Easter is a time when people turn their attention to Jesus Christ and His resurrection. For millions of people, Jesus’ resurrection offers the hope of life after death. But this year, Easter is unique because it falls on April 1, sharing the date with April Fool’s Day. It’s rare that these two observances fall on the same day, as it hasn’t happened since 1956. Yet, many will think the two holidays celebrate the same thing: fools.
People have always thought Christians were fools for believing in dead bodies rising again. History tells us the ancient Romans felt the Christian belief in the resurrection was foolish. The Roman authorities would leave the bodies of Christian martyrs exposed to the elements for six full days, lying above the ground for all to see. Afterwards, they burned the bodies reducing them to ash. They swept the ash into the nearby Rhone River where one Roman said, “Now, let’s see if they rise again and if their God can help them.” Karl Marx famously said that religion is the opiate of the masses. According to Marx, rulers used the promise of a happy future in eternity to oppress the masses from rising in a revolt.
Are we fools to think there’s life after death?
Stephen Hawking thought so. The former professor of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge was known for his brilliance and for having Lou Gehrig’s disease, or ALS. Bound to a wheelchair & dependent on a computerized voice system for communication, his lectures were widely attended. Hawking mused on the possibility of the afterlife just three years before his death: “I regard the brain as a computer which will stop working when its components fail. There is no heaven or afterlife for broken down computers; that is a fairy story for people afraid of the dark.”
For many, you simply go out of existence after your death. You feel nothing and you know nothing. Yet, at the heart of Christianity is a cross, and one of the most significant things about that cross is that it is empty. Christians down the ages have been sure that Jesus’ shameful death on those gallows was not the last word about Jesus. He rose from the tomb and triumphed over death.
Today, I want to talk about what Jesus secured for His followers – life after death. And, “Are we fools to think there’s life after death?”
Please find 2 Corinthians 4 & 5.
This Easter, I want to ask, “What does the resurrection secure for Christ’s followers?” Or, what happens to a believer after she dies?
1) Why Should I Care if Jesus is Risen?
“So Jesus rose from the grave?” you ask. “What should I care about the death of a religious figure two millennia ago?”
“knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and bring us with you into his presence.” (2 Corinthians 4:14)
Jesus’ resurrection and the believers’ resurrection are inseparably linked together. Now, we see confirmation of this link between Jesus rising and your rising all over our Bibles.
“If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.” (Romans 8:11)
“Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.” (1 John 3:2)
“When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.” (Colossians 3:4)
“And God raised the Lord and will also raise us up by his power.” (1 Corinthians 6:14)
Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, 26 and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11:25–26)
“For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.” (Romans 6:5)
“that the Christ must suffer and that, by being the first to rise from the dead, he would proclaim light both to our people and to the Gentiles.” (Acts 26:23)
“But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. 21 For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. 23 But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ.” (1 Corinthians 15:20–23)
The risen Jesus is the model for a believer’s future body, but the risen Jesus is also the means by which the believer rises again.
All the hope of you living after death is contingent on whether or not He rose from the dead. If Easter is a myth, then you have no hope for life after death. Any theory or any person selling a “near death experience” is just a good as the next if Jesus lies in a borrowed tomb in the Middle East today.
Converting to Christianity is a response to an unyielding, stubborn historical fact that Jesus Christ was raised physically from the dead. Hundreds and hundreds of people besides Paul saw Him, talked to Him over and over again over a period of days, ate with Him, watched Him, touched Him, put fingers through the holes in His hands. Again, all the hope of you living after death is contingent on whether He rose from the dead.
Newsweek, a secular magazine, in a March 27, 2005 magazine article researches the historical data for the resurrection and concluded that probably the resurrection of Jesus Christ must have happened. The article’s author, Jon Meacham, says there is no other way to explain the widespread growth and the rapid growth of the early church.
If He rose again, then you can be confident you will rise (if you’re in Christ).
We can ask, “Who will be raised from the dead?” The Bible says every person will be raised:
“Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. … 28 Do not marvel at this, for an hour is coming when all who are in the
tombs will hear his voice 29 and come out, those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment.” (John 5:25, 28-29)
Jesus raises categorically, every single person who has ever lived. Who will be raised by Jesus? Verse 28 says, “all who are in the tombs…” All the dead who have ever lived will be raised from the dead by Jesus. Millions of Chinese and Nigerians and Germans, liberals and conservatives. He will raise Julius Caesar from the dead, and Judas Iscariot from the dead… Muhammad Ali from the dead and Michelangelo from the dead… Martin Luther King, JR from the dead and Adolf Hitler from the dead. He will raise them, and they will stand before him. You will be raised from the dead, too. Jesus will give existence to your decomposed bodies. He allows no one to go out of existence.
If you are not a believer, the aim of these messages is to wake you up from the slumber of indifference to the question of death and eternity. I hope to motivate you to consider Jesus Christ as the only way to eternal life and the only escape from hell and eternal death.
Jesus is not saying, “I will show you how you can live so you will be resurrected.” Instead, He’s saying, “I am the resurrection. I am your resurrection. I am the way any one gets resurrected. My resurrection is yours. I have been raised for you.”
2) What Will My Resurrected Body Look Like?
2 Corinthians 5:1–10 is the most explicit answer to the question, “What happens to me when I die?”
“For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. 2 For in this tent we groan, longing to put on our heavenly dwelling, 3 if indeed by putting it on we may not be found naked. 4 For while we are still in this tent, we groan, being burdened—not that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. 5 He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.” (2 Corinthians 5:1–5)
This is a complex passage that doesn’t readily open itself up to you. Now, Paul will mix his metaphors and even switch among metaphors going back and forth from one metaphor to another. You want to say to Paul, “Stop! My head hurts!” There’s tearing down a tent, a house not made with hands, taking off and putting on clothes, nakedness, and being away from home versus being at home.
2.1 Your Present Body
Three times in these verses, Paul says your physical body is a tent. Here are two of the verses: “For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home…” (2 Corinthians 5:1a) For while we are still in this tent…” (2 Corinthians 5:4a)
The Bible is saying your physical body is like a tent. And tents are weak structures. Here are you today, weakened by allergies, weakened by injuries, weakened by old age. Tents are temporary structures – nobody expects a tent to last very long. Even Charles Barkley knows this. Former NBA star, Barkley said of the diminishing skills of aging athletes, “Father Time is undefeated.” You cannot make your body do what it did 10 years ago, 15 years ago. We all lose to Father Time; your body is a tent.
2.2 Your Future Physical Body
“…we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” (2 Corinthians 5:1b)
Your future resurrected body is “a building from God.” Your future resurrected body is a safe and secure house. Your future resurrected body is no longer subject to sickness, injury, decay, or death. The new body is not just a replacement of your old body. It’s an upgrade! Your software and your hardware will one day be upgraded!
There’s a lot of confusion concerning the resurrected bodies believers will receive. For example, when the ancient Greeks heard Paul talk about resurrection in Acts 17:32, they probably thought he meant something to the effect that your corpse will simply stand up. Your future resurrection is not like the raising of Lazarus or the widow’s son located in the ancient city of Nain (John 11:1-44 and Luke 7:11-17). These two were simply restored to their “tent”, the physical body you now enjoy. But your future body, your resurrected body is an eternal body, or “a house not made with hands.” (2 Corinthians 5:1b) Instead, it is a transformed body.
Let’s put the contrast together: your corruptible body is a tent while your future resurrected body is an incorruptible body. Your new transformed body is more than your old body. It’s more solid and substantial – it’s more of what a human being was meant to be. Let your mind race of me now and stoke your imagination to all that the resurrected body will mean for you and your believing friends.
“not that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life.” (2 Corinthians 4:4b)
This future, resurrected body will be put over the top of our bodies, our clothes, our building.
“who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.” (Philippians 3:21)
“He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.”
(2 Corinthians 5:5)
He’s not going to assign this to an intern or a staff member, but He’ll take care of it Himself!
2.3 The Future You
Not only will you be physical body be perfect but so will your spiritual and moral self be made perfect. You will be spiritually and morally flawless. Just as God will remove all evil from heaven, He will remove all evil from you. You will have a pure heart to go along with your perfect physical body.
Someone might say, “But what about the angel Lucifer? He was in heaven and fell? If he fell from a perfect heaven, could I fall? What if I entertain a sinful thought sometime in the first 1,000 years of heaven? Will I fall out of heaven?”
You are Made Completely New
“And he who was seated on the throne said, ‘Behold, I am making all things new.’ Also he said, ‘Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true’” (Revelation 21:5).
God makes new streets, new walls, new gates, can he not make remake you spiritually and morally? God does not lie and we can trust his word. In heaven, your every impulse and every thought will be holy and pleasing to God. You will experience complete freedom from the chains addictions and from any of your sinful choices.
27 But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life.” (Revelation 21:27)
Imagine you in the holy city where nothing is false, nothing is detestable, and noting is unclean. You are in the middle of a fortress of safety and security from outside forces that may threaten you but also inside forces that have enchained you (Romans 7:23-24). You have the same chance of thinking a sinful thought as Satan would of entering the city’s gates.
You Are Made Morally and Spiritually New
Right now, God is at work in your life to make you more like the Jesus – more like Him spiritually and morally. And one day He will complete this work by perfect your body in every way – physically, morally, spiritually, and emotionally.
“For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 30 And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.” (Romans 8:29-30)
Read those verses again and you’ll see a chain where one link leads to the next link and so on. In fact, the verse is given to you to comfort you. See these as a golden chain that cannot be broken. From eternity past when He knew you, He loved you, and He choose you to eternity future when He glorifies you.
“Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 24 He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.” (1 Thessalonians 5:23–24)
3) Will I Go Directly to God After I Die?
The Bible emphatically says, “Yes!”
“So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord, 7 for we walk by faith, not by sight. 8 Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord.” (2 Corinthians 5:6–8)
Jesus will say to the dying thief, “…Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.” (Luke 23:43b)
Believers go directly into the presence of the Lord. In fact, you can have courage because we know to be “away from our physical body,” our tent, is to be “at home with the Lord.”
4) When Will My Resurrection Take Place?
Our passage does not tell us, but the elsewhere in the Bible we’re told your resurrection will happen when Christ returns at the Second Coming, and not before. The Bible seems clear that you will not receive your resurrected bodies until the Second Coming.
“For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. 23 But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. 24 Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power.” (1 Corinthians 15:22–24)
Many believers will die before the Second Coming of Jesus where they will be “at rest” with God but waiting on their resurrected bodies until the return of Jesus Christ. Paul seems to shift in his thinking at 2 Corinthians 5:6 to focus on the believer’s existence between death and the Second Coming of Christ. It is in their interim state, we wait on the transformed bodies, but we are in the very presence of the Lord Himself. So dead believers wait on a body until the Second Coming but are with the Lord.
When we think about this interim state where believers wait for their resurrected bodies, it is helpful to see the story of Christian martyrs waiting. These men and women wait in the presence of the Lord for the eventual Second Coming (Revelation 19). Their status is very much like any believers’ status who has died and waiting on the Second Coming of Christ. Let’s read their account for some clues to what happens to those who die in Christ before the Second Coming.
“When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the witness they had borne. 10 They cried out with a loud voice, ‘O Sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before you will judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?’ 11 Then they were each given a white robe and told to rest a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and their brothers should be complete, who were to be killed as they themselves had been.” (Revelation 6:9–11)
We can learn several facts about those who have died and are waiting for their future resurrection from these martyrs. First, these men and women know what is happening in heaven but they also know something about what is happening on earth. They know they have been killed for their belief in Jesus Christ and they are waiting on God’s judgment to begin on earth for those who are evil. So they remember both the past but also have hope for the future as well. They realize that what happens on earth matters even though they are in heaven. Lastly, we note that while they wait on their final resurrected bodies, they are called “souls.” John tells us that he saw these souls so they must have a physical presence to them. We should note they are given white robes to wear which would also mean they have some kind of body while they wait. Plus, they can also speak in some way because they cried out with a loud voice. So while their physical bodies lie in the ground or on the earth waiting their future resurrection, they are conscious of what is happening on earth but more importantly, they are with the Lord Himself.
Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:6–8 that he would prefer experiencing the Second Coming and receiving His resurrected body and skip death. The greatest want for the believer is to be alive at the Second Coming of Christ for we will be clothed with their resurrected bodies skipping death. Christians want to be in the presence of the Lord more than anything. So much so that if Christ delays His return, we will get there even by means of death if we have to.
“I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. 24 But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account.” (Philippians 1:23–24)
Longing for Resurrection
The truth is life, as it is, is not satisfactory for Christians. Life here is rough, and while we are happy some of the time, none of us are happy all of the time. “For in this tent we groan, longing to put on our heavenly dwelling…” (2 Corinthians 5:2) We are not groaning because of our aches and pains only, but we groan and long for the opportunity to experience our resurrected bodies.
Where most of us seek to prolong living … living in our tent … the Bible speaks so highly of experiencing the resurrected body:
… that it describes believers as “groaning” for the opportunity “to put on our heavenly dwelling”
(2 Corinthians 5:2b).
5) Why Does My Resurrection Matter Now?
What good does it do me to think about heaven or hell or Easter? Here’s why - because thinking about eternity encourages you.
“So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please him. 10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.” (2 Corinthians 5:8–10)
When you are losing your grip on life, you’re tempted to give up. Despair arrives when you are physically hurting, financially broken, or relationally bruised. You’re tempted to say, “It isn’t worth it.” You’re tempted to say, “Who cares?” But the resurrection changes all this. For when you see your life from its future perspective, you sense the significance of life itself. Knowing that Christ Himself will evaluate your life, we know every good deed done will be rewarded. Not one item in our lives will be overlooked! Because you see your life from the future perspective, you “[know] that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.” (1 Corinthians 15:58)
There’s a day when everyone of you, believer and non-believer, will stand before the judgment seat of Christ. The decree of acquittal which was pronounced over us at the cross must be confirmed by God’s verdict in the Day of Judgment. Your enemies, your sins, and the devil all speak out with words of condemnation. But that is not the last word. Christ will speak on your behalf on that day, believer. No voice can prevail over the voice of Christ who defends His own.
Conclusion
The essence of Christianity is personal pronouns. If you are here this morning saying, “The Son of God was born, He died, He was raised, He ascended, and He’s coming again,” that doesn’t make you a Christian. But if you say, “The Son of God was born for me, He died for me, He was raised for me, He was ascended to the right hand of the Father for me, and He’s going to come again for me,” that’s what it means to be a Christian.
