THE
March, 1939
K I N G ' S B U S I N E S S
The Five Mysteries of the Resurrection
By R O Y L LAUR IN * Los Angeles, California
the hundredweight of the embalming myrrh and aloes were left in the shape of a phys ical form, but they were empty. They were not crushed or unwrapped by angels. But the body of the Lord Jesus Christ had been changed by. the resurrection, and the undis turbed graveclothes were an evidence that the body Christ possessed was not the same body but a changed body. In fact, it was changed from a terrestrial body to a celes tial body, having certain properties differ ent from those of an ordinary human body. There are three proofs of this change: 1. The vanishing Person (Lk. 24:31). 2. The invisible entrance (John 20:19). 3. The visible ascension (Acts 1:9). They crucified Jesus as "The King of the Jews,” but we must not lose sight of the fact that He was our High Priest. Nor must we lose sight of the further fact that the redemption which was “finished” on the cross must be presented in the presence of God by the credentials of the atoning blood. On the Day of Atonement, which had been solemnized for centuries and which Christ in His crucifixion was finally fulfill ing, the Hebrew high priest went behind the veil of the tabernacle three times. First, he entered with coals and incense that the sacred precinct might be filled with the cloud of incense that he might not see God and die. Second, he went in with the blood of his own sin offering. Third, he entered with the blood of a sin offering for the people. Now bear in mind that when Christ died on the cross, the veil in the temple was “rent in twain”—there was thereafter no holy place on earth. Any entering beyond the veil and presentation of blood which Christ would make must be in heaven. Re member also that He needed only to make one appearance. Not the first with coals and incense. He was God and could see God. Not with blood for His own sins. He was sinless and needed no cleansing. But He did need to enter the heavenly sanctu ary with the blood of the sin offering for all the world. But when? It occurred some time after His resurrection and before His Olivet ascension. How do we know? There are three apparently contradictory or confusing statements in Scripture that III. The Mystery of the High-Priestly Ascension of our Lord.
There is a necessary distinction that must be observed at this point Those who teach annihilation claim that the only im mortal person was Jesus Christ, and they quote 1 Timothy 6:16: “Who only hath immortality." You will find that every men tion of immortality associated with Jesus means deathlessness and incorruption. He accomplished His own death by voluntarily surrendering life. Disease could not kill Him; accident could not kill Him. In this sense, He “only hath immortality." And in that sense every believer will also have the same immortality when "this mortal shall have put on immortality” (1 Cor. 15:54). But it is an indisputable fact from nature and from Scripture that there is im mortality in all men which is the quality of an endless existence. There is in the world that “die-as-a-dog philosophy” which is bom of materialism. But there is instinctive in the human race the idea that death is only a change in life and not the end o f life. The scientist, who of all men should most believe in God, is too often a materialist and a disbeliever in the resurrection of Jesus. But notwithstand ing that fact, reputable science, while it cannot put forth its magic hands into the invisible future and draw forth certain demonstrable exhibits of the other life, pre sents us with almost innumerable examples and analogies which make necessary a be lief in the fact that death is only a change in life and not the end of life. In the Bible, death is certainly not an event that ends life. It has associated with it a resurrection which is twofold: “Some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt” (Dan. 12:2). Death is an endless existence, and the quality of that endless existence is determined by the kind of resurrection we pass through. &?> II. The Mystery of the Changed Body of our Lord. From the record of John 20:2-8 we dis cover two things: First, we learn that the body of Jesus was not found in His tomb: “They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre, and we know not where they have laid him” (v. 2 ). Second, we find that the body of Jesus was profoundly changed (vs. 5-7). The evidence of the change is found in the graveclothes. The linen clothes in which were innerwrapped
I F YOU set out to collect all the the ological writings, dogmas, creeds, and explanations, you would have almost enough to rival Pike’s Peak! As necessary and as proper- as dogmas and doctrines are to the Christian faith, we are brought once more at Easter to remember that the Chris tian faith is not founded upon a dogma, that is, a doctrine or a teaching or an idea, but a fact—and that fact is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. He Himself is the Christian faith, and when an individual becomes a Christian, that one is required to believe the fact of the resurrection—‘‘If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved” (Rom. 10:9). W e have before us in the resurrection not only the world’s most remarkable fact but the world’s most certain fact as well. But there is a strange thing about this fact —it is surrounded with mystery. You do not usually associate mystery with facts, but this fact is all the more enhanced be cause it is surrounded with the halo of mystery. It is thus seen to be divine, super natural, and miraculous. And it has to be, for a supernatural faith, such as the Chris tian faith is, could not be founded upon or started from a natural fact. It was born in the atmosphere it still possesses, that of the divine. There are at least five mysteries associ ated with the resurrection: &T> I. The Mystery of Immortality. Immortality is the quality of endless ex istence, not endless physical life as we know it. * Vice-President o f the Bible Institute o f Los Angeles and Associate Pastor o f the
Church o f the Open Door. Photographs by H. Armstrong Boberts.
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