Deliverance from the Cross — Page 101
prevail upon the earth. It cannot survive under any other conditions. If by ascent to heaven of any person it is meant to convey that such person has departed physically from the earth and has taken up his abode somewhere in or beyond the atmosphere of the earth with his physical body, or has been admitted with that body into the conditions of the spiritual state which is promised to the righteous after their demise, in either case the statement amounts to an absurdity. Jesus was a human being, righteous and a prophet. After his experience on the cross and in the sepulchre he was still a human being, with the same physical body and its needs as he possessed before being put upon the cross. He was most anxious that this should be recognised by his disciples, so that they should become witnesses to the fact that he had not died upon the cross and had not become accursed. That is why he drew their attention to the fact that he was not a spirit but himself in his physical body: 'Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have. And when he had thus spoken he showed them his hands and his feet'. (Luke 29:39-40) 'But they still wondered and did not believe and he said unto them, Have ye here any meat? And they gave him a piece of broiled fish and of an honeycomb. And he took it, 101