SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/11/2016 11:07 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
The Persons
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: John 5:28b
Message of the verses: “28 “Do not marvel at this; for an hour is
coming, in which all who are in the tombs”
It may look
like we are repeating our “focus” because a few days ago we look at “the
persons” from John 5:25, but we will actually be repeating the same three
focuses as we change from looking at the spiritual resurrection to the physical
resurrection, which will cover verses 27-29 in the fifth chapter of John. Let us look at verses 27-29 and do a bit of a
preview of them this morning: “27 and He
gave Him authority to execute judgment, because He is the Son of Man. 28 “Do
not marvel at this; for an hour is coming, in which all who are in the tombs
will hear His voice, 29 and will come forth; those who did the good deeds to a
resurrection of life, those who committed the evil deeds to a resurrection of
judgment.”
In verse 25
Christ calls Himself “The Son of God,” and now in verse 27 He calls Himself “the
Son of Man,” which is a messianic title from the 7th chapter of the
book of Daniel. We may repeat this a bit
later but it is only God who can call a person to a spiritual resurrection, but
man can be used to judge people and so this is why He uses these different
titles. Let us look at Daniel 7:14 “14 “And
to Him was given dominion, Glory and a kingdom, That all the peoples, nations
and men of every language Might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting
dominion Which will not pass away; And His kingdom is one Which will not be
destroyed.” This verse is speaking of
the Messiah as seen in “Dan. 7:13
"I kept looking in the night visions, And behold, with the clouds
of heaven One like a Son of Man was coming, And He came up to the Ancient of
Days And was presented before Him.’”
John MacArthur writes “Since He is the God-man who entered fully into
human life, experience, and temptation (Heb. 2:14-18; 4:14-16), Jesus can be
the ultimate judge of all mankind.”
Now we will
look at the “persons” from John 5:28a.
Now we have just been looking at what the Lord had said to these
Pharisees about He being able to give people spiritual life and now He goes on
to tell them that He will be the ultimate judge of all men, and so I suppose
this got them more upset. He tells that they
would “marvel at” His teachings as He continued by revealing another truth to
them what would surely astound them, and that is that He would raise the dead
from their graves, something that they will see later on when He raises Lazarus
from the dead, and also after His crucifixion we see from Matthew’s gospel that
many who were in the grave came out alive after that event. 52 The tombs were
opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised; 53 and
coming out of the tombs after His resurrection they entered the holy city and
appeared to many Matthew 27:52-53).”
In the same
way that Jesus spoke of the physical resurrection “an hour is coming” He speaks
of the physical resurrection, but does not say “and now is” when He speaks of
the physical resurrection. The
resurrection of all who are in the graves is still future. There are different phases of the coming
resurrection as we studied when we looked at 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, which
speaks of the rapture of the church. I
believe the Bible teaches that at the end of the Tribulation Period that those
believers who died during that period along with the OT saints will be
resurrected at that time.
I think
that it is best to look at the following quote from John MacArthur so we can
make sure we understand about the resurrection Jesus is speaking of here. “Some argue from this text that the resurrection
of both the righteous and unrighteous takes place at the same time. But while Jesus spoke here of the resurrection
in general, He did not describe one general resurrection. On the contrary, in verse 29 He clearly
distinguished between the resurrection of life and the resurrection of
judgment. He made that same distinction
in Luke 14:14, where He spoke of the resurrection of the righteous, implying
that it is a distinct event. Revelation
20:4-6 also mentions two resurrections; the first consists of the righteous
dead before the Millennium, and the second of the unrighteous dead for the
Great White Throne judgment at the end of the Millennium.
The Bible
teaches that the dead are raised in a specific sequence, not all at once: ‘22 For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ
all will be made alive. 23 But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits,
after that those who are Christ’s at His coming, 24 then comes the end, when He hands over the
kingdom to the God and Father, when He has abolished all rule and all authority
and power (1 Cor. 15:22-24).’
“The
adjective tagma (‘order’ or ‘turn’)
stresses that the dead are raised at different times: ‘Christ the first fruits,’ ‘those who are
Christ’s at His coming,’ and the rest at ‘the end’—the consummation of all
things when the wicked (the only ones not already mentioned) will be
resurrected. The adjectives epeita (‘after that’) and eita (‘then’) almost always describe
chronological (as opposed to logical) sequences of events.”
I can say
that people have different opinions about when the resurrection will take
place, as stated some believe that at the end of the age all will be resurrected
and the wicked will then go into hell and the righteous will go into
heaven. Unfortunately that is not what
the Bible teaches.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: It is best to study what the Bible teaches,
as we all should be like the Bereans.
Paul writes about this to Timothy “Study to show thyself approved unto
God, a workman who needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of
truth (2 Tim. 2:15 KJ 21).”
My Steps of Faith for
Today: 2 Timothy 2:15.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “The Word of God.”
Today’s Bible question:
“Who said ‘"For you always have the poor with you, but you do not
always have Me?’”
Answer in our next SD.
3/11/2016 11:53 AM
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