The spiritual body in relation to the divine law of life

Dedication

E dedicate this book to the great army of sor-

rowing souls, who in the hour of distress earn-

estly seek yet fail to find consolation through

Preface

URING a ministry of more than fifty years I

have oft been oppressed by the overmastering

grief of many mourners, at the passing away of

loved ones, and have wondered why the Gospel of the Resurrection has not afforded them more consolation under their severe afflictions. “The early Christians seem to have received the Gospel with marked enthusiasm and their courage under severe trials was sublime.

The Gospel which sustained and inspired them was the Gospel of “the Resurrection of the dead.” Paul and his fellow Apostles preached it everywhere, and especially in the great centres of commercial, intellectual and religious influence, Antioch, Cesarea, Corinth, Thessalonica and even at Athens, Rome and Jerusalem. Paul made his most noted defence of the Gospel before Ananias and the Elders at Jerusalem, in his reply to Tertullus, in the presence of Felix, the Roman governor. So earnest was the apostle’s reasoning upon the Resurrection, before Festus and Agrippa, that Festus declared him a mad man and Agrippa was almost persuaded to be a Christian. Dr. Adam Clarke says ‘There is not a doctrine of the Gospel, on which more stress is laid, and there is not a doctrine in the present system of preaching, which is treated with more neglect.” For some reason the Gospel of the Resurrection of the dead is not proclaimed as earnestly as during the early centuries of the Church. The Apostles made it the chief doctrine of the Gospel, the very corner stone, the very key of the Gospel arch and without which there is no gospel. In his address at Athens Paul

8 PREFACE makes the judgment of the world in righteousness, hinge upon the resurrection of the dead, as assured by the resurrection of Jesus Christ. “The key note of Paul’s preaching always was, “I have seen Jesus my risen lord, the personal Jesus, who spake to me from the Heavens, thus assuring me of a personal identity beyond this life.” His trenchant utterance is “If Christ be not raised your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins. But now is Christ risen from the dead and become the first-fruits of them that slept.”

False Philosophies had not yet dimmed and confused the Gospel of the Resurrection, the dominant facts prevailed, they believed the Jesus they had known and loved had risen from the dead and ascended to Heaven; his loving words still lingered in their ears “If I go away I will come again and receive you unto myself, that where I am ye may be also.” ‘The well remembered words of the Master to the dying thief, cheered and consoled them—‘“To-day thou shalt be with me in Paradise,” and the vision of Stephen, in his dying moments, as he looked up and saw Jesus on the right hand of God, assured them of personal identity in the eternal kingdom of the Most High.

If the doctrine of the Resurrection of the dead was once so central, in the Gospel system, the reasons which made it so dominant must still exist and our endeavor is to assign this doctrine its true place, that it may continue to exercise its all-conquering power for the inspiration and consolation of the people of God. Many and varied attempts have been made during the past centuries of the Christian era, to exalt minor doctrines of the Gospel, but they have all been negatived by the supreme declaration of Paul “If there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen, and if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your

PREFACE 9 faith is also vain.”

The influence of these minor doctrines and false Philosophies of past ages, have served to mislead the mind of the church of Christ and to misintrepret and misrepresent the true and vital significance of the resurrection of the dead. The doctrine as Paul and his fellow Apostles preached it changed the whole moral condition of the Roman world, until the early Christians would accept no deliverance, from any form of torture, in order that they might obtain a better resurrection: In their minds the Heavenly Paradise lay just before them, where they expected to be immediately at home with Jesus and the great family of God forever. “They believed that the compensations for all their trials were immediate and abundant and therefore welcomed all their severe, trying martyrdoms.

During nineteen centuries of the Christian Church the great doctrines of the Gospel have been discussed by leading minds and certain forms and philosophies of doctrine have been set forth as final, absolutely deterring the most earnest thinkers from suggesting a change but a new era has dawned, the spirit of the age demands the whole truth and will have it at all costs. Theology sets forth a system which is mystical unscientific, full of contradictions, which constantly calls for apologies and has very little of the human helpfulness seen in the Gospel as it came from the mind of the great Teacher. ‘This is pre-eminently true of the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead as set forth in the Gospel. The Apostles preached the resurrection of the dead in some form which won the Heathen world but the gross form in which that doctrine has been presented during the later centuries of the Christian Church has made the doctrine far from welcome. ‘The resurrection of the dead has

10 PREFACE been made to mean the raising up of the material body as the same body, so called, of the resurrection. William Tyndall in his translation speaks of the resurrection from death, which suggests continued life, without discussing or suggesting the sameness of the material body, which is simply the twisting of the Greek words to enforce an impossible interpretation. Recently a number of advanced thinkers have appeared who have attempted to relieve the supreme doctrine of the resurrection of its setting and thus win the world to its acceptance. A sorrowing world is earnestly waiting to welcome all the light and consolation which the Gospel of the resurrection affords.

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE ToS herd ines Order Of LE oe os vlecns sie ohn 13 II The Resurrection and the Divine Order... 21

III The Human Soul a Revelation of the Divine COT ET MC et SoU eau ernst Ona man ered Rid bth

IV The Words of Inspiration Interpreting the Diurre: Tay opt Life een Usain as ihe 42 V Historic Opinions on the Divine Law of Life 58

CHAPTER I Tue Divine Orber oF LIFE

HE present age is very critical. During the

nineteenth century the human mind has made its

greatest advances along every line of knowledge

presented, and still the universe of eternal mystery lies open demanding investigation. Earnest students are knocking at the door of every science and the secrets of nature and religion, however sacredly regarded, are scrutinized and criticised as never before. ‘The day has long since passed, when a doctrine is received as true because taught by the church or embodied in a system of religious formula. The age is crying out in the language of Pilate—‘‘What is truth?”

The age-criticism is manifested in the character of many books recently issued with an earnest desire to express the truth, as an antidote for the universal distrust, which is destroying the morality of the nation. The character of these writers is beyond suspicion, embracing such names as “Natural Law in the Spiritual World” by Drummond, “The Reign of Law” by the Duke of Argyle, “Christ and the Eternal Order” by Buckham, “The Gospel for an Age of Doubt” by Dr. Henry Van Dyke, “The Mind of the Master” by Maclaren, etc., and the number of earnest seekers after final truth is daily multiplying and leading us to hope for a true revival of religion, with deeper consecration, through a better understanding of the Gospel. It is certain that the old methods of Gospel presentation de not win nor hold the masses and the age is drifting away from the church.

Against no doctrine of the church have more objections been raised than the resurrection of the material body. It has lost its former place and power. In the Apostolic age the risen Christ was the key-stone of the arch. During the past centuries the resurrection of the material body has been substituted for the risen Christ. The resurrection that Paul preached was the resurrection of the dead or the release of the spirit as a process towards the evolution of an endless life. He says emphatically of the wheat, ‘(How shall it be quickened except it die?’ In his mind death was the open gate towards a larger life. He does not place his stress upon the thought that the physical body of Christ rose again, but upon the fact that the same Christ rose again and was seen of many. He makes death a part of an eternal order of Life.

Nature unfolds a material order of life, while the Gospel reveals a spiritual order, eternal as the life of God, which Jesus proclaimed when he said “I am the resurrection and the life’ and the Apostle in Hebrews calls this order ‘“The power of an endless life.” “To comprehend this spiritual order is to understand the law of the resurrection which the Gospel seeks to proclaim for the consolation of struggling and sorrowing humanity.

The problem of life is so vast and involved, that the wisest of Philosophers have stood speechless before the mighty mystery. Many minds doubt God and the spiritual realm and become blank Materialists. Others accept the Bible as a revelation from God but are constantly perplexed with the

THE DIVINE ORDER OF LIFE 15 infinite problems presented. “The Philosophies of the ages have traveled in a circle and the most earnest Christian thinkers have found it difficult to cast aside material theories, in their endeavors to explain spiritual mysteries. A new Gospel for an age of doubt is earnestly demanded.

How perplexed is the mind with the simple question “What is life?” Bichat defines life as ‘““Che sum of the functions by which death is resisted.” Coleridge said of this definition it is but a circuitous way of saying that life consists in being able to live. Dr.:Fletcher says, “Life consists in the sum of the characteristic actions of organized beings, performed in virtue of a specific susceptibility, acted upon by a specific stimuli.” Herbert Spencer declares “The broadest and most complete definition of life will be the continuous adjustment of internal relations to external relations.” All these definitions deal with the mere phenomena of life. All recognize the presence of an all pervasive power, acting according to well defined laws and reaching towards well ascertained results. Because these laws of life in nature are so well defined, human life and progress are made possible and human governments are ordained. In the spiritual realm of God’s government, divine, unerring law must also prevail.

As we observe nature, three things seem essential to life, viz. Vital stimuli, food and proper adjustments of atmosphere. By these we see certain laws of action and re-action, producing the mysteries and diversities of life. Through these creation unfolds all the beautiful variety called life, as the divine panorama is constantly unfolded to human vision. “Today studied and labored attempts are being made to give diversity to the products of nature and doubtless here is a wide field for study in tracing out the larger scope of vegetative life, for the uses of humanity. Casting a backward look through the centuries, we can perceive the vast strides made through studying out the laws of cereals and the subtle laws of vegetation, as aids towards higher living. Mankind has found the eternal laws of vegetative life reliable and calling for a better understanding.

Beyond this is the remarkable fact that the age is noted for wonderful advances in interpreting the higher laws of the Universe. Modern inventions are hardly less than miraculous and a few centuries past would have subjected the inventors to the discipline and scourge of the inquisition. They would have been regarded as wizards rather than discoverers of higher laws of God. Mulracles are no longer regarded as violations of law but as manifestations of the operations of God’s higher laws. ‘The sun no more stands still at the command of any Joshua but God’s sunlight continues to shine and dispel darkness, while his intellectual heroes march on towards decisive victories.

As the realm of nature has unfolded its mysteries to earnest minds, so is it in the spiritual realm, and we may confidently expect clearer visions from the spiritual universe. To find the divine pathway of law is the task which always confronts humanity. About us we behold the laws of nature in all their mystery but the far deeper laws of the Spirit constantly call for interpretation. At present we are concerned to know how the law of death is related to the mysterious law of life. ‘That death ends all, has been coined into a proverb, but how little insistence has there been upon the fact that death is the essential factor of life. While it is true that life leads to death, yet how eminently true is it that death constantly leads to life. Mankind has for ages been oppressed by the fact that death reigns, while they should

THE DIVINE ORDER OF LIFE Vy be far more impressed with the fact that death is brief and comparatively powerless as compared with the overwhelming force of life. Life is not a mere factor of death but death is a constant factor in life and an indispensable aid for its unfolding.

_ All through nature the decay and death of certain material elements opens wide the gates of life and leads towards fuller life and expansion. ‘This is Paul’s wise explanation of the spiritual life and expansion. ‘The life of humanity is like the life of the wheat. Except the kernel of wheat decay and die, how shall it be quickened or live again to bring forth its hundred fold? ‘To unfold this mysterious law is to understand the unfolding power of an endless life. What relation has the spiritual body to this wide and wonderful realm of immensity is the ever recurring question? ‘The modern Christian world is demanding an adequate reply.

What is life, and what the nature of the future life, are questions as old as humanity. The Roman world with all its vices and crimes was transformed into a Christian Empire through the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead. All the Greek Philosophies and surmises upon immortality had failed to transform Pagan Rome from beasthood into manhood; but certain features of the resurrection, as proclaimed by the Apostles, wrought a mighty change and introduced the dominant factors of a Christian civilization. The dominant theme of the Apostles was the resurrection of the dead and this preaching was the initiative of modern Christian civilization.

The Apostles did not assert the resurrection of the material body but most strenuously insisted upon the resurrection of the living Christ. The very figure upon which Paul relies to illustrate the resurrection, assumes that the life principle continued, is the true resurrection and that the material body has no vital relation to eternal life. It is the dead that rise and not dead bodies. According to Paul it is the spiritual body which rises, after casting off the Physical body, and this spiritual body is the factor of power and glory in the unfolding life of the future. The eternal order of life is abundantly manifest in nature and the vital question for humanity is—what is the character of this order beyond this present life? )

The Duke of Argyle expresses the reign of Law as follows —‘“The question has often been raised, whether there is any law of growth, of progress, and of decay prevailing over nations, as over individual organisms. ‘There is a condition prepared always by ignorance or neglect of some moral or economic laws, and determined by long continued perseverance in a corresponding course of conduct. ‘Then the laws which have been neglected assert themselves, and the retributions they inflict are indeed tremendous. In the last generation and in our own time, the Old and the New Worlds, have each afforded memorable examples of the reign of law over Political events. Institutions maintained against the natural progress of Society have foundered amidst fanatic storms. Other institutions upheld and cherished against justice, and humanity, and conscience, have yielded only to the scourge of war.”

“The Laws of nature were not appointed by the great Lawgiver, to baffle his creatures in the sphere of conduct, still less to confound them in the region of Belief. As parts of an Order of things, too vast to be more than partially understood, they present indeed, some difficulties which perplex the intellect, and a few also, it cannot be denied, which wring the heart. But, on the whole they stand in har-

THE DIVINE ORDER OF LIFE 19 monious relations with the human spirit. ‘They come visibly from one pervading mind, and express the authority of one enduring kingdom.”

The reign and extent of Law is nobly expressed by Dr. Buckham—‘“God is the author and End of the kingdom of Christ and God in Christ is the soul of it. It is he who occupies the throne of the kingdom, not in God’s stead, not as his representative, but as the revelation of himself, in his human aspects and kinship. Serving this king, one serves not only the king of kings, but the king of all kingdoms, earthly and celestial. “The beginnings of the kingdom reach far back of history, of humanity, back into the heart of eternal love, creating all things, purposing all things, before all time, through the Eternal Word of Wisdom. Each one who obeys the Divine will, the Eternal Christ within him, makes his contribution to the great structure which has risen through the ages and in its completion shall be gathered within it. For the kingdom is humanity’s kingdom and the Christ is humanity’s Christ.”

Maclaren speaking of the old traditional ideas of the New Jerusalem says “They were the vindication of a Trapist Monastery—and from it we turn to Jesus with his doctrine of continuity. It follows upon Jesus’ suggestion of the next life—the continuation of the present upon a higher level— that it will be a continued progress, and Jesus gives us frequent hints of this law. When he refered to the many mansions in the Father’s house, He may have been intending rooms, places where those who have been associated together on earth may be gathered together; but He may be rather intending stations in that long ascent of life that shall extend through the ages of ages. Jesus heartens His followers by an assurance that not one hour of labor, not one grain of attainment, not one honest effort, on to the moment when the tools of earth drop from their hands but will tell on the after life.”

The sage Isaac Taylor says “It is surely a frivolous notion that the vast and intricate machinery of the universe, and the profound scheme of God’s government, are now to reach a resting place, where nothing more shall remain to active spirits through an eternity but recollections of labor, anthems of praise, and inert repose. All the practical skill—as well as the highest virtues which we are learning every day, may well find scope in a world which is rationally anticipated, when we think of Heaven as the stage of life, which is next to follow the discipline of life.” All these thinkers agree in assuring us that as spiritual beings, we belong to an eternal kingdom under the rule and laws of the Most High God, who has ordained all in righteousness and truth and _ holiness.

CHAPTER II THE RESURRECTION AND THE DIVINE ORDER URING long centuries the church of Jesus

Christ has made her confession, “I believe in

the resurrection of the body” which the mass of

believers have received as teaching the resurrection of the material body, as the general consensus of the church. As late as the early part of the nineteenth century, sermons by prominent divines prove that they held to the doctrine of a material resurrection and sought to establish it by the direct teaching of the Gospel. Viewed in the light of the present as illuminated by reason, science and Scripture, this is one of the saddest perversions of the Gospel of Christ. ‘The apology for this perversion lies in the fact that the subject is so vital, and so related to the sorrows and hopes of humanity, that every device has been used to establish a material resurrection, as the only real assurance of a personal identity beyond death.

The great procession of death never ceases. From the clouded regions behind us, through the illuminated pathways of human experience, we pass on to the unveiled realms of death. Where are they who have preceded us in this endless march? Will they ever appear in full personality, in that mysterious future to which we are forced by human destiny and if so, how will this countless throng of the ages, appear? Is there any assurance that we shall appear in personal identity and with personal consciousness, to meet again the old friends and touch again the vanished hands, we loved to clasp on earth? The king and the peasant alike ask these question, with deep earnestness and long to be instructed more fully, in the mysterious law of the Divine life.

Hence Paul’s earnestness in discussing the resurrection and the spiritual body, as its outcome and divine reply to human questionings. He does not speak as if by permission, but with supreme authority. He is proclaiming the essential Gospel which he had received from the risen Christ. If there be essentials of the Gospel they must appear in this memorable fifteenth chapter of First Corinthians where Paul says “I declare unto you the Gospel—wherein ye stand” and then proceeds to discuss and exalt the vital doctrine of the resurrection of the dead and the glory of the spiritual body as the outcome of spiritual progress, incorruptible, powerful, glorious, the painless inheritance of the Saints of God.

In the face of these facts, the doctrine of the resurrection has become so mystified that multitudes long for a new and clear statement of the Gospel doctrine.

‘The average mind has associated the resurrection with the material body and has no clear perception of it as a spiritual outcome or as an expression of life entirely apart from material relations. “The angels must have had spiritual bodies long ere man was formed from the dust of the ground and the eternal Son of God must have had a substantial body long ere he was born of the Virgin. ‘The average mind is filled with doubts because the church at large has confused ideas of the nature of the soul and its essential relation to a spiritual body. ‘The nature of the resurrection body as material, has been discussed throughout all the Christian centuries and enforced as essential to personality, apparently oblivious of the fact that God created man a living soul, a

THE RESURRECTION 23 substantial well defined entity, entirely apart from his own spiritual being. As the devout Phillips Brooks well says: “In the image of God created he man. Yes, from the beginning there had been a second person in the Trinity, a Christ whose nature included the man-type. In due time this man type was copied and incorporated, in the special exhibition of a race.” "Thus is it manifested that the spiritual man—Christ—was a spiritual entity, ages before the creation of this world of humanity.

“What is the nature of the soul is the all important question. Is it a passing zephyr, formless and intangible or has it a well defined form, the great essential to a distinct personality, so that soul can be distinguished from soul, both here and hereafter, and at any point in God’s Universe.” Many to-day deny the existence of the soul except as a mere organizing force, associated with a material body and destined to perish at death. ‘To such the future is a dead blank. In no respect has the Gospel been made so dim, dark and dismal as upon the resurrection, whose glorious light dispelled the gloom and darkness of the Roman world. ‘These facts indicate a decided demand for a restatement of this vital doctrine.

It is certain that the doctrine of the resurrection was supreme during the Apostolic age and while it is certain that the body of Jesus disappeared from the tomb, it is equally certain that his natural body of flesh and blood did not enter the kingdom of Heaven. Paul in his memorable discussion of the resurrection admits that Jesus rose from the tomb and was recognized by his followers as their Master and Lord and yet in the same discussion he denies that the resurrection of flesh and blood was the true resurrection which he proclaimed. According to the Gospel record the resurrection of Jesus occurred immediately after his death and it was a complete resurrection, for his transformation was complete. His new body seemed to flit in and out of both worlds, of the seen and unseen, as if it dominated all natural forces. It was not a mere resuscitated body, restored to die again but a body at once painless and powerful, able — to resist death and also able to mount to the Heavens, to assume his sceptre of spiritual power. Whatever its quality, it was capable of identification and yet it was far more of Heaven than earth and as the first-fruits of the resurrection was designed to teach the ages to come, the nature of the spiritual body to be possessed by all the saints of God. According to Paul, the spiritual body seen in Christ is the glorious body of the résurrection, incorruptible, honorable, powerful and worthy of eternal Son of God.

Because the resurrection body which Jesus possessed seemed needful to prove his identity, there has been a constant historic attempt made to prove it was a more material body and not the true type of the future spiritual bodies of the saints. The subject is burdened with difficulties, but if we assert that this body was a material body, we contradict Paul’s assertion that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God. But if we assume the body in which our Lord arose to be the true body of the resurrection and the spiritual body of eternity, it is only needful to accept the fact that this body, although substantial, was not material, and already possessed the power which Paul declared was to be its eternal attribute. This fully relieves the question of all difficulty and enables us to account for those incidents which seemed essential to prove the identity of our Lord, such as eating in their presence. Matthew Pool declares that our Lord ate and drank in the presence of his disciples, “not to satisfy his hunger, but to

THE RESURRECTION 25 confirm the truth of his resurrection,” his glorious body not now being clothed with those infirmities which it had before his death.

‘The term resurrection is used in a loose sense as if the mere resurrection of a material body were a true resurrection, while Paul uses the term in a far broader sense, as including, the rising up in the Spiritual body and entire domination of material elements. If this seems not to accord with the fact of Jesus saying to his disciples “A spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have” again we reply, that it is not for us to limit the power of the resurrection body to assume or cast off material elements at will. Luke and John both tell us of the linen grave clothes which Peter saw in the tomb when he went into the sepulchre after the resurrection and no wise commentator presumes to tell us with what clothes Jesus appeared during the forty days after his resurrection.

The assumption that the body of Jesus underwent a gradual change from his resurrection until his ascension is entirely without support in the Gospel and really limits the power of the spiritual body to manifest itself. Paul’s teaching is that if we have a material or physical body, we have also a psychical or spiritual body and both are the factors of our common humanity and the factor which dominates characterizes the body as either material or spiritual. If Christ had a spiritual body in eternity as his heritage, as Son of God and man was created in his likeness, it is evident that the release of the material body in death, gives freedom to the spiritual or permanent body, which fully identifies him beyond death. When God said “Let us make man in our image and likeness’ man must have been created with only a spiritual body like the Son of God, by whom God created all things. And let it be carefully noted that a spiritual body is a contradiction in terms. The spiritual body must be a body entirely dominated by the Spirit and if Paul sets the example by inspiration of so revealing the future body of the saints, let us cling to the divine revelation disclosed, that there is at once a material and spiritual body in our common humanity and death frees us from the domination of the material to enjoy the power and glory and permanence of the spiritual body. Such a body of power Jesus Christ seemed to possess immediately at his deliverance through death, the type of the spiritual body of God’s Saints in glory—the first fruits of them that slept.