T H E K I N G ' S B U S I N E S S
March, 1939
93
¿XT' V. The Mystery of the Believer's j Resurrection. What does the resurrection mean to you? Is it a [act or a hope? It should be both. The fact is that which happened nineteen centuries ago. The hope is in the fact. For if Christ is risen, then remember that being risen, He is become “the firstfruits of them that slept” (1 Cor. 15:20). And that means that He, the risen One, is the Guarantee of our own coming resurrection. Now, if this is not true, then the conclu sion of the whole Easter pageantry is this: "If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable” (1 Cor. 15:19). W e would then be no better than the Brahman. When a Brahman is dying, though he may have prayed ten hours daily, yet all that his friends can do is to clasp his hands about the tail of a cow. The man cries in hopelessness, "Where am I going?” But contrast the Christian, one “having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ” (Phil. 1:23). He recognizes that at death he will be "absent from the body, . . . present with the Lord” (2 Cor. 5:8 ). This hope is a mystery: “W e shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed" (1 Cor. 15:51). It is the change of the resur rection when the dead shall be raised in corruptible, when this corruptible body shall put on incorruption and this mortal body shall put on immortality. This change is a mystery. I do not profess to under stand its biochemistry or its biophysics. I cannot fathom it, but I can believe it be cause it has been demonstrated in an event nineteen centuries old which bears that many centuries of proof and certainty in evidences of the power of the risen Christ. The event of that fact is the proof of my hope, mysterious as it is, but it is the pat tern as well as the proof, for Christ “shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body” (Phil, 3:21 ). As He is, so shall I be, and I shall become what He now is. Ignoring or rejecting this view, men and women are willing to spend fabulous sums in eccentric enterprises. They are willing to subscribe themselves to all sorts of schemes and ideas. They are willing to throw their lives away in chasing bubbles and playing with the toys of time that break and vanish beneath their hands. They worship their own bodies and saturate them with delights and then, as in the paganism of Egypt, associate an immortality with this corruptible flesh. There are two societies in this country, the American Rocket Society, a national organization, and the Cleveland Rocket So ciety, sponsored by Edward L, Hanna, the grandson of Mark Hanna. It is reported that Hanna has set aside a trust fund of $20,000 to provide for the ultimate burial of himself and his wife on the moon, pro vided they are unable to make the trip while they are alive. The trust fund, so the story goes, is to operate when and if the journey ever becomes possible in the future. O fools! of what moment is it whether the body lies on the moon or Saturn or this earth? What about the soul? The destiny of every soul is wrapped up in its relation ship to Jesus Christ. "He that hath the Son hath life."
can be related to this High-Priestly act of Christ: 1. ‘‘Touch me not; for I am not yet as cended to my Father” (John 20:17). 2. "And they came and held him by the feet” (Matt. 28:9). 3. “Handle me, and see” (Lk. 24:39). There is no discrepancy here if we ac cept the interpretation that Christ’s High-
Priestly ascension to the heavenly sanctu ary occurred between the above command in John 20:17 and the statement in Mat thew 28:9. IV. The Mystery of the Disciples' Un belief and Questions. Though the resurrection is the event up on which the Christian faith is founded as the most essential reason for faith, and though this event was justly calculated to produce faith, at least in the disciples, it brought out flagrant unbelief instead. If you will search the resurrection ac counts in the Gospels, you will see the dis ciples’ unbelief in great prominence: Mark 16:10: "As they mourned and wept.” There was no happy expectation but a mournful admission of disaster. Mark 16:11: “And they, when they had heard that he was alive, and had been seen of her, believed not." They showed no disposition to accept the testimony of one of the women of their own company. Mark 16:13: ‘‘And they [two disciples] went and told it unto the residue: neither believed they them.” Here was evidence from another source, but it met the same unbelieving reception. Luke 24:11: “And their [the women's] words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not.” This was not mere casual disbelief but deep unbelief. The women’s testimony was received as nothing more than town gossip. In the face of what the disciples had heard and seen, their attitude is one of the deepest mysteries of the resurrection. The world was not expected to believe it, but surely the disciples ought to have accepted it, especially in the face of the fact that be fore His death Jesus had told them of His resurrection and had arranged a meeting place. He had stated it specifically: “But after I am risen again, I will go before you into Galilee” (Matt. 26:32). If there is any explanation of their unbelief, it will be found in Jesus’ words to the two disciples on the Emmaus road: “O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken” (Lk. 24:25). Modern unbelief still treats the resurrec tion as “idle tales,” as the gossip of super stition. It loves to observe Easter as a drama of mythology or the type of a beau tiful idea. In this day of scientific skepti cism, we must acquaint ourselves with the simple elements of the resurrection as the basis of our personal Christianity and of the Christian faith at large, and we must remember that the Lord Jesus’ explanation of unbelief still holds good—“O fools, and slow of heart.” Just how and when did the disciples come to believe in the resurrection? Certain events of the resurrection day epitomize the resur rection revelation: 1. When He “took bread, and blessed it, and brake, and gave to them” (Lk. 24:30), they recognized the Person. 2. When He said: “Behold my hands and my feet" (cf. Lk. 24:36-40), they recog nized the cross. 3. When He “opened . . . their under standing, that they might understand the Scriptures" (Lk. 24:45), they accepted the Word.
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