For the Sake of the Gospel # 20
Life after Death: Part Three

In last week’s column, I explained that St. Paul understands life after death in terms of resurrection from the dead. Just as God raised Jesus from the dead, so God will raise from the dead those who have believed in Christ. Paul’s understanding of the resurrection from the dead is crucial for our understanding of life after death. For, if we will be raised from the dead, this means that the whole of us, body as well as soul, will enjoy eternal life.
But what does it mean to say that our body will be raised from the dead? What kind of body will we have at the resurrection of the dead? This is the question that St. Paul addresses in the second half of 1 Corinthians 15. Having shown the Corinthians the importance of the resurrection of the dead for their faith in Christ, in the last part of this chapter Paul explains what it will mean for us to be raised from the dead.
Paul is very insistent that resurrection from the dead is not merely a matter of returning to our former way of life. For example, Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, but Lazarus died again. The kind of resurrection that Paul is talking about is different. It is not merely coming back to life; it involves a complete change and transformation of our body. It is the kind of resurrection that Jesus Christ already enjoys. Having been raised from the dead, Jesus will never die again because his body has been transformed by the power of God’s Spirit.
The resurrection body that Paul envisions, then, is a “spiritual body” in the sense that our mortal and corruptible body will be transformed by the power of God’s Spirit. When our bodies are raised from the dead, they will be changed and transformed by power of the Holy Spirit so that our moral and corruptible body will become immortal and incorruptible. Death will have no power over us, just as death has no power over the risen Lord. By raising us from the dead, God will destroy the power of Death once and for all.
So what does this mean for our hope in eternal life? It means eternal life is more than the salvation of our immortal soul; it is the salvation of the whole of us—our body as well as our soul. In a way that we do not yet understand, in a way that we cannot yet comprehend, we will be changed and transformed at the resurrection of the dead. There will be continuity between who we were and what we will be. Our body as well as our soul will be saved, in a way that will completely amaze us. This is why the body is so important; this is why we honor and reverence our body as a temple of the Holy Spirit.
But is it only we humans that will be saved? What about the rest of creation? Will it also participate in God’s redemptive plan? This is next week’s topic.
Father Matera