The Future Resurrection of the Body: Conclusion
I am now going to quickly wrap up this series of posts on the Future Resurrection of the Body.
Just as a refresher, I argued in the last few posts for two important aspects of Jesus' resurrection:
1.) That Jesus' resurrection acts as the "first fruits" (1 Cor 15:20) of the resurrection event and indicates an integral, symbiotic relationship between Jesus' resurrection from the dead and the future resurrection of the believer.
2.) The resurrection functions as the redemption of Jesus' body and further cements his role as Last (or second) Adam. As the new Adam, Jesus not only participates in the salvation process but his salvation acts paradigmatically for the believer.
I believe when these insights are combined the believer can have a firm hope for their own resurrection in the future. Take point number one for example, Jesus' own resurrection as "first fruits" would not make since if the believer did not participate in their own resurrection from the dead. As noted before the concept of "first fruits" has in view the rest of the harvest that will soon follow. Paul's example of the two resurrection moments would make no sense if we tried to narrowly focus salvation on the personality of the individual alone. If this were the case then Paul's entire ranting on the future resurrection of the believer in 1 Cor 15 becomes meaningless.
As for the implication of point number two, this should be obvious. Because Jesus (as Last Adam) forms a new paradigm for humanity, namely, one of salvation, and since Jesus participated in this salvation paradigm which climaxed in the resurrection of his body the believer can therefore have the hopeful expectation of the climax of their salvation being the redemption of their own body (which in the ordo salutis is called glorification).
Many other reasons can be given which could provide a reasonable basis for the hope for a future resurrection of the believer. One of the chief ones has been brought forth in some of the comments on my posts, namely, since God desires to redeem his entire creation this would include our bodies. But I've lingered much too long on this issue. For what it's worth these are just some of the reasons I have for hoping that when Christ returns and "the trumpet is sounded" my body will be raised from the dead and transformed into the likeness of Christ. This is my hope and, I believe, it was the hope of Paul and the early believers which was itself grounded in the belief that God had raised Jesus of Nazareth from the dead.
Just as a refresher, I argued in the last few posts for two important aspects of Jesus' resurrection:
1.) That Jesus' resurrection acts as the "first fruits" (1 Cor 15:20) of the resurrection event and indicates an integral, symbiotic relationship between Jesus' resurrection from the dead and the future resurrection of the believer.
2.) The resurrection functions as the redemption of Jesus' body and further cements his role as Last (or second) Adam. As the new Adam, Jesus not only participates in the salvation process but his salvation acts paradigmatically for the believer.
I believe when these insights are combined the believer can have a firm hope for their own resurrection in the future. Take point number one for example, Jesus' own resurrection as "first fruits" would not make since if the believer did not participate in their own resurrection from the dead. As noted before the concept of "first fruits" has in view the rest of the harvest that will soon follow. Paul's example of the two resurrection moments would make no sense if we tried to narrowly focus salvation on the personality of the individual alone. If this were the case then Paul's entire ranting on the future resurrection of the believer in 1 Cor 15 becomes meaningless.
As for the implication of point number two, this should be obvious. Because Jesus (as Last Adam) forms a new paradigm for humanity, namely, one of salvation, and since Jesus participated in this salvation paradigm which climaxed in the resurrection of his body the believer can therefore have the hopeful expectation of the climax of their salvation being the redemption of their own body (which in the ordo salutis is called glorification).
Many other reasons can be given which could provide a reasonable basis for the hope for a future resurrection of the believer. One of the chief ones has been brought forth in some of the comments on my posts, namely, since God desires to redeem his entire creation this would include our bodies. But I've lingered much too long on this issue. For what it's worth these are just some of the reasons I have for hoping that when Christ returns and "the trumpet is sounded" my body will be raised from the dead and transformed into the likeness of Christ. This is my hope and, I believe, it was the hope of Paul and the early believers which was itself grounded in the belief that God had raised Jesus of Nazareth from the dead.
'1.) That Jesus' resurrection acts as the "first fruits" (1 Cor 15:20) of the resurrection event and indicates an integral, symbiotic relationship between Jesus' resurrection from the dead and the future resurrection of the believer.'
Moses died, returned from the dead at the Transfiguration, never died again, and presumably ascended back to Heaven.
Is that also what Jesus did?
Why does Moses need to be resurrected, when he appears to be doing just fine as he is?
Posted by
Steven Carr |
6:09 PM
'This is my hope and, I believe, it was the hope of Paul and the early believers which was itself grounded in the belief that God had raised Jesus of Nazareth from the dead.'
Many early converts to Jesus-worship denied that dead bodies could rise and thought the dead were lost. The Corinthians, for example, did not take part in baptism for the dead, which they would have done if they thought the dead had some reward. Paul has to assure the Thessalonicans that the dead were not lost.
Apart from showing a lack of faith in their Lord and Saviour's words in Matthew 22, this raises the question of what converted these people to Jesus-worship, and why the doubted that God would make to choose dead matter live. After all, as 1 Corinthians 15 shows, even the resurrection-douting Corinthians accepted that God could breathe life into dead matter if he wanted to. Paul takes it for granted that his opponents accepted that.
So there must have been something about the resurrection of Jesus that convinced early Christians that God might not choose to breathe life into dead matter.
Jesus , being a god himself, could as easily live after death as Zeus could turn into a swan and back. But mere mortals might not be able to imitate that trick, unless there was evidence to the contrary. And the Thessalonians and the Corinthians, apparently, had none.
Posted by
Steven Carr |
4:04 PM
Steven,
These "early converts" you speak of were most likely those of Greek thought who were denying the future resurrection of the dead for one of two reasons (or both). Either they would have thought in terms of the salvation of an immortal soul (which incidentally comes close to your viewpoint of the "escape" from the body) or had seized on Paul's emphasis that in some sense we are already raised with Christ and so adopting a type of realized eschatology.
But the context of 1 Cor 15 clearly indicates they accepted the tradition handed down to them that "Jesus was raised." There is no reason why they could not have accepted this claim while still denying a future resurrection of the dead. Paul's point is in fact to show that since they do accept Jesus' resurrection from the dead this then gives them hope that they will likewise in the future be raised from the dead.
Also, Steven, you commented on another post that Paul's seed metaphor clearly shows that he was thinking of the new body as a release from the body because of the image of the dead husk that's left over from the seed. But you committ a common, exegetical error by trying to force a metaphor to say more than it does. The point of Paul using the metaphor of a "seed" is because it was an adequate metaphor which could stress both continuity and discontinuity between the pre and post resurrection body. I seriously doubt that Paul intended his readers to take the metaphor and run with it the way you do.
Posted by
Chris Petersen |
9:58 AM