Most of us have a love/hate relationship with our bodies. I mean, if you could change something about the way you look, would you do it? Many people would. As many as 40% would change their looks if they could, according to Synovate’s global survey on beauty.
The fact is, our bodies wear out, they sag, they expand, they wrinkle, the joints get creaky, the arteries harden, gravity pulls everything downward, the heart slows down, the eyes grow dim, the teeth fall out, the back is stooped, the arms grow weary, our bones break, and our muscles weaken. The body bulges in the wrong places.
Our bodies wear out as we grow older. Someone listed 10 signs that you’re getting older. You know you’re getting old when …
10. Everything hurts and what doesn’t hurt doesn’t work.
9. You look forward to a dull evening.
8. Your favorite part of the newspaper is “20 Years Ago Today.”
7. You sit in a rocking chair and can’t get it going.
6. Your knees buckle, and your belt won’t.
5. Your back goes out more than you do.
4. You sink your teeth into a steak, and they stay there.
3. The gleam in your eyes is from the sun hitting your bifocals.
2. Your ears are hairier than your head.
1. When you bend over, you look for something else to do while
you’re down there.
Our bodies won’t last forever. The moment we are born, we begin to die. In fact, you’re falling apart right now as you listen to this message.
Death is the fundamental human problem. It is the sum of all other fears. You can see it in the way we treat the dead. An entire industry has grown up to help us deal with death. When a person dies, we do our best to make them look as if they were not dead.
Many times I have heard someone stand by a casket and say, “She looks so natural.” Well, no, she looks like she’s dead. But death is so final, so forbidding, so shocking to our senses, that we can’t even say the word. We say that someone “passed on” or “departed” or “slipped away.”
Now, I fully understand the need to use terms like these when a loved one has died. I believe the funeral industry plays an important role in bringing comfort to grieving families. But death still stands as an inevitable reality. The Grim Reaper visits every home sooner or later.
But one day all that will change. Because Jesus is a risen Savior, we, who have put our faith in Him will one day receive a brand new body. Because He has been raised, we will be raised to be like Him.
“But we are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives. And we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior. He will take our weak mortal bodies and change them into glorious bodies like his own, using the same power with which he will bring
everything under his control.” - Philippians 3:20-21 (NLT)
As Paul tells us in verse 49 of our text, we will be just like Jesus. What was our Lord’s resurrection body like?
He ate with His disciples - Luke 24:41-42
His disciples could touch Him - John 20:27
He had a physical body of flesh and bone - Luke 24:39
He was recognized by His disciples - Matthew 28:9
He could appear and disappear - Luke 24:31
He could pass through locked doors - John 20:19
Some mistakenly teach that until our Lord’s return, believers are ‘asleep” in the grave and have no consciousness until the resurrection. But the Scriptures teach that until that day Jesus returns, “to be absent from the body is to be face to face with the Lord” (2 Corinthians 5:8). The Bible says that between our death and our resurrection, we will have temporary pre-resurrection bodies. This is suggested by the story of the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16), as well as passages showing pre-resurrected people doing physical things, such as wearing robes (Revelation 6:11).
Those in heaven today were transformed spiritually by means of the new birth; and now that they are in the presence of our Lord, they have been transformed intellectually, emotionally, and volitionally, in that they think like Jesus, feel like Jesus and choose like Jesus. But on the day of the resurrection, Christ will complete the work of transformation and restoration in those of us who have placed our faith in Him by transforming us physically.
This is the promise of the resurrection!
“We will not be disembodied spirits in the world to come,
but redeemed spirits, in redeemed bodies, in a redeemed universe.”
- R. A. Torrey
Paul tells us what our bodies will be like when Jesus returns.
1. We will have an imperishable body – v. 42
Our physical bodies are “perishable,” which is why they are subject to aging, disease, and death. Our resurrected bodies are imperishable. They are not subject to corruption or death.
“(God) will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” - Revelation 21:4 (NIV)
This raises an interesting question: “What age will we appear to be in eternity?” I think who the Bible says we will be like is the key to answering this question. We will be like Jesus. Since Paul tells us in Philippians 3:21 that we will have a body like Jesus, I would assume that includes the quality of age. Since Jesus was likely 33 years of age when He was crucified, we can guess that our appearance will be that of a young adult of around 33 years of age.
And, although that might not be the age that we were when we died, people will, nevertheless, recognize us just as they recognized Jesus. In fact, we will recognize people in heaven that we never met on earth, just like the disciples knew who Moses and Elijah were when they appeared with Jesus on the mount of transfiguration (Matthew 17:1-8). The point is that no one will ever age again and we will enjoy perfect health.
2. We will have a glorious body – v. 43a
There is nothing very noble about the process of dying or about death itself. With few exceptions, we put dead bodies away from us, out of sight. For the Old Testament Israelites, contact with a dead body made one unclean. Death was defiling. The resurrected body, however, is characterized by glory, not dishonor.
Beauty could be in view here, too. Our resurrected bodies will be
beautiful in the way our creator defines beauty, as they were when first made and he said that His creation of man was “very good.”
3. We will have a powerful body – v. 43b
Our body is weak and frail. Our resurrection bodies, though, will be characterized by power. Also, this could refer to the fact that Jesus’ resurrection body is not confined to space, and neither will ours’.
4. We will have a spiritual body – v. 44
The physical body is a natural body, while the resurrected body is
spiritual. The physical body is an “earthy” body, that is, an earth-bound body. Our present bodies suit us well for living on this earth. Our earthly bodies, though, do not suit us for life in eternity.
Our resurrected body is a “spiritual” body. Not in the sense that they will not be physical, but in the sense that they will be specially suited for our life in eternity future.
God will raise us up to live forever as resurrected beings in a society of resurrected beings, on a resurrected earth, with our resurrected Lord. And what a life it promises to be! Life will become more rich and fulfilling and UNIMPAIRED in the world to come than its ever been.
“In heaven we will be permitted to finish many of those
worthy tasks which we had dreamed to do while on earth but
which neither time nor strength nor ability allowed us to achieve.”
- Wilbur Smith in The Biblical Doctrine of Heaven
“Our God won’t just take away suffering; he’ll compensate by giving us greater delights than if there had been no suffering. He doesn’t merely wipe away tears; he replaces those tears with corresponding joys. Hence, ‘our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us’ (Romans 8:18).” - Randy Alcorn
Because of the resurrection, eternity will offer us opportunities we wished for but never had. God’s original plan was that human beings would live happy and fulfilling lives on Earth. If our current lives are our only chances at that, God’s plan has been thwarted.
Consider the injustice - many honest, faithful people languished in prison, while some dishonest and unfaithful people seemed to fare much better. But God is not unjust, and this is NOT our only chance at life. Some of the human race’s greatest discoveries and achievements still await us in eternity in the new heaven and the new earth.
When Christ returns and eternity is ushered in, not only will we have been saved from sin’s penalty and sin’s power, but from sin’s presence. Imagine the quality of life that awaits us with sin no longer being a problem for the human race!
(Show video - The White Paper: Easter Redemption)
Conclusion: Jesus is coming again, and when He returns, we will
receive a resurrected body that is imperishable, glorious, powerful, and spiritual - uniquely fit for life in a sinless eternity. In all these ways our body will be just like Jesus, except for one - unlike our bodies, His body will still have scars.
Why?
So that we might forever be reminded that He was willingly scarred for us so that we would have no scars for all eternity.
