But why discuss this further? Christ has been raised, the firstfruits of the rest of the dead, thus, as one with them, pledging their resurrection. If man brought death, resurrection must equally come through man. The whole race died in Adam, the whole race will be raised from the dead in Christ. This universal resurrection will not be accomplished all at once but in stages according to the different classes concerned. In the first stage there is Christ Himself as firstfruits; in the second, at His return, Christians; in the third stage, the rest of mankind, when He delivers up His kingdom to the Father after He has abolished all hostile powers, for His reign must continue till this has been achieved. The last of them is death. This is foretold in Scripture (Psalms 8:6), which says that God has put all in subjection to Him. (The Psalmist says to man, which Paul interprets as equivalent to the Son of Man; son of man is used in the Ps. in the sense of man.) Obviously God, who puts all things under Christ's feet, is not included in the things made subject to Him. When this is accomplished, the Son will subject Himself to God, that He may be all in all, that is the indwelling power animating and controlling the whole universe.
1 Corinthians 15:22. There is no reference here to what is known as universal restoration. But there is to universal resurrection. The all is as unlimited in one place as the other. The acts of Adam and Christ are racial acts, done in their capacity as natural and spiritual heads of the race, and affecting the whole race. Christ undoes, and more than undoes, what Adam has done, physical death is cancelled by physical resurrection. This would not have been the case if universal death had been met only by limited resurrection. In Christ has here no specific reference to those who are united to Christ by faith. This relation depends on the choice of the individual, but death and resurrection are quite independent of personal volition. The general structure of the Pauline theology would compel us to postulate his belief in universal resurrection; here he explicitly asserts it.
1 Corinthians 15:24. Usually the first clause is translated as in RV, and the end is the usual sense. It seems, for various reasons, better to accept Lietzmann's view that it means here the final portion, the remainder, i.e. the non-Christian portion of mankind. There is thus a double resurrection of the dead, the former of Christians, at the Parousia, the latter of non-Christians, presumably at the end of Christ's reign.
1 Corinthians 15:29-34. Very abruptly Paul descends from this soaring flight, one of his most daring pieces of speculation, to very practical arguments. What is the object of baptism for the dead? Apparently some received vicarious baptism, hoping that by being baptized in their place they would benefit friends who had died unbaptized. If there is no resurrection, they cannot be profited. Why do Paul and his colleagues run such daily risks of death? for this, he assures them by his Christian pride in them, is no exaggeration. If he had really, as men wished, fought with wild beasts at Ephesus, what would that extreme risk have profited him? The consequence of denying the resurrection is to practise the maxim, Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die (Isaiah 22:13). Let them not give ear to such maxims. The saying (quoted from Menander, the Athenian dramatist, 342- 291 B.C.) is true, Bad company corrupts good morals. Let them awake in a right spirit and not sin; a shameful ignorance of God is only too prevalent among them.