The Immortals

 

“And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it” (Matt. 16:18).

 

Did you ever wonder what Jesus meant in this passage about building His church?  Now, I’m not talking about the non-denominational, First Bapticostal Church of the Nazarene in Christ, the church that is right down the road from your house. Christ’s church is the one He builds by His grace, through our faith, which entrance into it can only come through the baptism of the Holy Spirit into the body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:13).

 

The church is the universal body of believers making up the body of Christ throughout the last 2,000 years.  We are also referred to as the “bride of Christ” in keeping with 2 Cor.11:2 and Rev. 19:7-9. We come from all different backgrounds and ethnicities, from different times and eras, from the rich and poor, and everywhere in between. We are baptized into one Body, coming from many nations, tongues, and peoples (1 Cor. 12; Col. 1:17-19).

 

We also have many differing gifts and callings; we are given varying levels of understanding, as pertaining to what God the Father directs God the Spirit to gift us with so that we may accomplish His will.  So what does Matthew 16:18 mean, when it states that the “gates of Hades” will not prevail against His church?

 

The Church Age was officially born on the day of Pentecost some fifty days after Christ’s resurrection.  The implications of this day, as opposed to any other day, is that Pentecost represented the only feast in which leavened bread was used, implying that leaven equaled something bad, or impure (sinners), and was being brought before the Lord as the offering. 

 

The age of the Church moved from being a predominantly Jewish movement to a primarily Gentile one over the course of the next 40 years. This is in keeping with the opposite descriptions in the Parable of the Sower and the Seed, in which Matthew and Mark’s accounts are reversed;  Matthew’s gospel being aimed directly at the Jewish audience, while Mark’s is that to the Gentile audience.  This seemed a fait accompli by AD70 when the Roman Legions under Titus Vespasian, laid siege to Jerusalem and ultimately destroyed the city and the Temple.

 

The age of the church then progressed through the next 2000 years bearing a striking resemblance to the sequential order of the Seven Churches in Revelation chapters 2-3, in which the first three and the last four have endings that are swapped, possibly signifying that the last four churches would last until the time of the Tribulation. (He who has an ear let him hear.)

 

The last church, the Laodicean period, becomes the predominant face of Christendom and marks a period in church history where Christianity would all but become indistinguishable from the world. Yet, as the other three remain during this era, there are still those in the minority who hold to the Word of God, and God delivers us from what is about to come upon the whole world (Rev. 3:10). 

 

Even though it seems that this last Church Age is lukewarm and repugnant, God always has His remnant. The Church Age closes not in defeat but in victory. The “dead in Christ” are resurrected and the last generation of believers who are still alive—are “caught up” from this world and in a moment, are transformed from mortal to immortal.

 

“For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.  So 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: ‘Death is swallowed up in victory’

 

O Death, where is your sting?
O Hades, where is your victory?

 

The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 15:53-57).

 

Since we have victory over sin through Jesus Christ, the “sting of death,” which was meant as punishment for sin, is eliminated, and we who die are immediately with the Lord in glory (Gen. 2:17; Rom. 5:12-18; 2 Cor. 5:5-8).  What remains then, is the “victory of Hades” and “Hades” being another name for death, hell, or the grave, which all mankind, with the exception of Jesus Christ, have been under subjugation too since Adam.

 

This is what Jesus meant, in that the “gates of Hades” (or death, hell, or the grave), shall NOT prevail over His church. His promise of delivery from this seemingly ominous fate that we all dread to think about, and to eventually meet, is only to His church.  It wasn’t to the OT saints, who were set aside in Abraham’s bosom until the Cross (Eph 4:8), nor is it to those who come after the church. The Tribulation saints are those martyred saints who during the Tribulation find their station beneath the altar of God awaiting their final number to be killed, seeking retribution from our Lord on those who slaughtered them (Rev. 6:9-11; 13:7).