We All Need Some Body, Part 1

Alan Dunn – February 2021

My Dad died on Sunday, January 31^st, one week shy of his 92^nd birthday. On Saturday, February 6^th, we placed his body in the ground alongside my Mom’s grave. In the days leading up to my Dad’s passing, he fixated on Philippians 3:21, which informs us of the second coming of Christ, who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself. We are encouraged to think that my Dad died in Christ with the confident hope of obtaining his resurrected body, a body conformed to the body of Christ’s glory.

In 1 Corinthians 15:35ff, Paul answers a question concerning the resurrection: with what kind of body do they come [v35]? In chronological order, we can identify three kinds of human bodies in 1 Corinthians 15. Before we look at the three different kinds of bodies, we need to acknowledge what Paul says about chronology itself. We need to be sensitive to the unfolding of redemptive history.

Now and Then

In 1 Corinthians 15:44-49, Paul speaks of chronological sequence: a first and a second. He is trafficking in the basic binary of the Bible. He contrasts two realms [earthly//heavenly]; two periods of time [this age//the age to come]; two orders of creation [the first, old//the second, new]; and two kinds of life [natural//spiritual].

The natural is first then the spiritual. Men live in these two orders of created life in their respective bodies. There is a natural body and a spiritual body. Both bodies are determined by one’s vital union with either the first man, Adam, who bestows a natural body; or the second man, the last Adam, who bestows a spiritual body. The first man is earthy, from the earth, of this age. The second man is heavenly, from heaven, of the age to come. Those of this age bear the image of the earthy and those of the age to come bear the image of the heavenly.

The First Body: Pre-Fallen Adam

1 Corinthians 15:45 is the only place in the New Testament that cites Genesis 2:7 the Lord God formed man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living being. Here we see how God made the natural body. We gaze upon Adam’s pre-fallen body. Here is the first body for our consideration: Adam before the Fall – a man alive with the vitality and vigor of God’s good creation. Would you like to have that kind of body? Of course you would. That is why you visit the doctor, endeavor to exercise and eat a healthy diet and take vitamins and medications. You want to be as healthy as possible in your present natural body as the progeny of the first man, Adam.

The Second Body: Fallen Adam

We might think it would be wonderful to have a pre-fallen body like Adam when God formed him from dust and breathed life into him. But that is impossible because Adam rebelled and plunged his planet and posterity into the punishment of death.

Paul contrasts our present bodies with our resurrected bodies in v35-43. The relationship between the two is analogous to a seed and the plant produced by the seed. The body that we bury in the ground returns to dust, but it will be transformed by Christ when He returns. Paul gives us three contrasting couplets to consider. It is sown a perishable body, it is raised an imperishable body; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. My Italian mother-in-law, who also lived a long life, used to say “invecchiare e brutto”: getting old is ugly. However, the resurrection body will be beautiful.

Here is the second human body, the one we see when we look in the mirror, our present body, the body of this death [Rom 7:24], the body that is collapsing back into the dust, the body we place in a casket and then in a grave. Our present bodies are perishable, without honor, and weak. Our resurrection bodies, in contrast, will be imperishable, glorious, and powerful.

The Third Body: The Resurrected Last Adam

The last Adam became a life-giving spirit [v45b]. Paul here points us to the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ as the eschatological [last] Adamic Man of the new creation. He continues his comparison of Adam and Christ from v22 and uses terms specific to the resurrection. V45 places two snapshots side by side for our consideration. The first is the pristine first man, Adam at the point when he came to life by the in-breathing of God [Gen 2:7]. The second is the second man, the last Adam, Jesus Christ, when He came to resurrection life by the power of God. Consider the body of the resurrected Jesus.

The resurrected Jesus became a life-giving spirit. The word life-giving has no equivalent in English. In the original, it is a term that combines two words, “life” plus “making.” It describes the nature of Jesus’ resurrection life in contrast to Adam’s creational life. Whenever we read this term, we are being told about the resurrection life of the age to come. Paul used this term in 1 Corinthians 15:22, For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all shall be made alive, and again in v36, That which you sow does not come to life unless it dies.[1]

Here is Paul’s answer to the question posed in v35, With what kind of body do they come? They “come,” that is, they are given resurrected bodies that are conformed to the body of the resurrected Jesus. In comparison with our present death-prone, perishable, weak bodies, our resurrected bodies will be imperishable, glorious, and powerful. In comparison with Adam’s first, natural, earthy body, our resurrected bodies will be spiritual, heavenly, life-giving spirit. We are not to think of the spiritual body of the resurrected, ascended and enthroned Jesus as immaterial. Jesus bodily rose from the dead and bodily ascended and will return bodily. Jesus was not resurrected back into the life of this age, as was Lazarus. He is the beginning, the first-born from the dead [Col 1:18]. He is the first-fruits, signaling that the harvest of resurrection has begun [1 Cor 15:20-23]. He is the Adamic progenitor of the new, resurrected race of humanity. Just as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly [1 Cor 15:49]. In order for us to inherit the [glorified, consummated] kingdom of God [v50], we must bear the image of the heavenly, second man, the resurrected Jesus, the last Adam. Flesh and blood [Adam’s pristine pre-fallen body] cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does the perishable [our death-saturated body] inherit the imperishable [1 Cor 15:50]. If we are to live with the resurrected Jesus, bearing His image, we too must have resurrected bodies.

When He returns, He will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory [Phil 3:21]. Can we even conceive of the body of His glory? I direct your attention to Jesus on the mount of transfiguration and there you glimpse something of the body of His glory. He was transfigured before them and His face shone like the sun and His garments became as white as light [Mat 17:2]. What will it be for our bodies to be transformed into conformity with the body of His glory? The righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears to hear, let him hear [Mat. 13:43]. Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we shall be. We know that, when He appears, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him just as He is [1 John 3:2].

1. This term is also found in John 5:21; 6:63; Romans 4:17; 8:11; Ephesians 2:5; 2 Corinthians 3:6; and Colossians 2:13. In every instance, the life of the age to come, resurrection life, comes into view.