What is life according to the Bible?

Life in itself is a very simple thing, though to give an accurate description of it in words would, I have no doubt, puzzle the wisest. It has been defined as power to enjoy the relationships in which one is placed, and though this definition of it may be far from perfect, I know no better. Of course, life can be seen to exist apart from the consciousness of surrounding objects, as that of a newly-born child, a man asleep, or one rendered unconscious through misfortune. The latter is mere animal or, better, physical life; the former, moral; one the life lived, the other the life essentially. The latter is what is referred to in Acts 17:25-28, “He gives to all life and breath,” and “In Him we live, and move, and have our being.” This can scarcely refer to life in moral relationship with God, for man in his natural condition is dead in sins. (Col. 2:13). Again, He says, “If He set His heart upon man, if He gather unto Himself his spirit and his breath, all flesh shall perish together, and man shall turn again unto dust” (Job 34:14-15).

We read in the Bible the expression “the living God.” This does not only distinguish God from all the dead, man-made idols, (for every idol, every god beside the only true and Living God is a man-made god); but also, and it is far deeper thought, He is the Living God because He is life and the source of all life. Where does life come from? The Bible is the only book that tells us. People try to explain it without God, but they must postulate a miracle in the beginning. The “big bang” and the origin of life is, in evolutionary theory, a miracle which cannot be explained. In the Bible it is also a miracle that life has been created, but it is explained, for there is a Living God, the God who is life in Himself who created all living beings, including man; but still there is a great difference between the creation of all other living beings, living souls, and man, because God breathed into man's nostrils the breath of life .

Life is that by which a created being enjoys the place in which the Creator has set it. God breathed into man's nostrils 'the breath of life; and man became a living soul.' Gen. 2:7. Sin having come in, this life is forfeited and God claims it, saying, "surely your blood of your lives will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it, and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man." Gen. 9:5. This instituted capital punishment for murder, which law has never been rescinded or altered.

Now, it is deeply interesting to turn from Satan's lie in reference to the truth and love of God, to the mission of the Lord Jesus Christ, who came from the bosom of the Father in order to reveal what He really is. "Grace and truth" — the very things which man lost, in his fall — "came by Jesus Christ." (John 1:17) He was "the faithful witness" of what God was. (Rev. 1:5) Truth reveals God as He is; but this truth is connected with the revelation of perfect grace; and thus the sinner finds, to his, unspeakable joy, that the revelation of what God is, instead of being his destruction, becomes the basis of his eternal salvation. "This is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." (John 17:3.) I cannot know God and not have life. The loss of the knowledge of God was death; but the knowledge of God is life. This, necessarily, makes life a thing entirely outside of ourselves, and dependent upon what God is. Let me arrive at what amount of self-knowledge I may, it is not said that "this is life eternal, to know themselves;" though, no doubt, the knowledge of God and the knowledge of self-will go very much together; still, "eternal life" is connected with the former, and not with the latter. To know God as He is, is life; and "all who know not God" shall be "punished with everlasting destruction from His presence."

The second verse, "The life has been manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and report to you the eternal life, which was with the Father, and has been manifested to us" is a parenthesis. It took me a long time to learn that eternal life does not just mean to live forever because, while the unbeliever is never said to have eternal life, once a human life begins, whether he believes the gospel or not, it goes on forever. Any person born into this world will continue to exist forever either with the Lord in glory and bliss or in eternal condemnation in hell, but this second fate is spoken of as "the second death" (Rev.2:11, 20:6,14, 21:8) and never "eternal life". The Lord Jesus said in John 17, "And this is the eternal life, that they should know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent" (v.3). The word 'knowing' as it is used in Scripture generally denotes more than simply knowing something or someone with the mind. As a result of Adam 'knowing' Eve a child resulted (Gen. 4:1). So the knowledge referred to in Scripture is usually much more intense than knowing about something. Knowledge speaks of a relationship. There was a relationship between Adam and Eve and there were consequences of that relationship, and while our relationship with the Lord is not the sexual relationship of a husband and wife it is an intimate relationship. The thought of having eternal life in John 17 is that we not only know who He is and know something about Him but we are in relationship with the only true God and with Jesus Christ. This is the essence of eternal life. Yes, it goes on forever, thank God for that, but it speaks of a loving and appreciated relationship that continues forever. Any relationship of knowing a human being in the sense that Scripture uses the term ultimately comes to an end, but this relationship that we have with God the Father and with the Lord Jesus will never end. As the hymn says, it will be 'sweeter as the days go by'.

In John 17, verse 3, we read: "And this is the eternal life, that they should know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." This Scripture shows that the ability to know of the Son of God and the One who sent Him is the central feature of eternal life. 'Knowledge' in Scripture is the enjoyment of an existing relationship. This is what we will enjoy in eternity; but already now the present possession of this life enables us to have that communion with Divine Persons, with the Father and the Son. This shows the quality of this life ('eternal' life is not just a matter of duration, see the introduction and the section on 'Why is it called 'eternal' life?').

Eternal life therefore consists in the knowledge of the only true God, that is of God fully revealed as Father in the Person of the Son, and in the knowledge of Jesus Christ as the Sent One of the Father. This divine life is evidently connected with the Christian revelation, as far as this world is concerned, and could not be known apart from the incarnation of Jesus.

This stands commonly in scripture in contrast to death. It is revealed in the Lord Jesus. "He is the true God, and eternal life." "This is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." 1 John 5:11-12, 20. He that has the Son of God therefore has life now, and knows it by the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of life. The apostle John speaks of life as a subjective state in believers, though inseparable from the knowledge of God fully revealed as the Father in the Son, and indeed characterised by this. The Lord said to His Father, "This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." John 17:3. The apostle Paul presents eternal life more as a hope before the Christian, which however has a present moral effect. Titus 1:2; Titus 3:7. From which we gather that eternal life for the Christian refers in its fulness to the glory of God, when the present body as a part of the old creation will be changed, and there will be complete conformity to Christ, according to the purpose of God. In the meantime the mind of God is that the Christian, indwelt by the Holy Spirit, should know (have the conscious knowledge) that he has eternal life. 1 John 5:13. For Christians it is evident that eternal life is morally distinct from life after the flesh.

This leads to the explanation of "the eternal life" in question. Life for evermore, life to eternity, is the blessing commanded by Jehovah on the mountains of Zion (Ps. 133); and of the many Jews that sleep in the dust of the earth, some shall wake to everlasting life, as others to shame and everlasting contempt (Daniel 12). But both these Scriptures contemplate that great turning-point for the earth, the kingdom when it comes in manifest power and glory. The Lord speaks of life as given in Himself to faith now. "And this is the eternal life, that they know Thee, the only true God, and Him Whom Thou didst send, Jesus Christ." If it be distinguished from that which is to be enjoyed in the displayed kingdom by-and-by, it stands as to its character in the knowledge not of the Most High Possessor of heaven and earth, with the true Melchisedec a Priest on His throne, but of the Father and of His sent One, the only true God now plainly revealed in the Son, the one Mediator between God and man. If distinguished from the past, it is no longer the Creator-God giving promises to the fathers protected and lodging as under the shadow of the Almighty; nor yet the sons of Israel in relationship with the name of Jehovah, the moral governor of that chosen nation. But the children of God now possess the revelation of the Father and of Jesus Christ Whom He sent; and this knowledge is identified, not with promises nor government, but with "eternal life," as a present thing in Christ, the portion of every believer. A deeper blessing it is impossible for God to bestow or for man to receive; for it is exactly what characterised the Lord Himself, Who is the eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested unto us. Only Christ could be said to be that life; we as believers are not, but we have it in Him; and as by faith alone it is received, so in faith it is exercised, sustained, and strengthened.

He now contrasts Himself with the thief. It would be right of me to say to all of you there would be no life at all for anybody save on the basis of the work that Christ has wrought. His death lies at the basis of all life. The life that will be enjoyed in a coming age of millennial blessing here on earth is on the basis of the death of Christ, but to us today there is not only life but life “more abundantly”. I think it is a good thing to ask ourselves, ‘Am I going in for the real abundant life which Christ has made known and revealed?’ I am afraid we have got to look at ourselves whether we are young Christians or old Christians, there is a life which is not merely the divine spark, so to speak, which is in every true saint, but life is often used in Scripture in a second sense. We use it in ordinary conversation, there is a young man of the world who says, ‘I am going out to see life’. You cannot look at life? Life puzzles the scientists, what is it? We can tell the difference between a live person and a dead one, you cannot see it, but you can see it in is manifestation. I know what the young man means, he means he is going to have a jolly time and perhaps a bit of sin and the bright lights of the city and is going out to enjoy himself, he is interested in the things the world calls ‘life’. Now we Christians have got life, we are brought into the knowledge of God as our Father, we are indwelt by the Holy Spirit of God, we have most blessed things to occupy our hearts affections and our devotion to our risen Lord. These are things that are really life. The Lord said, “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly”. He came to reveal an abundance of such things that we may walk in the power of an abundant life. It is a wonderful fact. This is the divine program which the Lord had before Him when as the good Shepherd He gave His life for His sheep.