In 1 Corinthians 4:1 Paul writes of himself and his fellow labourers as “ministers of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God.” The servants of the Lord brought Christ before their hearers; Christ was their Master, but He was also the subject of their ministry. The Gospel they preached was of Christ, “how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures: and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures” (1 Cor. 15:3-4). Knowing that the Corinthians naturally valued human wisdom, when Paul came to them he “determined not to know anything among” them, “save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (2:2).
Although the Apostle refused the wisdom of this world, and of its princes, who come to nought, there was wisdom of which he spoke that was infinitely superior to the world’s wisdom; and this wisdom he spoke among the perfect. Unhappily, the Corinthian saints could not be numbered among the perfect, those who were mature in the things of God. They were yet babes, who needed the elementary milk of God’s word, not the strong meat that belongs to those who had grown strong in the truth of God. Paul had spoken to them of God’s wisdom in relation to the cross of Christ, which set aside all human wisdom, but their present immature state hindered his opening out to them the wonderful secrets of the purpose of God.
This divine wisdom is “hidden” wisdom, hidden from the princes of this world, and “which God ordained before the world unto our glory.” If the Apostle is unable to open out in detail about the hidden wisdom, he gives the Corinthians this ray of light in regard to it. It belonged to the eternal counsels of God, because it was ordained of God “before the world.” And it was ordained to “our glory,” which indicates that the saints of God of this period are destined for a state of glory. What an incentive for the saints at Corinth to desire the spiritual state in which they could learn of this hidden wisdom.
Neither the religious princes of this world, the leaders of Israel, nor the political princes, Pilate and Herod, had any knowledge of this hidden wisdom, else they would not have crucified the One who is God’s wisdom. The actions of these princes only demonstrates the folly of the world’s wisdom. Unable to do anything for man’s true blessing themselves, they put out of the world the One in whom all God’s resources were.
The things that God has prepared for our glory are things which “eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither have (they) entered into the heart of man, the things which God has prepared for them that love Him.” This puts them outside the range of the natural man, who can only apprehend by his natural senses. But those who love God have these things revealed to them by the Spirit of God now, and they have the Spirit to God as the power by which they are apprehended in the soul.
Only the spirit of a man can understand the things of a man; and no man would give to anyone else his own Spirit if he had the power to do so, for he does not wish any other to know the deep secrets of his heart; but God has given to us His Spirit that we might know the wonderful secrets of His heart; things that have been revealed by the Spirit that God has given to us.
Even the words in which the revelations of God, the divine mysteries, have been communicated are of God, and this is inspiration. The writers were controlled by the Holy Spirit, so that He chose the very words in which to convey the secrets of God. The revelations were of spiritual things, and it was by spiritual means these were given in the words of Scripture.
The natural man, the man who has not the Spirit of God, is unable to benefit by the words of inspiration, and cannot therefore apprehend the revelations that God has given. He regards the things of the Spirit as foolish, not understanding them, and he will not accept them; but he cannot know them, not having the spiritual capacity to receive them.
“behold I show you a mystery”
Before going back to the Father, the Son of God had told His disciples that He was going to the Father’s House to prepare a place for them, and He would come for them to receive them to Himself. In 1 Corinthians 15, the Apostle Paul, by the Spirit of God, shows how the saints will be prepared to enter the Father’s House. It is a divine revelation, one of the secrets that God has made known to His saints by the Holy Spirit. The Apostle writes, “Behold I show you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed” (verse 51).
Just before revealing this secret, Paul had written, “As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither does corruption inherit incorruption” (verses 49-50). We cannot enter heaven in our present flesh and blood condition, which is subject to corruption; and we are to bear the image of the heavenly. How is this to take place? This question is answered by the secret that Paul opens out here.
It is not necessary for us to sleep, to pass through the article of death, to enter heaven; but it is necessary for those who are alive at the coming of the Lord to have their bodies changed, and this the Lord will do. This great change will take place “in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye at the last trump.” The trumpet sound shall raise the dead in Christ in an incorruptible state, and change these bodies of humiliation into conformity to Christ’s body of glory.
Our bodies are subject both to death and decay, but in their new condition we shall have put on incorruptibility and immortality. The Apostle had already spoken of the new state of the saints who had died, but who would be raised, saying of their bodies, “It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: it is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body” (verses 42–44).
The resurrection of the dead had sometimes been spoken of in the Old Testament, and also by the Lord while upon earth. Here the apostle writes of it, giving fresh revelations regarding it; but he gives this special revelation, this mystery, in relation to the saints who will be alive at the coming of the Lord, when the sleeping are raised. The sleeping and those who are still here, will both be changed, ready for the summons to heaven from the lips of the One who died for them, and who will come to fulfil His promise to His disciples, as recorded in John 14.
“this we say...by the word of the Lord”
First Corinthians 15 does not take us off the earth, but deals with the subject of the raising of the dead and the changing of the living. We are seen there in our glorified condition, but not yet called to heaven to meet the Lord. This further revelation is given by the Apostle Paul to the saints at Thessalonica, who had been troubled about those who had fallen asleep, wondering if they would miss the blessings of the coming kingdom.
At the end of 1 Thessalonians 1 we read that the saints had been turned to God from idols, to serve the living and true God, and to wait for His Son from heaven. Then at the end of chapter 2, we learn that the living saints would be “in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at His coming.” But at the end of chapter 3, there is the glad news for the Thessalonians that when the Lord Jesus came, it would be “with all His saints.” This then must include the living and the dead. How would this be brought to pass? How could the dead be with the Lord when He comes? These questions are answered in this revelation, given by “The word of the Lord.”
God is going to bring with Jesus, the sleeping saints, at His coming; that is, when He comes in the display of His glory, and to reign in His kingdom. The secret is, there will be a special descent of the Lord from heaven to take His own back with Him before He comes out publicly in His kingdom (1 Thess. 4:14).
The living saints, the Lord Himself has said, will not go to heaven before the sleeping saints, that is in their glorified bodies. Already, in their unclothed state, the saints are with Christ in the paradise of God, but they are to enter heaven with their bodies of glory. To bring the saints home to be with Himself, the Lord will come Himself. He will not entrust this even to the greatest of angelic beings, for He promised to come Himself when He said, “I will come again, and receive you unto myself.”
When He comes, He will announce His presence with a shout of triumph that will summon His own. The voice of the archangel may be for the angels to tell them their work of ministry for the heirs of salvation on earth is over, and they too are to go to heaven to join the anthems of praise around the throne (Heb. 1:14; 12:22; Rev. 5:11). The trump of God, already referred to in 1 Corinthians 15, brings the sleeping saints from their graves, and changes the living.
Now comes the special revelation, “Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them” (the dead in Christ who rise first) “in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord” (verse 17). Here we are all together taken away from the earth, to be in the company of the Lord Jesus for evermore.
There are other mysteries of God unfolded by the Apostle Paul. For example, in 2 Corinthians 5 he brings us into the secret of the judgment seat of Christ; and there also reveals the truth of the “man in Christ.” Then in Ephesians and Colossians, he writes of “The mystery,” of Christ and the church, speaking of it as “The mystery of Christ;” “The mystery of the Gospel;” “The mystery of the Christ;” and “The mystery of God.”
R. 24.12.64