Paul and Jesus

Stage two, which Paul calls the “end” (Greek telos), follows, but only after an indeterminate period of time. That is when Christ, who has been given all rule, authority, and power, is able to successfully put “all his enemies under his feet.” Presumably, during this interim period, he will be assisted by his newly glorified heavenly family—thus Paul’s statement that they will be future judges of the world and the angels (1 Corinthians 6:2–3). Paul never writes explicitly of “hell” as a final state of those judged as wicked. He does believe in the “wrath” of God against sinners who do not repent when Jesus appears as judge in the clouds of heaven: “The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night. When people say, ‘There is peace and security,’ then sudden destruction will come upon them as travail comes upon a woman with child and there will be no escape” (1 Thessalonians 5:2–3). In contrast, those “in Christ” are saved from this wrath (1 Thessalonians 1:10; 5:9–10). Presumably, as victorious glorified Spirit-beings, these members of the God-family assist their older brother Jesus Christ in adjudicating the fate of all humanity—whether living or dead. Paul apparently conceives of this as a process involving dispensing of rewards and punishments impartially to all human beings: “There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first, but also the Greek [i.e., Gentile], but glory, honor and peace for every one who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek” (Romans 2:9–10).

The last enemy to be destroyed is death, which seems to imply a full resurrection of all the dead in Hades, but since “everything” becomes subject to Christ, and all those who died “will be made alive,” the implication, at least, is of universal salvation.

Paul ends the long passage from 1 Corinthians 15 with his final, most cryptic statement: “When all things are subjected to him [Christ], then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things under him, that God may be everything to everyone” (verse 28). Here we see that in Paul’s view the rule of Christ, as well as those who assist him in this cosmic transformation, is an intermediate and functional rule. It is for a specified period of time, to accomplish a designated end. Once that goal is achieved and the universe reaches a complete harmony, “God will be everything to everyone.” The phrase in Greek, panta en pasin, is difficult to translate but literally says, “That God may be all things in everything.”

The author of the letter of Ephesians, an obvious devotee of Paul writing in Paul’s name several decades after his death, seems to offer a fair summary of what we can otherwise deduce directly from Paul’s letters about the mystery: “For God has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his predetermined purpose that he set forth in Christ, as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth” (Ephesians 1:9–10).

Salvation then, for Paul, is, in the end, rescuing the entire human race from the disharmony and death that pervade the entire cosmos as a result of the rebellion of the angelic hosts. Christ, along with his newly empowered family of chosen ones, must reign until they have destroyed “every rule, authority, and power,” so that God can be all things to all. Ultimately, Paul says, the “creation itself will be released [i.e., “saved”] from its bondage to decay” (Romans 8:21).

Paul believed that his own experience as well as that of his followers verified the Announcement he proclaimed, this gospel of the mystery of God, uniquely revealed to him. He is adamant that he received his extraordinary personal revelations directly from Christ, swearing to his followers, “In what I am writing you, before God, I do not lie!” (Galatians 1:20). He even went so far as to place a curse on himself, or anyone else, who would dare to change his message, or depart from it. Paul also regularly appealed to the specific ecstatic spiritual experiences of his followers, who he believed had been “joined to the Lord, having become one Spirit with him.”