2, 3, 4--Two Deaths, Three Resurrections, Four Judgments Part 1

Good afternoon to all of you. Good to see you on a... I don't know what kind of Saturday to call it. I had had it this morning to look at the newspaper and it went over to the weather page and it said, Downpours. I looked out the window and I said, well, they missed this one by a country mile. And I have no complaints whatsoever. Seeing blue skies and sunshine when the forecast for all the next five days was rain, rain, rain, rain, rain.

Very delightful to have a sunny Sabbath. Mr. Sexton has been sharing with me over a brief period of time the upcoming trip and I know the excitement involved in doing so. It should be a tremendous opportunity. It's been many, many years ago, but my father came to me one day and he said, I'll make you an offer. He wanted to go back to Israel after having lived there and he said, I'll be your tour guide if you'll be my photographer. And I said, I'll take you up on it. And so we had the opportunity to literally tour Israel from Dan to Beersheba and tremendous delight. So the time they'll have there in Israel, I'm sure it will be delightful and you know you just can't go.

It doesn't matter how many times you've been there. You can't go without coming back with a fuller, broader perspective of the Bible, the Bible settings, the Bible geography, and the Bible time. So I know it will be a tremendous trip for the two of them. I was scheduled for today and then Mr. Sexton said going to Israel and I think it was Ken Lauch that was doing some coordinating and he said, if you will trade me next Sabbath in Salem, which I was scheduled for, for you taking next week in Portland, I would appreciate it.

And I said, well, I'll do that as long as I can have both of those Sabbaths. I said, I found out that a sermon that I had been working on really wasn't going to fit into one sermon slot. It was the result during the Feast of Tabernacles of giving the eighth day, meaning of the day message. And following giving that message, a young lady walked up to me and we were talking about the message and she said, my husband said to me, you know there are three resurrections.

And she furled her brow at her husband and came to me and said what he had said to her. And I said, well, he's absolutely right. I said, the focus on the eighth day is the second resurrection. But I said, your husband is absolutely right in what he said to you. And she said, well, do you have a sermon on file, I guess with ucg.org or with a Portland site, that covers that topic.

And I said, you know, I really don't think I do. I've covered edges of the topic at some time or another. But I said, I don't really know that I have one. And I smiled at her and said, you know, the next time I get the chance to speak in Portland, I'll speak on that topic. And then you can plug into the Portland site and you can get a fuller answer to your question about the third resurrection. You know, it's interesting. Time goes by quickly, as the sermonette was pondering the both sides, the slow and the fast of it. But time goes by quickly.

And it is easy from the pulpit to take for granted that members understand our doctrines. But the nature of time is such that a generation comes, a generation goes, and a third generation comes along. And in times, doctrines can fade to the place where one generation is well anchored and later generations are really not familiar with the teachings. And this is what was happening in the conversation that afternoon on the eighth day as I was talking with this young lady.

Since Mr. Sexton is graciously giving me two sermon slots, I will use both of them to cover the topic at hand. I'll give you an initially cryptic title for today's sermon. The short title is 234. The 234 stands for two deaths, three resurrections, and four judgments. All of us know when it comes to basic doctrines that we go back to Hebrews 6 and we look at the statement in Hebrews 6 that says, look, we don't need to go back over the fundamentals.

In fact, it says here, we're going to leave the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ and we'll go on from there to perfection. And oh, by the way, it's almost parenthetical those elementary principles of Christ and it really walks through the whole plan of salvation in a few very simple steps. Faith, repentance, baptism, laying on of hands, resurrection, and eternal judgment. The period that we are talking about is the period described in two very simple phrases of resurrection of the dead and of eternal judgment.

Understanding two deaths, three resurrections, and four periods of judgment is something that is not common. I've sat down a couple of times in the last couple of weeks and there are a few sites, online sites, I won't name them. Those of you that have electronic Bible tools, you will know that there are a few sites where you can address 10 to 15 commentaries on one site.

And so I sat down and I went through 15 commentaries on the subject. And as you would imagine, they are first of all, all over the place. Secondly, mostly all over the wrong place and only occasionally giving a gem of understanding that we could add to our collection.

To study this means a trip into the Word of God with a tremendous caution on the use of any biblical tool. And I think we can all understand why. There are some scriptures that deal with the resurrections and judgment and death that are so clear and so plain that a commentator cannot misinterpret what it says. But by and large, in a world that believes in instantaneous reward or punishment upon death because resident within us is an immortal soul, it is very difficult for a commentator so oriented to give a useful and valid comment on some of the doctrinal statements in the New Testament that are as contrary as night and day from that position.

As a result, the Bible, as we would anticipate, is our gold standard, and only on occasion are you going to find a useful gem in a commentary or like source. So let's go through this in order. We'll start with our twos today. We will get into the front end of three, and then we'll finish three and four next week. Let's talk about two deaths. A beautiful segue, Mr. Sexton Last Sabbath, on his start on Ephesians, addressed the subject of the second death, and I sat there listening and saying, okay, now how far is he going to go?

And thankfully, the second death was not his focus. Ephesians was. And so he gave me—I'd be knowing to him—he gave me a very fine introduction into the sermon today by pointing out to all of you the second death. I'm going to say at the beginning these subjects crisscross each other consistently, and as a result, as we go through the scriptures on each of these, it's going to be very easy for you to see comments within the scriptures that I won't address.

And the reason being, there are comments to address in the subject of two deaths, and there are comments to address in the next and the next. And as a result, I may totally ignore certain comments in a verse at this point in time, which you will hear me comment upon next week. Okay? So if you hear some things that I don't comment on, hold on, I'll get to those later, because these topics are totally and completely interwoven, and you can't speak on one without touching on the others.

Four scriptures deal explicitly with the fact that there are two deaths. And so we can go from the implied and the inferred and the implicit, all of those that we have to sort of feel our way around, but these are not areas where we have to feel our way around and conjecture. There are four scriptures that are explicit, and we're going to look at each one of those.

And then after we finish looking at them, I'll comment on each one. So let's start in order. Revelation 2, the message to the seven churches. In the rewards that are offered to the churches, we find in the message to the church at Smyrna, Revelation 2, the reward that is offered to those who are overcomers in the Smyrna church is described as follows. Verse 11, Revelation 2, he who has an ear let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.

He who overcomes shall not be hurt by the second death. Incident number one. The remaining three incidences begin in Revelation 20 and spill over into Revelation 21. The first is in Revelation chapter 20 and in verse 6. In Revelation 20 and verse 6 it says, blessed and holy is he who has part in the first resurrection. Over such, the second death has no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ and shall reign with him a thousand years.

Later in the same chapter, at the very end, it says in verse 14, then death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And the final scripture is in Revelation chapter 21 verse 7 and 8. He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.

These are the four explicit locations within the word of God where the phrase second death is addressed explicitly. Let's look at what each one has to say. It's not necessary that we have to go back there if you wish to do so and see it with your own eyes as I'm commenting. That's fine, but I'm not going to spend a lot of time on each one. In the message to the church at Smyrna in Revelation chapter 2 in verse 11, the only element that we can draw from that particular verse relative to this sermon, a sermon on the doctrinal nature, is that there is, we are informed, a second death, and it is very easy to see that it is considered to be a hurtful event and not one that the saints wish to experience.

So the nature of the way it's expressed is that this is a hurtful event, and it isn't something that the saints of God wish to experience. Revelation chapter 20 in verse 6 takes us a step further, and it says to us, it is a blessing to be in the first resurrection because, okay? I mean, I'm sure there are, well, when I say I'm sure, we all know there are additional blessings, but there's a connection being made here.

That connection is, it is a blessing to be in the first resurrection because you will not have to experience the second death. So in that place, the connection that it's making is, the blessing and being in one is so that you don't have to experience the other. In Revelation chapter 20 and verse 14, this is a highly complex verse filled with end-time doctrine, and most of what is in that verse we will visit more thoroughly in the next sermon as we go through the later resurrections and we go through the judgments.

So in Revelation chapter 20 and verse 14, for now, we will simply say, since we are focusing on the second death, we need to take from this verse what it has to say directly about that subject. And I said earlier, there's no room in this doctrine. Well, I didn't say it earlier. I will say it now. What you are going to see developing and what you will see from this particular verse is that in the, if we can call it such for the sake of this sermon, the doctrine of two deaths is that there is no room for three.

There is a first death, there is a second death, there is no room within the doctrine for more deaths. You know, people as they study doctrine, especially doctrine that have numerical components, can wonder, well, how far does it go and how many are there and how many component parts are there. But there is no room for more than two deaths. So there is a first and there is the second. The second death, when you look at Revelation 20, verse 14, is defined as the time when death ceases to exist.

If something no longer exists, it can't appear again later. It doesn't exist. 1 Corinthians chapter 15. In fact, let's just keep a finger in Revelation chapter 20 and verse 14. I didn't read it, but I think at this particular time, since I've made the comments that I did, that I do need to read it. Verse 14 says, In death and Hades, both Necros, dying, death, being dead, and Hades, the grave, both of these are cast into the lake of fire.

And that event constitutes the second death. So if death is cast into the lake of fire, death is dead. I mean, it's some strange wording because we're dealing with things that you can't define in that way. But to make the point, if death is cast into the lake of fire, death just died.

We're all familiar because we read it every time we have a funeral. But I don't know how often in a doctrinal sense, end-time doctrinal sense, we stop and process it. We go back to 1 Corinthians 15 and hear scriptures that it's a rare memorial message or funeral message that I'm asked to give, but this is not part of what is read. 1 Corinthians 15, verses 22 through 26. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive. But each one in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, afterwards those who are Christ's at his coming. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when he puts an end to all rule and all authority and power.

For he must reign till he has put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that will be destroyed is death. So Christ has a list of enemies. He's got a checklist that he will be checking off. We see, while things are going on in our current world, in our current society, for instance, at the beginning of Revelation 20, the end of Revelation 19, we see a beast and a false prophet.

They're on a checklist. They are people who are going to no longer exist. We go down the list and there are others to check off. But here, as Paul is going through the order of events, he said Christ is heading toward a place in time where he will simply officially hand over the whole package to his father. And he says, I won't be ready to do that until I've checked off all the checks. And the last box to check in the checkbox is to destroy death.

And when I've destroyed death, then I'm going to hand it to my father. It's exactly the same thing we read in Revelation 20, verse 14. It's simply addressing it from different angles. Revelation 20, 14, simply says, the grave and death as a function are cast into the lake of fire, and this is the second death. We don't stop reading here in 1 Corinthians chapter 15 in funeral messages. You know, the direct audience, some people can, if they don't remain focused, they can get tangled in 1 Corinthians 15.

This is a letter to a church. It's a letter to a congregation. The audience is a congregation of the church of God. You can't address things broader than that audience within your letter, but remember who the audience is, because there are components within this chapter that apply only to the audience who are being spoken to. For instance, when he says, Behold, I show you a mystery, we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment of a twinkling of eye at the last trump, that's the audience.

He's speaking specifically to an audience. But later he addresses the topic on a broader level that isn't aimed specifically at that audience but is aimed at humanity as a whole. He speaks of a time when corruptible, this is verse 53, this corruptible must put on incorruption and this mortal must put on immortality.

Okay. We know at the sound of the last trump for the saints that will be the point in time when that will happen for them. But eventually, eventually, it is going to have to happen for far, far more than just those who are in the first resurrection. Or it will have to happen for far more than just those who will respond to the last trump. And so he's describing something that must happen to all in humanity who fit within the profile that God has set for giving this gift. And for those, corruptible must put on incorruption, mortal must put on immortality. He says, now when that's happened, verse 54, so when this has taken place, you know, on the eighth day we talk about the resurrection of all who have never had an opportunity for salvation. They make that calling good. The same thing has to happen with them that happens with us. Otherwise, of what value was it? He says, when this has happened, when this corruptible has put on incorruption, and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written. And he's quoting from Isaiah 25.8, death is swallowed up in victory.

You know, we don't stop, brethren, too often just realize that in God's greater plan, he has a focus. He has a focus on the day when death dies. From where he is, he has a laser focus on the day when death dies.

I have appreciated in messages at memorials, I've appreciated what follows. It is literally a taunt.

It's a neener-neener. It's a standing up there and defying. It's, oh, death, where's your sting?

Oh, Hades, where's your victory? In other words, I've pulled your stinger. I've taken all your power.

You're useless. You have no effect. There's nothing you can do.

There is a day coming, brethren, when death dies. And it dies, as Revelation chapter 20 and verse 14 tells us, it dies at the second death.

As for that reason I said to you, there must be two deaths, there can't be three. It's a critically important foundation stone for the discussion of two deaths, three resurrections, and four judgments. We will see it as a reference point.

The last of the scriptures that we read was Revelation chapter 21 verses 7 and 8, as we were then commenting on the elements that made up the second death.

And as we read, he that overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God, and he will be my Son. How do you get there? He that overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God, and he will be my Son. You get there by mortal putting on immortality and corruption putting on incorruptableness. But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderer, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death. This last reference tells us something very simple about the second death. It is reserved for those who will not turn from disobedience. And we see by those who are told it is a blessing that you will not have to experience it, on the one hand. And then in contrast, those who will experience it, it is very easy to see that those who are told one of the great benefits of being where you are is that you will never see the second death. Who is the audience? It is the saints. Those who have followed God and have done so faithfully. Who is told that death is reserved for you? It is those who you can list all the categories you want, but when you lump all the categories together, it is those who say, no, thank you. I choose not to follow and submit to the way of God.

I want to add an addendum at this particular point in time.

While it is not necessary to go where I am going in a narrower study, it may be good to include this just so we have it as a point of reference, and so we have it as a way of understanding as we walk through these end-time areas that Hebrews 6 simply describes under the umbrella of resurrection and judgment, that with every complex subject, the subject, because it is more complex, has facets and nuances to it that we need to respect.

There is an old saying that we are all familiar with. The old saying is, the exception proves the rule. If you understand what that saying is trying to say, what it is trying to say, or if you look up the saying to see what it is trying to say, it is trying to say the exception that proves that a rule exists.

So when you hear the phrase, the exception proves the rule, what it is saying is, it is the existence of the exception that proves that the rule actually does exist.

You know, there is a possibility that some of you in this room may get to demonstrate that.

Okay? 1 Corinthians 15. Let's go back there again.

You may not have thought of it this way, but you may one day get the chance to be the poster child for demoing the old saying, it is the existence of the exception that proves that the rule exists.

1 Corinthians 15. Verse 51. We zoomed over this earlier, but we'll gear down to 2nd gear and walk through it slower. Behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.

In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet, some of you may have the opportunity to one day prove the rule exists by being the exception.

Now, you will be able for all eternity to say, I never experienced death. First or second?

I was born. I lived the next number of years. There was a moment in time where I was this, and there was a next moment in time when I was no longer this. 1 Thessalonians 4.

Two scriptures that we read as scriptures of comfort when we have times where we have lost those that we love. 1 Thessalonians 4.

Well, let's go back to 13. That's where we normally start.

I do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep.

Lest you sorrow as others who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, God will bring with him those who sleep in Jesus.

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 will by no means precede those who are asleep. So there are going to be those of us when we use the euphemism that are dead, asleep, and those who are not dead, not asleep. And those who are not dead will say you first.

I mean, not that you have to, because it's going to happen whether you say you first or not.

Those who are dead will rise first, and you will have to wait your turn if you are one of those exceptions who proved the existence of the rule, and then you will be changed.

Then we who are alive, 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 will rise first.

And then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and thus shall we always be with the Lord.

In the 2-3-4 that make up the elements of the doctrines of resurrection and judgment, there is an exception, a little asterisk that will footnote at the bottom, that says this is what is going to happen to 99 and 44 hundredths percent of all humanity, but there is a little, bitty, tiny element here that we need to note who will never experience any death, first or second.

So, when we look at death from a doctrinal position, brethren, we all know from the minute we draw our first breath, we, of course, don't know if we are the one drawing the breath, but if we are in the arms of a parent or a grandparent is looking by, we are addressing the reality that from that very first breath, this new being is on a journey, a journey that has only one destination, the first death. That destination is assigned to everyone.

Nobody gets to bypass it except that group that we just asterisked from 1 Corinthians 15, 51, and 1 Thessalonians 4, verses 16 and 17. For everyone else, there is no bypassing it.

That isn't the end of things. In fact, as Christ mentioned as he was preaching, and as has been mentioned recently in messages from this pulpit, you don't need to fear those that can issue you death number one.

You need to fear those who can issue you death number two.

Because death number one is transitory. It comes and it goes. Death number two is not.

It's permanent. And so as Christ warned his audience, obviously, every natural human being, if somebody is coming at them in a way that they know, that that person coming at them may take their life, they're afraid. That's just being a normal human being. But Christ is putting it on a comparative scale, and he's just saying to them on a comparative scale. If you want to place your fear where that fear has merit, place your fear on someone who can provide for you the experience of the second death.

Don't waste your time fearing the person who can only take you and make you experience death number one. Because we're going to get past that. All of you are going to get past that. No matter good, bad, or indifferent, whoever you are, you will get past number one. But you're not going to get past number two. The absolute beauty when you see what God has in store for us, and you see God's way of thinking. As Mr. Slocum was going through Peter, and that a day as a thousand years and a thousand years as a day, when you're God and you've been eternal, what in the world difference does a day or a thousand years, either one, make? Neither one of them makes any difference at all to an eternal being. They are both absolutely, totally inconsequential. So, as God looks at this little moment in time, time probably something created for us, where humanity starts on this earth, moves toward a terminal point when the new heaven and the new earth come.

And God says, you know, in this whole plan, I have a focus. And that focus is, I brought all of these beings into existence, and I brought them into existence with the hope that one day they would join us, me and my son, and that they would join with us, live forever, and enjoy the bounty of what we have to share with them. And he said, in all of that, there is a public enemy number one, because I've existed forever, my son has existed forever, and I'm offering eternity to all of my children. And death is our biggest enemy. And he said, I intend to put an end to it.

So, as we look at the doctrinal area of death, understand, brethren, God has a day when he will put an end to public enemy number one.

We've handled the two. Now, let's go on to the three.

You may ask the question, how do two deaths fit with three resurrections? As the young lady who walked up to me and said, my husband said, dear, you know there are three, and the reason she walked up to me was that she didn't know there were three.

And she was asking for a confirmation, and she was asking for elaboration. I don't think it was so much a matter that she was doubting what her husband said. She was saying, can you give me some resources? Can you give me some information that I can go to to add to the discussion that we have had? If we look at a critical starting place for the discussion of three resurrections, I try to find a way to put it in a frame and in a context that makes it the easiest to understand at the beginning. It gives us a platform we can work with, and then we can flesh out that platform.

I think the easiest way to go at it is to understand that God has assigned resurrections to groups, that this is not random. And this is one of the areas, as I said, where you look at Christian theology in general. I have been in the cathedrals of Europe. I have seen the paintings of the Goulish paintings of Judgment Day on the walls of great cathedrals, where an endless line of humanity are lined up. And on one side, obviously, in the way the painting is painted, these are people who have already gone by the judgment bar while the line is still behind them waiting to go through. And on one side are people who have their wings and their halos and their smiles. And on the other side are those who don't have any wings or halos. And depending on how ghoulish the depiction is, there can be some pretty gruesome pictures of what's going on on the other side. And an apprehensive line of people behind waiting until they get up to the counter to hear whether it's right or left. When that is the picture and the term the general resurrection is a mainstay in Christian theology, the general resurrection.

And a lot of things are lumped together there that God really doesn't lump together there.

So if we're going to untangle that, and we're going to make some sense of it, we have to start with going back to a principle that we all know that God is a God of decency and order.

That God is not random, he's not haphazard, and God is simply provided a time and a place for each specific category of humanity. There is a resurrection that is set aside for the saints and for no one else. From the time, if we use the biblical terminology as a marker, the first individual in all of human history that has the term righteous connected to his name is able. So if you go from righteous, able, to whoever, the last person in line in calling and acceptance before the blast of the seventh trump for that entire time period, God says, I have one resurrection that I have set aside for you and you alone. It doesn't belong to anybody else. We're not co-mingling. We're not scrambling the egg. This is yours. It belongs to you and you alone. There is a resurrection that is set aside for all of those who can probably—I'm trying to find the right way to put it—nobody pleads this case as passionately as Paul.

Paul in Romans 9 and 10 and 11, the true empathy that he has, and his focus is his own people, but this is not exclusive. He looks and he says, are they lost?

They don't know. They don't understand. In some cases, they even have good motives, but they're misdirected motives. So he says, out there is everything from—if you read all of Paul and his description of people, Romans chapter 1, it's just raw, total, fist-in-the-face defiance to God all the way to Romans 10 and 11, where he says, I'd give my life for these people. They have a zeal. They're ignorant. They're blind.

You know, God—I grew up in a Sunday school. We had our Scripture competitions.

He wanted to win that little New Testament in Psalms that was going to be given away for the person who had memorized the most verses. And, of course, the most memorized verse, probably in the Christian world at that time, was John 3.16. And most of the kids could rattle it off without ever thinking mentally about any single word in the entire thing. For God so loved the world, he gave them the little sun, and you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and away it goes. But you stop. You say, whoa, put the autopilot on hold. God loved every single solitary human being on this earth so much he'd let his son die for them. If you care that much, then you've got a resurrection set aside for them. They get their own resurrection.

You know, God says, and I don't remember if we went sideways over into this. I think I may have made a slight comment to the young lady as we were talking. But it was very understandable as we were talking, and she said, I'm not familiar. Her message was, I'm not familiar with the third resurrection. And I thought, since that conversation, well, it's very natural that over time that can fall into the shadows, because the Feast of Tabernacles, in the last great day, the Feast and the Eighth Day, are a time of tremendous celebration. It's not a time to come with blood and thunder and pounding the pulpit and woe and doom and all the rest. It is a celebratory time. It's 10% of your tithes come and rejoice before God, you and your family. And so, you don't focus on the third resurrection. It is out of character to the rejoicing of the time.

Because a third resurrection is anything but a time of rejoicing.

It is the worst event in all of human history.

God has reserved a resurrection for all who are damned.

It's not a pretty picture. It's not a doctrine you want to spend a lot of time on. It's not something you stand up on a regular basis and say, well, let's walk through the ugliness of the fact that at the end of all of this, there is a day where people will have probably in some cases the thought go through their mind from Scripture, if they know Scripture. There's a Scripture that says, God is not mocked. What a man sows that he shall reap.

You know, the day is a thousand years and a thousand years as a day is in part because God says, I want to give a level of mercy, an extension of mercy, to people far beyond what most people can even comprehend. And don't look at my tardiness as slackness. You know, I'm just lazy.

I'm unorganized. I haven't got things together. He says, that's not the case. I am hoping, I am hoping, in some cases I'm hoping beyond hope, that every last single person who comes to that place where they can choose to go the right way will choose to go the right way. Because at the end of it all, I have a third resurrection and it's not one you want to be in. God is dealing with three distinct classes of people and each has its own resurrection.

So, as we set the stage by going through resurrection one today, and you think toward next week, the easiest way to put it in a template is God has reserved as sitting at this table for specific groups of people. They're not mixed. They're not scrambled. There is a sitting for one who are distinct. There's a sitting for the second that is distinct, and there's a sitting for the third who is also distinct. Let's now simply walk through the first resurrection, which is the easiest one and the one that you are most familiar with.

God has reserved the first resurrection for those who are called and faithful to the end.

So, if you want the components that make up a candidate for the first resurrection, called faithful, faithful to the end. You remember the old statement in Ezekiel where he says, no more? Or are you going to use the old saying, the father eats sour grapes and the children's teeth are put on edge? He said, let me clarify this all. I'm going to make it very plain. There are four categories. You need to understand them all. If there's a righteous man who remains righteous till he dies, I will reward him. If there's a righteous man who changes from his righteousness, I will forget all of his righteousness. If there's a sinner who turns from his righteousness, I'll forget his sins. If there's a sinner who stays a sinner, I will remember his sinning. The first resurrection is for those who are called and faithful to the end.

We see the reference to the saints. We have a world that has tainted that word to the place where I know a lot of people are not comfortable looking in the mirror and saying, I'm a saint.

When I look in the mirror, there's no halo. Every time I look, frustrating. Never a halo.

So how can I be a saint? Of course, I'm being facetious. But if you go to art galleries, you always know who the saints are because they've got the little yellow dish over the top of their head. Easy in art. Easy in medieval art. Easy in ancient art. Easy in religious art to know who the saints are. But you know what? You can go home and look in the mirror, and you won't see any dish, but you are the saints. And so were every body of people before you who responded in the same way.

Remember Revelation chapter 20 verse 6.

On those who were in the first resurrection, the second death has no power. And so God says to my saints, right up front, I want them to know the biggest benefit of being one of my saints. The second death will never touch you. You'll never experience it.

The hallmark of the first resurrection is its time and the circumstances that surround that time.

I'm going to take you through four scriptures, all of which give you the focus on the when and what accompanies the when. I'll start with the words of Jesus Christ himself, because you can't go to a higher source. It is in response to his disciples' question, who will tell us the signs of the end of the age and of your coming. And he said in the Olivet prophecy, Matthew 24, verses 30 and 31, Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.

And he will send his angel with the great sound of a trumpet.

They will gather together his elect from the four winds from one end of the heavens to the other.

Here Jesus Christ made it very plain. If you're not comfortable being a saint, you can settle in as the elect.

You know, there are people who are trying their very best next week to be the elect, either as a Republican, a Democrat, a conservative, an independent, or whatever.

None of you are on the ballot. You're already there. And you don't have term limits. You can step out if you want to, and you don't want to.

But you've got a lifetime office. You are the elect.

And when that time comes, it will be at the sound of the trumpet, that all the elect will be gathered to Christ.

We've read this already, but let's go back there again. 1 Corinthians chapter 15.

Because all Paul does is parrot the words of Jesus Christ when the disciples said, tell us how will we identify? He says, well, this is how you'll identify it. There are all sorts of things going on, but in this particular context, what's going on is there'll be the sound of a great trumpet. The angel of God will take all the elect from wherever they are, gather them in.

1 Corinthians 15.51. As we've already seen, behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we all shall be changed in a moment, in a twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.

For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

This was early enough in Paul's ministry where he lived like many have in the earlier years of the Church of God. My mother and father, many of your family members, lived with the belief that very likely they would be standing there. And Paul felt the same way at this time, so he was dividing between those who had died in the faith and those who were alive in the faith. But again, it was the same marker, wasn't it? It was at the sound of the trumpet. In this case, he says the last trumpet. So Matthew was not as specific as this one. Paul is a little more specific.

Revelation 11 is even more specific. As we walk in Revelation through the seven seals, and then we get into the subdivisions, and we get into the seven trumpets, we arrive in Matthew 11 at the seventh trumpet. So we've gone from a great trumpet to the last trumpet to the seventh trumpet. They're all the same trumpet, just simply different descriptors.

Then the seventh angel sounded, and there was loud voice in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever. And the four and twenty elders who sat before God on their thrones fell on their faces and worshipped God saying. And the next verses, 17 and 18, are what the four and twenty elders are saying at the sound of the seventh trumpet.

And if you take the part that relates to us, to those in the first resurrection, it's the last part of verse 18. He says, And that you shall reward your servants, the prophets, and the saints, and those who fear your name, small and great.

So at the sound of the seventh trumpet they fall on their faces, and they announce multiple things that are going to happen from that point forward. But among the things that it describes that will happen is, now you will reward your saints, your servants, and your prophets.

This is the time that they finally have been waiting for, and you will give to them what has been reserved for them. We understand there's a lot of inset. In fact, there's an ongoing from there after the seven trumpets, as the seven last plagues. And we really don't come back to this subject that we're at right now in Romans 11 fully until we hit Revelation 19 and 20, specifically the beginning of chapter 20. And it picks up the elements of, okay, how is that done?

Well, it's done by, they will reign and rule with Christ for a thousand years.

So the elements that make up what the four and twenty elders are saying right here really don't come into full focus until we get to chapter 20. And then, ah, we have the rest of the story.

The last incident that helps mark and identify the first resurrection.

Again, we have been to before, but we'll go to once more. As I said to you at the beginning, brethren, if you're going to talk about deaths, resurrections, and judgments, you're going to crisscross, crisscross, and crisscross multiple times. And so the final scripture to add to the picture of the first resurrection is 1 Thessalonians 4. And we will read once more what we read previously. Beginning in verse 13, I don't want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who are dead. You know, the Bible, it's funny, in our day and time, we would see this as a euphemism.

It's like saying somebody passed away rather than saying they're died because died is a harder edge, passed away as a softer edge. Christ wasn't using euphemisms.

He simply owned life and death. And, you know, back when he resurrected Lazarus, well, Lazarus is dead. He said, no, Lazarus is asleep. I'll go in and wake him up. And they sat there and went, oh, you know, this guy's got, he's already beginning to stink. He has been dead long enough that his body is in decay. And this fellow is saying, he's asleep. I'll go wake him up.

I don't like the term, but in this case it fits. You know, people pass off truth and concrete things in life by saying, well, you have your reality and I have my reality, which not the way it goes. But in this particular case, Christ has his own reality.

I've lived forever. I will live forever. I never die. And so for me, the first death is sleep.

Because you're going to wake up. And so he said, I don't want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who are dead, who are asleep, lest you sorrow as others who have no hope.

If we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with him those who sleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God.

And the dead in Christ will rise first.

The first resurrection has certain elements that are definitive.

Number one, those in the first resurrection are the only ones who are guaranteed never to experience another death.

Guaranteed. Nobody else is guaranteed that they will never see a second death.

The first resurrection is the resurrection that is reserved for those who are called and faithful to the end. The markers are simply, it will occur at the time of Jesus Christ, and it will be announced by the sound of the last, the great, the seventh trumpet.

The end of the first resurrection serves as a good place to end, part one. We've covered two deaths and one of the three resurrections, so we have two resurrections and four judgments to go.

A wise man I once knew explained the nature of discussions, such as the one we're having right now. He smiled as we were having a discussion like this, and he says, we start slow, we finish fast.

And I remember being in a group that chuckled when he said that. But he understood the point.

In a doctrinal discussion like this, you have to put your foundation down first, and the foundation takes a little bit of time. We'll get the two by fours and the roofing on and the siding on a whole lot faster. So next Sabbath, we will start with resurrection, chapter two, and we will finish with a fourth judgment.