Godbey's Commentary - Acts - Romans - Enter His Rest

from Alpha, “not,” and aidoo to “see.” Hence Hades, the unseen, includes both heaven and hell. We
have this illustrated in Luke 16, where the rich man and Lazarus are in the same world, actually
enjoying conversational proximity. But Dives is tormented by the flame of fire. Hence he is in hell
properly so called; while Lazarus is in that intermediate Paradise called Abraham’s bosom, because
it was the receptacle of all the spiritual children of Abraham, i.e., the Old Testament saints, saved
in the Abrahamic covenant and there detained in a state of felicitous captivity (Ephesians 4:8) till
the Abrahamic covenant was sealed and ratified by the blood of Christ The dying thief went to this
paradise the very day of the crucifixion, (Luke 23:43), notwithstanding certain wicked heretics have
had the audacity to even change the punctuation of the Greek in this passage in order to sustain the
most senseless of all heresies which even brutalizes you by taking away your immortal soul. As our
Savior assured the women in the garden that He had not yet ascended into heaven, though He had
already, pursuant to His prediction on the cross, met the saved thief in paradise, i.e., in Abraham’s
bosom (Luke 16), the intermediate paradise of the old dispensation, where the saints enjoyed
unmingled bliss, awaiting the great redemption on Calvary, and their risen and glorified Lord to lead
them all into heaven, throwing wide the pearly portals evermore to stand ajar while angels welcome
every saint into the New Jerusalem, the city of God, the home of the angels and glorified saints.
1 Peter 3:19: “Being put to death in the flesh and quickened in the spirit, by which going,
he proclaimed to the spirits in prison.”
This is the pillar of popery and modern theories of a second probation for sinners after they die
in sin. It is radically and literally untrue as manipulated by those heretics. The capital S in “Spirit”
in E.V. was put there by the translators, because they thought it meant the Holy Spirit, which is
incorrect, as this construction would break up the antithesis with “flesh.” The simple meaning is that
while our Savior’s body was put to death, His human spirit, not the Holy Ghost, was quickened by
the Holy Ghost, so that His human spirit leaving His dead body on the cross [poor soul-sleepers even
deny that Jesus had a soul] went down to the intermediate world and proclaimed to the lost millions
of hell. The E.V. erroneously translates ekeeruxen, which simply means “proclaim as a herald,”
“preach,” thus leading the people to believe that Jesus preached the gospel to the disembodied
sinners in hell. The word which means to preach the gospel is not in this passage, but it simply
means to proclaim as a royal herald. What did our Savior proclaim to the inmates of Hades? He
proclaimed His own victory, gloriously and eternally won on the cross of Calvary. The devil had
been after Him to kill Him all His life, vainly congratulating himself that if he could kill the man
Jesus, the final victory would perch on his black banner, and he would have nothing to do but add
this world to hell and reign forever without a rival. While the devil is paradoxically intellectual, his
spirit is black as the midnight of hell, uncheered by a solitary ray. Hence he leaped to the conclusion
that if he could kill the man Jesus, the last battle was fought and the final victory won. Therefore hell
roared with shouts over the arrest of Jesus in Gethsemane, cheered and enthused more and more by
the successive reports of His condemnation by Caiaphas, Herod and Pilate, meanwhile the black
couriers constantly arrive from Calvary, reporting the bloody culmination of their hellish enterprise.
Finally, Satan, sitting on his ebon throne in the center of the pandemonium, has ordered ten thousand
tall demons to subscribe in glowing capitals, “Victory,” on the black walls all round the palace of
damnation. Demoniacal hands have half written the word. Suddenly thunderclaps and lightnings
flash from the opening portals of the pandemonium appalling all the inmates of the bottomless pit.
Lo! Hark! Who comes there? It is none other than the human soul of Jesus. He has left His dead