1 Corinthians 15:25-28 shows that Jesus will rule the earth to the point of total victory; all of His enemies will be defeated. The last enemy is Death. Paul, combatting the lie in Corinth that there is no resurrection, shows that Death is something outside of God's original design for creation, and that when Jesus reigns on earth, Death, which doesn't belong in His perfect kingdom, will be discarded for those who believe in Jesus. We will live eternally with our King. Thus creation will be in harmony with its creator again, as Jesus redeems it, and submits to God the Father, and God dwells among His creation according to His perfect design.
In 1 Corinthians 15:25-28, Paul grounds Christ's reign in Psalm 110 andPsalm 8, names death as the lastenemy to be eliminated, and describes the Son's final subjection to the Father so that God may be all in all.
In the prior section, Paul stated that Jesus would take up reign over all the earth, in submission to His Father. Paul now signals that although Jesus will reign physically in the earth, it will take time until allenemies are fully defeated:
For He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet (v 25).
He must reign (v 25): the necessity comes from Scripture. Psalm 110:1 records the LORD's oath to David's Lord: "Sit at My right hand Until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet." That verse is often quoted or echoed in the New Testament:
Peter preached Psalm 110:1 at Pentecost as having been fulfilled in the ascension (Acts 2:34-36), and
Hebrews 10:12-13 describes Christ seated at God's right hand, "waiting from that time onward until His enemies be made a footstool for His feet."
Jesus is already at the right hand of the Father, and has been granted all authority (Matthew 28:18,Hebrews 12:2,Revelation 3:21). Fitting the biblical pattern, there will be a gap of time between when authority is granted and when it is fully possessed. For example, David was anointed king many years prior to the time he actually took physical reign of the kingdom. Abraham was promised his descendants would be granted a possession of land, but it was centuries before they crossed the Jordan and possessed it. Then there was another lapse of time for them to fully possess it (which they did not fulfill).
The risen Christ holds "all authority... in heaven and on earth" (Matthew 28:18). He is and will be subduing His enemies through the advance of His kingdom until the last of them falls. In the current age, His disciples are subduing principalities and powers through spiritual warfare (Ephesians 6:12). At the end of the current age, Jesus will return and defeat "the beast" (the antichrist) and his armies, and set up a kingdom on this earth (Revelation 19:11-21). This will fulfill God's promise to David, the promise Jesus's disciples spoke of when they asked the risen Jesus whether He now planned to restore the kingdom to Israel (2 Samuel 7:12-14,Acts 1:6).
During that messianic kingdom, Satan will be bound for a thousand years, so that he will not be able to tempt the nations (Revelation 20:1-4). Then he will be released for a time and stir up another rebellion, which will also be defeated by Jesus. At that point it appears that Satan is finally thrown into the lake of fire, along with death and hades (Revelation 20:10, 14). Only then, it appears all of Jesus's enemies will be fully and completely defeated.
But Paul makes a point that the last of all the enemies to be defeated isdeath. Just as there is a sequence for those who are resurrected, there is a sequence of enemies to be vanquished. The last enemy that will be abolished is death (v 26).
Paul classifies death as an enemy, a hostile power occupying God's creation. The initial fulfillment of death's defeat came in Christ's own rising, when He "abolisheddeath and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel" (2 Timothy 1:10).
The ultimate fulfillment comes at the end, when "death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire" (Revelation 20:14). The fact that a still future event is spoken of in past tense is a typical prophetic device to express certainty. The certainty of the future event is so sure that it can be spoken of in past tense, as though it has already taken place.
Death is separation, as we can see in James 2:26 where physical death is defined as the spirit separating from the body. We can conclude that so long as anything is separated from God's design, death has not been defeated. Death will be fully and finally defeated when allthings are restored according to God's design.
This appears to take place in Revelation 21, where allthings are made new (Revelation 21:5). Creation is restored to a place where allthings are in harmony. The idea of “righteousness” dwelling in this new earth, as in 2 Peter 3:13, is the idea of allthings fitting together according to their design.
We see in Revelation 21 that in the new earth, death and sorrow are no more (Revelation 21:4). The separation from God is fully restored, to the point where God dwells physically on the new earth, apparently in His fully unveiled glory (Revelation 21:3, 23). Allthings will be subject to Christ. He will be the King of kings and Lord of lords (Revelation 17:14). However, He will still be subject to His Father, as it is the Father who putall thingsunder him. Paul now makes this point, saying:
For HE HAS PUT ALL THINGS IN SUBJECTION UNDER HIS FEET. But when He says, "All things are put in subjection," it is evident that He is excepted who put all things in subjection to Him. When all things are subjected to Him, then the Son Himself also will be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him, so that God may be all in all (vv 27-28).
Verses 27-28 elevates the mystery and intimacy of the Trinity. God is one, but God is three. God is all in all. The Father is one with the Son, and the Son is one with the Father, and they are one in the Spirit (John 10:30,Genesis 1:1-2). Although they are one, they have definitive roles. It appears that they submit to one another in love, according to their roles. The Son reigns, but He submits to His Father. The Father has all authority, but grants all authority to His Son. The Spirit appears to have all power, but rather than seeking to reign, serves as a helper (John 14:16).
Paul expresses this mutual submission by saying the Son will be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him (v 28). This is what we are supposed to reflect when we follow the command of Ephesians 5:21, to "be subject to one another in the fear of Christ." The Son chooses to submit to the Father (John 5:19, 30). We know He could have chosen otherwise because His temptation was real, and He was tempted to worship Satan and gain all authority over the earth through him rather than through the Father (Matthew 4:8-9,Hebrews 2:18).
Believers are asked to do likewise. We are asked to seek to apply our gifts for the good of others, seeking their benefit above our own comfort. It was because Jesus learned obedience, even to death on a cross, that He was rewarded by being given authority over all things (Philippians 2:5-10). In Philippians, Paul exhorts believers to have the same mindset, and also seek to be rewarded for pleasing God. Scripture calls being rewarded with responsibility in His kingdom "entering into His joy" (Hebrews 12:2,Matthew 25:21).
The phrase in verse 27 HE HAS PUT ALL THINGS IN SUBJECTION UNDER HIS FEET is drawn from Psalm 8:6. This is one of many New Testament passages that refers back to the Old Testament. It is worth remembering that at the time the early church was being formed, the Old Testament was the Bible. That is no problem though, because the Old and New Testaments have the same message. What was said of the coming messiah in the Old Testament is spoken of as a past event in the New. But they speak of the same thing.
The Old Testament is (at least) largely a picture of the coming messiah and His kingdom. For example, Jesus is the second Adam, as Paul has highlighted in this chapter (1 Corinthians 15:22). Jesus is also the second Moses, the prophet promised in Deuteronomy 18:18 who would speak as Moses (a man) the very words of God (as God did on Sinai). Jesus fulfilled this as the God/man. Jesus is the Son of David, the king who will sit on an eternal throne of David (Matthew 1:1). Joseph pictures Jesus--the second firstborn who was rejected of his brothers, put in a pit, then raised to sit at the right hand of Pharaoh, the greatest power on earth. This is just a small sample of ways the Old Testament pictures the Messiah, Jesus.
Psalm 8:6 directly refers to the original delegation of authority God gave to Adam to reign over the earth. Psalm 8 marvels that God chose to place mankind over the earth when they are lower than the angels (Psalm 8:4-5). In using Psalm 8:6 to refer to Christ, Paul is asserting that Christ restored the mandate to humans. God became human, and through the suffering of death received the rulership once again (Hebrews 2:9). Jesus knew this, stating that His death on the cross was going to unseat Satan (John 12:31).
God gave mankind rule over the works of His hands, giving a dominion mandate in Genesis 1:26-28. Adam held that office and lost it, handing his rule to sin and death. Hebrews 2:8-9 reads Psalm 8 the same way Paul does here: "we do not yet see all thingssubjected to him. But we do see Him... namely, Jesus." The "him" in Hebrews 2:8 is singular, so refers to Adam. It was through one man, Adam, that death entered the world, as Paul previously stated in 1 Corinthians 15:22. And Jesus is the one man that has restored humanity’s station.
Jesus is the first fruit of the resurrection, and the first fruit of those restored to humanity's proper place. Paul referred to this earlier in this letter, saying in 1 Corinthians 6:3, "Do you not know that we will judge angels? How much more matters of this life?" Since it is our design to reign as stewards of the earth, working as a team in harmony with God and one another, it makes sense that we should behave this way with one another now, having faith that God's rewards will exceed any we can gain from the world (Hebrews 11:6).
The risen Christ is the true Man who takes up the office forfeited by Adam; in Him the race regains the rule the first man surrendered, and those who overcome and follow His example will gain the reward of reigning with Him (2 Timothy 2:12,Revelation 3:21).
The psalm states the dominion as accomplished, HE HAS PUT, while Hebrews 2:8 observes it is not yet fulfilled in a way we can see it; what God speaks is certain to come to pass, so Scripture can state the outcome as already done (Isaiah 55:11). What God speaks is a certainty, because His word does not return empty.
Paul then adds a clarification a careful reader of Psalm 8 would need. When Scripture says all things are put in subjection, the Father, He... who put all things in subjection to Him, obviously stands outside the all things (v 27). The Son's universal dominion is delegated dominion; the Father who delegated it stands above everything subjected.
And when the delegation has achieved its purpose, the Son Himself also will be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him (v 28). This subjection is the Son's own act, willing and glad, the incarnate Son presenting His finished mediatorial work to the Father. It describes order of role within the Godhead, the same order as "God is the head of Christ" (1 Corinthians 11:3), while the Son remains fully God, the one in whom "all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form" (Colossians 2:9).
The goal is stated in the final clause: that God may be all in all (v 28). Every rival dominion abolished, every enemy subdued, every redeemed person raised, and God in supreme reign over a creation made whole and at peace. This is where history is going, and Christ's resurrection set it irreversibly in motion.
It is worth noting that although all believers will spend eternity with Christ, not all will inherit the reign. As 2 Timothy 2:13 asserts, even if we are faithless, Christ is faithful. Since all believers are in Christ, for Him to deny us as His would be to deny Himself. However, as the previous verse says, it is only those who endure who will reign with Him. Those who deny walking as faithful witnesses will be denied reigning with Him (2 Timothy 2:12). Revelation speaks of this same concept by calling those who will reign with Christ "overcomers" (Revelation 3:21).
Toward the end of Revelation, Jesus makes the same distinction. He says He will freely give the water of life to all who thirst (Revelation 21:6). This is like John 3:14-15, where all that is needed to gain eternal life is to have enough faith to look at Jesus on the cross, in hope of being delivered from the poisonous venom of sin. But to the overcomer, Jesus says he will "inherit these things" and be His "son."
To be promoted from being a child to being a son is to be granted authority. Jesus was rewarded the privilege of being a "Son"--as a human--for His faithful service (Hebrews 1:5). This followed the pattern of ancient treaties, where superior kings would reward faithful service with adoption. The ceremony would include a statement that "I will be to you a father and you will be to me a son" and the awardee would be given authority of a territory or land.
In Jesus's case, the territory given as His adoption award attending Sonship (as a human) was the entire earth (Hebrews 1:5,Psalm 2:8,Philippians 2:8-10). And, amazingly, Jesus wants to bring "many sons to glory" (Hebrews 2:10). The "glory" spoken of in Hebrews 2:10 is in the context of humanity's original mandate to reign as servant leaders, in harmony with God and one another. This means that when we live in this life as servant leaders, we restore our design by faith. Choosing to live as faithful witnesses in the face of worldly opposition is what brings fulfillment to us, as well as bringing healing to the places we affect. It also is what pleases God and He desires to greatly reward (Matthew 25:21,Revelation 3:21, 21:7).
1 Corinthians 15:25-28
25 For He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet.
26 The last enemy that will be abolished is death.
27 For He has put all things in subjection under His feet. But when He says, “All things are put in subjection,” it is evident that He is excepted who put all things in subjection to Him.
28 When all things are subjected to Him, then the Son Himself also will be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him, so that God may be all in all.
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1 Corinthians 15:25-28 meaning
In 1 Corinthians 15:25-28, Paul grounds Christ's reign in Psalm 110 and Psalm 8, names death as the last enemy to be eliminated, and describes the Son's final subjection to the Father so that God may be all in all.
In the prior section, Paul stated that Jesus would take up reign over all the earth, in submission to His Father. Paul now signals that although Jesus will reign physically in the earth, it will take time until all enemies are fully defeated:
For He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet (v 25).
He must reign (v 25): the necessity comes from Scripture. Psalm 110:1 records the LORD's oath to David's Lord: "Sit at My right hand Until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet." That verse is often quoted or echoed in the New Testament:
Jesus is already at the right hand of the Father, and has been granted all authority (Matthew 28:18, Hebrews 12:2, Revelation 3:21). Fitting the biblical pattern, there will be a gap of time between when authority is granted and when it is fully possessed. For example, David was anointed king many years prior to the time he actually took physical reign of the kingdom. Abraham was promised his descendants would be granted a possession of land, but it was centuries before they crossed the Jordan and possessed it. Then there was another lapse of time for them to fully possess it (which they did not fulfill).
The risen Christ holds "all authority... in heaven and on earth" (Matthew 28:18). He is and will be subduing His enemies through the advance of His kingdom until the last of them falls. In the current age, His disciples are subduing principalities and powers through spiritual warfare (Ephesians 6:12). At the end of the current age, Jesus will return and defeat "the beast" (the antichrist) and his armies, and set up a kingdom on this earth (Revelation 19:11-21). This will fulfill God's promise to David, the promise Jesus's disciples spoke of when they asked the risen Jesus whether He now planned to restore the kingdom to Israel (2 Samuel 7:12-14, Acts 1:6).
During that messianic kingdom, Satan will be bound for a thousand years, so that he will not be able to tempt the nations (Revelation 20:1-4). Then he will be released for a time and stir up another rebellion, which will also be defeated by Jesus. At that point it appears that Satan is finally thrown into the lake of fire, along with death and hades (Revelation 20:10, 14). Only then, it appears all of Jesus's enemies will be fully and completely defeated.
But Paul makes a point that the last of all the enemies to be defeated is death. Just as there is a sequence for those who are resurrected, there is a sequence of enemies to be vanquished. The last enemy that will be abolished is death (v 26).
Paul classifies death as an enemy, a hostile power occupying God's creation. The initial fulfillment of death's defeat came in Christ's own rising, when He "abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel" (2 Timothy 1:10).
The ultimate fulfillment comes at the end, when "death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire" (Revelation 20:14). The fact that a still future event is spoken of in past tense is a typical prophetic device to express certainty. The certainty of the future event is so sure that it can be spoken of in past tense, as though it has already taken place.
Death is separation, as we can see in James 2:26 where physical death is defined as the spirit separating from the body. We can conclude that so long as anything is separated from God's design, death has not been defeated. Death will be fully and finally defeated when all things are restored according to God's design.
This appears to take place in Revelation 21, where all things are made new (Revelation 21:5). Creation is restored to a place where all things are in harmony. The idea of “righteousness” dwelling in this new earth, as in 2 Peter 3:13, is the idea of all things fitting together according to their design.
We see in Revelation 21 that in the new earth, death and sorrow are no more (Revelation 21:4). The separation from God is fully restored, to the point where God dwells physically on the new earth, apparently in His fully unveiled glory (Revelation 21:3, 23). All things will be subject to Christ. He will be the King of kings and Lord of lords (Revelation 17:14). However, He will still be subject to His Father, as it is the Father who put all things under him. Paul now makes this point, saying:
For HE HAS PUT ALL THINGS IN SUBJECTION UNDER HIS FEET. But when He says, "All things are put in subjection," it is evident that He is excepted who put all things in subjection to Him. When all things are subjected to Him, then the Son Himself also will be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him, so that God may be all in all (vv 27-28).
Verses 27-28 elevates the mystery and intimacy of the Trinity. God is one, but God is three. God is all in all. The Father is one with the Son, and the Son is one with the Father, and they are one in the Spirit (John 10:30, Genesis 1:1-2). Although they are one, they have definitive roles. It appears that they submit to one another in love, according to their roles. The Son reigns, but He submits to His Father. The Father has all authority, but grants all authority to His Son. The Spirit appears to have all power, but rather than seeking to reign, serves as a helper (John 14:16).
Paul expresses this mutual submission by saying the Son will be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him (v 28). This is what we are supposed to reflect when we follow the command of Ephesians 5:21, to "be subject to one another in the fear of Christ." The Son chooses to submit to the Father (John 5:19, 30). We know He could have chosen otherwise because His temptation was real, and He was tempted to worship Satan and gain all authority over the earth through him rather than through the Father (Matthew 4:8-9, Hebrews 2:18).
Believers are asked to do likewise. We are asked to seek to apply our gifts for the good of others, seeking their benefit above our own comfort. It was because Jesus learned obedience, even to death on a cross, that He was rewarded by being given authority over all things (Philippians 2:5-10). In Philippians, Paul exhorts believers to have the same mindset, and also seek to be rewarded for pleasing God. Scripture calls being rewarded with responsibility in His kingdom "entering into His joy" (Hebrews 12:2, Matthew 25:21).
The phrase in verse 27 HE HAS PUT ALL THINGS IN SUBJECTION UNDER HIS FEET is drawn from Psalm 8:6. This is one of many New Testament passages that refers back to the Old Testament. It is worth remembering that at the time the early church was being formed, the Old Testament was the Bible. That is no problem though, because the Old and New Testaments have the same message. What was said of the coming messiah in the Old Testament is spoken of as a past event in the New. But they speak of the same thing.
The Old Testament is (at least) largely a picture of the coming messiah and His kingdom. For example, Jesus is the second Adam, as Paul has highlighted in this chapter (1 Corinthians 15:22). Jesus is also the second Moses, the prophet promised in Deuteronomy 18:18 who would speak as Moses (a man) the very words of God (as God did on Sinai). Jesus fulfilled this as the God/man. Jesus is the Son of David, the king who will sit on an eternal throne of David (Matthew 1:1). Joseph pictures Jesus--the second firstborn who was rejected of his brothers, put in a pit, then raised to sit at the right hand of Pharaoh, the greatest power on earth. This is just a small sample of ways the Old Testament pictures the Messiah, Jesus.
Psalm 8:6 directly refers to the original delegation of authority God gave to Adam to reign over the earth. Psalm 8 marvels that God chose to place mankind over the earth when they are lower than the angels (Psalm 8:4-5). In using Psalm 8:6 to refer to Christ, Paul is asserting that Christ restored the mandate to humans. God became human, and through the suffering of death received the rulership once again (Hebrews 2:9). Jesus knew this, stating that His death on the cross was going to unseat Satan (John 12:31).
God gave mankind rule over the works of His hands, giving a dominion mandate in Genesis 1:26-28. Adam held that office and lost it, handing his rule to sin and death. Hebrews 2:8-9 reads Psalm 8 the same way Paul does here: "we do not yet see all things subjected to him. But we do see Him... namely, Jesus." The "him" in Hebrews 2:8 is singular, so refers to Adam. It was through one man, Adam, that death entered the world, as Paul previously stated in 1 Corinthians 15:22. And Jesus is the one man that has restored humanity’s station.
Jesus is the first fruit of the resurrection, and the first fruit of those restored to humanity's proper place. Paul referred to this earlier in this letter, saying in 1 Corinthians 6:3, "Do you not know that we will judge angels? How much more matters of this life?" Since it is our design to reign as stewards of the earth, working as a team in harmony with God and one another, it makes sense that we should behave this way with one another now, having faith that God's rewards will exceed any we can gain from the world (Hebrews 11:6).
The risen Christ is the true Man who takes up the office forfeited by Adam; in Him the race regains the rule the first man surrendered, and those who overcome and follow His example will gain the reward of reigning with Him (2 Timothy 2:12, Revelation 3:21).
The psalm states the dominion as accomplished, HE HAS PUT, while Hebrews 2:8 observes it is not yet fulfilled in a way we can see it; what God speaks is certain to come to pass, so Scripture can state the outcome as already done (Isaiah 55:11). What God speaks is a certainty, because His word does not return empty.
Paul then adds a clarification a careful reader of Psalm 8 would need. When Scripture says all things are put in subjection, the Father, He... who put all things in subjection to Him, obviously stands outside the all things (v 27). The Son's universal dominion is delegated dominion; the Father who delegated it stands above everything subjected.
And when the delegation has achieved its purpose, the Son Himself also will be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him (v 28). This subjection is the Son's own act, willing and glad, the incarnate Son presenting His finished mediatorial work to the Father. It describes order of role within the Godhead, the same order as "God is the head of Christ" (1 Corinthians 11:3), while the Son remains fully God, the one in whom "all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form" (Colossians 2:9).
The goal is stated in the final clause: that God may be all in all (v 28). Every rival dominion abolished, every enemy subdued, every redeemed person raised, and God in supreme reign over a creation made whole and at peace. This is where history is going, and Christ's resurrection set it irreversibly in motion.
It is worth noting that although all believers will spend eternity with Christ, not all will inherit the reign. As 2 Timothy 2:13 asserts, even if we are faithless, Christ is faithful. Since all believers are in Christ, for Him to deny us as His would be to deny Himself. However, as the previous verse says, it is only those who endure who will reign with Him. Those who deny walking as faithful witnesses will be denied reigning with Him (2 Timothy 2:12). Revelation speaks of this same concept by calling those who will reign with Christ "overcomers" (Revelation 3:21).
Toward the end of Revelation, Jesus makes the same distinction. He says He will freely give the water of life to all who thirst (Revelation 21:6). This is like John 3:14-15, where all that is needed to gain eternal life is to have enough faith to look at Jesus on the cross, in hope of being delivered from the poisonous venom of sin. But to the overcomer, Jesus says he will "inherit these things" and be His "son."
To be promoted from being a child to being a son is to be granted authority. Jesus was rewarded the privilege of being a "Son"--as a human--for His faithful service (Hebrews 1:5). This followed the pattern of ancient treaties, where superior kings would reward faithful service with adoption. The ceremony would include a statement that "I will be to you a father and you will be to me a son" and the awardee would be given authority of a territory or land.
In Jesus's case, the territory given as His adoption award attending Sonship (as a human) was the entire earth (Hebrews 1:5, Psalm 2:8, Philippians 2:8-10). And, amazingly, Jesus wants to bring "many sons to glory" (Hebrews 2:10). The "glory" spoken of in Hebrews 2:10 is in the context of humanity's original mandate to reign as servant leaders, in harmony with God and one another. This means that when we live in this life as servant leaders, we restore our design by faith. Choosing to live as faithful witnesses in the face of worldly opposition is what brings fulfillment to us, as well as bringing healing to the places we affect. It also is what pleases God and He desires to greatly reward (Matthew 25:21, Revelation 3:21, 21:7).