The Resurrection of the Body

It’s been a while, but in our last look on the resurrection, we ended with this image of our lives being held in the memory of God as we await, what the Apostle’s Creed calls, the Resurrection of the Body. This is the orthodox way of expressing the hope for which we patiently wait. It is not the hope of the soul going to heaven when we die, but the hope of the “Resurrection of the Body.” The way it is phrased is wonderfully ambiguous. There are a number of ways to interpret what “the body” means, and when taken together they give us a fuller meaning of what salvation entails.

First, “the body” can mean Christ’s literal, physical body. The Resurrection of the Body is about the resurrection of his body. His body is the body, raised from the dead in advance of all others. As Paul writes, “Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1 Cor. 15:20). Christ’s risen body is like that first flower that blooms while the snow is still melting, giving us a glimpse of what is in store when spring comes and winter fully passes away.

Second, “the body” can refer to a figurative body. Think of Paul’s famous analogy of Christ’s body — the body of which we have been made members. It is a singular body made up of many parts. The body that is resurrected, in this case, is a people This, I think, is the corrective we need in thinking about salvation in the modern West. That is, we need to see salvation as a communal reality before it is individual. Or better, it is only individual because it is communal. This is something that is entirely glossed over in the “will you go to heaven?” way of thinking about salvation — a predominantly individualistic way of casting salvation.

Lastly, ”the body” can be taken to mean bodies in general. Here, the Resurrection of the Body is about the resurrection of all bodies, not least of which is our own. This is perhaps the most intuitive interpretation. I look forward to the day when my body will be raised. Of course this is true, but I think it best to understand resurrection in the order we have just laid out. The Resurrection of the Body is first about Christ, then about us, then about me.

Rather than seeing the story of Scripture told in five acts, we tend to see it, in our highly individualistic culture, as only three:

1. Act ONE: Creation/Fall
2. Act THREE: Jesus
3. Act FIVE: The End

What is missing? Acts TWO and FOUR, which are Israel and the Church. The way we understand salvation deeply affects the significance we place on these two acts. When the individual is at the center of God’s plan for salvation, Israel becomes an oversight and the Church an after thought.

So it matters how we see the End.

Could we recast the End as our End and not simply my End? Or what if we saw our individual ends as inextricably bound up with the communal End described in Scripture? Then maybe we could better appreciate how integral Israel and Church are. For it is within the living memory of these two communities that the story of Scripture has been and continues to be kept alive. And through the ongoing telling and retelling of this millennia old story, we are given the resources to know that we are not just anybody, but made into somebody by virtue of our inclusion in the body, Christ’s body. It is in, through and for this body that we find our end and it is with this body that we will be raised at the end on the last day.