Where Do I Begin?

In class yesterday, we mentioned the importance of forming a habit of reading, praying, and studying. When thinking about reading the Bible daily, the question I most often get asked is, “Where do I begin?” There are many possibilities (and I’m happy to share more if you would like). Vanderbilt University, however, offers a great resource, the Revised Common Lectionary Daily Readings. It’s simple.

Go here: http://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/daily.php?year=B

Scroll down to today’s date.

Click the readings (they are linked to biblegateway.com).

Read.

This same site also offers the weekly readings (Sunday), along with some beautiful prayers to help guide you in devotion. I hope you will find this as helpful of a resource as I have. Grace.

The Coming of Jesus: Resurrection of the Body

“…we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.” Romans 8:23

Thinking back to the story we covered last fall, you might say that one of the most significant functions of the spirit is “life-giver.” In the last post, we talked about God’s plan of restoring, not destroying, his creation. This plan was accomplished through Jesus’ death and resurrection and is continuing to be fulfilled through the church, those in whom the spirit dwells.

In this post, as we continue to consider Jesus’ second coming, we’re going to talk about a piece of this plan of restoration, the resurrection of the body. To do so, again we’re going to take a look at some of Paul’s words in 2 Corinthians 4, 5 and 1 Corinthians 15.

2 Corinthians 4, 5

If all we had was the end of chapter 4, we might very well say that the future hope to which Paul refers is one in which our bodies will be done away with and left behind, after which only the pure spirit will remain (“Outwardly we are wasting away; inwardly we are being renewed day by day.”). Even though this is not all we have from Paul, some still try to argue this.

This line of thought is not what Paul is getting at. It’s not even Christian. It actually comes out of Greek philosophy. Plato taught, basically, that material things are bad and will fade away, while the spirit is what will remain, as that is pure. He saw this disconnect between physical and spiritual. If we keep reading, we discover that Paul really doesn’t see this same sort of disconnect, and he certainly does not think “physical” equals bad.

We all know that bodies decay and die. We see this and experience it. As we grow older, our bodies become weaker, and strange things begin to happen to them. Eventually, they die off. The same can be said for cities and entire civilizations. And so we think that to be “bodily,” or physical, is to be impermanent, not lasting –– to be permanent (or immortal), then, is to become something nonphysical.

Paul’s point is much different. Imagine a ghost. When you think of a ghost, do you think of it as being physical? Most of us would, I presume, answer “No.” Therefore, when you compare your current body to that of a ghost, you would say that you are more physical than a ghost, right?

Paul’s point about the resurrected body is similar. Just as your present physical body is more substantial, more touchable, than a disembodied spirit (like a ghost), the resurrection body that is awaiting us is much more real, more physical, than our present, earthly body. Paul’s is asking us to imagine a new sort of physicality, one that moves from physical to something even more physical than our current, earthly bodies.

1 Corinthians 15

This is, in many ways, the heart of Paul’s teaching on resurrection. There are some in Corinth who have abandoned their belief in the resurrection, and Paul is addressing this issue. They say that the dead do not rise, and Paul says, “Yes they do. Just as Jesus was raised, so, too, his people will be raised.”

Two Important Words:

Psychikos

• Does not mean “physical” in our sense of the word
• Comes from psyche –– means “soul,” not body
• To add –ikos to the end describes not the material out of which things are made but, rather, the power or energy that animates them
• This is the difference between asking…
  • Is that a wooden ship or an iron ship (the material it’s made of)?
  • Is that a steamboat or a sailboat (the energy that powers it)?
• Paul is talking about the present body that is animated by the human psyche (the present life force that ultimately is powerless against illness, injury, decay, and death)

Pneuma

• This means either “spirit” or “breath” (God’s spirit is thought of as breath…God “breathed” creation into existence)
• Therefore, the future body will be animated not by psyche, but by pneuma, God’s breath of new life that overcomes death

Paul does not make a contrast between the corruptible physical body and the incorruptible spiritual body. It is the perishable psyche and the imperishable pnuema. Paul would not have us think, “Okay, my body is a waste; I’m simply waiting to be taken away to some sort of spiritual existence.” Rather, Paul wants us to know and believe, “Okay, this body will be transformed into something glorious, animated by something imperishable, like Jesus’ resurrected body; therefore, I will be focused on doing God’s work here and now because it will not be in vain. It will not be a waste.”

Offering your bodies as a living sacrifice will never be a waste of a resource.

If we will be like Jesus, what is Jesus’ resurrected body like? à see John 20:26, 27, noting how Jesus’ body can be touched and how it still bears the scars from this life

Just like last week, when we discovered that God is restoring, not destroying, his creation, now we learn that God is transforming, not destroying, our bodies into imperishable, resurrected, even more truly physical bodies.

Why is this important?

1. Evil is not more powerful than God.
2. We take care of our bodies because they matter.
3. What we do in the body will not ultimately be a waste!

The Coming of Jesus: Restoring (not destroying) Creation

Throughout the story, we have followed God’s plan for restoring his creation from the chaos it has brought upon itself. He created beauty out of chaos in the beginning; he will create beauty out of chaos once again. The word we often associate with this is “redemption.” Redemption is not simply making things a little better than they currently are (or have been), nor is it rescuing spirits and souls from an evil world. Redemption is the adoption and remaking of creation. God created it very good, and he will recreate it very good.

The point is that if he can’t fix what evil has broken, then evil is more powerful than he.

In consideration of this, let’s think about God’s plan of restoration within the context of Jesus’ second coming. To do so, we’ll look at some of Paul’s words in Philippians 3:17-21.

Philippi: A brief history lesson

Philippi was a Roman colony in which the emperor, Augustus, had settled his veterans following the battles of Philippi (42 BCE) and Actium (31 BCE). “Why establish colonies,” you might ask. First, this helped avoid the problem of overcrowding the capital. The last thing the emperor wanted was retired and bored soldiers with time on their hands. Secondly, and more important for our point, establishing colonies extended Roman influence around the Mediterranean world. This created pockets or cells of people who were loyal to Caesar and the ways of the empire in the wider culture through which the empire could spread.

What does this have to do with anything?

When Paul says, “Our citizenship is in heaven,” he is alluding to a similar sort of idea. He does not mean that when we’re done with this life we will go off to live in heaven. In a sense, the king in the heavens has established colonies throughout his creation. Within these colonies, there are cells and networks that are loyal to the king, influencing the rest of creation and spreading the good news of the kingdom.

When all is said and done, the Lord and King, Jesus (“Lord” and “King” of course being imperial titles), will come from his throne in heaven to earth, in which these networks have been living and carrying out their work, bringing about his kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. When he comes, Paul tells us that he will bring transformation, not desolation, and this is key. He is not coming to declare that physical things are all bad and worthless and must now be done away with (remember, he created it very good). Nor is he simply coming to make things a little better than they are. He is bringing new life through resurrection, transforming our “lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body” (which we’ll discuss in more detail next week). This sort of life is, of course, viewed in the much larger context of God’s transformation of the whole of creation, for this Lord Jesus will come and “bring everything under his control.”

Two other texts worth considering are Matthew 6:10 (“Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”) and Matthew 17:10-12.

To what is he restoring it?
When God instructs Israel to build the tabernacle, later the temple, what is one of the reasons for these places of worship? In a sense, the tabernacle and temple were places where God would make himself readily available to his people –– where heaven and earth would intersect. This, of course, is what we see in the community of the church, especially when gathered for the Lord’s Supper.

Revelation 21:1-5
Revelation offers us a similar sort of idea about the ultimate goal of God’s re-creation efforts: new heaven, new earth. Thinking back to the temple, the new heaven and new earth with be the re-created heaven and earth, now intersecting for eternity. “Now the dwelling of God is with humans, and he will live with them.” Therefore, what God accomplished temporarily through the temple with Israel and what he has begun in the church will be fulfilled at Jesus’ second coming when he fully restores his broken creation.

Summary:
God’s plan is to restore his creation, not destroy it –– to bring transformation, not desolation! In his restored creation, God will come down to dwell and reign forever. This is important because if God cannot fix what evil has broken, then evil is more powerful than he. This is his very good creation (it always has been), and he will love it to the very end.