On the other hand, the thought of Christ's coming is to the believer the source of inexpressible joy. Christ has saved us from a terrible abyss. Our joy in salvation is in proportion to our dread of the destruction from which we have been saved. To the truly penitent man, the thought of the righteous God is full of terror. God is holy; we would sometimes endeavor vainly to shrink from his presence. Yet such a God has stretched out his hand to save—there is the wonder of the gospel—and if we trust in the Saviour the last great day need cause no fear. We are lost in sin, but God looks not upon us but upon him who died to save us. "Salvation" to the apostolic Church meant "rescue," rescue from the just and awful judgment of God.
3. THE INTERMEDIATE STATE
The time of that judgment has not been revealed, but so far as any offer of repentance is concerned the time comes to every man at death. One question of detail cannot altogether be ignored. What did the apostles teach about the condition of the believer between death and the final resurrection? Upon this subject, the New Testament says very little, but it becomes clear at least that the believer, even when absent from the body, is to be present with the Lord, II Cor. 5:8, and that to die is to be with Christ. Phil. 1:23. On the whole, no better statement of the apostolic teaching about the "intermediate state" can be formulated than that which is contained in the Shorter Catechism: "The souls of believers are at their death made perfect in holiness, and do immediately pass into glory; and their bodies, being still united to Christ, do rest in their graves, till the resurrection." The hope of an immediate entrance into bliss at the time of death should not be allowed, however, to obscure the importance of the resurrection. The resurrection of the body will be necessary to "the full enjoying of God to all eternity."
4. THE FINAL BLESSEDNESS
That enjoying of God is no mere selfish pleasure; it means first of all a triumph of holiness. Every last vestige of evil will be removed. No taint of sin will separate the redeemed creature from his God. Service will be free and joyous. The consummation, moreover, will concern not merely individuals, but the race; no mere expectation of the personal immortality of individuals begins to do justice to the apostolic teaching. The ultimate end, indeed, is not our own enjoyment, but the glory of God. Some carnal, materialistic conceptions of the future age would really remove God from his own heaven, but such is not the teaching of the New Testament. God will be all and in all; only in his glory is to be found the true glory of a redeemed race. The power of loving God is the highest joy that heaven contains.
5. THE DISPENSATION OF THE SPIRIT
The present age, according to the New Testament, is a time of waiting and striving; it is related to the future glory as a battle is related to the subsequent victory. Satisfaction with the present life, even as it is led by the best of Christians, would to the apostles have been abhorrent; the Christian is still far from perfect. A prime condition of progress is a divine discontent. Jesus pronounced a blessing upon them that "hunger and thirst after righteousness." Eternal things to us are unseen; they can be discovered only by the eye of faith; we long for a time when hope will be supplanted by sight. Nevertheless, there is no room for despondency; the blessed time is surely coming.
Its coming is rendered certain by the presence, here and now, of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit may be relied upon to prepare us, both in soul and in body, for the glory of heaven.
(1) The Spirit in the Old Testament and in the Life of Jesus.—The Spirit of God was mentioned even in the Old Testament. At the beginning he "moved upon the face of the waters," Gen. 1:2; he was the source of the mighty deeds of heroes and of the prophets' inspired words. In the life and teaching of Jesus, however, the Spirit was far more fully revealed than he had ever been revealed before. He was the source of Jesus' human nature, Matt. 1:18, 20; Luke 1:35; he descended upon the newly proclaimed Messiah, Matt. 3:16, and was operative in all the earthly ministry of the Lord.
(2) The Spirit in the Church.—For the disciples, however, the full glory of the Spirit's presence was manifested only after Jesus himself had been taken up into heaven; the present age, from Pentecost to the second coming of the Lord, is peculiarly the dispensation of the Holy Spirit. Discontent with the Church's imperfections and dismay at her many adversaries should never cause us to lose confidence in the work that is being done by the Spirit of God. It was expedient that Jesus should go away; through the other "Comforter" whom he has sent, he manifests himself even more gloriously than he did to the disciples in Galilee.