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Colin Smith: We've seen that there is a good, better, best pattern to the Christian life: to be in Christ is good, to be with Christ is better—in fact, the Apostle says it is better by far—but even for our believing loved ones who are with Christ right now, the best is yet to be.

Guest (Male): Welcome to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith. So, Colin, you're telling us that those who are in the presence of Christ right now still have something better yet to look forward to?

Colin Smith: Oh yes, I'm quite sure that is what the Bible makes clear. Those who are with Christ consciously enjoy His presence. It is a marvelous thing for them right now, but the Scripture makes very clear that there is an anticipation that they have.

In Revelation, the souls under the altar are saying, "How long, oh Lord?" They're looking forward to something that's still to come. And what's still to come, of course, is the return of the Lord Jesus Christ, when those souls who are with Him will return with Him, and we will be caught up to meet them in the air.

Then we shall all be given the gift of the resurrection body, which is our focus today. That's going to happen in the moment and in the twinkling of an eye. That's ahead for us, and it's also ahead for them, and they anticipate it with joy.

Guest (Male): Well, we're going to look at this a little further today from the book of First Corinthians. So, if you can, join us there in chapter 15 as we begin to unpack verses 50 through 58. Here is Pastor Colin.

Colin Smith: I want us to look—this is perhaps the most ambitious outline I've ever attempted—four doctrines, four promises, four changes, and four conclusions in forty minutes. Okay? So here we go. That's the introduction.

We begin with four doctrines that teach us the importance of the body. Number one, creation teaches us that God made us both body as well as soul. You remember Genesis chapter two and verse seven: the Lord formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.

So, God made the body of Adam from the dust of the ground. Imagine it there: a biodegradable corpse, and it's lying there lifeless, made out of the dust of the ground. It could be chemically analyzed—the physical body. But then into this corpse, God breathes, the Bible says, the breath of life, so that Adam became a body-soul union.

That is the nature of our life. That is why death is an enemy and why the Bible speaks of death as the last enemy, because it is the separating of what God put together in the very nature with which He made us. We are a union of body and soul, and death separates the soul from the body. It is a tearing apart of what God has joined together.

So, you have a phone, but if it is not connected to the network, what is it? It's no longer a phone. It can't function as a phone. Without the network, it cannot fulfill the function for which it is made. It depends upon its union with the network. And there is a network, but the fact that there is a cellular network is of absolutely no value to you if you do not have a phone. It is the joining of the two together that makes this wonderful gift of immediate personal communication possible.

So, God created you as a body-soul union. And all that God has created is good—we have that from Genesis in chapter one. That is why God will not scrap it and start again. He will not scrap you and start again. What God has made, He redeems in Jesus Christ, and that means He redeems your body as well as your soul.

Second doctrine that speaks to this wonderful truth is the doctrine of the Fall, which reminds us that sin has ruined us both in relation to body and soul. Never forget that the bodies that we have are different now from the bodies Adam and Eve had when they were created by God. Created in the garden, their bodies were subject to no disease, no pain, and no death. All of that came, the Bible makes very clear, with the entrance of sin into the world.

What that means is that sin afflicts every area of our life, including not only the soul but also the body. So, we live with teeth that decay, cholesterol that goes up, energy that goes down, skin that sags, bones that ache, eyes that need glasses, and hearing that declines. We live with the trials of chemical imbalances in the body, hormones flying around out of control, and on top of that, a multitude of diseases and maladies and conditions and cancers that afflict the course of our lives.

God created you, body and soul. Sin has affected all of us, body and soul. Third, the doctrine of the Incarnation. Jesus Christ became one with us, body and soul. Think about this: the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. God became a man, that is, a body-soul union in Jesus Christ.

The body of Jesus was a body like ours with a central nervous system. He was born as a baby. He grew up as a child. He learned in the same way as we learn. He grew to be a man. He knew what it was to feel pressure, to sweat, to hunger and to thirst, and to be weary.

It's very interesting that the first major heresy that the church had to deal with in the early days was not the denial that Jesus was God, but the denial on the part of some that Jesus was man. Here was the rationale: people in the early world had this idea that we've sort of got a pure spirit in an unworthy body, and so they reasoned like this.

How could God, who is pure spirit, possibly allow Himself to get mixed up with anything as base as a human body? That's why you have in Second John and chapter seven, for example, the statement: "Many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh."

But God did become man. The Word did become flesh. That's very significant. You see, if the Bible said, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word remained spirit"—if it said that, we might reasonably conclude that God's interest in our lives was only in relation to things of the spirit, like prayer and meditation and Bible study.

If it said that, we might reasonably conclude that God's concerned with your heart but not your home, that God's concerned with your spirit but not your schedule, that God's concerned with your character but not with your activity. But what the Bible says is that the Word became flesh.

God entered the world of noisy kids and pushy parents and overcrowded schedules and relentless pressures and unending demands that push us to the limit. He came into that world and lived life in the body. And when He went to the cross, He died not only to save your soul, but to redeem your life. What that means is that God is laying claim to and invading every part of your life: marriage, checkbook, career, kids, everything. Not just, "Here's my life, and I add prayer and church to it." No, the Incarnation just blows that away.

Fourth doctrine: resurrection. Now, please understand this. All religions have at least some notion of survival after death. They're different notions, but some notion is common to all religion. The Titanic goes down and what does Celine Dion sing for us? "My heart will go on." She sings it very beautifully, too. Some idea of the survival of the soul is common to humanity.

But the resurrection of the body, friends, is unique to Christianity. The reason for that is very obvious: only Christians have a risen Savior. We should be trumpeting this. It is the most glorious truth that we need to grasp and to cherish and to put on display.

At the heart of our faith is that the tomb was empty and the corpse of Jesus was raised to life and that all who share in Him will share in this glorious resurrection. The truth of the resurrection of the body, friends, is a crown jewel of the Christian faith. This is a truth that we are to treasure. This is a truth that we are to put on display before the world. Nobody else has anything like it.

It is a promise to excite the interest of every Christian. It is a hope for every believer to anticipate with God. And here's the tragedy: many Christians hardly have a grip on this doctrine at all. In fact, what I've found over the years as a pastor, and then what's pressed me particularly to this message today, is that it is increasingly obvious to me that many Christians have the idea that what God has prepared for us beyond this life is a kind of half-life, a sort of compensation for those who didn't have the strength to continue the real life in this world. But friends, the resurrection is the very purpose for which you were created by God and redeemed in Christ.

Guest (Male): You're listening to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith and a message called "The Joys of Life in the Resurrection Body." Something that every believer has to look forward to.

A number of years ago, Pastor Colin's book, *Heaven, How I Got Here: The Story of the Thief on the Cross*, was made into a one-man play performed by actor Stephen Baldwin. He talks in this play about how he is now experiencing the joys of heaven and how he got there. Well, that film has been translated into well over 20 languages and it's available to view for free at our website. Come to openthebible.org and you can watch *Heaven, How I Got Here: A Night with the Thief on the Cross* in languages like Arabic, Russian, Chinese, Spanish, Farsi, and Hindi. Again, more information about this and watch the film online at openthebible.org/heaven. Back to the message. Here is Pastor Colin.

Colin Smith: Let's move on and take a look at this glorious prospect that lies ahead. Let me point you to four promises, simply four scriptures from right across the Bible, Old Testament and New. Particularly, these point out for us the great continuity that there is between life here and the marvelous life that is to come.

Here's the first: Job chapter 19. Many of you know this well, a marvelous statement of Job: "I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last He will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another."

Notice what Job knew: his Redeemer lives, and his Redeemer one day will stand on the earth. That's what he says. And when this living Redeemer stands on the earth, here's what will happen for me, says Job: "I will see God with my own eyes."

Now, I don't suppose for a minute that Job understood from that all that was later revealed in regards to the resurrection of the body. But the great Saint Augustine said on one occasion that the Old Testament is like a room that is fully furnished, but it's only dimly lit. When the New Testament light is pulled on the Old Testament scriptures, we have every reason to see what God had put there in the first place, even if it was not fully revealed to those who were living at the time.

Notice what he says: "I will see God with my own eyes." Friends, that's eyeballs. That's eyeballs. That's not, "Oh, now I see," in the sense of "Now I understand." That's "I will see" in the sense that you're looking at this pulpit right now. You see it. Your eyeballs.

Job says, "In that same way, I'm going to see God in all of His glory." And when is it going to happen? It's not going to happen immediately after my death. No, "after my skin has been thus destroyed." It's going to happen when my Redeemer, who lives, stands on the earth. But it is going to happen. You will see God as truly as you see this pulpit in front of you.

Second scripture, a great promise: Romans chapter eight, verses 22 to 24. "We know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit—what's our experience now?—we groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for the adoption as sons." And what is that? "It is the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved."

You see what Paul says here: the redemption of your body is the hope in which you were saved. The great purpose of God, the great reason for which Jesus went to the cross, was not to save a part of you but to redeem the whole of you. God made you body and soul, and Christ came to redeem you, soul and body. And He does it in this order: soul now, body later. But what God has joined together, no one is going to separate for all eternity. All that God has made is good, and all that God has made, He will redeem.

This is staggering to our minds. Let's look at a third great promise from Philippians chapter three this time, just to fill our minds with the scripture regarding this great truth. Philippians three, verses 20 and 21: "Our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ."

And what's He going to do? "The Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like His glorious body." How's He going to do that? "By the power that enables Him even to subject all things to Himself."

Notice that the human body is described here as lowly. Lowly. At its strongest, it is quite fragile. The fittest person being hit by a car—it's very, very fragile. It's a lowly body. C.S. Lewis has a wonderful picture here. He says when you are learning to ride, they give you unimpressive horses. Only when you are ready for it are you allowed an animal that will really gallop and jump. Isn't that a great picture? When you're learning to ride, they give you unimpressive horses.

God has given you a body that the Bible says, for all its marvelous capacities and for all that we enjoy in it, God describes it as lowly. In other words, what He's saying to us is, "Wait till you see the upgrade." Wait till you see the upgrade.

And here's how the upgrade's going to happen: your body that's presently lowly—however strong and well-developed and capable it marvelously is—it is going to be transformed from its present condition by the power of the Lord Jesus Christ. In other words, this is a truth that cannot be grasped apart from the work of Christ and the power of Christ. That's why it's a uniquely Christian doctrine.

It's only when you consider the power of the Lord Jesus Christ and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, by which He Himself rose from the dead, that you can begin even to contemplate this amazing and glorious truth. The credibility of this great truth is demonstrated in this one fact: that Jesus Christ has the power to raise His people from the dead because He rose Himself.

Think of it this way: the Savior gave you a new heart. You rejoice in that if you're a Christian. "Oh, yes, He gave me a new heart." Well, the Savior, in the same way, He's going to give you a new body. New heart now, new body to come.

And we're told that your resurrection body will be like Christ's glorious body. Philippians chapter three: your resurrection body will be like Christ's glorious body. Now, that means that it will be a physical body. You will not be a disembodied ghost or spirit in the new creation.

Let me put it this way: the reason that you won't be floating on a cloud is that bodies don't float. They fall, right? And when people are in this sort of vague floating world, it's a denial of the resurrection of the body. That's what it is. It really is. It's a failure to grasp Christian doctrine at its most central point. That's why this issue is so important.

Listen to what Jesus said as He appeared in the resurrection body to His disciples. He says this: "See my hands and my feet"—this is Luke 24 and verse 39—"it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have."

Flesh and bones. Resurrection body. Our body will be like His. That's a physical body. That's why the word resurrection is used. Yes, there will be ways in which it is different. We'll come to that in just a moment. But the first thing you need to know about the resurrection body is that it is a body.

In terms of appearance, the resurrection body of Jesus and ours will be like His. The resurrection body of Jesus was so similar in form to the body that we have now that Mary could mistake Him for a gardener. The two disciples on the road to Emmaus thought this was just another traveler.

The resurrection body will be very different in some ways. It will be different in that it is a vehicle for endless life, which the present body obviously is not. The similarities between what we have now—created good by God—and the upgrade—created better and best by God—the similarities are more striking than the differences.

And as if to press it home, you have the risen Lord Jesus Christ saying to them in Luke 24, "Have you anything to eat?" And they gave Him a piece of broiled fish, and He took it and ate it before them. Later in John's Gospel, we have Jesus actually cooking the breakfast and eating it with the disciples.

Friends, we are definitely talking barbecue in the resurrection. If we start thinking in more concrete terms with regards to the promise of the life to come, we will be helped in our anticipation: walking and running and jumping and hitting balls on green grass growing in this planet renewed and made perfect as it shares in the redemption of the children of God. A spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have. The first thing you need to know about the resurrection body is that it is a body, and when you get that settled in your mind, you will have a far greater anticipation of the joys that lie ahead.

Guest (Male): You're listening to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith, and we've just begun to look at four promises for the body. We'll continue to look at this teaching next time on the broadcast, so I hope you'll make it a point to tune in. By the way, if you ever miss a program, you can always come to our website and listen there at openthebible.org.

Open the Bible is able to be on this station, we're able to make the podcast, the app, and all the other resources available because of your generosity. And as you give a gift of any amount this month, we want to send you three copies of our first graphic novel inspired by Pastor Colin's book, *Heaven, How I Got Here: The Story of the Thief on the Cross*, plus we'll send one copy of the original book. But Colin, what is one thing that you'd like people to take away from this new graphic novel?

Colin Smith: Well, without any question, it's that when God draws near, He comes to give us what we do not have. You know, the default assumption of the fallen human heart is that if God draws near, He's going to place some demand on us that we can't meet.

There are millions of people who have never understood the wonderful truth of God's grace. Their whole idea of Christianity is that they're going to be told what they need to do and what they need to be, and they have neither the desire nor the ability to do it. As long as folks think that God is placing demands upon us, well, they're never going to open the doors of their hearts or of their lives to Him.

So, here is a marvelous opportunity to share the story of the thief on the cross that tells us that God gives to us what we do not have. It explains God's marvelous grace. Is there someone in your life—maybe it's a young person brought up in church, but they have never really understood the love, the mercy, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ?

This graphic novel is a simple way in which they could grasp the most important truth in all of the Bible. Could you please place it into their hands? Could you give them a copy of this? Is there someone that you know who's trying to live a life that's pleasing to God, always feels that they're failing, and needs to understand God's grace? Well, that's who the graphic novel is for.

We want to communicate the very center of the gospel to as many people as possible, and I hope that you'll take these copies of the graphic novel, that you'll put them into the hands of people who will benefit from them and will be released in seeing the marvelous good news of the grace of God that brings hope for every single person.

Guest (Male): Well, we want to send you three copies of the graphic novel, plus the original book, *Heaven, How I Got Here: The Story of the Thief on the Cross*, as our way of saying thank you for your financial support this month. You can give at our website, openthebible.org, or when you call 1-877-OPEN-365. That's 1-877-673-6365 or openthebible.org. For Pastor Colin Smith, I'm Steve Hiller. Thanks for listening and I hope you'll join us next time.

Colin Smith: This is Pastor Colin, and I want you to know about a resource that will help you in your devotional life. It's called Open the Bible Daily. My colleague, Pastor Tim Augustine, takes what you hear on Open the Bible and he edits it into daily bite-sized chunks that you can read in your devotional time in less than three minutes.

Every day, you'll find a verse of scripture, a short teaching from God's Word, and an application that you can carry with you through the day. People who use this tell us that they read it every day, and I think that if you try it, you'll love it too. For more information, visit openthebible.org/daily. That's openthebible.org/daily.