The 39 Articles of Religion

Part six: the mediatorial work of the Son and Holy Spirit

Article IV: Of the Resurrection of Christ

Christ did truly rise again from death, and took again his body, with flesh, bones, and all things appertaining to the perfection of Man's nature; wherewith he ascended into Heaven, and there sitteth, until he return to judge all Men at the last day.

Raphael Sanzio, Resurrection of Christ, c. 1500

Article V: Of the Holy Ghost

The Holy Ghost, proceeding from the Father and the Son, is of one substance, majesty, and glory, with the Father and the Son, very and eternal God.

Corrado Giaquinto, The Holy Spirit, 1750

The literal resurrection• The claim that Christ or his disciples ever presented the resurrection as a metaphor

for a growing spiritual message has no basis in textual evidence or church history

Michelangelo de Caravaggio, Incredulity of Thomas, 1601

The curse broken, death reversed• The New Testament presents Christ’s resurrection as the supreme spiritual force in

the life of believers, the church, and all of fallen creation• Christ’s triumph over the grave is the basis of all our hope for redemption

…to judge the quick and dead

Jans Memling, The Last Judgment,

c. 1469

“The outcome can only be spiritual loss if the coming of Christ is ignored or set aside. There is no truth that purifies and exalts the Christian life, none that so inspires the worker with earnestness and the discouraged and perplexed with hope.” Griffith Thomas, Principles of Theology, p. 88

Christ’s intercessory life in heaven

Pietro de Corntona, Stoning of Stephen, 1660

“The intercession of the ascended Christ is not a prayer but a life. The New Testament does not present him as an orante standing ever before the father, with outstretched arms… and with strong crying and pleading in the presence of a reluctant God; but as a throned Priest-King, asking what he will from a Father who always hears and grants his request. Our Lord’s life in heaven is his prayer.”Henry Barclay Swete, The Ascended Christ, [1911] p. 95

Comforter, counselor, advocate, helper• The Spirit encourage and guides the church and individual believers, applying the

salvivic work of Christ, and pleading it efficacy to us against the devil’s accusations

Jean Restout, Pentecost, 1732