The Place of the Resurrection of Jesus in the Theology of the New Testament
G. B. Johnson. 2 Timothy 2:8 Remember that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel: The resurrection was far more than any mere sign, though so unique and remarkable. Like the miracles of Christ, only in a still profounder measure, it was in itself a display of mercy — an instrument of His mighty and beneficent mediation. When the apostles taught it they not only bore witness, but they preached a "gospel"; they not only announced a wonderful fact, but they presented that fact to men as in itself at the same time a measure of Divine grace. Apart from the resurrection of Christ you could not construct the faith, impart the solace, urge the appeal, or sway the inspiration of Christianity. It is not simply that there would be no sign, but there would be no power. It is, so to speak, the blood "which is the life," the blood that circulates through every vein to every limb and member of the Christian system. This is the fact I want to impress in my present discourse. Perhaps it will surprise you to hear my full belief that, but for the resurrection, you would have had in your hands no such exposition as you now possess of who and what Christ was and did for men. Christ Himself did not write any book about His life; not a line. How, then, came we to know what we do about Him? Right down to the end of His life, to the end of the Gospels, the disciples remained strangely ignorant of the great work their Master came to achieve. Dull, ignorant, confused, bewildered, they were the last men in the world to take up a forlorn cause, redeem it, and carry it to triumph. Contrast with this state of mind the speech and conduct of those self-same men in the stirring scenes with which the Acts acquaint us. You may search all literature, I believe, and you will not find a greater contrast. How did this happen? The only book that gives the history lets us into the secret. I claim, then, on the authority of this only history, to say that but for the resurrection of Jesus we had had no portraiture of Christ, no Gospels, no Acts, no Epistles, setting Him forth to the world for its salvation and joy. No other writers of the age have depicted Him; and these who have all refer their knowledge and appreciation to the illumination of that Spirit whom He sent on His exaltation to heaven. Again. It is the constant representation of the writers of the New Testament that Christ offered Himself in some way as a sacrifice for sin, and that that offering was presented in His death. But what had that sacrifice been without Christ's revival from death? With the greatest force does the letter to the Romans teach us, "He was delivered for our offences, and raised again for our justification." Paul does not hesitate to declare that apart from it there is no pardon: "If Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins." Another point of our "precious faith" at which the resurrection of Christ meets us with infinite power and solace is seen at death, when we bury our dead out of sight, or are ourselves laid in the grave. "For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him." None of the apostles had a higher standard of the Christian life than the Apostle Paul; none more keenly realised its contrast with the former habits of sin, or more acutely felt the struggle, fierce and constant, by which it alone was to be attained and maintained; none more clearly perceived the organic relation of one part of that life to another; and Paul strove by a most beautiful and expressive image to urge the believer to all vigilance and mortification of unworthy impulse and passion in its culture. Christ's death and resurrection furnished the image. "We are buried with Him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life," etc. If Christ be not risen from the dead, the day of judgment, as solemnly delineated in the New Testament, is denuded of many of its most sublime and thrilling features. There is no judgment-seat of Christ; for though Christ has died, He has not risen and revived that He might be Lord both of the dead and the living. Neither, for the same reason, can we look for His appearing, or expect Him from heaven, since He is not gone thither. I should have to quote a vast number of passages from all the great sections of the New Testament Scriptures were I to set forth the claims, according to their teaching, of the Lord Jesus on our worship, His power and readiness to hear our prayers and satisfy our trust. But these are obviously of no authority and service to us if He did not rise from the grave. The writer to the Hebrews has repeatedly described Him as seated at the right hand of God, but of course he is mistaken; Christ is in the grave. He has imputed illimitable efficiency to His intercession. But he is mistaken; Christ is not capable of making any intercession at all. Believers are designated by Paul as those who call upon the name of the Lord Jesus Christ; but they were all deluded, for Christ was not risen nor ascended. Nor would the example of Christ as an all-perfect pattern of holiness and love in a world governed by infinite holiness and power occasion us less hopeless embarrassment, if He be not risen, than the facts just dismissed. We should, in that case, have the frightful spectacle of a righteousness, truth, goodness, and mercy that never faltered or failed expending themselves to the very uttermost, and this without Divine acknowledgment and vindication. A greater shock to all virtue could not be conceived. And in this instance it would be aggravated by the very measure with which this Great Exemplar had indulged the hope of reward. The resurrection stands to us a pledge and pattern of our own; and while our dust may await its final recovery, our spirits shall be with Him. Nay, He will even be our convoy through the gates of death, and then receive us into the mansions of His Father's house, that where He is we may be also. (G. B. Johnson.) Parallel Verses KJV: Remember that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel: WEB: Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, of the seed of David, according to my Good News,