1 Peter 1:3-4 - “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you.”
Our lives and our bodies are not merely disposable. Considering the incarnation and resurrection of Christ, we can appreciate the value of life, flesh and bone. Our hope in the resurrection informs how we are to live today. We are not just waiting to escape into eternal forgetful bliss; instead Christ invites us to participate in a thorough and full plan of redemption. As sure as the new creation, new heavens and new earth are coming… likewise, in the twinkling of an eye, our bodies will be transformed into glorious ones, perfectly suited to dwell in eternal glory with Christ. This is the hope that daily propels us forward.
In the movie Risen, Clavius kept asking questions that Peter did not have answers to. Exasperated, Peter responds in frustration, “I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know… We are followers. We follow to find out.” (https://www.instagram.com/p/BCgxS9Lk0qb/) We do not have all the answers, we are not perfect, but together, we are followers, those who want to find out all that the risen Christ has died for, all that the living Lord wants us to live for. There is much to discover, much to pursue… let’s follow the Lord together!
“I have come home at last! This is my real country! I belong here. This is the land I have been looking for all my life, though I never knew it till now… Come further up, come further in!” C.S. Lewis, The Last Battle, p. 196
-JP
]]>Luke 24:38b, 39 - “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.”
“Is the Resurrection for Real?”
It had better be real.
As real as the contractions that ripped new life from my body.
As real as the rattle that strangled life out of his.
I’ve no use for a spiritual resurrection.
If Hope
for the drowned, damaged, disfigured, disowned,
is emotional ease,
if the pain of flesh and bones
is answered with mystical comfort,
if Guns are stronger than god,
then count me out.
But tell me that Death Loses,
tell me that Life Prevails,
and not in the abstract,
but in pulsing blood, flowing tears, thumping heart,
then the Resurrection
is Hope
for us all.
(Kara Root)
The world was a far different place before Jesus’ resurrection. We now live in a world where Jesus is risen from the dead. As (our favorite disciple) Bartholomew says in the movie Risen, “This changes everything!”
“If Jesus rose from the dead, then you have to accept all that he said; if he didn’t rise from the dead, then why worry about any of what he said? The issue on which everything hangs is not whether or not you like his teaching but whether or not he rose from the dead.” (Timothy Keller, The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism, p. 202)
Take a moment to think about and celebrate what the resurrection of Jesus means for your life. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEXx0mfxe-E
-JP
]]>Philippians 3:20-21 (NLT) - “But we are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives. And we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior. He will take our weak mortal bodies and change them into glorious bodies like his own, using the same power with which he will bring everything under his control.”
Watch this scene from the movie Risen where Clavius meets Jesus resurrected, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5JtCpDi2Bc.
When we consider key moments of salvation history (creation, incarnation, redemption), we realize how much God cares about embodied existence (cf. T. George, “What Do We Gain from a Bodily Resurrection?”). Christ could have been raised as pure Spirit, but he had a body that the disciples could recognize and touch. He could have had a body that was absolutely pristine, yet his wounds from the crucifixion remained.
I’ve always wondered why Jesus kept his wounds on his resurrected body. Will we have scars that remain on our resurrected bodies? As kids, we used to brag about our scars, and each scar told a story. Jesus’ wounds tell the story of salvation, our salvation. We’ll all want to touch his hands, his feet and side when we see him in heaven! Will we have scars that tell the salvation story… moments of self-giving or self-sacrifice? I think of James, the brother of Jesus, whose knees were calloused and hardened like those of a camel from so much time spent in prayer. Or of Mother Teresa and her famously disfigured feet from wearing ill-fitted shoes. Upon receiving donations of footwear, she would always defer to her sisters, allowing everyone else to find their proper sizes before taking what was leftover for herself.
Rejoice that in Christ our lives matter! What we do here and now can have significance in eternity! Rejoice in the Lord!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkZkeyu6a3k&index=8&list=PLPHfTWQ26S5y9zYrhYffO7R6lfLUyfSgP
-JP
]]>1 Corinthians 15:52 (NLT) - “It will happen in a moment, in the blink of an eye, when the last trumpet is blown. For when the trumpet sounds, those who have died will be raised to live forever. And we who are living will also be transformed.”
The Bible talks about creation being frustrated because of its “bondage to decay” (Romans 8:21). Think of trying to swim while being strapped to a ten pound weight. You may be able to stay afloat for a while, but eventually, inevitably, it will drag you down. Or think of the frustration that accompanies our efforts to change our diets…watching our cholesterol, monitoring our sugar levels, avoiding all tree nuts, fleeing any traces of gluten, cutting out carbs, etc. We’re trying to stave off the inevitable… decay and degeneration. At times it can be exasperating-thank God for cheat days, vegan substitutes and medical innovations!
We could mention many things that provoke frustration in our physical existence-injury, sickness, disease, violence, effects of injustice, mistakes, accidents or poor choices, etc. But in the twinkling of an eye, we will be changed… transformed… ready to inhabit a new heaven and new earth (cf. G. Ladd, The Last Things, p. 83). It is not simply to escape or to forget our past struggles and pain… but everything will be thoroughly redeemed and transformed… all wrongs being made right!
Read the following poem and spend time writing your own response (in 100 words or less) to this question: Why do you need the Resurrection?
I need the Resurrection
because my sister is sick
and can’t afford insurance,
because I’ve told a weeping Haitian mom,
“No, I can’t take your son home with me.”
because I’ve been rushed off a Jerusalem street
so a robot could blow up a bag that could’ve blown up us.
because I’ve exploded
in rage
and watched their tiny faces cloud with hurt.
because evil is pervasive
and I participate.
I need the Resurrection
because it promises
that in the end
all wrongs are made right.
Death loses.
Hope triumphs.
And Life and Love
Prevail.
(Kara Root)
-JP
]]>Romans 8.23b (NLT) - “…We, too, wait with eager hope for the day when God will give us our full rights as his adopted children, including the new bodies he has promised us.”
The Christian faith is not escapist, but rather ambitiously hopeful, invigorated by God’s passion for redemption. Think of all the suffering and pain we feel in our physical existence. God’s plan is not simply to extract our spirits from misery, but also to have us experience fully the extinction of sin, death and decay… we’ll “feel it in our bones”! God’s plan of redemption will be thorough and full.
“God created you with a body and he created you for his glory. Therefore he is going to raise your mortal body no matter how mangled, or deformed, or emaciated, or disease-ridden, and he is going to make it so strong, so healthy, so beautiful, that when I see it, I will say, ‘…in you I see the form and grandeur of the glory of Jesus Christ who made you, redeemed you, raised you, and glorified you with his glory for ever and ever’” (John Piper, “The Spirit Will Give Life to Your Mortal Bodies”) (Cf. Dan 12.2-3, Matt 13.43, Rom 8.11).
Praise God for salvation - what you have experience thus far, but also what is still to come! Be amazed at God and his great love for us! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-_4cy-tnGI
-JP
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