We will have the same bodies
There are many Scriptural reasons for believing that we will be raised with the same body that died. First, Christ was raised in the same body He had before He died. We know this because the tomb was empty (Luke 24:1-6) and because His resurrected body retained scars from the crucifixion (John 20:25, 27). Since Christ's resurrection is the pattern that our resurrection will follow (Philippians 3:20-21; 1 Cor. 15:49), then we will also be raised with the same body.
Just wanted to ask.....If Christ was resurrected in the same body that was offered in sacrifice, then how could he take it back? That body was sacrificed and God disposed of it, (just as he disposed of Moses' body in a place where no one could find it. Deuteronomy 34:5)
Acts 2:29-3 and Psalm 16:10 tells us that it was prophesied that Jesus body would not see corruption in the tomb.
Peter tells us clearly that Christ was "put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit" (1 Peter 3:18) This means that he was not raised in the same body as he had before.....in fact Jesus, as a spirit being, could materialize fleshly bodies as other spirit beings had done throughout the Bible. On some occasions when Jesus "appeared" to his disciples, they did not recognize him. On another occasion when he was eating with them, he 'disappeared' before their eyes. The body he materialized to convince Thomas had the marks of his execution, but on no other occasion were they mentioned. With the treatment he received the night before his agonizing death, Jesus would have been a physical wreck. Why would God resurrect that battered body?
Christ's death and resurrection do form a pattern for those chosen to rule with him in heaven. They too will be divested of their fleshly body and be given spirit bodies so that they can dwell in the presence of God.....that is something that is physically impossible for mortal flesh. You cannot be immortal in the flesh.
Jesus speaks of the resurrection as involving the coming forth out of tombs, which strongly indicates that the resurrection is the reanimation of the body that had been lied to rest originally: "An hour is coming, in which all who are in the tombs will hear His voice, and will come forth; those who did the good deeds to a resurrection of life, those who committed the evil deeds to a resurrection of judgment" (John 5:28-29).
OK, so what happens to those who have been eaten by wild animals or sharks?....or those who were cremated and their ashes scattered over a cliff or into the sea? These are not in tombs as such but are still very dead...there is simply nothing left of their physical bodies. They must of necessity be "recreated"....since not a molecule of their flesh is left.
In Matthew 19:28...addressing the ones chosen to rule with him in heaven...."And Jesus said to them, “Truly I say to you, that you who have followed Me, in the regeneration when the Son of Man will sit on His glorious throne, you also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel."
This sounds to me like God will "regenerate" the bodies of those who have been long dead. It isn't our bodies that make us who we are...it is our personality. Anyone with a relative suffering with advanced dementia will know that the body is alive, but the person they knew is dead. Jesus healed those with physical disabilities and sicknesses, so the body raised will not be one stricken with cancer, heart disease or any other debilitating condition. If by his power he can heal them, he can recreate them just as easily as God created Adam.
Paul's statement "it is sown a perishable body, it is raised an imperishable body" (1 Corinthians 15:42) establishes that there is a continuity between our current body and our resurrected body, for it is the same "it" in both cases.
"IT" is the same person.....but not the same body. Just as Jesus died in a mortal human body....he was raised as a spirit.....he is the same person but in a different body....one designed to inhabit the spirit realm.
the same body we have now (which is mortal), will become immortal: "For this perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality."
Only those who go to heaven will be granted immortality. Adam and his wife were not immortals, yet God designed them to live forever in their mortal flesh. He gave them the opportunity never to die. All they had to do was obey one simple command.
Being "mortal" simply means that a human can die, not that they must. There is a difference between everlasting life and immortality just as there is a difference between the soul and the spirit.
What do you think?
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