GOD’S WORD FOR OCTOBER 28 ~ ~ Revelation 20:6 ~ ~ “Blessed and holy is the one who has a part in the first resurrection; over these the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and will reign with Him for a thousand years.”
From the book, We Shall See God, with Charles Spurgeon and Randy Alcorn. Today’s chapter is “The Resurrection of God’s Children” – Part one – Charles Spurgeon
The redemption we look forward to is not one dimensional, nor is it surface level. Our resurrection will be like Christ’s, with the full flourishing of bodies and spirits. We will experience at last what God intended for us all along.
I think some ministers would do far more for the profit of God’s people if they would preach more about the first coming of Christ and less about the second. But I have chosen this topic because I believe it has practical bearings and may be useful, instructive, and rousing to us all. I find that the most earnest of the Puritan preachers did not resist dwelling upon this mysterious subject. I turn to Charnock, and his discussion upon the unchanging nature of God. He does not hesitate to speak of the fiery destruction of the world, of the millennial reign, and of the new heavens and new earth.
And consider John Bunyan, – plain, honest John, who preached so simply that a child could comprehend him and was certainly never guilty of having written upon his forehead the word “mystery.” He, too, speaks of the coming of Christ and of the glories which shall follow and uses this doctrine as a stimulus to the saints and as a warning to the unsaved. I do not think, therefore, I need tremble very much if the charge should be brought against me of bringing before you an unprofitable subject. It shall profit if God shall bless the word, and if it is God’s word, we may expect His blessing if we preach it all. But He will withdraw it if we refrain from teaching any part of his counsel because in our pretended wisdom we fancy that it would not have practical effect.
Turn to the first letter to the Thessalonians: “We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep. For this we declare to you by the word from the Lord, that we which are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. (1Thes 4:13-17)
Here is nothing said whatever about the resurrection of the wicked. It is only stated that the dead in Christ shall rise first. The apostle Paul is evidently speaking of the first resurrection. And since we know that the first resurrection implies a second, and since we know that the wicked dead are to rise as well as the righteous dead, we draw the conclusion that the wicked dead shall rise at the second resurrection, after the interval between the two resurrections shall have been accomplished.
Everyone will rise – no orthodox Christian doubts that. The doctrine of a general resurrection is received by all the Christian church. What, then is this resurrection after which Paul is exerting himself, if by any means he might attain unto it? It could not be the general resurrection. He would attain to that however he might live. It must be some superior resurrection of which only those shall be partakers who have known Christ and the power of His resurrection, having become like Him in His death. I think you cannot interpret his passage, or give it any force of meaning, without admitting that there is to be a prior resurrection of the just before the resurrection of the unjust.
In Chapter 14 of the gospel of Luke, in verses 13-14, you have a promise made to those who, when they host a feast, do not do it with the intention of getting anything in return. “When you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.”
I would not insist upon it that this would prove that the just rose at a different time, but still there is to be a resurrection of the just, and on the other hand, there is to be a resurrection of the unjust. And the time of reward for the righteous is to be the resurrection of the just, which is spoken of as being a particular period.
There is a passage in Hebrews where the apostle, speaking of the trials of the godly and their noble endurance, speaks of them as “refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life” (11:35). the better life is not in the after results of Resurrection, but in the Resurrection itself. How then could it be a better resurrection of the saint and the resurrection of the sinner? Let the one be a resurrection of splendor, let the other be a resurrection of gloom and horror, and let there be a marked division between the two. As it was in the beginning, it may even be to the end – the Lord has put a difference between him who fears God and him who fears him not.
I have no purpose to serve except to make the Scripture as plain to you as possible. And I say it yet again: I have not the shadow of a doubt in my own soul that these passages teach us that there shall first of all be a resurrection concerning which it shall be said: “Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection! Over such the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with Him for a thousand years.” (Revelation 20:6)
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1Corinthians 15:58
Therefore, my beloved brothers and sisters, be firm, immovable, always excelling in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.
1Corinthians 15:20
But the fact is, Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who are asleep.
The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were completed. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is the one who has a part in the first resurrection; over these the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and will reign with Him for a thousand years.
that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; if somehow I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.
Rev 3:21 To him that overcomes will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne.
Rev 3:5 He that overcomes, the same shall be clothed in a white robe; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels.