The Conditionalist Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 1

IV. Five Basic Considerations Involved

1. THREE CONSECUTIVE STATES IMPRESSIVELY PORTRAYED

Paul here impressively describes three different consecutive states, or conditions, of man: (1) The present earthly life; (2) the period of death, or intermediate state; and (3) the eternal future state, when he shall have put on Immortality. (See the illustrative diagram on the three states, on page 341.) These states he sets forth under the figure of a temporary “tent,” in contrast with an “abiding house”—which he later changed to the simile of “clothing,” or covering. This transitory present life was wasting away under the incessant sufferings he had endured. It is a life in which he groans and is burdened. This body, however, was soon to be “dissolved,” like a worn-out tent that is laid aside. CFF1 331.1

But Paul’s mind leaps forward from the present, transitory existence to the eternal heavenly status of things to come. He sees a glorious change—the blessed hope of exchanging his frail earthly “tent” for a new and eternal “house,” a “mansion which is of heaven”—by which he refers to his glorious resurrection body to come, in likeness to that of his Lord’s. And he is satisfied. CFF1 331.2

2. SHRINKS FROM BEING UNCLOTHED IN DEATH

When he thinks of the time when his present “tent” must be taken down, or dissolved, he shrinks from the thought of being without tent, or covering—for here he changes the figure to that of “clothing.” What was before a “tent” is now “being clothed.” And he distinctly states that he does not desire to be “unclothed,” or “naked.” He would much rather be “overdraped” with the coming immortality than to be denuded of the mortal body. “Not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life” (2 Corinthians 5:4). CFF1 331.3

The “unclothed” state is manifestly that of death (1 Corinthians 15:37)—the “bare [gumnon, “naked”] grain,” planted in the ground, in gravedom, with a view to resurrection. And the “clothed upon” condition is obviously the resurrection or translation life, in which we shall have “put on” Immortality. CFF1 331.4

3. LONGS FOR ETERNAL STATE

In 2 Corinthians 5:1, Paul had depicted death as the dissolving of our “earthly house.” He is speaking not merely of the body but of our entire being. Death is the dissolution of our entire being. It is also to be emphasized that Paul is not speaking of the consequences of death to a special part of our being, but of the state of death in contrast with the future state of eternal life, for which he earnestly longs. And this future life is in contrast with the condition called, from its transitoriness, a “tabernacle,” in contrast with the “house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens” (2 Corinthians 5:1). CFF1 332.1

5. DEATH NOT A POINT OF TIME, BUT A PERIOD

The clue to this entire passage clearly lies in what is meant by, and involved in, that interim state of death which the apostle calls the dissolution of “our earthly house.” Popular theology presupposes “death” to be a momentary act—the departure of the soul from the body, with instant entrance into the presence of Jesus. Such a view assumes the act of dying to be both the beginning and the end of death. But in inspired Scripture the act of dying is only the entrance into the state of death, which lasts from the moment one closes his eyes in the death-sleep to the moment he awakens in the resurrection. It is therefore not a point of time but a period—the entire period during which the person is enfolded in the embrace of gravedom. This is Paul’s teaching in 1 Corinthians 15:54, 55. CFF1 333.1

The reign of death remains unbroken during this entire period of death. It is undeniably the period during which “our earthly house of this tabernacle” is dissolved. This cannot be overemphasized. We repeat: So far from contemplating merely the moment a person dies, Paul is speaking of the entire time one is dead. The act of dying, therefore, so far from being the termination of death, is only the entrance under the dominion of death. This, then, is established: At death our “earthly house of this tabernacle” is “dissolved,” and continues in its state of dissolution until the Lord wakes us up from the deathsleep for the restoration of life and the bestowal of Immortality at His second advent. CFF1 333.2

6. INTERIM DEATH STATE VS. ETERNAL RESURRECTION STATE

With this point established we are freed from a number of perplexities in this passage. Paul is not here contrasting any state of the soul with that of the body. He is not contrasting the act of dying with that of the person in some other state or condition. The whole intermediate state is embraced in the idea of the “dissolution” of the “earthly house.” No, Paul is here contrasting the temporary interim death state with the eternal resurrection state. CFF1 333.3

He is contrasting the present life, verging toward dissolution—and after a few years of dissolution and remaining in this state of dissolution until the resurrection—with the glorious, endless life which will begin when Christ raises His people, and which life will continue without end forever. This is the “building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens” (2 Corinthians 5:1). CFF1 334.1

On no theory could the intermediate death state be said to be “eternal in the heavens.” The soul of the believer does not go to Heaven at death—an idea that was regarded as a heresy by the primitive church, as attested by Justin Martyr and Irenaeus. ³ CFF1 334.2

7. SIGNIFICANCE OF TERM “NOT MADE WITH HANDS.”

The expression, “not made with hands” (acheiropoietos), is not a cursory or merely routine phrase. It is fraught with meaning, and is historic in intent. This is by no means Paul’s first use of the term. He had already used it three or four years prior in his oration on Mars’ Hill, at Athens, in which he declared: “God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands” (Acts 17:24). CFF1 334.3

And again in his Epistle to the Hebrews (c. A.D. 53) Paul is even more explicit: CFF1 334.4

“For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us” (Hebrews 9:24). CFF1 334.5

However, the expression is more than Pauline. In his great apology, in answering the accusation of blasphemy, Stephen likewise used the expression in “the most High dwelleth not in temples made with hands” (Acts 7:48). It clearly has to do with God and heavenly things. Yet even that is not the origin. It stems back to Christ Himself. CFF1 334.6

At the very outset of His public ministry, when Christ had purged the Temple from its desecraters, and had driven out the money-changers and merchandisers in the only recorded show of force in His life on earth, the Jews immediately challenged His authority for such an unprecedented act, and demanded a “sign” of His right and power to meddle in Temple affairs. Then He answered cryptically, and said, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up” (John 2:19). But they countered by asserting that the Herodian temple was forty-six years in building, and asked scornfully: “Wilt thou rear it up in three days? But he spake of the temple of his body” (John 2:20, 21). CFF1 335.1

That was the real meaning. His resurrection would be the ultimate proof of His claims and the “sign” of His deity. But the significance of this utterance was, at the time, lost upon all—including the disciples. However, after Christ’s resurrection from the dead, the disciples remembered it vividly—and then understood its meaning (John 2:22). And after the Temple episode the Jews again demanded a “sign” from Christ (Matthew 12:38). But He upbraided them, and said: CFF1 335.2

“An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas: for as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days ⁴ and three nights in the heart of the earth” (Matthew 12:39, 40). CFF1 335.3

His meaning then began to unfold to those who would understand. CFF1 335.4

8. EXEMPLIFIED IN CHRIST’S NATURAL AND RESURRECTION BODY

This differentiation between “made with hands” and “made without hands” is further emphasized in the experience of Christ at His trial in the palace of the high priest. Then it was that the Pharisees’ witnesses said: CFF1 335.5

“We heard him say, I will destroy this temple that is made with hands, and within three days I will build another made without hands [acheiropoietos]” (Mark 14:58). CFF1 336.1

That is highly significant. They spoke more wisely than they knew. Finally, at Calvary, when Christ hung in anguish on the cross— CFF1 336.2

“they that passed by railed on him [“reviled”—Matthew 27:39], wagging their heads, and saying, Ah, thou that destroyest the temple, and buildest it in three days, save thyself, and come down from the cross” (Mark 15:29, 30; see Matthew 27:40). CFF1 336.3

But He was fulfilling a predetermined plan. He died that we, too, might have resurrection bodies “not made with hands.” He would, and did, appear in His glorified resurrection body on the third day, according to prediction. Christ’s body was placed in the tomb as a “natural body.” It came forth on the specified third day as a “spiritual body.” And in similar fashion we, too, shall “bear the image of the heavenly” (1 Corinthians 15:49), the image of the “second man,” the “Lord from heaven” (1 Corinthians 15:47; cf. Romans 8:29). Our earthly bodies will then be “fashioned like unto his glorious body” (Philippians 3:21) “made without hands.” Or as John says, “We know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him” (1 John 3:2). CFF1 336.4

That is what Paul meant. Or, as he phrased it to the Colossians: “When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory” (Colossians 3:4). CFF1 336.5

That is the glorified body we are destined to receive, “made without hands,” formed by the creative power of God, in contrast with these earthly, corruptible, inglorious bodies, “made with hands,” through human generation. CFF1 336.6

9. EARTHLY TABERNACLE TEMPORARY; HEAVENLY TEMPLE ETERNAL

In discussing what happens to the body, Paul illustrates it by this figure of the temporary wilderness tabernacle-tent of old, when God commanded Moses to build for Israel a “tent for the congregation,” made after the pattern of the original temple, eternal in the heavens, shown to Moses in the mount (Exodus 25:40). This was so important that it is thrice referred to in the New Testament. CFF1 336.7

For the vast majority of the saints there will be a lapse of time between the moment of death and the time when Christ, having returned with His retinue of holy angels, shall make our mortal bodies like unto His own glorious body, by His own omnipotent, creative power. The actual lapse of time is not equally long for all—the longest being for the patriarchs before the Flood, the shortest for those dying just before the Second Advent. CFF1 337.1

But when the believer lies down in death, Paradise is just one act away—at the resurrection at the Advent. Between death and the resurrection would seem a briefer time than for an angel to wing his way from earth to Heaven. And the change will seem to take but a moment—a twinkling of an eye. CFF1 338.1

And some will not die. Their mortal bodies will be “changed” without experiencing death, through translation into glorified body form (1 Corinthians 15; 1 Thessalonians 4). This tremendous, final, supernatural act is what Paul calls being “clothed upon,” after having been “unclothed” in the death state. This is the main point of the passage. CFF1 338.2

10. SIMULTANEOUS REUNION AND REWARD AT CHRIST’S RETURN

The whole passage treats on, and is written in, the spirit of the resurrection, with which it actually begins: “Knowing that he which raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise up us also by Jesus” (2 Corinthians 4:14). CFF1 338.3

The comfort Paul offered the bereaved Christians at Thessalonica was not that their loved ones who had died in Christ would be immediately with Him in conscious joy. He does not offer happiness in a disembodied state. Rather, they would be caught up together with them to meet our Lord upon His return. That would be the moment of glad reunion (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18). Paul’s eye was always upon Christ’s future coming, as the day of (1) reward and (2) reunion. Thus he writes: “What is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming?” (1 Thessalonians 2:19). CFF1 338.4

It will be conceded that if man had never sinned he would have reached the eternal state or condition without passing through the experience of death. Then the notion of an inner, immortal soul would never have come into being. That was the aftermath of the temptation and the Fall. It was, in fact, the second falsehood invented by the archdeceiver to sustain the first lie—“Ye shall not surely die” (Genesis 3:4). When man should fall in death, the original lie would be inconcealably apparent, unless he could be persuaded that there is some invisible medium or entity (soul or spirit) through which he continues to live. Hence, such a theory was imperative, and was introduced into and through paganism, and became widely believed. CFF1 338.5