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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadWilliam Burkitt Notes and Observations - 1 Corinthians 15:26 - 15:26
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Observe here, 1. What sin had subjected the human nature to, and that is, death; sin brought mortality into our natures, and the wages of sin is death.
Observe, 2. That death is an enemy to humanity, an enemy to the whole race of mankind, both to body and soul, to the righteous and to the wicked; to the body, by turning that which is the glory of the creation in a moment into rottenness and putrefaction; to the soul, by occasioning its separation from the body, towards which it has so strong and affectionate an inclination and desire, as its old companion.
Death is also an enemy to the righteous, as it blunts the edge of his desires after heaven, and abates that joy which he should have in the believing thoughts and apprehensions of heaven; and it is an enemy to the wicked, as it is a passage to everlasting misery, by their falling immediately into the hands of the living God, from whose mouth they receive a final sentence to depart accursed into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.
Observe, 3. That this enemy is the last enemy; it is so to the children of God; when they have overcome death, they have overcome all their enemies at once, and especially their worst enemy, sin, which they could never overcome before fully.
Blessed be God, though death came into the world by sin, yet sin shall go out of the world by death.
Note, 4. This last enemy shall be destroyed, by losing its sting that it cannot annoy, by losing its terror that it cannot amaze, by losing its power that it cannot destroy; and by losing its very being, it shall be finally abolished and destroyed, by a resurrection from the dead.
Note, 5. The destroyer of death, this last enemy, is Christ, I will ransom them from the power of the grave, I will redeem them from death. Hos_13:14. Christ has conquered death meritoriously by his satisfaction, victoriously by his satisfaction, victoriously by his resurrection.
6. The scope and drift of the apostle's argument in this assertion: and that is, to prove the necessity of his resurrection. The argument lies thus: Christ must reign till all his enemies are destroyed; but death is one of these enemies, the last of them which keeps the believer's body from union with his soul, and from communion with Christ: therefore death must be destroyed; and there is no other way to destroy death but by a resurrection from the dead, which is the truth our apostle strongly proves throughout this chapter.