III. Immortality Received at Resurrection After Sleep of Death

1. WHOLLY DEPENDENT UPON CHRIST FOR IMMORTALITY

Ellen White ever set forth the eternal, self-existent Christ as the sole source of life and immortality for “mortal man.” Here is a characteristic statement published in an article in 1897:CFF2 722.3

“‘In him was life; and the life was the light of men’ (John 1:4). It is not physical life that is here specified, but immortality, the life which is exclusively the property of God. The Word, who was with God, and who was God, had this life. Physical life is something which each individual receives. It is not eternal or immortal; for God, the Life-giver, takes it again. Man has no control over his life. But the life of Christ was unborrowed. No one can take this life from Him. ‘I lay it down of myself’ (John 10:18), He said.CFF2 722.4

“In Him was life, original, unborrowed, underived. This life is not inherent in man. He can possess it only through Christ. He cannot earn it; it is given him as a free gift if he will believe in Christ as his personal Saviour. ‘This is life.eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent’ (John 17:3). This is the open fountain of life for the world.” ^{2424) Ellen G. White, “Christ the Life-giver,” The Signs of the Times, April 8, 1897, p. 214. Reprinted in Selected Messages 1:296, 297.}CFF2 722.5

And as to man’s complete dependence upon Christ for immortality and his avoidance of the second death she adds:CFF2 723.1

“No man can have an independent spiritual life apart from Him. The sinner is not immortal; for God has said, ‘The soul that sinneth, it shall die’ (Ezekiel 18:4). This means all that it expresses. It reaches farther than the death which is common to all; it means the second death.” ^{2525) Selected Messages 1:297, 298.}CFF2 723.2

Thus by nature “man is only mortal.” And as long as he feels himself too self-sufficient to accept Jesus, “he will remain only mortal.” ^{2626) Selected Messages 1:298.} Immortality is bestowed at the resurrection, which truth has been so generally “lost sight of by the Christian world.” ^{2727) Ellen White, The Great Controversy, 547.}CFF2 723.3

2. DEAD SLEEP UNCONSCIOUSLY UNTIL RESURRECTION

Death is consistently presented as a period of wholly “unconscious rest” and untroubled “sleep.” Such, she repeatedly states, is the position of the Bible (Job 7:21; Psalm 13:3; Deuteronomy 31:16; Matthew 9:24; John 11:11). ConsequentlyCFF2 723.4

“to the Christian, death is but a sleep, a moment of silence and darkness.” ^{2828) Ellen G. White, The Desire of Ages, 787}CFF2 723.5

“Christ represents death as a sleep to His believing children. Their life is hid with Christ in God, and until the last trump shall sound those who die will sleep in Him.” ^{2929) The Desire of Ages, 527.}CFF2 723.6

Death is the complete reversal of the animation of man in the beginning. ^{30One function of human life is thought—and dead are incapable of thinking (Psalm 146:4, Ecclesiastes 9:5, 6). And to thought must be added activity—and the dead have not “any more a portion for ever in any thing that is done under the sun.... no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom in the grave” (Ecclesiastes 9:6, 10). Moreover, thought and activity find expression in speech—but the dead “go down into silence” (Psalm 115:17). Finally, man’s highest capacity is fellowship with God—but “the dead praise not the Lord” (Psalm 115:17)—and there is no fellowship with God during death. The dead have no “remembrance” of God (Psalm 6:5). Death is therefore the complete antithesis of life in every respect.—L. E. F.}CFF2 723.7