By Kayode Crown

Philippians 1:21

For to me, living is Christ and dying is gain.

Paul said that whether he lived or died, he wanted Christ to be exalted in his body (Phil 1:20). This is the language of deep spirituality, as evident in Paul's sharing throughout this book.

For him, death is nothing but an opportunity.

On the whole, death is not something we want to talk about or think about. And that is sensible because God did not design humans to want to die. Death itself is an intrusion into the human experience (Genesis 3). This would now lead us to discuss the theology of death.

Death was not on the horizon for Adam and Eve. Paul was very clear in another place that through one man, the first Adam, sin entered the world, and death followed in its wake through sin (Romans 5:12).

Therefore, to avoid wanting to die and to do everything possible to maintain life and health is the human default. No one needs to be told that.

So, Christ saying that He willingly laid His life down (John 10:17-18) is truly amazing. But his death wasn't for nothing. It was the ultimate thing.

Through death, Jesus destroyed the one who wielded the power of death (Hebrews 2:14), that is, the devil, and through Christ's life is now our portion. We move from death to life (John 5:24), and at his second coming, death will be swallowed up forever (1 Corinthians 15:54). Just as it is a sure thing that Jesus walked the earth, it is a sure thing that we will gain an immortal body that cannot die.

Paul, in another place, said that Christians should not treat death like the unbelievers who have no hope (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18), because we have the hope of eternal life. Everyone should hold onto that vision as we await the hope of the resurrection.

1 Corinthians 15:19-22: For if only in this life we have hope in Christ, we should be pitied more than anyone.

But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead also came through a man. For just as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive.

That is the hope that the gospel makes real in us. We are not wondering what would happen. We know what would happen. We have been given a glimpse of the afterlife. Paul says being absent from the body is to be present with the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:8). And the thief that died on the right hand of Jesus was promised an immediate entrance into the presence of God. So, Paul did not say anything strange or obscure.

2 Corinthians 5:8: Thus we are full of courage and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord.

Would you want to be anywhere else except in the presence of Christ and behold Him face-to-face? Not me? I don't want to be anywhere else.

However, before Jesus died, He said that He did not pray for us to be taken away from the world (John 17:15). Therefore, our presence here is because that is the way God has chosen for us to glorify Him at this time.

When Jesus told Peter how he would die and John wrote it down, John's account described Peter as glorifying God.

John 21:19: Now Jesus said this to indicate clearly by what kind of death Peter was going to glorify God.) After he said this, Jesus told Peter, “Follow me.”

John said Peter's death was a way to glorify God, and Paul said in the previous verse that it was about exalting Christ. He said dying is gain.

As we would see in the following verses, to depart and be with the Lord is of personal gain to him, but his continuing existence in this plane is an opportunity for continued ministry. It's not that one is bad and another is good. As far as he was concerned, both are equally good.

But that reality is not for everyone, only for those who have put their hope in Christ, whether for a brief moment like the thief hanged on the right side of Jesus (Luke 23:43), or Paul, who had years of devotion and was at the very height of Christian ministry as an apostle.

In another place, Jesus said that those who believe in Him would not die, and those who die and believe in Him will live again.

John 11:25-26: Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live even if he dies, and the one who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

Resurrection, which is life swallowing up death, is therefore not an event but a person: Jesus. And never dying is the actual state of the believer; that is why what is regarded as the event of death, which is not technically called that in the bible, instead it is called sleeping.

Death is no longer final because of Christ.

Even if the believer dies, it is not really death because the person living in Christ cannot really see death; he sleeps.

Meaning the body-life ends (sleeps to be reanimated on the future day [from our frame of reference] of resurrection), but his spirit is with the Lord, just as the thief on the cross was buried and has rotted, but was immediately with the Lord.

Christ's frame of reference is not ours. However, we can adopt Christ's perspective and see that death is nothing but sleep, and more than that. As Paul says, living is Christ, dying is gain.

So, when Jesus says that the one who believes in Him will never die, that is speaking from His frame of reference, which is different from ours. And by faith, we believe and adopt that frame of reference; we also see death differently and can say, like Paul, 'Dying is gain.'

Christ stopped a funeral procession and raised a child from the dead (Luke 7:11-17). He raised Lazarus from the dead after four days in the grave (John 11).

He regards death differently from the way we do. We are called to believe in Him to experience new life in Him, so that even if we die, we do not really die because we live forever in Him.

From the frame of reference of the one who calls the things that be not as though they are (Romans 4:17), the resurrection already occurs, so in truth: