What About Us? | What About Now?

This is the third and final installment of an excellent article by Terry Cropper. The claim (false to the core) is often made that if Christ came in AD 70, at the end of the Old Covenant age of Israel, then there is nothing for us today. There is no such thing as sin, there is no such thing as morality– the end came, it is “all over.” In this final installment responding to the question What About Us? Terry offers some thrilling answers. Be sure to read the previous two installments What About Us – #1  and What About Us – #2.

Here now is Terry’s concluding article on What About Us?

According to the Bible, when was the resurrection to take place? The Scriptures testify that the time of the resurrection was to be at the end of the Old Covenant age. (John 6:39-40) We know this to have happened in AD 70 with the destruction of the Jewish Temple. The disciples knew that the fall of the temple and the destruction of the city meant the end of the Old Covenant age and the inauguration of a new age. (Matthew 24:3) The resurrection of the dead was not a biological resurrection of dead decayed bodies, but a release from Sheol of all who had been waiting through the centuries to be reunited with God in the heavenly country. Paul tells us about this hope of reunion of the Old Testament saints with God in the heavenly country starting in (Hebrews 11:8-16).

Our story of the future is told in the pass in the redemption history of Israel. Since all things are fulfilled our place today is to rest in that reality of the complete redemption work of Christ.

What About Us? – Our Relationship With Christ

What are some of the evidences in your life of new things having come, and old things having passed away? What does the Bible say about our relationship to God and experience of newness?

Christ Jesus has given us eternal life, and will never die, which means we have no need of resurrection. You cannot have life and need resurrection. Eternal life is something that was not possible to the saints under the Old Covenant. The bible says death reigned from Adam to Moses, “even over those who had not sinned”. (Romans 5:14)

The resurrection was a onetime event in which the Old Testament saints were brought out of Hades and finally overcame death to be with the Lord. Because of God’s great love for us we will never see death (separation from God) and go Hades to await the day of redemption which is something the Old Covenant saint hoped for. WHAT MORE COULD WE ASK FOR? WE HAVE EVERYTHING GOD PROMISED AND THE SAINTS HOPED FOR?

What is our new relationship with God? Those who are in Christ are no longer enemies, of God but are called sons. As believers, upon physical death, we simply drop the flesh and enter the spiritual realm where we will be with God for all eternity. A physical resurrection of our bodies would have no point, since we will not continue living on this planet, breathing earth’s oxygen, and eating earth’s food after we die physically.

The Bible is about God’s redemption plans through Christ. (Geneses 3:15) It’s about the hope of the promise made by God to the Jewish patriarchs. (Romans 15:8) It’s about the release or resurrection from Sheol of all saints who had been waiting through the centuries to be reunited with God. (Psalms 49:15; Hebrews 11:13) It’s about Christ giving eternal life to the saints so they will never again be separated from God. (John 5:24) It’s about gentiles being united with God who were at one time separated from Christ, that were excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. (Ephesians 2:12) It’s about receiving an eternal kingdom that will never end. (Daniel 2:44) It’s about God fulfilling his promise to dwell in and among his people, and be their God. (Revelation 21:3)

The Bible is NOT a book of fairy tales promising a life of utopia upon the earth. The Bible is not about the rapture so we will not have to go through life’s problems. The Bible is not about man made assumptions of how God should fulfill his promises. The Bible is about God restoring that what Adam lost from the book of Genesis to Revelation Like the angels in heaven we should be constantly praise God for all that he has done for us through the redemption work of his Son. For He is worthy of our praise day and night.

Terry has done an outstanding job of answering the question: What About Us?