Our Foundations in Jesus – Resurrection of the Dead
Written on someone’s gravestone:
Where I am now, you soon shall be
Prepare yourself to follow me.
Underneath some wag scrawled:
To follow you his not my intent
Until I know which way you went.
Here on Earth, we have faith in Jesus and everything He stands for. But when we are called to walk through the valley of the shadow of death (Psalm 23), i.e., when we kick the bucket, we shall see Jesus face-to-face.
Our physical bodies will run down and quit, but our souls and spirits will live on. Some claim we will just be out cold forever — like a deep sleep — but in reality, do we have further consciousness but on a higher plane?
2 Corinthians 5:8: “We are confident … (that) to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord”
Kiss off Earth, Hello Heaven!
Several Bible passages tell us that we do in fact awaken after our physical bodies die. Here are three:
- “…No one can SEE the kingdom of God unless he is Born Again”.
- “…no one can ENTER the Kingdom of God unless he is Born of water and the Spirit.”
- “For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son that whosoever BELIEVES in Him shall have Everlasting Life.”
- John 3:3, 5, 16
Note the verbs in those passages. You can’t do anything (that’s what a verb means: doing something) if you are taking a dirt nap. You have to wake up and be aware.
But how? Jesus does not throw surprise parties for someone’s salvation. Spiritual Resurrection happens while we are still physically alive and decide to follow Jesus. If you decide against Jesus, and ignoring Him is deciding against Him, you are choosing to spend eternity apart from God — a very unhappy place to be.
What about all those millions of people who lived and died before Jesus came to Earth? Are they just out of luck? (Read 1 Timothy 2:4-6 — it asks and answers that question.)
The answer is no. Those who were righteous in their generation (think Noah) fulfilled God’s plan for that time, and were saved by that means. Abraham’s obedience was accounted to him as righteousness. (See Genesis 15:6.)
Later, at a critical moment, Jesus tells the thief suffering on the next cross that he will be with Him in paradise. (Luke 23:43)
How do we know Jesus rose from the grave?
Many people claim that Jesus never rose, yet everything that Jesus claimed has come to pass. In the OT, there are over 700 prophesies concerning the Messiah, and every last one of them came true with Jesus.
Proof #1: The Holy Spirit. It does so much for us and it supplies peace that passes all understanding when we receive Jesus. Can some dead guy in a tomb do that for us? Not today! We might benefit from past actions, like people still benefit from Abraham Lincoln ‘s actions, but Jesus is right here right now, still doing good.
“…Jesus gave up His Spirit. At that moment the temple curtain was torn from top to bottom” – Matthew 27:50-51
Proof #2: The curtain hid the Most Holy Place in the temple. The curtain tore from top to bottom; if torn by men, it would have had to be from bottom to top, so we know God did it.
Proof #3: No more separation. Jesus took all the sins of every man, woman, and child for all time unto Himself so that we can (and should) approach God directly and boldly, with confidence of His full attention.
Proof #4: Jesus showed Himself in His resurrected body to the disciples. He let them touch Him and ate in their presence (See Luke 24:36-43.)
Jesus wounds showed, yet He was otherwise perfectly restored. The disciples recognized Him, so we can be confident of looking like ourselves when we get our resurrected bodies.
What about resurrection for Unbelievers?
Yeah, they’ll wake up alright, but it won’t be pretty. Revelation 20:11-15 tells us that these people will stand before the Throne of God, only to be reminded that they did not decide for Jesus while alive on Earth, were still in their sins, and had thereby chosen to go to Hell. Their names were not recorded in the Book of Life, so they were thrown into the Lake of Fire, a spiritual (or second) death. That’s gotta hurt.
The deciding evidence for the Lake of Fire toss was the absence of names in the Book of Life. We can rejoice as the Spiritually Resurrected (born again) group, because our names are recorded in the Book of Life. Want more? Read Exodus 32:33, Daniel 12:1, Malachi 3:16, Luke 10:20, and Revelation 3:5, 21:27, and 22:19.
Conclusion
Too many people, including Christians, fear death. When we are re-equipped with our resurrected bodies, they will be 100% new. Our natural, or Earthly bodies may rot away, but those new jobs will be perfect and indestructible. No more aging, no more sickness, no more achy joints or backs… “poifect!”
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