Art Thou not from everlasting, O Lord my God, mine Holy One?
we shall not die.
The Christian conception of immortality
We know” that this prophet was inspired, from the profound moral insight and far-reaching spiritual vision revealed in his utterance. His words are his only credentials, but they are amply sufficient. The prophecy dates near the close of the seventh or the beginning of the sixth century, b.c. The circumstances of Habakkuk’s time largely determined the contents as well as the form of his prophecy. What were these circumstances? On the one hand grave disappointment in the development of his own nation. The hope centring in Josiah was dispelled by his death in ill-advised battle. Simultaneously the power of Assyria waned, and the power of Babylon grew. The politician’s despair is the prophet’s opportunity, and grandly does Habakkuk rise to the occasion. The prophet saw that though Babylon was a hindrance to Judah’s political emancipation, yet it was one of the necessary agents of its moral deliverance. Chaldea is to this extent God’s agent, that it will compel Judah to fall back upon its religion and its God. Because the Eternal God is holy, Judah cannot die. The argument deals, strictly speaking, only with the persistence and decay of earthly societies and kingdoms. The life which is inferred from ethical kinship with God is victorious national life. The individual counterpart of the prophet’s argument is given by our Saviour in His inspiring words, “Because I live, ye shall live also.” The relation of the principle to the individual, and individual immortality is, no doubt, more subtle and complicated, especially with regard to the negative results of the principle; but there is a wide field of positive conclusions, where the argument is quite as strong and clear and inspiring in the case of the individual as of the nation, and this profounder and richer application has been fully made in the New Testament. Indeed the whole progress of revelation has been the unfolding of old principles into ampler significance rather than the addition of new ones. In the New Testament the individual is emphasised, and all ethical and religions considerations are first of all studied in reference to the individual. There is a little danger nowadays of losing sight of the individual again, of going back to the old world immature conceptions of society, in which the individual lay latent in the mass. This is a mistake. We shall not create an ideal society by accomplishing superficial reformations in the mass; we must be ever searching through the mass for the individual. The religion of Christ is primarily for the individual. Primarily, therefore, in the application of the Divine message, we have to deal with the spirit of man in its individual relation to God.
I. The spiritual man’s conviction of immortality. The Scriptures nowhere assert the general principle of human immortality. There is certainly no clear indication of conditional immortality. The biblical revelation of immortality is in part bright and clear as the noonday, in part obscure and shadowy. We must not confound the method of Plato and Butler with the biblical method. One thing is clear. As man is, like God, an essentially ethical being, he cannot be destroyed by a merely physical change like death. The sense of spiritual kinship with God gradually compelled the personal conviction of immortality. The revelation has always come in the intense individual conviction, “I live in God, and so live for ever.” The manifest aim of revelation has been to develop the Christian consciousness, not to satisfy all our curiosity about the eternal future. It is sometimes said that the only certain proof of immortality is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. This is correct, if it is carefully stated. It is correct, when the resurrection of Christ completes the Christian consciousness, and is vitally related to it. Paid argues thus, “If the resurrection of Christ be not a historic fact, then the deepest and noblest spiritual consciousness of men is a vanity and a falsehood, for that depends upon and demands a risen Christ.” The Christ within me is the final assurance of life and immortality.
II. The christian contents of this conviction. It is a conviction, not of mere continued existence, but of eternal life, rich and varied in its content, a life filled to overflowing with the fulness of the Eternal.
1. The Christian conviction of immortality involves the assurance of a great increase and expansion of life after death. This assurance of expansion of life does not imply a breach of continuity between this life and the next.
2. The contents of this conviction include the resurrection of the body. Scepticism on this subject has arisen from supposed intellectual difficulties which have been allowed to obscure the utterance of the living voice of the Christ-spirit within. The denial of the resurrection of the body is virtually a denial of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Are there then no difficulties? None at all, except those created by superficial theories of the resurrection. The continuity and redemption of our wonderful complex life will be complete. (John Thomas, M. A.)
The eternity, providence, and holiness of Jehovah
I. The prophet regards the eternity of Jehovah as an argument for their preservation. “Art Thou not from everlasting?” The interrogatory does not imply doubt on his part. The true God is essentially eternal, He “inhabiteth eternity.” From His eternity the prophet argues that His people will not perish,--“we shall not die.” There is force in this argument. His people live in Him. Christ said to His disciples, “Because I live, ye shall live also.” Man’s immortality is not in himself, but in God.
II. He regards His providence as a source of comfort. “O Lord, Thou hast ordained them for judgment; and, O Mighty God, Thou hast established them for correction.” “Jehovah, for judgment Thou hast appointed it, and, O Rock, Thou hast founded it for chastisement” (Delitzsch). Whatever evil of any kind, from any quarter, comes upon the loyal servants of God, comes not by accident: it is under the direction of the All-wise and the All-beneficent. These Chaldeans could not move without Him, nor could they strike one blow without His permission; they were but the rod in His hand. All the most furious fiends in the universe are under His direction. Whatever mischief men design to inflict upon His people, He purposes to bring good out of it; and His counsel shall stand.
II. He regards His holiness as an occasion for perplexity. “Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity: wherefore lookest Thou upon them that deal treacherously, and holdest Thy tongue when the wicked devoureth the man that is more righteous than he?” Jehovah is the Holy One. As if he had said, Since Thou art holy, why allow such abominations to take place? why permit wicked men to work such iniquities, and to inflict such suffering upon the righteous? This has always been a source of perplexity to good men. (Homilist.)