1 Cor. 15:12-19, John 14:1-3, John 6:26-51, 1 Thess. 4:13-18, 1 Cor. 15:51-55.

 “And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life” (1 John 5:11, 12, NKJV).

 Though writing in Greek, all the New Testament writers (except Luke) were Jews, and they of course approached the nature of human beings from the Hebrew wholistic perspective, not from the Greek pagan one.

 Thus, for Christ and the apostles, the Christian hope was not a new hope but, rather, the unfolding of the ancient hope already nurtured by the patriarchs and prophets. For example, Christ mentioned that Abraham foresaw and rejoiced to see His day (John 8:56). Jude stated that Enoch prophesied about the Second Coming (Jude 14, 15). And the book of Hebrews speaks of the heroes of faith as having expected a heavenly reward that they would not receive until we receive ours (Heb. 11:39, 40). This statement would be meaningless if their souls were already with the Lord in heaven.

 By stressing that only those who are in Christ have eternal life (1 John 5:11, 12), John disproves the theory of the natural immortality of the soul. Truly, there is no eternal life apart from a saving relationship with Christ. The New Testament hope, then, is a Christ-centered hope, and the only hope that this mortal existence will one day become an immortal one.

 Study this week’s lesson to prepare for Sabbath, November 19.