God. What is the value of one soul? What is the influence that one soul can exert on the universe? This, then, may emphatically be called the "work of the Lord." It is the field which he—the great Husbandman—has been cultivating. He will make it one day his choicest garden. It is the temple which he—the great Architect—has been building; it will excel in glory all former structures. It is the "new creation" which he is accomplishing; before it will pale into dimness all other productions.
II. The work of soul restoration DEMANDS THE MOST EARNEST EFFORTS OF MANKIND. "Steadfast, unmovable." There are some works of the Lord in which we cannot engage. We cannot help to control the ocean, guide the stars, or even create a blade of grass, but here we are "labourers together with him."
1. Our labour must be invincible. The two words, "steadfast" and "unmovable," express this. So many are the impulses within, so many are the forces without, opposing the work, that nothing but an invincible determination can carry us through. We must have a purpose strong enough to bend and subordinate everything to itself. "This one thing I do," says Paul.
2. Our labour must be abounding. "Always abounding." The spirit of this work should reign in us, everywhere and at all times. As the parental element inspires the mother, and mingles with all her domestic arrangements and pleasures, so this spirit must inspire us and mingle with all our undertakings. It should sweeten our daily toil and breathe into our recreations and amusements. The distinction between the secular and the spiritual is a theological fiction. Religion in a man is either everywhere or nowhere, everything or nothing. Labour and business, as well as the gospel, are means of grace. As the life of the plant requires the tempest to bend its fibres, as well as the calm to yield it repose, so the religious life requires for its development the rough element of worldly business as well as the smoother influences of spiritual devotion.
III. The work of soul restoration MUST INEVITABLY SUCCEED. "Forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord." There are two kinds of vain labour.
1. That which aims at a worthless end. Therefore, if it succeeds, it is useless.
2. That which is directed to a good end, but can never realize it, simply because it is too indeterminate and feeble. But here is a work that must succeed. Every true thought, every earnest prayer, every godly deed, carry in themselves success. As all the elements and forces of this world go to build up a new stratum around the globe's surface, for geologists of coming ages to study, so all that I do and think and say in the work of the Lord goes to give blessedness to my being. Inasmuch, therefore, as you cannot fail in this work, labour.
IV. The work of soul restoration will FULLY REALIZE ITS SUCCESS IN THE FUTURE WORLD. "Therefore," says Paul, "were this life our all, our spiritual labour might be considered vain." What boots our striving after knowledge, our efforts to build up a noble character, if the grave be our end? But there is a future, and in it there is a full reward. All the waters of holy thought and effort we now receive into our being go to make a well within us that shall spring up to everlasting life.
HOMILIES BY C. LIPSCOMB
1 Corinthians 15:1-4
Introduction.
"Moreover" indicates a change of subject. "Declare unto you," or remind you, is somewhat emphatic. What St. Paul brings to memory are certain fundamental ideas which he does not hesitate to call "the gospel," the glad tidings of God to the world. It was the same gospel he had preached unto them, the same they had accepted, the same in which they stood. By it these Corinthians were saved, present and future, if they adhered to their faith, unless indeed their faith was "in vain." Was this faith a vain thing? Was it possible that it was an illusion? How could this be when they had embraced it, stood in it, felt its power to save, and rejoiced in its blessedness? The power of this gospel lay in these facts, viz.: Christ had died, had been buried, had been raised from the grave; and these had occurred for a special purpose and agreeably to pre-announcement of Divine revelation. What was the specific object of Christ's death? He died "for our sins." In this he was the Christ of God, the Messiah, the Anointed, the Jesus of Nazareth, who, as "the righteous Servant of the Father," was ordained to "bear their iniquities." It was not, then, a common death. It was not a death brought about as to its main end by the disappointment of his nation because he had refused to be a secular king. It was not the death of a martyr. Worldly influences, earthly agencies, Satanic power, appear in the immediate and circumstantial connections of his crucifixion. His arrest was an act of human violence; his trial was twofold, Jewish and Roman; his execution was Roman; and yet all this array of man's hate and skill and successful wickedness passes out of sight, and is lost in a view infinitely higher. Judas could not have betrayed him, Caiaphas and the Sanhedrim could not have condemned him, Pilate could not have given him over to the Pharisees and Sadducees, unless Christ himself had permitted them to control the manner and incidents of his death. The death itself, as to its motive, spirit, and aim, occupies the whole mind of the apostle. Man and man's instrumental relation to it fade from view, and it is with him a vicarious, expiatory, propitiating death, deriving its reason, character, and value from a single consideration—a death for our sins. On no other basis could he regard the gospel as glad tidings. And how had the knowledge of this as a doctrinal reality come to him? He had "received" it from Christ himself, who had appeared personally to him at midday. The historical facts of his death, burial, and resurrection had been known to him; for Saul of Tarsus could not have been ignorant of these things as events involving the nation. Mysteriously, too, he had felt their impression in vague ideas, in vaguer fears; out of unconscious depths, sounds had throbbed as strange pulsations on the inner ear; and so sharp had been the call to thought and reflection, as for the Lord Jesus to remind him on the way to Damascus that he had been kicking against the goads which had pierced his conscience. His conversion was sudden and marvellous. Sudden and marvellous it could not have been but for the long and acute goading that had opened his heart to the hand of the Divine Healer. Yet this preparatory work of conviction was all within himself, under the Spirit's agency. What he knew of Christ's death was not from the historical fact alone, but from the doctrinal truth couched in the fact, and this saving truth he had received. It was a revelation to his soul, a direct and assuring manifestation from the Lord Jesus. To be an apostle, he needed this immediate communication from heaven, this peculiar intensifying of conviction and conversion. Means and methods suited to others were not adapted to his case. Notorious as he had been in the championship of the national Church—the forlorn hope of Sadduceeism and Pharisaism, the young hero whose fanatical strength was adequate to replenish the wasting and well nigh exhausted forces of the Sanhedrim—it was not for him to go over to Christ in some quiet way by meditation, by laborious inquest of soul, by those high resolves which often have their birth from the womb of solitude. No; he must be signally converted, for his own sake and for the sake of others. The change was a momentous affair in the history of the Jewish Church no less than the Christian Church, and, accordingly, he speaks of himself as having "received" the grace of God in an exceptional manner. But were human means disowned? Was naturalness set at nought or even depreciated? Not so; what he "received" was altogether in unison with the true creed of Israel as contained in the records of her national faith. "According to the Scriptures," argues he, was the truth of Christ's death which I "received." Above the effulgence that flashed from the Syrian noon upon his eye, there was another light, and it spread all over Pentateuch, Psalms, prophecies. What, indeed, Gamaliel stood for, but was not; what Sadducee and Pharisee ideally meant, but utterly failed to make real; what priest and scribe had been designed to represent, but had hidden under carnal observances; what temple and sacrifices had been set apart to commemorate and prefigure, but had obliterated in sign and symbol;—all these were now illumined. "According to the Scriptures," which he had learned when a boy in Tarsus, and had come to Jerusalem that he might enlarge and perfect his knowledge of these holy writings; "according to the Scriptures," which St. Stephen had expounded before the Sanhedrim when the shadow of death retreated before the glory descending upon the youthful saint from the "Son of man standing on the right hand of God;" "according to the Scriptures" that Ananias had explained to him at Damascus, when "there fell from his eyes as it had been scales," and, in no long time, the inner eyesight was made clear and strong. Thus it was that providence in the past became providence in the present, the Holy Ghost alike in each, and Tarsus, Jerusalem, and Damascus brought, though seemingly so wide apart, into the unity of his soul's development. Verily, a wondrous scheme of personal history, recognizing home and parents, life in "no mean city," life in the metropolis that was venerated as the glory of the elect nation, life in the leadership of an assault on the young Church, and forever memorable in her annals because of the crown of martyrdom then first won; a marvellous interweaving of the natural and supernatural as warp and woof in one and the same fabric. Back to the original promise spoken in Eden that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head; back to the early institution of sacrifice, and thence on to the organization of the Divine idea in a most solemn and august ceremonial that allowed no day to escape its impressive symbolization; all through penitential psalms and instructive prophecies. The great doctrine was present everywhere that "without shedding of blood there is no remission," that "he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows," and that "the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all." No emaciating criticism here; no destructive intellect; no disposition inclining St. Paul to obscure Christ in the shadow of the Jewish nation, and minimize his figure to the smallest dimensions consistent with any faith at all. No such taste and temper had this man, fresh from the schools and master of the theology of his times. Nor is it other than one of his very marked peculiarities, that he so frequently cites his thorough and familiar acquaintance with the Scriptures, and that from first to last in his Epistles, he is quite as much a commentator of the Old as an exponent of the New. The two grand hemispheres of religious thought formed one globe in him. From the one to the other, he passed with unobstructed step. Over the immense domain, divided and cut up to so many other minds, adverse or even hostile sections to not a few honest souls; over all this stretch of diversified territory, there was to St. Paul the very perfection of unity. His footsteps never missed their pathway; his eye never lost a landmark. For him, Christ was in Eden, in Abraham, Moses, David, Isaiah, Hosea; and the Old Testament was what it was and all it was because Christ was in every one of its doctrines and institutions. The present Christ to him—the Christ of Damascus, and Arabia, and Jerusalem, and Athens, and Ephesus, and Corinth—was the Christ of the past, and he was this because he was the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." Is it like]y, then, that we shall find too much of Christ, and especially as it respects the legal bearings of his death, in the Old Testament? Clearly St. Paul did not think so. "According to the Scriptures" was prefatory, and essentially so, to the logic, sentiment, fervour, of the grand argument he was about to make. What was this argument to be? A defence—the defence—of the doctrine of the resurrection of the human body. Observe now that the historical fact of the Lord's resurrection was not in debate. No one of the Corinthians denied or even doubted that. What, then, was in controversy? This it was, viz.: Did the doctrine involved in the Lord's rising from the dead apply to all? Was there to be a general resurrection? From this point of view, we see why in the present case he laid such stress on his dying for our sins. It was not death as an ordinary termination of life, but death considered in this exclusive instance as an atoning death, as a vicarious and expiatory offering, as a complete and perfect satisfaction to law and justice. It is this death that stands so closely related to his resurrection, and through it to our resurrection. Taking merely an ethical view of the matter, and confining ourselves to what Jesus of Nazareth taught, and to the example of moral excellence he set before men, we can see no reason why he should have risen. He added nothing to morality, nothing to example, nothing to a high and self-sacrificing manhood, by returning to life and reappearing at sundry times to his disciples during the forty days. On the other hand, looking at his death as penal "for our sins"—we can understand why, if he was "delivered for our offences," he should be "raised again for our justification." Without the resurrection, we could not be assured whether he died simply and solely as a good man, the best of men, or as the Son of God to expiate our sins. If, indeed, law and justice have been satisfied by the sacrifice, let them express in an authoritative and sovereign manner, clear of all liability to misapprehension, and assuring to the most eager solicitude, that the penalty has been paid and a full pardon for guilt in man made possible. Precisely this was accomplished by Christ's resurrection, and thus the scars of Calvary, preserved upon his person, were shown to the disciples as the signs of victory over "hell and death." He rose, furthermore, on "the third day." Though it was not Christ's habit to fix times and seasons, yet he was careful to settle the day of his resurrection. Again and again he announced the date of the event. Friends, in their overwhelming dismay, forgot it, or if some remembered it, as the two who journeyed to Emmaus, it was clouded by grief and distrust. Foes remembered it and provided a guard for the sepulchre, and his foes were the first to know that he had risen, and that, too, from their own soldiers. There was no ethical reason for him to rise on the third day or on any other day, but, viewing his death as penal, its purpose instantly answered when he died, we can see congruity between the two facts, "the third day" being his own appointment and a proof that he had died, not as a mere man, but as the eternal Son of God. St. Paul repeats, "according to the Scriptures," i.e. Christ's resurrection had been foretold. "Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption" (Psalms 16:10). Christ's death, burial, and resurrection hold together, and their congruity is determined by the fact that "the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes we are healed." To these truths the apostle gave prominence in the opening of his argument. Logically, they had to assume that commanding position, and emotionally they could have no other. And therefore, "first of all," he delivered these doctrines. They took precedence of all else; they were the data foreverything in Christianity; they were "the gospel." So that if he was about to dwell on a topic which should evoke his power to the utmost, nor leave a faculty of his mind disengaged nor a sensibility unmoved, he would "first of all," as he had done in his preaching, rest his whole cause on Christ dying and rising as the Redeemer of the human race.—L.
1 Corinthians 15:5-11
Apostolic testimony to Christ's resurrection, and testimony of others.