15:35 ¶ But some man will
say, How are the dead raised up? and with what body do they come? 36 Thou fool, that which thou sowest is
not quickened, except it die: 37 And
that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be, but bare
grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other grain: 38 But God giveth it a body as it hath pleased
him, and to every seed his own body. 39
All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind
of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and
another of birds. 40 There are
also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is
one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another. 41 There is one glory of the sun, and
another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars: for one star
differeth from another star in glory. 42
So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in
corruption; it is raised in incorruption: 43
It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness;
it is raised in power: 44 It is sown a
natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there
is a spiritual body. 45 And so it is
written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made
a quickening spirit. 46 Howbeit that was
not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that
which is spiritual. 47 The first man is
of the earth, earthy: the second man is the Lord from heaven. 48 As is the earthy, such are they
also that are earthy: and as is the heavenly, such are they also
that are heavenly. 49 And as we have
borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.
50 Now this I say, brethren, that flesh
and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit
incorruption.
In this passage Paul begins to give us some detail of the nature
of our resurrection body, a spiritual body, which is not just some incorporeal
ghost drifting about on a cloud. A spiritual body is a body only of a
fundamentally different nature than a physical body of flesh and it cannot die.
He finishes by explaining that flesh and blood as we know it cannot inherit in
eternity. We must be changed in order to live in eternity with God.
Looking at some of the hints the Bible gives us about the nature
of a spiritual body we can see some interesting characteristics.
In the flesh as we know it but powered by the Holy Spirit of God Elijah
outran a chariot.
1Kings 18:44 And it came to pass at the seventh time, that
he said, Behold, there ariseth a little cloud out of the sea, like a man’s
hand. And he said, Go up, say unto Ahab, Prepare thy chariot, and get thee down, that the rain stop thee not.
45 And it came to pass in the mean
while, that the heaven was black with clouds and wind, and there was a great
rain. And Ahab rode, and went to Jezreel. 46
And the hand of the LORD was on Elijah; and he girded up his loins, and
ran before Ahab to the entrance of Jezreel.
Under the power of God Samson, still in the flesh, performed
incredible feats of strength.
Judges 14:5 Then went Samson down, and his father and his
mother, to Timnath, and came to the vineyards of Timnath: and, behold, a young
lion roared against him. 6 And the Spirit
of the LORD came mightily upon him, and he rent him as he would have rent a
kid, and he had nothing in his
hand: but he told not his father or his mother what he had done.
And Jesus, after His resurrection and ascension, with a heavenly,
spiritual body could pass through walls and yet still have a body that could be
touched.
John 20:26 ¶ And after eight days again his disciples were
within, and Thomas with them: then
came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you. 27 Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy
finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and be not
faithless, but believing.
Note the phrase image of the
heavenly as a reference to a spiritual, heavenly body so fundamentally
different from our bodies now as to be inexplainable. Image is often misused by
preachers as referring to character traits as in the image of God meaning our
ability to discern good from evil. However, image refers to physical
appearance. It means that man looks like God, with Adam indistinguishable from
Christ Himself.
Genesis 1:26 And God
said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the
sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth,
and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
Deuteronomy 4:16 Lest ye corrupt yourselves, and make you a graven image, the similitude
of any figure, the likeness of male
or female,
But, then with Adam’s fall each generation bore the degeneration
of sin’s downward fall.
Genesis 5:3 And Adam
lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth:
In fact, this devolution has gotten so bad that scientists have
commented on it with one even pleading for government action, believe it or not.
With
each cell division and in each generation mankind passes on more and more
deleterious mutations, so much so that some researchers into genetics have been
alarmed at the accumulated damage and amazed that human beings have not become
extinct because of it. So much for Darwin’s onward and upward evolution, huh.
(5)
So, we await that time when our bodies
will be transformed, changed into something that will live in eternity.
Romans 8:23 And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the
Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit,
the redemption of our body.
(5)Alexey S. Kondrashov, “Contamination
of the Genome by Very Slightly Deleterious Mutations: Why Have We Not Died 100
Times Over?” Journal of Theoretical
Biology, (1995) vol. 175, pp. 583-594.
James F. Crow, “The High Spontaneous Mutation Rate: Is it a Health
Risk?” Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences, (Aug 1997) vol. 94, pp. 8380-8386.
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