The Conditionalist Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 1

III. Paul’s Baffling Dilemma-“Life” or “Death”

1. CHRIST “MAGNIFIED” BY EITHER LIFE OR DEATH

Paul was “in a strait” (sunechomai, “being pressed”) “betwixt” the two alternatives of “to live,” or “to die.” “For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain,” he wrote. In the context Paul had just said that Christ would be “magnified in my body, whether it be by life, or by death.” So, if Paul lived, Christ would be “magnified” (Philippians 1:20), and the church profited (Philippians 1:24). If he died, Christ would still be “magnified” (Philippians 1:20), and it would still be “gain” to Christ. CFF1 359.3

Paul had been beaten eight times and stoned once. He had been in perils of waters, robbers, the Jews, false Christians, the heathen, perils in the city, the wilderness, and on the sea, and had been times innumerable in weariness, pain, sickness, hunger, thirst, cold, and nakedness (2 Corinthians 11:23-27). He had a desire to end this mortal pilgrimage. He could well say that to die is “gain,” for he would then be at rest. But the cause of God and his sympathetic heart drew him to remain here in labor if acquitted. CFF1 360.1

On the other hand, his own weariness and sufferings were an urge for rest in the sleep of death. He was in a quandary. These strong pulls were just about balanced, though he did think it more needful for him to remain to give the benefit of his counsel and labors to the church. Thus “gain” to the cause of Christ would come by martyrdom, and there would be gain to himself as a martyr through the resurrection, for in his affliction any form of death would be a release. Thus he reasoned. CFF1 360.2

2. INVOLVEMENTS AND ADVANTAGES OF DEATH

To Paul death was a state of unconsciousness for the sleeper, as he so often and clearly taught, with no conscious lapse of time between death and the resurrection. He knew that, after he had lost consciousness in death, the next moment of awareness would be the hearing of the voice of the returning Christ, calling him to arise and be with his Lord forever. The first face he would look upon would be that of his beloved Life-giver. Thus he could say, “For me ... to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). But how could death be “gain” if it reduced him to a state of unconsciousness? Just as it would be to Job, who entreated, “O that thou wouldest hide me in the grave” (Job 14:13). CFF1 360.3

The intervening period between death and the return of the Lord would, for the sleeper, be annihilated, and the glories of the eternal world, through the resurrection, would open instantly, as it were, upon his view. The waiting period, however long, is an utter blank—seemingly but a moment of time, like the twinkling of an eye. The very moment he would regain consciousness, upon the call of the Life-giver, he would be in the presence of Christ. So he need not actually wait a single conscious moment, for, we repeat, those who are sound asleep have no awareness of the passing of time. CFF1 360.4

3. CHRIST WILL CALL FORTH FROM DUSTY BEDS

The Lord Jesus Christ Himself went down into death. But it was not the prospect of death that filled Him with joy—except as He was fulfilling His Father’s will and providing salvation for man. His joy was over the fact that God would not leave His soul in she’ol (the grave) nor suffer His “Holy One to see corruption” (Psalm 16:9, 10). CFF1 361.1

Christ “passed into the heavens” (Hebrews 4:14), and now ministers for us in the presence of the Father (Romans 7:23-27). But that was through the designated resurrection and ascension provision. On the contrary, the worthies of old passed into the earth, the grave, and are dependent upon the living Son of God to come forth from the heavens to call them from their graves (John 5:28, 29). Until then they have no share in “any thing that is done under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 9:6), for “the dead know not any thing” (Ecclesiastes 9:5), and there is no “knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest” (Ecclesiastes 9:10). That was the Scripture dictum of Paul’s day—the Old Testament. CFF1 361.2

4. ONLY TWO DESIGNATED WAYS TO GLORY

The intermediate state has been arbitrarily injected into this passage, whereas the text is totally silent on the condition of the dead. That is not the point. Surely, if all the prophets and apostles, and saints and martyrs were already in Heaven, death would indeed be more desirable—if that were the pathway to Heaven. CFF1 361.3

It is commonly assumed by the Immortal-Soulist that one goes into the presence of Christ immediately upon death. But the text states nothing of the kind. And a whole battery of other texts affirm the contrary fact that we gain immortality and go into His presence only at the Second Advent and the concurrent resurrection. CFF1 361.4

Entrance into Christ’s presence is therefore a future event, to be experienced simultaneously by all saints alike—except for those privileged few who have a prior special resurrection (like Moses), or special translation (like Elijah), both of whom appeared with Christ on the Mount of Transfiguration. But in either case, it is still only by resurrection or translation. Clearly, then, it is by resurrection or translation, there being no other way of going to be “with Christ” (John 5:21, 29; 1 Thessalonians 4:17). Paul does not deny or contradict his own testimony. CFF1 362.1

5. PAUL’S MULTIPLE TESTIMONY AS TO “WHEN.”

The notion that during the state of death believers are “with Christ” in a state of life in Heaven, involves an inescapable denial of one of the cardinal doctrines of Scripture—the sleep of all the dead, in gravedom. Further, if the deceased saints were already with Christ in glory, and were able to see Him “as he is,” they would already have been changed into the “likeness” of Christ (1 John 3:2). But here is the timing for that change according to Scripture: “But we know that, when he [Christ] shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2). CFF1 362.2

It would follow that, on the premise of the Immortal-Soulist, the saints would already possess the fullest transformation that they could ever look for and obtain, and thus long anticipate Christ’s actual personal advent. But such a view brings a denial of an antecedent resurrection uniformly taught by Paul. Either that, or it implies that the resurrection occurs at death, and is already past (2 Timothy 2:18), which Paul likewise condemned as a heresy. CFF1 362.3

Paul repeatedly went on record as to when the Christian goes to be with his Lord. Here is the Pauline testimony. It is an eight-strand cable of evidence—so strong that it cannot be broken: CFF1 362.4

We are told there will be “fulness of joy” in Christ’s presence (Psalm 16:11). But those who are fallen asleep are not yet enjoying that presence. If they were, the resurrection would be unnecessary. And as stated, Paul makes all life beyond the grave depend on resurrection. Thus the saints of old were “tortured, not accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection” (Hebrews 11:35). Again, “if there be no resurrection of the dead,” “then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished” (1 Corinthians 15:13, 18). They are consequently not in Heaven. And once more, the sleeping saints of the ages do not go to Jesus before the saints living at the time of the Advent (1 Thessalonians 4:14-17). CFF1 362.5

Therefore it is not at death but at the resurrection of the dead that the saints will be ushered into the presence of Christ. And for this Christ must first return from Heaven. It is only when He comes again that He will receive us unto Himself (John 14:3). Again, “when Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory” (Colossians 3:4). Paul told the Romans that he, with them, awaited “the redemption of our body” (Romans 8:23). This is the glorious “change” about which Paul wrote to the Philippians, when he said: “A Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: who shall fashion anew the body of our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the body of his glory” (Philippians 3:20, 21, A.R.V.). CFF1 362.6

That occurs only at the Second Advent (1 Corinthians 15:51, 54). CFF1 362.7