Our Glorious New Bodies

A real question. Some people in Corinth said the dead do not rise. Paul knew they would ask, “How are the dead raised up? And with what body do they come?” (15:35). Look at a garden. “What you sow is not made alive unless it dies” (15:36). Sow means plant. A seed goes into the ground and seems to be gone. Then it comes up as a living plant. Same seed, new body. You plant “mere grain—perhaps wheat” (15:37), but what grows is tall and green. The plant came from the seed, yet it looks far better. God decides. “But God gives it a body as He pleases, and to each seed its own body” (15:38). The God who makes every plant knows exactly how to make new bodies. Jesus went first. Jesus was buried, and on the third day He rose. “Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits” (15:20). The firstfruits were the first part of the harvest, a promise that more was coming. Honest about death. Death is sad. Paul even calls it an enemy (15:26). It is right to cry when someone we love dies. What this means for you. For people who belong to Jesus, death is like planting a seed, not like throwing it away. It is sad, but it is not the end. God will raise His people with new bodies.

The doubt behind the question (15:35). Some in Corinth said “there is no resurrection of the dead” (15:12). Many people in Greek cities thought the body was a prison and only the soul mattered. To them a raised body sounded silly, so the question “How are the dead raised up?” was really a doubt. “Foolish one” (15:36). Paul answers firmly because the answer was growing in every field around Corinth: “What you sow is not made alive unless it dies.” Death is the doorway to new life for God's people, not the end of it. The same, yet new (15:37). What goes into the ground is “mere grain,” but what comes up is a full plant. It is the same life in a new body. Your raised body will truly be yours, yet far greater than the one you have now. God's choice (15:38). “God gives it a body as He pleases.” God is doing this right now in every garden. The resurrection is not a strange exception to the way God works. It is the Creator doing on a grand scale what He does every spring. Jesus used the picture first. Before the cross, Jesus said a grain of wheat must fall into the ground and die, and then it bears much fruit (John 12:24). He was speaking of His own death and what it would produce. The firstfruits (15:20). In Israel the first sheaf of the harvest was brought to God as a pledge that the whole harvest would follow (Leviticus 23:10-11). Christ's empty tomb is that first sheaf. His resurrection guarantees the resurrection of everyone who belongs to Him (15:23).

Paul gave the people in Corinth a picture from a garden. When you plant a seed, it goes down into the dark ground. It looks like the end of the seed. But God makes it come up as a brand-new plant! The plant has the same life, with a new and better body. That is what God will do for His people. It is sad when someone we love dies. It is okay to cry. But for people who belong to Jesus, death is not the end. Jesus was buried too, and He came back to life. He was the first to rise with a new body. God gives each seed the body He wants. He will give each of His children just the right body too.

A seed goes into the ground. Then a new plant grows up! God will give His people new bodies too. God can do it!

Many kinds of bodies. “All flesh is not the same flesh” (15:39). People, animals, fish and birds each have their own kind of body. Heavenly and earthly. “There are also celestial bodies and terrestrial bodies” (15:40). Celestial means in the sky. Terrestrial means on the earth. Different glory. “For one star differs from another star in glory” (15:41). Glory here means brightness and beauty. If God can make so many kinds of beauty, He can make a new kind of body. Wearing out, then never. “The body is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption” (15:42). Corruption means rotting and wearing out. Incorruption means it can never wear out. Weak to strong. “It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory,” and “it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power” (15:43). Sickness, tiredness and getting old will be gone. A spiritual body. “It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body” (15:44). This does not mean a ghost. It means a real body that is fully led by God's Spirit. After Jesus rose, His friends could touch Him, and He ate fish with them (Luke 24:39-43). What this means for you. Your body matters to God. If you belong to Jesus, He plans to raise your body in glory, so you can use it for Him today.

From the field to the sky (15:39-41). Paul moves from people and animals to the sun, moon and stars. Each has its own kind of body and its own glory. God never runs short of ways to make a body fit for the place it lives. Four pairs (15:42-44). Corruption becomes incorruption, dishonor becomes glory, weakness becomes power, and a natural body becomes a spiritual body. Each pair answers a different fear about death: decay, shame, weakness and being unfit for heaven. Sown (15:42). Paul keeps the farm word. For a Christian, burial is a planting. Early Christians called their burial grounds sleeping places, because they expected a harvest. Our word cemetery comes from that idea. Spiritual body (15:44). Pneumatikos (say: pnyoo-mah-tee-KOS) means spiritual, but it does not mean made of spirit instead of matter. In 1 Corinthians 2:15 the same word describes a person led by the Spirit. A spiritual body is a real body completely ruled and powered by the Holy Spirit. The risen Jesus. His friends touched Him, and He ate in front of them (Luke 24:39-43). Yet He also came into a locked room (John 20:19). His body was real, and it was no longer limited the way ours are. Romans 8:11. “He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.” The Spirit who lives in believers now is God's promise of the body to come. Why it matters now. The body is not a cage to escape. God made it, Jesus rose in it, and the Spirit lives in it. So Christians honor God with their bodies today.

God made a world full of different bodies. People, animals, birds and fish are not the same. The sun, the moon and the stars are different too. God is creative and powerful. So He can make a new kind of body for His people. Paul showed four big changes. Our bodies now wear out, but new bodies will never decay. When a body is buried, it is weak. The raised body will have glory. Today we get tired and weak. Then we will be strong with God's power. Our body now is made for life on earth. The new body will be made for life with God forever. It will still be a real body, like the risen Jesus.

God made the sun, moon and stars. Each one is beautiful in its own way. God will give His people strong new bodies. They will never die!

The first man. Paul quotes Genesis 2:7: “The first man Adam became a living being” (15:45). God formed Adam and breathed life into him. The last Adam. “The last Adam became a life-giving spirit” (15:45). That is Jesus. Adam received life. Jesus gives life. Natural first. “However, the spiritual is not first, but the natural, and afterward the spiritual” (15:46). We start with bodies like Adam's. The better body comes later. Dust and heaven. “The first man was of the earth, made of dust; the second Man is the Lord from heaven” (15:47). Jesus is God the Son, who came down to us. Two families. “As was the man of dust, so also are those who are made of dust” (15:48). Everyone born into Adam's family shares his weak, dying body. A new likeness. “And as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly Man” (15:49). To bear an image means to look like someone, the way a child looks like a parent. Why we die. “For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive” (15:22). Adam's sin brought death. Jesus brings life. What this means for you. When you trust Jesus, you move from Adam's family into Jesus' family. One day you will look like Him.

Genesis 2:7 (15:45). “The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.” Adam received life as a gift. He could pass on only what he had been given. Life-giving (15:45). The last Adam does not just have life; He gives it. Jesus said, “the Son gives life to whom He will” (John 5:21). Raised from the dead, He gives resurrection life to His people. God's order (15:46). God's plan moves from natural to spiritual, from the first creation to the new creation. Eden was a good beginning, not the final goal. Made of dust (15:47-48). Choikos (say: khoy-KOS) means made of dust or soil. It points back to Genesis 3:19: “For dust you are, And to dust you shall return.” Death came into the world through Adam's sin (Romans 5:12). The Lord from heaven (15:47). Adam came up from the ground; Jesus came down from heaven. He is not merely a better man but the eternal Son who took on flesh. Bearing the image (15:49). Adam's son was born “in his own likeness, after his image” (Genesis 5:3). Adam passed on a dying likeness. God planned for believers “to be conformed to the image of His Son” (Romans 8:29). Already and not yet. The change has begun on the inside: we “are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory” (2 Corinthians 3:18). The body will be changed when Jesus comes.

Adam was the very first man. God made him from the dust and breathed life into him. Adam disobeyed God. Because of his sin, death came to every person. Jesus is called the last Adam. Adam got life from God, but Jesus gives life! Adam came from the earth. Jesus came down from heaven. Everyone who trusts Jesus becomes part of His family. Right now our bodies are like Adam's body. We get sick, tired and old. But one day God will make us like Jesus. His people will be strong and new forever.

God made Adam from dust. Jesus came from heaven. Jesus gives life forever. One day we will be like Jesus!

Not fit for forever. “Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God” (15:50). Our bodies now get tired, sick and old. They must be changed. A mystery. “Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed” (15:51). A mystery in the Bible is a secret God has now made known. Sleep is a gentle word for death for people who belong to Jesus. In a blink. It will happen “in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet” (15:52). Many Christians see this as the moment Jesus comes to take His church home. Raised and changed. “The dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed” (15:52). Believers who have died will rise, and believers who are alive will be changed. New clothes. “This corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality” (15:53). Mortal means able to die. Immortality means never able to die. Swallowed up. “Death is swallowed up in victory” (15:54). Paul is quoting Isaiah 25:8. Death will be gone, like something swallowed and never seen again. No more sting. “O Death, where is your sting?” (15:55). “The sting of death is sin” (15:56). Jesus took our sin on the cross, so death has lost its sting for us. Thanks be to God. “But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (15:57). This is our memory verse. The victory is a gift.

Why a change is needed (15:50). “Flesh and blood” means human nature as it is now, weak and dying. “Nor does corruption inherit incorruption.” A body that wears out cannot live in a kingdom that never ends. A mystery (15:51). In Paul's letters a mystery is a truth God kept hidden and has now made known. Not every believer will die, but every believer will be changed. A moment (15:52). The Greek atomos (say: AH-toh-mos) means something too small to cut, an instant that cannot be divided. “The twinkling of an eye” is the time it takes to blink. Many Christians see this as the moment Jesus comes to take His church home. 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 describes the same trumpet and “the dead in Christ will rise first.” Putting on (15:53-54). Paul uses the picture of putting on clothes. The person is the same; what they wear is new. He hopes “that mortality may be swallowed up by life” (2 Corinthians 5:4). Isaiah and Hosea (15:54-55). Paul joins Isaiah 25:8 and Hosea 13:14 into one song of triumph. The prophets looked ahead to this day. The sting (15:56). Kentron (say: KEN-tron) is the sharp sting of a scorpion or a bee. Sin gives death its power to hurt, and the law makes sin's guilt plain. Jesus took that sting into Himself on the cross. A gift (15:57). God “gives us the victory.” Believers do not win it by being brave or good. The empty tomb has already won it, and God hands it to everyone who trusts His Son.

Our bodies now cannot live forever with God. So God will change His people. It will happen as quickly as an eye blinks! The trumpet will sound, and God's people who died will rise. God's people who are still alive will be changed too. Then death will be gone forever. Death hurts because of sin. Jesus took away our sin on the cross. That is why death cannot win over God's people. Like Paul, we can thank God, because Jesus gives us the victory!

A trumpet will sound. Jesus will come back! God will change His people in a blink. Jesus beat death for us!