Question 38

At the resurrection—The resurrection of the dead is exclusively a doctrine of the word of God. It nowhere appears in the religions of paganism. That the soul should continue to live after death was the faith and hope of many of the best men in heathendom; but that there should be a resurrection of the body, and a reunion of soul and body for ever, this is a doctrine derived wholly from the word of God. The Athenians in Paul’s day believed in the existence of God. They raised no opposition even when he preached the unity, spirituality, providence, and fatherhood of God; but when he went on from these things to preach Jesus and the resurrection, that was a “new doctrine” to them, and some mocked, though others said, We will hear thee again of this matter.

There is nothing taught in the text touching the resurrection of unbelievers, because the Catechism is engaged in tracing the benefits that “believers” receive from Christ; and though all the dead shall rise again, all shall not “attain to the resurrection” set forth in the text.

believers being raised up in glory—This is the last time “believers” shall bear that name. From the day of their effectual calling to the day of their resurrection they have been “believers,” but after their resurrection there is no more room for faith; then and thereafter they shall know even as they are known. At the resurrection Christ shall change their vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body. But what that glory shall consist in we cannot in this life tell; we are “believers” in the resurrection and the resurrection life. “Therefore some of our divines say that our Saviour Christ did not simply merit the resurrection of the dead, for that apart from Him they must have risen again and been brought to judgment: but these glorious qualifications the saints have at the resurrection, which is the preparation to the glory in heaven—these He merited, this some divines say” (Goodwin).

shall be openly acknowledged and acquitted in the day of judgment—God had secretly acknowledged and acquitted them on the day of their first justification. But both their faith in Christ and their acceptance before God had been hidden with Christ in God. The whole transaction of their renewal, union to Christ, pardon, and acceptance was unknown to the world in which they dwelt: in many cases true believers themselves had never come to a clear assurance that they possessed these saving benefits. But all that will then be made manifest both to themselves and to all men. What had been spoken in secret shall then be told from the house-tops.

“Christ hath not all His members up to Him, nor are they out of all danger, as I may so express it; for though at the day of judgment to the saints there is no real danger, yet they are to give an account of their actions, and there remaineth a final sentence to be pronounced upon them by the Great Judge, and in that sense there is a forgiveness of sins then; therefore Paul prayeth that he may find mercy at that day” (Goodwin).

“Jesus, Thy blood and righteousness
My beauty are, my glorious dress:
’Midst flaming worlds in these arrayed,
With joy shall I lift up my head.

“Bold shall I stand in that great day:
For who aught to my charge shall lay?
Fully, through these, absolved I am
From sin and fear, from guilt and shame.”

made perfectly blessed—

“It may not be,
That one, who looks upon that light, can turn
To other objects, willingly, his view.
For all the good, that will may covet, there
Is summ’d; and all, elsewhere defective found,
Complete.”—Paradise. (See the whole canto, xxxiii.)

See also the talk that the Shining Ones held with the pilgrims about the glory of the place.

in the full enjoying of God—“But especially in the immediate vision and fruition of God the Father, of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, to all eternity” (Larger Catechism). “To sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob was the phraseology of the Old Testament, but to sit down with Us—with Father, Son, and Holy Ghost—this is Christ’s language, this is New Testament language” (Goodwin).

“Man’s chief end” is now attained. (See Question 1.) The Scriptures constantly teach that man’s only true happiness is in God, and that his full happiness in God cannot be attained in this life, but that believing men have that happiness assured to them in the life to come. Commenting on John xiv. 6, Godet says: “Jesus here substitutes the Father for the Father’s house. For it is not in heaven that we are to find God, but in God that we are to find heaven.”

to all eternity. “When time and sin together cease.” “Both a prophet and an apostle join in teaching us that eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor man’s heart conceived, what God has prepared for those that love Him. When the bodies of the just rise at the general resurrection, with their senses spiritualized and rendered capable of pleasures which do not fall within their province now, and with perhaps many new senses developed in the immortal body which were unknown in its mortal days, the pure pleasures of their glorified senses must be something quite beyond the power of our imagination to picture to itself” (Faber).

Uses

1. “As Christ would have us to be certainly persuaded that there shall be a day of judgment, both to deter all men from sin, and for the greater consolation of the godly in their adversity; so will He have that day unknown to men, that they may shake off all carnal security, and be always watchful, because they know not at what hour the Lord will come: and may be ever prepared to say, Come, Lord Jesus, come quickly. Amen” (Confession).

2. Luther warns us: “The flesh ever seeks to be glorified before it is crucified: exalted before it is abased.”

3. It is often ignorantly and frivolously charged against Christian men that it is selfish in them to seek heaven and glory for their own souls; but no man who is truly seeking salvation will be moved by that accusation. When men really begin to seek their salvation, and to turn their faces to the glory of heaven, then it is that all selfish and ignoble desires receive their death-blow. It is not selfish, surely, for the diseased to seek healing, or the hungry food, or the prodigal his father’s house. So far from this being a sign that the heart is selfish, there is no surer sign that it is being sanctified.

4. “Pliable. The hearing of all this is enough to ravish one’s heart; but are these things to be enjoyed? How shall we get to be sharers hereof?

   “Christian. The Lord, the Governor of the country, hath recorded that in this book; the substance of which is, If we be truly willing to have it, He will bestow it upon us freely.”

Questions

1. Give New Testament passages where the Resurrection life is called a Regeneration, a Redemption, and a Restitution, and explain these terms when so applied.
2. Reconcile acquitted in the text with the teaching of Answer 33.