The Final Authority for the Resurrection

Continuing my thinking about What It Means to Be Resurrected and a sovereign God as a final authority, I was remembering a time in seminary when one of my professors talked about being in college and his roommate asked, “Hey Dude, do you think God could create a rock so big He couldn’t lift it? Whooaaaaa. Deep.” (OK not really deep, but it was pretty funny and I still chuckle at it.)

The Apostle Paul deals with that same kind of thinking in today’s passage (continuing in flow from these verses before it):  1 Corinthians 15:24 Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. 25 For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. 26 The last enemy to be destroyed is death.

1 Corinthians 15: 27 For he “has put everything under his feet.” Now when it says that “everything” has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. 28 When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.

Can God put everything under Himself … until it means He’s under … Himself? Waaaaat?

Of course not. That’s Paul’s point.

Loosely quoting Psalm 110:1 and attributing it to Christ, Paul says that Jesus submits to God’s authority and became God’s commissioned One to do battle and to complete it. He’s doing a march of total victory, that final enemy (death) and all other enemies (sin)…boom! They’re all conquered! And then Jesus faithfully reports back to His Commander-in-Chief, the final authority–the Father Himself.

The Message (a Bible paraphrase) helps to make this clear: “When everything and everyone is finally under God’s rule, the Son will step down, taking his place with everyone else, showing that God’s rule is absolutely comprehensive—a perfect ending!”

In a medal ceremony of sorts, God the Father rewards the final victory. The Father bestows upon His Son Jesus the position of head over everything (Ephesians 1:22-23), and the Name above every name (Philippians 2:9-11) so that the Father, the final authority for the Resurrection, is glorified.

What Does It Mean to Be Resurrected?  It means we have a day in the future in which prayers prayed through the centuries ‘Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, On earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10) will be finally accomplished, once done and for all time.  The Father, the final authority for the Resurrection will see to it “that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:10-11).