Live Forever In A Perfect Body!

FOREVER IN A PERFECT BODY!

Job 19:25-27

Summary: Death holds no fear for those who know Jesus as Savior. He promised that, at His Second Coming, all the faithful will rise from the dead in perfect, immortal bodies and will spend eternity in His glorious presence.

There was an expectation of the resurrection as far back as the Old Testament.

Job 19:25-27a [Job said] I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; I myself will see him with my own eyes — I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!

•• Job probably lived at least 1,000 years B.C., and perhaps far earlier than that. Yet he already had the personal revelation of the resurrection from the dead. He knew that "in the end", long after his death, his Redeemer would stand on the earth and Job, "in [his] flesh ... [would] see God." He clearly expected to live again bodily after death in the presence of God.

•• This hope of resurrected life thrilled Job's heart — "How my heart yearns within me!" — as it should thrill ours today.

Isaiah 26:19 But your dead will live, Lord; their bodies will rise — let those who dwell in the dust wake up and shout for joy — your dew is like the dew of the morning; the earth will give birth to her dead.

•• The great writing prophet Isaiah had the revelation. He saw and wrote of the dead living again, their bodies rising, the earth descriptively "giving birth to her dead". And note that this promised, joy-filled hope was to those who belong to God — "your dead will live, Lord ... and shout for joy". (We will see later that the lost rise also, but not to a resurrection of "joy")

Daniel 12:2 Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt.

•• Daniel gives early hints of two distinct resurrections — of the saved and the lost. We will look (below) at this truth as it is developed clearly in John 5 and Revelation 19-20.

Jesus promised that believers would be raised from the dead.

John 6:40 For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.

•• Jesus spoke of a specific "last day" — the Second Coming of Christ (1 Corinthians 15:22-23) — when all who have "looked to" Jesus in faith will be raised from the dead to live eternally in His presence.

The New Testament Christians were confident of their future resurrection.

Acts 24:15 ...I have the same hope in God as these men themselves have, that there will be a resurrection of both the righteous and the wicked.

•• The apostle Paul assured his listeners that "there will be a resurrection..."

•• For Christians this is a great reason for "hope in God". There is life beyond this life, beyond the grave!

John 11:25-27 Jesus said to [Martha], “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; 26 and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?” “Yes, Lord,” she replied. "I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God..."

•• Martha believed Jesus' promise of resurrection for those who believe in Him.

•• And she properly based her faith on the revelation of who Jesus is — the Messiah (the Christ), the Son of God. Her faith was immediately vindicated (), when Jesus displayed His resurrection power by bringing her brother Lazarus back from death to life in the sight of Martha and the other onlookers. He will do the same to millions of believers at His Second Coming!

There are actually two resurrections of the dead.

John 5:28-29 "Do not be amazed at this, for a time is coming when all who are in their graves will hear [my] voice and come out — those who have done what is good will rise to live, and those who have done what is evil will rise to be condemned."

vs. 29, KJV And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.

Acts 24:15 ...there will be a resurrection of both the righteous and the wicked.

•• Paul preached what Jesus had revealed, that there will be two resurrections — a resurrection of life for the righteous, a resurrection of damnation for the wicked.

1) THE FIRST RESURREXCTION---OF THE SAVED!