The Gospel of Luke 23:33-49 Deaths, Resurrections & Judgments I

Good morning. Before we proceed here, a couple of things to make you aware of. One is just to let you know, Paul Giles went home to be with the Lord. Got some strange things going on with the fonts here. At any rate, he went home to be with the Lord this last week. He and Pat had been missionaries to the native peoples in northern Canada.

And so I want to let you know that. Now, I'm glad you're sitting, because the next thing I have to tell you Kirk and Karen and family are expecting to have a son! In law. So Tori is engaged now to fiancé Ben, right? So anyway, I thought I'd let you know that. Yeah. OK.

Now with that, after our hearts settle down, we can get into the passage here. Last week, having touched upon the parable, the rich man and Lazarus, we'll be taking for today and next Sunday a slight detour on just kind of some general subjects of deaths and resurrections and judgments. and when and how those take place.

So today we'll be looking at deaths and resurrections, and along with that, raptures. And next Sunday we'll look at the various judgments that are described in the Bible. Some of those are in this life, and some are in the afterlife. So we will be taking a look at that.

First, the raptures. While we've said that we're going to examine deaths, there have been, in fact, raptures in Scripture. where the people are taken to be with the Lord while alive. That's been true of the past, as well as what scripture predicts is going to take place. Enoch and Elijah are examples of those in the Old Testament who have been taken to be with God in heaven while still alive. And so those would be individual examples. But those alive at the time of the rapture of the church will also be taken to be with the Lord directly. So we have a kind of an Old Testament example of a couple individuals, and then this will be a group thing.

By the way, don't teach a partial rapture. A partial rapture is really hard to imagine. Imagine somebody, you know, hitting the head in the ceiling and stopping partway. That's just really difficult. Anyway, so to talk about the rapture of the church, the taking up of the church, which is the body of Christ, we'll take up those who are asleep in Christ. And then those who are alive and remain in the twinkling of an eye is the way Corinthians, Paul's writing to Corinthians puts it. This will happen at least seven years before the Lord's return to earth with us at the second coming and when the saints of all other times will be resurrected. So here's John 14, 1 through 3 as a passage that is both a rapture passage and a resurrection passage.

Do not let your heart be troubled, he wrote. Believe in God, believe also in me. In my father's house are many dwelling places. If it were not so, I would have told you, for I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am, there you may be also.

So the picture we get from this is Christ will go away. He will come back and take us to be with Himself. By the way, verses 2 and 3 are very similar to what a Jewish groom would tell his new bride. The one he's engaged to is called a bride. So he would go away for a time and come back up to a year later after he'd prepared a house, usually built on to the house of his father. And so anyway, that reflects that. Here is 1 Thessalonians 4, 13 through 18.

But I do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep. Asleep being Paul's term for those who are in Christ but who have died. So that you will not grieve as the rest who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, by the way, that's telling you the gospel, right? If we believe that Jesus died and rose again, it's that simple. Even so, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. Those who are in Jesus and who have died physically. he will bring with them for this we say to you by the word of the Lord that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord and uses we indicate that this could have happened in his day and it is still imminent it could happen before we get done with the service right for the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout with the voice of an archangel with the trumpet of God and the dead in Christ And this is those who are asleep, right? The dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore, comfort one another with these words.

Real interestingly, if you put John 14, 1 through 3, And 1 Thessalonians 4, 13 through 17, you have a very similar, and in some cases identical, sequence of words and ideas there. And so the little parentheses behind there is the verse number. But that idea, they're both in sequence and ideas, very parallel and similar. All right.

Believers, whether they are raptured or die, go to be with God in heaven. This is a good question. You have the instance of Genesis 5, 21-24, where you're talking about Enoch. You have 2 Kings 2, 1, and then 9-14, this is Elijah going up, and Elisha is right there, right? And sees him go up. And this is in the Jordan River Valley, not too far from Old Testament Jericho, where this took place. John 14, 1-3, as we just read, is an instance.

The Father's house is a way of describing heaven. And Luke 23, 39-46, with Randy just read, talks about paradise. Today you will be with me in paradise, right? And 2 Corinthians 12, 1-4, as we'll see, confirms that identification. Continuing on you have others that we'll talk about more specifically. And then, so we go through the New Testament, we continue to have this pattern of directing us toward heaven.

As a matter of fact, in Colossians 3, 1 through 4, set your mind on things above, specifically not on things that are on earth. Hebrews 11, 5 and 13 through 16, that likewise confirming not only with Enoch, but with others who have died. And then we have similar things during the tribulation period with Revelation 4, 5, and 6, and on into Revelation chapter 11. And finally, Revelation 21 and 22 talk about the new heavens and the new earth, where heaven comes down to earth.

OK, so if you want the details on that, because I went over them quickly, there's a four-page supplement on where believers go after earth on the cabinet to the right as you exit the room here. There's also another handout, just sort of a color one page, you get to see it all, and that's available as a supplement as well on the cabinet to the right as you leave the room. So what are some names for heaven? There's, just like Jesus has different names in scripture, there are actually different names for heaven given in scripture.

The heavenlies, Ephesians 1.3 and then several other places in Ephesians. It just says literally heavenlies, plural. Heavenly places sometimes is the translation given it, but literally it's heavenlies. Paul calls heaven, and we'll talk about this in a minute, the third heaven, the place where God dwells, and we'll talk about what the first and second ones are.

So 2 Corinthians 12.2 would be another description. at home with the Lord. Second Corinthians have several passages that make reference to our being resurrected and to be being with the Lord. The Father's house, as we saw in the passage just earlier here, John 14, 1 through 3. And then paradise, as Randy read for us from Luke 23. and 2 Corinthians 12 4 and then Revelation 2 7 is the last occurrence of that.

This is today you'll be with me in paradise. We'll talk about that word again. There are other words we'd point to as well in the parable last week. Abraham's bosom, which means being right there next to Abraham. I think that particular term, which only occurs there, by the way, was specifically used for the benefit of the Pharisees, that they might, thinking themselves so close to Abraham, realize, hey, you're not so close. And they need to give that some thought, some very serious thought. So here's this word paradise. It's actually a Persian word. It means pleasure garden, most literally.

And so Jesus uses it for the first time in the New Testament, Luke 23, 43, speaking to the thief on the cross. Imagine this thief, who earlier that day was not headed for paradise. He came to believe there on the cross, and Jesus tells him explicitly and personally. To me, it's just astounding, because you would think, boy, I'm a little preoccupied right now, right? I can't really bother with you, it's just a little bit much. But instead, no, he takes the time to tell this thief, who doesn't deserve it, by the way, to tell this thief, today you'll be with me in paradise. It's used by Christ when he told this thief on the cross there, Luke 23, 43, as Randy read for us.

Aside from this passage, it shows up one more time, one last time, in Revelation 2.7, to him who overcomes, I will grant to eat of the tree of life which is in the paradise of God. We won't go into it in detail. The one who overcomes is the one who believes, 1 John 5. And now we have this poetic form to summarize 2 Corinthians 12, 1-6.

What this is doing, Paul gets essentially taken to heaven, but this is before he's died, right? This took place in the 40s AD when he was taken to heaven. He says, boasting is necessary, though it is not profitable, but I will go on to visions and revelations of the Lord, of which Paul had a number. I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago, whether in the body I do not know or out of the body I do not know, God knows, such a man was caught up to the third heaven. I know how such a man, whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, God knows, was caught up into paradise. So we see this as making the third heaven and paradise equivalent terms. and heard inexpressible words which a man is not permitted to speak."

Now it's very interesting because here Paul is saying, I've been there, because he knows this man, it is him. I've been there, I can't talk about it. And yet the apostle John was given the command, you must write about it, right? So they have different assignments. Paul talked about a lot of things that John did not. But writing about heaven was something where John had a specific assignment.

So we have in the book of Revelation 150 verses approximately on the heavenly scene. On behalf of such men I will boast, but on my own behalf I will not boast except in regard to my weakness. For if I do wish to boast I will not be foolish, for I will be speaking the truth, but I refrain from this so that no one will credit me with more than he sees in me and hears from me." So you have this parallel pattern in the I know phrases and caught up and the equivalent terms third heaven and paradise there in that upper section.

Now here are the three heavens, and the first heaven is the one that says, for example, in Genesis 1.20, there are other places where that shows up. But one example is God said, let the birds fly above the earth in the open expanse of the heavens.

So this is the first heaven. Atmospheric heaven is another term that's been called. And that use of heaven gets used here in Genesis, and it gets used again in the Book of Revelation. The second heaven is what we would call the stellar heavens. And I will greatly bless you, and I will greatly multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens." This is Genesis 22, 17. The promise to Abraham.

And so this would be the second heaven. And Paul's reference here to the third heaven, such a man was caught up to the third heaven, paradise. 2 Corinthians 12, 2 and 4. He uses that, caught up twice, and used the equivalent term third heaven and paradise.

Now, there are some who try to make a great deal of differentiation between the two. I don't think it holds up to scrutiny. Next, we're going to switch to 1 Corinthians 15. This talks about Christ the firstfruits, and it actually does so twice. So this is Christ the firstfruits, and he's making comparison to the Jewish harvests and to the Jewish feasts. So verses 20-22, speak of Christ as the firstfruits, then contrast death from Adam's sin with being made alive in Christ twice. So verses 23-28, which we won't go to in detail, speak of Christ as the firstfruits, then proceed with a series of then and when statements about when certain things happen and are not going to happen. So what does the firstfruits mean? What does that term mean? So what does it mean? Oh, you want me to tell you? Okay, well, let's find out.

So now, in the culture of the people of Israel, as given in the Law of Moses, there were a series of seven feasts. They were grouped with either the earlier harvest and then Pentecost, kind of in the middle there, we'll talk about more in detail in a bit, and then the fall harvest season. And so we had those seven Mosaic Law feasts that were put in place here. So the harvest had three general stages in sequence.

And so those stages are, one, first fruits, the very first things of the spring harvest. The very first thing was typically the barley harvest was the first fruit. That came ready to be presented, and we'll talk about the timing of that, just about that season. And that was the first of the various harvests was the barley harvest. The next is the main harvest, most of the crops.

So after barley you have wheat, was another one, and then you get into the wine and the oil from the olive oil, and the figs and the dates, and so they go on with a series of different crop harvests. And then along with that, however, was the gleanings.

The gleanings were to provide for the poor and there was two primary things that they would do. One is the Jews were not to harvest in the corners. So if you've got a field with a lot of corners, you've got to leave a lot of it. And who's that for? These are for the poor and the orphan and the widow and to help provide for them. And the other thing that the Jews were prohibited from doing, aside from leaving those corners alone, They want to go back and go through their field a second time to get any leftovers.

If they miss them the first time, that's it. So one of the things that happens in the book of Ruth is Boaz says, hey, leave a lot for her. Go in and leave a lot for her to glean from. So it's the gleanings, you got the first fruits, and then the main harvest, which is really a distributed series of harvests of different kinds of crops, and then the gleanings to provide for the poor. And so those were things where they weren't supposed to go back in and get it, they have to leave that for the poor and widows, orphans, etc. So you have those main sections.

Here's Israel's harvest of firstfruits. It shows up in each of the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, and multiple times in each one. And so this was the literal harvest of firstfruits. Firstfruits is used in Psalm 105. 36 is a figurative term. And then we find that in every place in the New Testament that it shows up, including this passage here, it is used in a figurative sense.

So you have the main harvest, and that would be phased in with different crops, right? And in each case, you had to leave the gleanings, right? So here would be the gleaning from Leviticus 19, 9 through 10. Now, when you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the very corners of your field, nor shall you gather the gleanings of your harvest. Nor shall you glean your vineyard, nor shall you gather the fallen fruit of your vineyard. You shall leave them for the needy and for the stranger. I am the Lord your God.

So leave those things so that these others can have them. So very interesting. And so Paul has used this pattern of feasts spread throughout the year. and harvest to start off with saying Christ is the first fruit. And then there are subsequent harvests and subsequent feasts that match up there. Leviticus 23, 22 says something quite similar. So here is the poetic pattern for 1 Corinthians 15, 20, and 23 that goes together. But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who are asleep. And in verse 23, but each in his own order, Christ, the firstfruits, after that those who are Christ's at His coming. So this is making an equivalency between the firstfruits, Christ, and then those that are later, subsequent. Okay, and now we also have another poetic pattern in 1 Corinthians 15, 20-22, but now Christ has been raised from the dead ones, that's my kind of retranslation, the first fruits of those who are asleep.

For since by a man death, who's that man? Adam, right? By a man also resurrection of the dead ones, Christ. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive. I've got a question for you. Does that mean everybody will be made alive? Is that what that's about? It's those in Christ who will be made alive. In Adam, who does that apply to? Every human being born on this planet, right?

But in Christ is only those who have put their faith and trust in Christ. Notice also it says, now Christ has been raised from the dead ones, and that's in the perfect tense. It's a completed past action with ongoing results on in the future, implying permanence, right? He's not going back and forth. And then also we have a connection there for by a man death and Adam all die, and then by a man also resurrection of the dead ones and in Christ all will be made alive. So all who are in Christ are the ones who will be made alive.

So we have this pattern that the Apostle Paul is setting up here with the first fruits, and we also have along with that the pattern of the feasts. So if you had a lamb that was slain, and Christ is our Passover lamb, slain on a Friday, then the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread.

In other words, you'd have Passover, and then you'd have seven days of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. So that first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread would be equivalent to Christ being in the grave on Saturday, and the first fruits being on Sunday. That would be the presentation of first fruits. So if you have Christ just crucified and buried, that would be on Friday, right? And then you have Christ remains in the tomb, that is what we would call Saturday. And then what the Jews would call the first day of the week is Sunday, and that's the presentation of the first fruits, right?

So Christ was raised on the third day. One of the things that happened on that day is that began a series of resurrection appearances, with Christ as the firstfruits among all those who are resurrected. Now, were there people resurrected before Christ? Yeah. Yeah, there were. There were people resurrected before Christ, but those were resurrections back to this life. Christ is a new life, resurrected to new life forever. So we walk through that.

We have Friday, the Passover Lamb, Christ the Passover Lamb is slain, Christ is crucified and buried. Saturday, first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, Christ remains in the tomb. And then on Sunday, there is the Firstfruits, presentation of the Firstfruits, and Christ is raised.

So Christ is our Passover, 1 Corinthians 5.7.

And then Christ is the Firstfruits, 1 Corinthians 15.23. Now, here would be a presentation of the Jewish calendar, and let's kind of walk our way through it. Now, the first one we have shown here is Hanukkah.

Hanukkah takes place in the end of November, December, depending on the coordination between our calendar and the Jewish calendar. Hanukkah is not mentioned in the Bible by name, except it's called the Feast or Festival of Lights in John 10, 22 and 23. It appears that Jesus was observing Hanukkah, which was instituted between the Old Testament and New Testament periods. So then you have Purim, which is another that is not in the Old Testament. Purim, typically about a month before the Passover. And that is celebrated out of the book of Esther.

And so again, not in the Mosaic feasts. Then you have from Passover into the Feast of Tabernacles, the seven Mosaic feasts. And so these are all spelled out in the Law of Moses and the ones the Jews were given originally. And so they were to go and carry these out. What it would imply, because of multiple feasts after the presentation of the first fruits, the second day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, and then we have fifty days after that is Pentecost. And so you have that, and then you have other feasts after that into the fall. It would imply multiple resurrections. And the same thing could be said for the different harvests, multiple resurrections.

Okay, so what is the meaning of firstfruits? Just to get it clear, firstfruits was a term meaning for both the Jews, a term with meaning, excuse me, for both the Jews and the Gentiles. Among the Jews, firstfruits represented then consecrated, and then anticipated, and even guaranteed the whole crop. So all those things are meant in the presentation of the first fruits. Like I said, typically barley was the first thing that was presented.

Passover was the day when Christ was crucified and buried, followed by the first day of unleavened bread when Christ was in the tomb. and then firstfruits the day He was raised from the dead. So Christ is the firstfruits on that day He was raised. So now let's step through the sequence. What does this look like historically? In Christ's first coming, where He died and was buried and raised and ascended and seated, it's that third one, raised, that makes Christ the firstfruits.

Then we have us here during the intervening years of the church age. I put this arrow kind of closer to the Lord's coming. But the reality is, do we know? We don't know. As a matter of fact, if somebody says, it's going to be this time, you're almost guaranteed it's not going to be that time, right? What you should tell them is, don't do that! Then the Lord won't come, right? Okay, so here we are.

I'm inclined to think it's closer to the Lord's coming, but we really don't know. Then we have the Lord's coming for the church, as we read earlier in 1 Thessalonians 4, 13-18. First, those who are asleep in Christ are taken forward to this time of the rapture, and then those who are alive and remain are taken up at that time. Those who are asleep in Christ are taken up first, and then those who are alive and remain. But does that mean it's stretched out over time? It's all in the twinkling of an eye. All happens very quickly. We are caught up. This is a term that's called the rapture. Harpazo is the Greek term.

Christ then comes at the beginning of the kingdom with the church. But are we going, it's just us and the Lord? No. With other saints of prior times. Other saints of prior times and of the tribulation period. And angels will come with Christ at His second coming. So this is going to be a large group. So at any rate, we will be coming with the Lord for that time.

Death is abolished and all things are put in subjection to Him at the end of this present heavens and earth, and then begins the new heavens and new earth when heaven is brought down to the earth, described in Revelation 21 and 22. So here is the resurrection that the Old Testament saints are looking forward to and the Tribulation saints. This is not us, but this is their resurrection.

Isaiah 26, 19 describes it. Your dead will live, their corpses will rise. You who lie in the dust, awake and shout for joy, for your due is as the dew of the dawn, and the earth will give birth to the departed spirits. Daniel 12, 1 and 2 is another description.

Now at that time, Michael, the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people, and who's the sons of your people? It's talking about Israel, right? will arise and there will be a time of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time. We take that to be the tribulation period.

And at that time, your people, everyone who is found written in the book, which book is this book of life will be rescued. Many of those who sleep on the dust of the ground will awake these to everlasting life, but others to disgrace and everlasting contempt. The beast and the false prophet and all who take the mark of the beast will go directly to the lake of fire from here. That's what this is talking about. But we, however, as believers, have the blessed hope.

Paul wrote to Titus about this in Titus 11-14. For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men. instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously, and godly in the present age. And by the way, just to make clear, the Jewish expression, and we find it in the New Testament especially, is there's the present age, Paul calls it also the present evil age, that extends from the time of Adam's fall until right before Christ's second coming, right? So that's the present age or the present evil age. The age to come, if you see that description, is the Messiah's age. It says, the present age looking for, this is us, looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus.

And by the way, the Greek construction there is the great God and Savior are the same person. The same person. So is Jesus deity? Is He God? Yes. Christ Jesus who gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good deeds. Now think about this.

Every believer is in Christ in these five events, and that's they're crucified, buried, raised, ascended, and seated. When Christ would cross the boat on the Sea of Galilee with the disciples, you weren't identified in that. When Christ was born in Bethlehem, you weren't identified with Him in that. When He was twelve years old and they couldn't find Him until they finally found Him in the temple, You weren't identified with Him in that. You were identified with Him when He was crucified and buried and raised, ascended and seated.

Those are the five ways. That's it. So God saw fit that we would be identified with Christ in those things. So spiritually speaking, you've already been through a death. Spiritually speaking. You were buried with Him. Yes, you're really dead. Right? And then you were raised with Him, the firstfruits. Right? The firstfruits. So spiritually speaking, you've already been through those things. And by the way, spiritually speaking, you have already ascended and seated. Those are done deals. Right? Already happened. You've already been there, whether you remember it or not. Right? And we don't, do we? We don't remember going through that experience.

We understand it by faith that we were with Christ in these things. So these are spiritually true based on faith and what God has revealed. Let's pray. Lord, we thank You as we look at these resurrections for the great hope that we have, the blessed hope as Paul calls it. We thank You that as we look through these things spiritually, we've already been through these five things. And because the sequence matters, we're left seated with You. And we thank you for that. We pray that you would indeed help us to set our minds on you there in the heavenlies. And we just pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.