Systematic Theology (Volume 3 of 3)

by Augustus Hopkins Strong

2 Pet. 3:7, 10, 13—“the heavens that now are, and the earth, by the same word have been stored up for fire, being reserved against the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.... But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall be dissolved with fervent heat, and the earth and the works that are therein shall be burned up.... But, according to his promise, we look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness”; Rev. 20:13—“And the sea gave up the dead that were [pg 1016]in it; and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them”; 21:1, 5—“And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth are passed away; and the sea is no more.... And he that sitteth on the throne said, Behold, I make all things new.”

The smooth face of death with the lost youth restored, and the pure white glow of the marble statue with all passion gone and the lofty and heroic only visible, are indications of what is to be. Art, in its representations alike of the human form, and of an ideal earth and society in landscape and poem, is prophetic of the future,—it suggests the glorious possibilities of the resurrection-morning. Nicoll, Life of Christ: “The river runs through the lake and pursues its way beyond. So the life of faith passes through death and is only purified thereby. As to the body, all that is worth saving will be saved. Other resurrections [such as that of Lazarus] were resurrections to the old conditions of earthly life; the resurrection of Christ was the revelation of new life.”

Stevens, Pauline Theology, 357 note—“If we could assume with confidence that the report of Paul's speech before Felix accurately reproduced his language in detail, the apostle's belief in a ‘resurrection both of the just and of the unjust’ (Acts 24:15) would be securely established: but, in view of the silence of his epistles, this assumption becomes a precarious one. Paul speaks afterwards of ‘attaining to the resurrection from the dead’ (Phil. 3:11), as if this did not belong to all.” The scepticism of Prof. Stevens seems to us entirely needless and unjustified. It is the blessed resurrection to which Paul would “attain,”and which he has in mind in Philippians, as in 1 Cor. 15—a fact perfectly consistent with a resurrection of the wicked to “shame and everlasting contempt” (Daniel 12:2; John 5:29).

A. J. Gordon, Ministry of the Spirit, 205, 206—“The rapture of the saints (1 Thess. 4:17) is the earthly Christ rising to meet the heavenly Christ; the elect church, gathered in the Spirit and named ὁ Χριστός (1 Cor. 12:12), taken up to be united in glory with Christ the head of the church, ‘himself the Savior of the body’ (Eph. 5:23). It is not by acting upon the body of Christ from without, but by energizing it from within, that the Holy Ghost will effect its glorification. In a word, the Comforter, who on the day of Pentecost came down to form a body out of flesh, will at the Parousia return to heaven in that body, having fashioned it like unto the body of Christ (Phil. 3:31).... Here then is where the lines of Christ's ministry terminate,—in sanctification, the perfection of the spirit's holiness; and in resurrection, the perfection of the body's health.”

E. G. Robinson: “Personality is the indestructible principle—not intelligence, else deny that infants have souls. Personality takes to itself a material organization. It is a divinely empowered second cause. This refutes materialism and annihilationism. No one pretends that the individual elements of the body will be raised. The individuality only, the personal identity, will be preserved. The soul is the organific power. Medical practice teaches that merely animal life is a mechanical process, but this is used by a personal power. Materialism, on the contrary, would make the soul the product of the body. Every man, in becoming a Christian, begins the process of resurrection. We do not know but resurrection begins at the moment of dissolution, yet we do not know that it does. But if Christ arose with identically the same body unchanged, how can his resurrection be a type of ours? Answer: The nature of Christ's resurrection body is an open question.”

Upon the subject of the resurrection, our positive information is derived wholly from the word of God. Further discussion of it may be most naturally arranged in a series of answers to objections. The objections commonly urged against the doctrine, as above propounded, may be reduced to two:

1. The exegetical objection.

The exegetical objection,—that it rests upon a literalizing of metaphorical language, and has no sufficient support in Scripture. To this we answer:

(a) That, though the phrase “resurrection of the body” does not occur in the New Testament, the passages which describe the event indicate a physical, as distinguished from a spiritual, change (John 5:28, 29; Phil. 3:21; 1 Thess. 4:13-17). The phrase “spiritual body” (1 Cor. 15:44) is a contradiction in terms, if it be understood as signifying “a body which is simple spirit.” It can only be interpreted as meaning a material [pg 1017] organism, perfectly adapted to be the outward expression and vehicle of the purified soul. The purely spiritual interpretation is, moreover, expressly excluded by the apostolic denial that “the resurrection is past already” (2 Tim. 2:18), and by the fact that there is a resurrection of the unjust, as well as of the just (Acts 24:15).