Google J. B. Phillips. This British pastor lived 1906 to 1982. Wikipedia says, “During World War II, while vicar of the Church of the Good Shepherd in Lee, London, he found the young people did not understand the KJV Bible. During the hours in bomb shelters, while Germany bombed London, Mr. Phillips began translating the New Testament into modern English. He started with the Epistle to the Colossians. This was so well received by the young people, he kept at it. After the war, he finished the entire New Testament and in 1958 published The New Testament in Modern English. Time Magazine said of Mr. Phillips, “…he can make St. Paul sound as contemporary as the preacher down the street.”
His later books included classics like Ring of Truth and Your God is Too Small.
But here is the portion I wanted to share with you today. Taken from his book Ring of Truth, which I strongly recommend.
The basic text for what follows is John 8:51. “Whoever keeps my word shall never see death.” Phillips writes:
Christ taught an astonishing thing about death–not merely that it is an experience robbed of its terror but that as an experience it does not exist at all.
For some reason or other Christ’s words (which Heaven knows are taken literally enough when men are trying to prove a point about pacifism or divorce, for example) are taken more with a pinch of salt when He talks about the common experience of death as it affects the man whose basic trust is in himself. If a man keeps my saying, he shall never see death (John 8:51); Whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die (John 11:26). It is impossible to avoid the conclusion that the meaning that Christ intended to convey was that death was a completely negligible experience to the man who had already begun to live life of the eternal quality.
Jesus Christ abolished death, wrote Paul many years ago, but there have been very few since His day who appear to have believed it. The power of the dark old god, rooted no doubt in instinctive fear, is hard to shake, and a great many Christian writers, though possessing the brightest hopes of ‘life hereafter’ cannot, it seems, accept the abolition of death. ‘The valley of the shadow,’ “death’s gloomy portal,’ ‘the bitter pains of death,’ and a thousand other expressions all bear witness to the fact that a vast number of Christians do not really believe what Christ said.
Probably the greatest offender is John Bunyan, writing in his Pilgrim’s Progress of the icy river through which the pilgrims must pass before they reach the Celestial City. Thousands, possibly millions, must have been influenced in their impressionable years by reading Pilgrim’s Progress. Yet the icy river is a product of Bunyan’s own fears, and the New Testament will be searched in vain for the slightest endorsement of his idea.
‘To sleep in Christ,’ ‘to depart and be with Christ,’ ‘to fall asleep’–these are the expressions the NT uses. It is high time the ‘icy river,’ ‘the gloomy portal,’ ‘the bitter pains,’ and all the rest of the melancholy imagines were brought face to face with the fact: Jesus Christ hath abolished death. (end of Phillips’ quotations)
And now (this is Joe), here are some scriptures that reinforce this wonderful truth…
–From Second Timothy 1:10 “…but now has been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel…”
–From Second Corinthians 15:53ff “For this perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality. But when this perishable will have put on the imperishable and this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, ‘Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?’ …Thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
–From Hebrews 2:14-15 “Therefore, since the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself also partook of the same, that through death he might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and might fre those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives.”
–From Matthew 22:32, “He is not the God of dead people, but of the living.” I love the way He put the Sadducees in their place with pure scriptural logic.
–From John’s Gospel, we have a lot of great statements–
John 5:24 “He who hears my word and believes Him who sent me, has eternal life and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life,”
John 6:40 “For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life and I Myself will raise him up on the last day,”
John 6:58 “He who eats this bread will live forever,”
John 8:51 “Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word he will never see death,”
John 10:27-28 “My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow Me, and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.”
And on and on it goes. Chapter 11 of John, the raising of Lazarus, gives us verses 25 and 26.
We say, in concert with Dr. Phillips, what is it going to take for God’s people to start believing Jesus’ word??? And we must not blame it on Paul and say, “It’s just his interpretation.” Man, it’s all through the New Testament.
Often when I preach this truth to God’s people I will add, “I want you to remember something. When you wake up in Glory, a moment after taking your last earthly breath, you are going to say, ‘You mean that’s it? That was death? That is what I feared all this time? Why, it’s nothing! Just a curtain you slip through. Hardly anything at all!”
Well, we tried to tell you.
Remember you heard it here, friend.
