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Christ's Body, Our Body - Part 2

Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God,
an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. – 2 Corinthians 5:1

Now that we have a better understanding of the physical body of Jesus, as well as our own physical body, we can journey to deeper waters and ask what is in store for the future. This study will have a lot to say about our eschatological hope, because our bodies will actually be very significant in the world to come. But, hang on, "What in the world is our eschatological hope?", I hear you asking. Let me define a couple of terms:

A very significant aspect of our transformation on the last day is the renewal of our bodies. This is something which disciples tend to know very little about, so let's dig in.

In my flesh...

Read Job 19:23-27 (as before, I'm very hopeful that you do really read it). Job wishes that his words were preserved for eternity. Well, they are part of holy Scripture, so they most certainly will be. So there's a good start, but what does Job have to say that's so important? Job was one of the most righteous men ever to have lived (Ezekiel 14:14). This was probably because he never lost sight of God amidst the most extreme suffering. According to Job himself, he was able to do this because he was focused on the world to come. He knew that one day he would see God (v 26-27).

It is often mistaught that the Old Testament has little to say about the after life. I can only think that this is because people simply do not know the Old Testament. In Matthew 22:23-33, the Sadducees ask Jesus a ridiculous question about the resurrection. Jesus gives them a simple answer:

You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God – Matthew 22:29

I'm sure that I don't need to remind you what Scriptures He was referring to – the Old Testament, of course. You see, Jesus had a simple conviction: If you know the Old Testament, you know about the resurrection, the afterlife and the judgment - in fact, you know all about it, because Scripture makes it clear. It is beyond the scope of this study to show why this is true, but for now, let's just take Jesus at His word.

Back to Job 19. He knew that one day he would stand before God, and his heart yearned for that day. He is referring to his exaltation in heaven, and yet he keeps emphasizing the physicality, not the spirituality, of the experience. It will be in his "flesh", with his "own eyes". There is no evidence that Job bodily ascended to heaven, so we are pretty safe to assume that he is dead and buried. Considering that he probably lived over 4000 years ago, I would imagine that his skin and eyes are "destroyed", as he knew they would be (v 26). And yet his hope, his eschatological hope, was that he would see God in the flesh. And by this hope we are saved (Romans 8:24). So what flesh is he talking about? With what eyes will he see God? Let's hold that thought, and look at Jesus' own new body in Luke 24.

The Resurrected Christ

Let me begin by emphasizing one point. One fact about the resurrected Christ which we always hold onto is that he was bodily resurrected, something which Jesus himself made a big deal of (John 20:27). And nothing is truer: Jesus rose in the flesh - and Part 1 of this series gave some indication of just how significant it was that Jesus did just that. Jesus ate in the disciples' presence (Luke 24:41-43) and made sure that they all saw Him in the flesh. Thomas touched His wounds, a story we are familiar with. But if you read the account carefully, you will notice that all the apostles had to see Jesus before they believed - none of them accepted it "on faith". In my opinion, Thomas was not the most doubtful, he was simply the most honest about his doubts.

There is a "christian" heresy called Gnosticism which originally denied that Jesus was ever even a man. They taught that He was just a spirit of some sort. Nowadays, though, they tend to teach only that Jesus was resurrected as a spirit. They reject the bodily resurrection and, in so doing, they reject the Gospel message. It is beyond this study to go into why the Gnostics teach this. So let's move on.

Scan Luke 24:13-32, focusing on the first and last paragraphs of the passage. This is one of the key resurrection appearances of Christ. He walks for miles with two of his own disciples, one of whom is his own uncle (compare Luke 24:18 with John 19:25). He even goes into their house and eats with them. Think about it: He is with two disciples, one of whom has known Him all His life. Jesus talks with them and studies the Bible with them, and then has a meal with them in their own village, at their own table.

And yet they never recognise Him.

Only when Jesus left did they realize that it was Him. Isn't that bizarre? Doesn't that freak you out? Doesn't that spin your mind? There is something going on in this passage which we may be too fearful to even ask about. But we should never fear the deep truths of Christ, for by them we will be sanctified (1 Corinthians 1:2). When the Gospel writers wrote about the resurrection, they wrote about something that had never happened before. Something about which no one had ever dreamed (except maybe Job).

Let us recall that in Scripture, many people had been raised to life. Elijah raised the widow's son in 1 Kings 17; Elisha raised the Shunammite's son in 2 Kings 4; and Jesus raised 3 people during his ministry (the widow's son in Luke 7, Jairus' daughter in Luke 8 and Lazarus in John 11). Furthermore, people came out of tombs in Matthew 27:52. But look at what Paul says in Colossians 1:18:

He is ... the firstborn from among the dead.

How could that be, if so many had already been raised to life? The fact is that even though so many had been raised, when Jesus rose, something radically new happened. It was a totally unique event in all history. What made it unique? Well, firstly, Jesus was the first person to rise from the dead by His own power. The Bible teaches that death had no hold over Jesus (Acts 2:24) – He was too powerful for death. But there's more. The fact is that when Jesus rose, He rose with a spiritual body.

He rose with a heavenly body – the kind of body that could go directly to heaven (see Luke 24:51). Just like his resurrection, Jesus' ascension was something radically new. Enoch was taken up (Genesis 5:24), as was Elijah (2 Kings 2:11), and, perhaps, Melchizedek (Hebrews 7:3). But when Jesus ascended, history was being rewritten - something happened that had never happened before, because he already had a heavenly body. What do I mean by that? I mean that His body was dominated by its spiritual aspect. His body was spirit triumphing over matter.

What I'm trying to say, brothers and sisters, is that the resurrected Christ had the same kind of body that we are going to have in heaven. Before you write me off as a lunatic, I urge you to keep reading...

The Resurrection Body

Scan 1 Corinthians 15:20-58, focusing on verses 35-44. In this passage, Paul says everything else that I want to say, and he says it far better than I could ever hope to. What I will do here is focus on v42-44, and show how our new body in heaven is actually the same as the body which Jesus had in Luke 24. This is because these verses apply just as much to the resurrected Christ as they will apply to us when we are in heaven.

It was Jesus who, like us, had a body that was "sown perishable" (v42). He died, meaning that the body he was born with must have been mortal one, just like ours. But when he rose, he had an imperishable body, one that will persist for eternity in heaven. Moreover, Jesus was born in "dishonour" – not only did he have to lay aside his heavenly glory to become a man (Philippians 2:7), but he was dishonoured in the Pretorium, as mentioned earlier. But after he was raised, he had a body of glory, and could never be dishonoured again (Galatians 6:7). Further, Jesus was born in "weakness" – He was confined to this earth, and felt it when power went out of Him (Luke 8:46). But when He rose, He rose in power – the earth shook, and He had the power to ascend all the way to heaven, and the heavens are pretty high above the earth (Psalm 103:11).

Finally, and most importantly of all, He was sown with "a natural body", just like ours, but when He rose, He had a spiritual body. There's no doubt about it – this is the gospel message. Jesus rose with a spiritual body, and nothing said has ever been truer. Was it material? Absolutely. To say anything else would be blasphemy. But it was a body of spirit triumphing over matter. No longer could the material (anything of this world) overcome Jesus' body. No. Now, the spirit had overcome, because He had overcome death. And this is just as much a description of heaven as it is a description of the resurrected Christ.

You see, this passage simultaneously describes what is in store for us – it illustrates our eschatological hope. In our resurrection, the resurrection of the dead, the same thing will happen to us. Our perishable body will be raised imperishable; our dishonoured body will be raised in glory; our weak body will be raised in power. We will exchange our natural body for a spiritual one – a new body, a heavenly body, a glorious body. As it was for Jesus, so it will be for us. And that is the body that we will live in for eternity. How awesome is that?

Now, some people might be thinking that all of this stuff is pretty irrelevant for their life. "I mean, does it really matter?" they ask. Well, absolutely it does. The Bible talks about it, shouldn't we try to understand it? Shouldn't we know what we're hoping for? Job, one of the most righteous men who ever lived, knew that he was going to be bodily resurrected, and that hope sustained him. It sustained him through life's greatest trials.

We need to know what we're hoping for, or else our hope will not carry us through.

Our faith won't be up to the task.

Conclusion

Our bodies are special – sacred temples of God. They need to be cherished, respected – and treated as they are: as one of God's greatest gifts. We need to be so motivated to uphold God's standards of righteousness and to fight our sinful nature, especially in regard to sexual purity, because anything less will mean that our temples will be desecrated, and that is a tragedy. (But not a tragedy that God's grace can't cover – Jesus rose from the ashes, so that means we can to.)

But once we understand all that, we then need to see that our bodies are just shadows of what is to come. Our eternity in heaven will be incredible: It will be material, but it will be a state of the spirit triumphing over matter. We will receive new bodies in heaven, which will be glorious bodies that matter will never be able to rule over – they will be eternal bodies, our soul's true home (2 Corinthians 5:1-10).

I encourage you to go back and read over all of John 2, Job 19, Luke 24 and 1 Corinthians 15 with this new understanding. For more on the sanctity of our bodies, go thoroughly through 1 Corinthians 6 and 1 Thessalonians 4. Also, I recommend "Jesus among other gods" by Ravi Zacharias, which is where I got most of the material for Part 1. For more on our heavenly body, study through 2 Peter 3 and 2 Corinthians 5. If you want to find out even more about the resurrection, study the sermons in the book of Acts - their focus on Jesus' resurrection is incredible. I also recommend "Miracles" by C. S. Lewis, which is where I got most of the material for Part 2. Enjoy delving into these deep truths, and remember to start viewing your body in new way – a biblical way.

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