1 Corinthians 15:26

“The last enemy which is destroyed is death.”

The literal rendering is: “As last enemy, death is destroyed.” Here is the consummation of the reign and of the judgment exercised by Christ over the powers opposed to God. Death is impersonal, no doubt, but its reign nevertheless does violence to the Divine glory, and after the personal powers have been put down (1 Corinthians 15:24-25), this gloomy power of death must be destroyed, that God's glory may shine forth freely throughout the entire domain of existence. This judgment of death consists of two acts. Firstly, all beings who have become its prey must be rescued from it; this is what will be effected by the final and universal resurrection, which will bring to the light the third rank of the risen. In the second place, death must no longer have power to make new victims; this will be the result of the resurrection itself, which, by transforming our perishable into incorruptible bodies, will put them for ever beyond the reach of death. The apostle declares that this will be the enemy last conquered. Why so? Because the power of death rests on certain profound bases of a moral nature, which must be taken away before the throne of this enemy can fall. Death is an effect; the suppression of the effect supposes that of the causes. The apostle will explain this more clearly in 1 Corinthians 15:56. It was so in the life of Christ, in which the victory over sin and Satan, during His life, and the victory over the law and condemnation, in His death, became the foundation of His resurrection. It must be the same also for mankind (see at 1 Corinthians 15:56).

Without this last victory of the Divine work, there would remain in human existence a domain, that of the body, to which Divine power would not have penetrated, and in which God's work, conquered for a time, had not taken its revenge. This is why the body of the last man must participate in the victory over death, as well as that of Christ Himself; comp. Revelation 20:12-13, where there is a magnificent description of the general resurrection in which the Messianic kingdom of Jesus will issue.

As Edwards rightly observes, it follows from this passage that death will continue to reign over the earth between the Advent and the end.

It has been asked whether, in the final judgment which will follow the universal resurrection, there will only be the condemned. This might be inferred from the fact that all who are Christ's are raised at the time of the Advent (1 Corinthians 15:23). But is it not allowable to think with Luthardt, that among the multitudes who have gone down, and who go down daily, to the place of the dead, without having known the gospel or expressly rejected it, there will be individuals who shall yet accept it; for it is said that it will be preached to them also (1 Peter 3:19; 1Pe 4:6), and Jesus positively declared that there is still pardon in the other world for the man who has not committed the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit (Matthew 12:32). The judgment which will follow the universal resurrection will therefore have a double issue, as Jesus expressly says (Matthew 25:46, and as appears from Rev 20:15).