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November 9, 2014 |
| Resurrection | ||
The word resurrection means to return from the dead, to come alive again. Sometimes the Bible uses the word resurrection but in many case it uses the phrase "to rise from the dead" or similar phrases.
In Jesus' time many Jews did not believe there would be a resurrection. The Old Testament rarely mentioned it and the few mentions of it that there were did not convince everyone. One of the times when it is mentioned most clearly comes from the book of Daniel where an angel says to Daniel:
Daniel 12:1 […]. But at that time your people - everyone whose name is found written in the book - will be delivered. 2 Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt. 3 Those who are wise will shine like the brightness of the heavens, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars for ever and ever.
In Jesus' time there was a significant religious group who believed in a resurrection. They were called the Pharisees. There was also a group who did not believe in a resurrection. They were called the Sadducees. The Sadducees came to Jesus with a question that they were using to make their point that there was no resurrection. The question poses a paradox (something absurd or contradictory). They believed the existence of a resurrection would produce this paradox. Therefore, they argued, there can be no resurrection. Here is the story
Matthew 22:18 And the Sadducees came to him, who say there is no resurrection, and they were asking him and they were saying: 19 "Teacher, Moses wrote to us that if a man's brother dies and he leaves a wife and leaves behind no sons, his brother shall take his wife and raise up seed for his brother. 20 There were seven brothers; the first took a wife and he died and left no son behind. 21 And the second took her and he died, having also not left any son behind, and the third likewise. 22 And the seven of them took her and they left no seed after any of them, and the woman died also. 23 Therefore in the resurrection, whose wife among them will she be, for the seven had taken her?"
24 Yeshua said to them, "Do you not therefore err, because you do not know the scriptures, nor the mighty work of God? 25 For when they have arisen from the dead, they do not take wives, neither do men have wives, but they are like the Angels in Heaven."
26 "But concerning the dead, that they rise, have you not read in the scripture of Moses how God said to him from the Bush, 'I AM THE LIVING GOD, The God of Abraham, and the God of Isaaq and the God of Jaqob?' 27 He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. You therefore are greatly mistaken."
Jesus responds by first explaining the flaw in their question. The paradox vanishes when it is understood that the resurrected do not have wives; their marriages are dissolved by death. Jesus adds to that by saying the resurrected do not take wives after the resurrection.
Jesus therefore taught that there will be a resurrection. The Apostles would also teach that there is a resurrection and we will look at one of those teachings in this lesson.
Most Christians understand that there is a resurrection. So it might seem like a waste of time to study this topic. There is more to understand, however, that will be a benefit.
In these verses Paul begins by saying that there are some within the church who are spreading doubt about their being a resurrection.
34 Righteously awaken your hearts and do not sin, for there are some in whom the knowledge of God does not exist. I say that to your shame. 35 Someone among you will say, "How do the dead rise? With what body do they come?"
Paul says their lack of knowledge of God is shameful. These people have been causing doubt by posing a paradox much like the Sadducees had done. The problem in this question is that bodies decay after death and ultimately decay away to nothing. Perhaps an animal eats part of it and the former body becomes part of the animal's body. Perhaps a plant uses some of it to grow. Thus the former body becomes part of the plant which another man eats and it becomes part of his body.
Therefore the question asks how can there be a resurrection if the body is gone and possibly is now part of an animal or another man?
As with the Sadducees the paradox disappears with the right knowledge. Paul will answer this question by using the example of a seed that is planted in the ground. In Paul's time everyone understood seed planting and how crops grew.
36 Fool! The seed that you plant will not live unless it dies. 37 And the thing which you sow is not that body which is going to be, for you sow a naked grain of wheat or barley or of other grain. 38 But God gives it a body just as he chooses and to each one of the grains a body of its nature.
Paul says when a seed is planted that seed is not the plant that will grow. Instead the seed, with its biological machinery and energy stores, must die so that a plant may grow from it. Some grains are defective and will not grow a new plant, according to God's will. For the others this God created machinery creates a new plant of a type or nature that matches the seed that was planted. A wheat seed grows a wheat plant; a barley seed grows a barley plant. Overall Paul's point is that a naked seed body is planted but something different emerges from the ground, a plant body.
Paul now begins to show how his message about seeds dying to produce a new body relates to resurrection.
39 But not every body is equal to another, for there is the body of a man and another of an ox and another of a bird and another of a fish. 40 And there is a Heavenly body and there is an Earthly body, but there is one glory of the Heavenly and another of the Earthly. 41 And there is one glory of the sun and another glory of the moon and another glory of a star, and one star is greater than another star in glory.
The message here is that there are many types of physical bodies. There are also physical bodies and spiritual bodies and each has a different glory. Some bodies are more glorious than others. This idea of bodies with greater and lesser glory is going to return at the end of the text.
Paul is now ready to relate all of this to us.
42 Thus also is the life for those who die. It (life) is sown with corruption, it rises without corruption. 43 It is sown with disgrace, it rises with glory; it is sown in weakness, it rises in power. 44 It is sown an animal body; a spiritual body rises, for there is an animal body, and there is a spiritual body.
He says that, just as a naked seed was planted, when we die our life is planted. The life, in a body of corruption, disgrace and weakness is planted and it rises in a new body, a body without corruption but with glory and power instead. It dies in a physical body to rise in a spiritual body.
Paul has thus answered the initial question, how there can be a resurrection if our bodies are gone. His answer is that the resurrection is not to a physical body. Just as Jesus did with the Pharisees, Paul will now provide additional teaching.
45 Thus also it is written: "Adam the first man was a living soul; the last Adam - the life giver spirit." 46 But the first was not spiritual, but the animal, and then the spiritual. 47 The first man was dust from the ground; the second man, the Lord Yahweh from Heaven.
48 Just as he who was a being of dust, so also is that which is of the dust, and just as he who is the being from Heaven, so also is the Heavenly. 49 And as we have worn the image of him who is from the dust, so we shall wear the image of him who is from Heaven.
Paul draws on symbolism to explain how the spiritual body comes about. He recalls the first man (Adam) and the last Adam, who was Jesus. Paul says, just as the first Adam came first as an animal and then came the spiritual Adam, first we will wear this animal body of dust, then we will wear that body that is in the image of God.
50 But this I say my brethren: flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of Heaven, neither does corruption inherit indestructibility.
He says, just as the physical cannot inherit the spiritual, our physical bodies of corruption, disgrace and weakness cannot inherit indestructibility, glory and power. The keyword here is 'inherit'. Paul is going back to what he said about the seed and the plant. The seed does not become the plant. The seed must die so that the plant may become.
51 Behold, I tell you a mystery: we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be transformed,
I believe Paul is drawing another parallel between the seed sleeping in the ground for a while and us "sleeping" in the ground for a while. Remember that Jesus referred to Lazarus as sleeping, when Lazarus was dead. So also the angel, in the verses from Daniel above, referred to people sleeping in the ground and waking.
Some people will sleep, Paul says, and their bodies will die but others will not sleep (die). In both cases, however, they will be transformed. His point is that, in both cases, the seed does not become the plant. The seed must die so that the plant may become. The life of the seed does continue on into the plant.
52 Suddenly, like the blink of an eye, at the last trumpet, when it shall sound, and the dead shall rise without corruption, and we shall be transformed.
Paul talks about a time that is prophesied in the fall feasts of Israel. At that time, in a moment, the dead will rise in their new bodies, which are free of corruption and have glory and power. Then the living will be transformed into new bodies.
53 For this destructible is going to wear indestructibility and this mortal shall wear immortality. 54 Whenever this destructible puts on indestructibility and this mortal, immortality, then that word which is written shall come to pass, "Death is swallowed up by victory." 55 Where is your sting, oh death? Where is your victory, oh, Sheol?
About this transformation, Paul says, what was destructible and mortal will become indestructible and immortal. At that time death is overcome. Its sting is gone. Sheol, the place of the dead, has lost its inhabitants.
56 But the sting of death is sin and the power of sin is the written law. 57 But thank God who gives us the victory by our Lord Yeshua the Messiah.
Death is the result of sin, or it was until the time that Paul speaks about here. In Romans 4:15 and other places Paul talks about the written law making sin known as sin and that made sin a killer. We thank God who gave us the victory over sin and death.
58 From now on, my brethren and beloved, be steadfast; do not be shaken, but be abounding at all times in the work of the Lord Yahweh, as you know that your toil has not been worthless in the Lord Yahweh.
Paul now summarizes what he has said. He refers back to what he said in verse 41, "one star is greater than another star in glory." He encourages us to continue to do the work of the Lord and assures us that our work for him will not go unpaid.