I'll Have a New Body

I Corinthians 15:35-50

Years ago, before rattlesnakes were considered an endangered species, a lady found a rattle snake in her house and killed it to protect her children. While talking about the incident with a friend, the friend said “You mustn’t kill rattlesnakes. They might be one of your relatives that had to come back as a snake.”

“ If one of my relatives was so bad he had to come back as a rattlesnake,” the woman replied, “ he needs to be killed again.”

A few days later, the friend called the woman. “One of your relatives is in my yard, would you come get rid of him?” While her religious beliefs wouldn’t allow her to kill the snake, she still wanted him dead.

The idea of reincarnation is common to several religions. Buddhism teaches you will be re-incarnated in various forms until you finally live a life so good you reach Nirvana or nothingness. Some groups teach that we become angels after death. One group teaches that we become gods, just like God, while others appear to believe that our body will be the same as the present one, except for being immune to all diseases. Apparently this had become a point of contention among the church at Corinth.

“But some man will say, How are the dead raised up? and with what body do they come? Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die: 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: But God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him, and to every seed his own body. 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. There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another. 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. (I Corinthians 15:35-41)

A seed is different than the plant it produces and is destroyed by becoming a plant, and each different kind of seed is different. To get the plants you want you must plant the proper kind of seed. In the animal world, each type of animal is distinct from each other one. Chicken meat doesn’t look or taste like beef, nor does it taste like or look like catfish. Even the stars and planets are different from one another, and from the earth.

Just as there is a difference between a seed, and the plant it produces, there are differences between the body which dies and the one that is resurrected. It is silly to assume that the heavenly body will be just like the earthly body, since everything else is different.

“So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit. Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual.” (I Corinthians 15:42-46)

God did not start with a spiritual being and give it a physical body. When he created man, he created the physical body from the dirt, then put in the breath of life, and man became a living spirit. God created the natural man first. The Son of God later became a man to save the natural man. We were not spirit children before we were conceived. When God is said to have known us before we were born, he knew every detail before there was nay part of us. “Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.” (Psalm 139:16)

I John 3:2 tells us that we don’t yet know what our body will be like, but that we will be like him. “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.” A natural body could not stand being in heaven.

“The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is the Lord from heaven. As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.” (I Corinthians 15:47-50)