THE TEACHINGS OF PAUL by C. W. Stone

Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, California · Jan 18, 1877

THE TEACHINGS OF PAUL

By C. W. Stone

IS THE SOUL IMMORTAL?—NO. 15.

THE TEACHINGS OF PAUL.

AFTER noticing one more of Paul's peculiar expressions, which is the only remaining one of any note that our friends care to appropriate, we will examine some of his positive statements upon the subject. In Phil. 1: 23, 24 it is recorded: “For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better; nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful for you.”

In the 20th verse Paul expresses his determination that Christ shall be magnified in his body, whether it be by life, or by death. If he lives, he is bound to preach Christ; and if he is to be martyred, even in that he will honor Christ. Therefore, “For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain;” or, For me to live is Christ, gain for his cause, or for me to die is Christ, gain for his cause, for in my death will I magnify him. Compare verses 20 and 21.

In verse 23, he says he is in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; but he thinks (verses 24, 25, 26), that it would be more needful for the Philippians that he should live, that he might further them in the faith, and that they might be made to rejoice more abundantly in Christ by receiving another visit from him. But what about departing and being with Christ? Does not the expression prove that Paul expected to go right to Heaven at his death, and consequently that he possessed an immortal soul? Not at all. The manner in which Paul speaks of those two events proves nothing either way.

He desires to depart, and to be with Christ, but it does not necessarily follow that he expected to be with Christ immediately upon his departure. If it can be proved by other scriptures that a person goes to Heaven at death, then, it is true, this statement of Paul's comes in all right; but if it cannot be thus proved, and can be proved by other texts that a man does not go to Heaven at death, then this text comes in just as logically as before, and we have only to observe that Paul, in the expression of his desire to be with Christ, does not take into account the time spent in the grave, but passes over it from death to the resurrection.

And why should he not do so? If the dead are unconscious, do they realize the passing of time? If Abel is unconsciously sleeping, when he awakes how much time will seem to him to have passed since Cain dealt him that murderous blow? Not a moment. He will look around him for the altar on which his offering was made; he will expect to see his angry brother near, with rage still unappeased, but the altar has disappeared, and Cain is not to be seen. Not long is he allowed to wonder, for he beholds the glory of the Son of God, and the angels escort him, with all the righteous, to the everlasting gates of the New Jerusalem. It will seem to him that he has just arisen from that stunning blow, and until he is informed and has time to take in the facts, he will be unable to believe that centuries have passed while he has been sleeping in the grave.

When the saint awakes on the resurrection day, he will have no knowledge of the time that has passed; but it will seem to him that a momentary faintness has shut from his vision the weeping friends around his bedside, and he wonders for an instant how the scene has so quickly changed. His bewilderment is brief, for he feels the change in himself; he sees the grave that has held him, and recognizing that dear voice that he expected sometime to hear, he is caught up amid shouts of victory over the grave, to meet his Saviour in the air, and to go in with the righteous nation to the marriage supper of the Lamb.

When Paul shall come again from the land of the enemy, it will seem to him that he has just escaped from the ax of the executioner, and to him it is simply to depart and be with Christ.

Now how would a man who understood this fact in all its reality, in addressing a people who also understood the doctrine, be likely to speak of the two events, death and the resurrection? If he wished to touch the idea of slumbering for ages in the grave, or give instruction upon that fact, he would, of course, be explicit; but if he were only speaking of the Christian's experience, of what he expected to realize himself, he would just simply ignore that unconscious interval, and look right over to the meeting with his Saviour.

But some meet us here with the question, Why should Paul be anxious to depart, since he would be with Christ just as soon if he had lived a hundred years longer? Those who ask such a question can readily see how a person could be with Christ sooner by dying earlier if the soul should go right to heaven at death. We have already demonstrated that, to the individual, it is the same, as far as his knowledge of time extends, as if he were ushered into the presence of Christ at death. Therefore if Paul could be excused from living another six months, it would really seem to him that he should see his Lord six months the sooner for it, and to him the time really would be shortened just six months.

Paul's language in Phil. 1: 23, has reference to the intermediate state, and throws no light at all on just that point which our opponents wish to prove by it. As in 2 Cor. 5: 4, Paul did not desire the unclothed state (condition of death), but rather desired the immortal state following it, so here he looks over the unconscious condition of death as being but the little moment of which Isaiah speaks (Isa. 26: 20), and desires to be with Christ. That this is his meaning we will prove conclusively in our next, by showing when he expected to be with Christ, from absolute statements of his.

C. W. STONE.