THE RESURRECTION – AN OVERLOOKED MARVEL

All Scriptures citations are to the NIV-UK edition of 1984.

‘Why should any of you consider it incredible that God raises the dead?’

Acts 26:8

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THE DOCTRINE OF the bodily resurrection was rooted in Jewish faith and belief. It was implicit in Jehovah’s promises to Abraham and in the testimony of the Prophets, explicit in the witness of many holy men of old who wrote under the inspiration of the holy spirit.

Paradoxically, in some who profess disbelief in a God who created all things and breathed the breath of life into humankind, there is a baffling reluctance to accept that when that breath has ceased, the life has ended. Despite a widespread conviction of evolution propelled through a series of random extinctions, human instinct still chafes at the notion that life is transient, and of no lasting value.

So the belief lingers that the dead are not really dead, but have merely shed the earthly body, while the ‘soul’ survives, invisible to those on earth. Thus the Almighty, having created humankind with (supposedly) immortal souls, is apparently powerless to end the life of the unworthy. The departed good are assumed to be in heaven, while the not-so-good are also regarded as safe. Rarely do funeral services assign anyone, no matter how unworthy, to a hell of torment.

Such views are not accepted by all Christians, many of whom believe that immortality is conditional. This is an important distinction. As long ago as 1530, William Tyndale declared:

And ye, in putting them [the departed souls] in heaven, hell, and purgatory, destroy the arguments wherewith Christ and Paul prove the resurrection. . . . And again, if the souls be in heaven, tell me why they be not in as good case as the angels be? And then what cause is there of the resurrection? [Emphases added.]

The testimony of the holy men of old . . .

The Apostle Peter reminds us that ‘prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit’ (2 Peter 1:21). What did they say on the subject of death?

Job 14:14, 15: If a man dies, will he live again? All the days of my hard service I will wait for my renewal to come. You will call and I will answer you; you will long for the creature your hands have made.

Job 19:25–27: I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; I myself will see him with my own eyes . . . .

Isa. 26:19: But your dead will live; their bodies will rise. You who dwell in the dust, wake up and shout for joy. . . . The earth will give birth to her dead.

New Testament Evidence

And what did Jesus and the Apostles teach concerning death? That there would be a resurrection to new life! Jesus says (John 5:28, 29):

Do not be amazed at this, for a time is coming when all who are in their graves will hear his voice and come out . . . .

As noted elsewhere on this site, some special promises relate only to the members of the Body of Christ, the heavenly elect.

However, Jesus clearly taught that the unbelieving world of mankind would also be restored to life, to experience a trial for life everlasting. Jesus Himself restored the dead to life, most significantly His friend Lazarus, whose body had lain four days in the tomb. Martha, the sister of Lazarus, confidently expected her brother to return in the resurrection at the last day, but in her grief felt that Jesus ought to have saved him.

The raising of Lazarus, more than all else, demonstrated the power of God’s Son.

His avowal at that time, ‘I am the resurrection and the life’, foreshadowed His role as the world’s Redeemer, the giver of new life to every member of the human family (John 11:25).

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