XII. 1 CORINTHIANS 15:51-54 & ISAIAH 25:7,8 COMPARED

There are very few leading truths in Scripture which are based upon one passage merely, or upon teaching in one form: this is a gracious provision for meeting minds variously constituted as to their habits and ability of attention; those who do not feel at once the force of one kind of proof, are sometimes struck with the pointedness of another. Also, there are not a few who feel the conclusiveness of a legitimate and necessary inference even more than they do that of a direct statement.

The Apostle Paul, in teaching the Corinthians the hope of the resurrection of the saints, says, “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....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” (1 Corinthians 15:51-54). Where is this saying written? In Isaiah 25, in the midst of the predictions of the blessing of restored Israel, when the Lord “shall reign in mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and before His ancients gloriously”; then “He will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people, and the vail that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death in victory; and the Lord God shall wipe away tears from off all faces; and the rebuke of His people shall He take away from off all the earth: for the Lord hath spoken it” (Verse 7,8).

Thus it is a plain fact of revelation, that at the time of Israel's restored blessing, and not at a period (perhaps considerably) previous, shall the resurrection take place of “those who are Christ's at His coming”. The Spirit of God has given us His own note of time through the combined testimony of the prophet and the apostle. There can be no coming of the Lord (much more no secret coming) until He appears for the accomplishment of His promises to His ancient people Israel. “When the Lord shall build up Zion, He shall appear in His glory” (Psalm 102:16). Any hope of a previous resurrection must be based, not on Scripture teaching, but upon some thought which has been formed in contradiction to revealed truth.

This portion of Isaiah speaks, a little farther on, of a resurrection at this time: “Thy dead men shall live” [that is, the believing dead of Israel, the Old Testament saints]; “they shall arise my dead body” [this is the literal force of the words; Messiah owns His relation to them; He speaks of them as united to himself]. “Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead” (Isaiah 26:19).

XI. ANALOGY IS NOT NECESSARILY PROOF

When proofs have been asked for the doctrine of the secret advent and secret removal of the Church, certain supposed analogies have been sometimes presented instead, which were thought to bear on the subject. But as analogy is a resemblance of relations, it is needful that the facts should be first known and demonstrated instead of their being merely supposed. It has been asked if the crossing of Jordan by the children of Israel was not a thing known to them only at the time, and not heard of by the Canaanites till afterwards? Whether Elijah is not to be taken as a type of the Church, and Elisha as that of “the Jewish remnant”? Whether the ascension of the Lord from the Mount of Olives, seen by the disciples only, does not intimate a second advent only to be known by the Church? This last consideration, if it had any force, might seem to avoid the expectation of any coming of the Lord in the clouds of heaven in manifested glory. But not only are supposed analogies wholly insufficient to prove facts, but they are shown to be groundless, so soon as they are seen to be in opposition to any demonstrated point. When a truth has been proved from Scripture, then analogies may illustrate it; but they never can be the ground on which an elaborate system of teaching can be based. The teachers of the secret coming have first to show that the Word of God sets forth such a doctrine, and that the Church is not called on to look for the coming of her Saviour in the clouds of heaven, when every eye shall see Him.

A negative endeavour has been made to prove the secret removal of the Church. It has been said, that “in certain Scriptures, which speak of future events, no mention is made of the Church being on earth; therefore, of course, it has been removed in the manner in which we teach”. But in this it is assumed, that persons spoken of in any Scriptures referred to are not the Church, or part of the Church; secondly, the absence of all mention of the Church would not prove that it had been removed by a secret rapture; for, as this secret transaction is not mentioned in Scripture, it is a mere assumption of the point to be proved, to say that a silence respecting the Church at a particular time is a decisive reference to it. [11] We might as well argue, as certain Romanists have done, that when we are told in Acts 12:17, that Peter “went into another place”, he went to Rome to establish his See; asking (as they do), if he did not go to Rome, where else did he go? and, if this cannot be answered, then assuming that it must teach that he then commenced his (supposed) primacy of twenty-five years in that city. [12] To connect a negative fact with a supposition, does not add to the probability of the latter.

Differences of names and designations do not prove differences of classes; and this is especially the case when there is some figurative expression used, or some collective term for a corporate body. Thus, in Ephesians 1:22,23, the Church is Christ's “body”, and, in the same epistle (5:25-32), it is His spouse, the bride for whom He gave himself, “that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that He might present it to himself a glorious Church”. The same epistle speaks of believers as “saints” and “faithful in Christ Jesus” (1:1), and yet the children of God may be equally truly reminded that they are servants of a Master in heaven. (6:8) It is from the assumption that different terms or different figures must denote different bodies of persons, instead of different relations of the same persons, that the opinion has been framed of the Church's exclusion from various Scriptures.

Thus, when the Revelation is said to be given “to show unto His servants things which must shortly come to pass”, it has been said that the term “servants” shows that it is not intended for us, who are not servants, but sons of God, and brethren of Christ. This argument has been used by those who would evade the testimony of this book. But have such never read how the apostles of the Lord use and claim the term servant as pertaining to themselves?

“Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle” (Romans 1:1).

“James, a servant of God, and of the Lord Jesus Christ” (James 1:1).

“Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 1:1). 

“Jude, the servant of Jesus Christ” (Jude 1).

And Christ sent the Revelation itself “unto His servant John” (1:1); who also is addressed by the angel, “I am thy fellow-servant” (Revelation 22:9).

Whoever, then, thinks of taking some essentially higher standing than that of those who in privilege are sons, but who can rejoice in being also servants, shows that his thoughts on this subject have not been formed from the teaching of the Word of God.

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[11] See Appendix B.

[12] When questions were raised in the Jewish schools, by the Sadducean party apparently, as to where Daniel was when his companions refused to worship the image of Nebuchadnezzar and were, in consequence, cast into the burning fiery furnace, a reply was given (on the principle, apparently, of answering a fool according to his folly), "He was sent to Alexandria to purchase swine"; when the questioners treated this as wholly irrelevant, they were told to prove the negative, and if they could not show to what other place he was gone, to admit that he had been sent to Alexandria.

X. THE JEWISH “WASTEPAPER BASKET”

But if things are so, to whom would the Scriptures apply which give warning of perilous times? To whom could signs be given? This consideration has led to the Jewish interpretation of Scripture. Whatever has been felt to be a difficulty has been set aside by saying that it is “Jewish”; and that one word has been deemed to be quite enough to show that it has nothing to do with the Church. On this principle the application of very much of the New Testament has been avoided. If Jewish circumstances of any kind are found in a passage, or if the persons addressed were Jews by nation, these particulars have been relied on as showing that it does not apply to the Church. But it must ever be borne in mind that, however differing in external circumstances, the Church is one body, dwelt in by one Spirit: the Jew and the Gentile, alike brought near to God by the blood of Christ, are one in Him; so that Jewish circumstances or Gentile circumstances do not affect the essential unity. The apostles were all of them Jews; nevertheless, it is on the twelve stones inscribed with their twelve names that the heavenly city is builded. It is quite true that there are Scriptures which treat simply of hopes and promises for Israel; these, too, shall be accomplished fully; but the acknowledgment that some portions of Holy Writ are such, does not at all warrant the avoidance of the force of any part of the Christian Scriptures. It is easy to see who are addressed--whenever the Lord or an inspired apostle speaks to believers, whether Jews or Gentiles, they are treated as part of the one Church. There are in the New Testament personal addresses, corporate addresses, and teaching which might have to do with mere temporary or local circumstances. Just so do we find in the Pentateuch directions to Moses as an individual, precepts for guidance while in the desert, and ordinances to be obeyed in the land. There is no difficulty in distinguishing these things, unless, indeed, we choose to raise it for ourselves.

If the application of the Jewish theory of interpretation of definite New Testament prophecies be carefully examined, it will be found to refute itself; for it will give to Jews as Jews what most certainly belongs to the Church of Christ, and it will assume that Jews in their unbelief are found using the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ as a teacher. Thus, when Matthew 24 has been used as teaching how we are to expect the Lord, it has been repeatedly said that it is entirely “Jewish”. Let this be granted. But what then? Who are to use it, or to take heed to its warnings? No one can acknowledge Jesus there as a teacher without owning Him as the Christ: “Many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ, and shall deceive many” (Verse 5). The persons who will use the warnings, and who will expect the manifest appearing of Christ, as here spoken of, must be believers in His divine mission, and thus their profession must simply be that of believers in His name; in other words, they must be a part of the Church of the first-born, to which all belong who now accept the Lord Jesus as He is set forth by God.

An undefined term becomes an easy mode of explaining away distinct statements which cannot be reconciled to a theory; because in this manner no meaning whatever is assigned to the passages whose testimony has to be avoided. This has been the case with the word “Jewish” in connection with the Scriptures which teach the manifest appearing of the Lord in glory. In this manner the three first Gospels have been called Jewish, whenever any portion of their teaching was felt as a difficulty. So, too, the Epistle to the Hebrews, and those of James and Peter.

And yet how very much of the most blessed teaching for the Church is contained in these so-called Jewish portions of the New Testament.

In order to avoid applications of certain Scriptures to us, doctrines have been called Jewish also: thus it has been said that Covenant, Priesthood, and Mediation, are altogether Jewish. To this it has been added that the Church, “the body of Christ”, stands altogether above everything of the kind; even “above dispensation” (whatever this may mean). It would have been difficult to suppose that these opinions would have found any acceptance, if such were not the known fact. What if the expression the New Testament, or Covenant, stands in opposition to the Old Covenant with Israel? It does not make the New Covenant a merely Jewish thing. Just as the Lord Jesus said the night before He suffered, “This is my blood of the New Testament which is shed for many for the remission of sins” (Matthew 26:28); so, also, did the Apostle Paul teach as parts of His words, and as applied to converted Gentiles, “This cup is the New Testament in my blood” (1 Corinthians 11:25). [9] We might as well say that “the remission of sins” is Jewish, and that the shedding of the blood of Christ is Jewish: we might as well affirm that these have no relation to us, as explain away Covenant and its connected truths. [10]

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[9] I have heard it maintained that the Lord's Supper, as instituted and as recorded in the Gospels, is so simply “Jewish”, that the command, “This do in remembrance of me”, would be no warrant to us for observing it, if the Apostle Paul had not received of the Lord that which also he delivered to the Corinthians, and to other Churches gathered from among the Gentiles! What is this but building up a new wall of partition against believers who are Jews by nature?

[10] See Appendix A