16. GLORIFIED BODY?
Did He get it when He arose from the dead, or not until His Ascension? Between the "Resurrection" and "Ascension" there was an interval of 40 days, during which time Jesus appeared 11 times to His disciples, every time in His human body. If Jesus was glorified when He arose from the dead how are we to account for these human appearances? On the other hand, if He was not glorified until His Ascension, how are we to explain His mysterious comings and goings, and where did He spend the intervening time? It is the clear teaching of the Scriptures that Jesus was the "First-fruits" of them that slept (1 Cor. 15:20-23), and it is natural to suppose that His Resurrection was the pattern of our resurrection, and we know that the bodies of the Saints are sown in corruption, and raised in INCORRUPTION; they are sown in dishonor and raised in GLORY; they are sown in weakness, and raised in POWER; they are sown a natural body, and raised a SPIRITUAL body. 1 Cor. 15:15, 42-44. Therefore if Jesus is the "First-fruits" of the Resurrection, and a sample of the resurrection of the Saints, He must have received His "Glorified Body" when He arose from the dead. There is no statement or inference in the Scriptures that would lead us to believe that the resurrected bodies of the saints are first raised corruptible, and then after a longer or shorter time glorified. In fact the very opposite is taught. "Behold, I shew you a 'Mystery'; we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised INCORRUPTIBLE, and we shall be changed." 1 Cor. 15:51-52.
As further proof that Jesus received His "Glorified Body" when He arose from the dead we have the account of His appearing to Mary Magdalene, who, when she recognized her Lord, wanted to touch Him, but He forbade her, saying—"Touch me not; for I am not yet ASCENDED TO MY FATHER." John 20:17. Yet in less than an hour He met the other women returning from the Sepulchre and permitted them to HOLD HIS FEET and WORSHIP Him. Matt. 28:9. Where was He between those two interviews? Where could He have been, to be consistent with His refusal to let Mary touch Him until He had ascended to the Father, but to the Father? And how could He have made the passage if He had not received His "Glorified Body" when He arose from the dead?
This leads to the following
PROPOSITION:
THAT THE RESURRECTION BODY IS EN-DOWED WITH THE CAPACITY OF TRANS-FORMING ITSELF AT PLEASURE INTO A PHYS-ICAL BODY AND BACK AGAIN INTO A SPIRIT BODY.
This is the only solution of the miraculous appear-ances of Jesus to His Disciples during the 40 days that elapsed between His Resurrection and Ascension. Take His fourth appearance, the one to Cleopas and his com-panion on the road to Emmaus. Jesus assumed a physi-cal body and walked with those two, and talked with them, yet they did not know Him because "their eyes were holden," but when He sat down to meat with them, they knew Him in the breaking of bread, that is they recognized His physical body, probably by the pierced hands or by the voice, and the next moment He VAN-ISHED out of their sight. That is He changed His "physical body" back into His "Spirit Body" and disap-peared from human vision.
Take Jesus' fifth appearance, when He entered the closed room in Jerusalem. He entered it in His "Spirit Body." That was why they were "terrified and affrighted" and supposed that they saw a "spirit." Luke 24:37-43. But when He spoke and said unto them, "Why are ye troubled?" He assumed His physical body, and as proof called on them to behold His "hands" and His "feet" (that had been pierced), and to "handle Him," for said He a "spirit hath not FLESH and BONES, as ye see me have." And as further proof that it was His physi-cal body that they saw He called for something to eat, and when it was handed to Him, He ATE BEFORE THEM. Then after He had talked with them awhile, He breathed on them and said—"RECEIVE YE THE HOLY GHOST," and then He disappeared as suddenly and mysteriously as He came.
Take the sixth appearance of Jesus. It occurred eight days later. The conditions were the same. John 20:26-29. The Disciples were in the same room, the doors being shut, only this time Thomas, who had been absent on the first occasion, was present. Jesus entered as suddenly and mysteriously as before, but the Disciples were not surprised this time. Jesus had a twofold purpose in this second visit, first to reprove the unbelief of Thomas, and secondly to give additional proof that He had risen from the dead and was present in His physical body. This He did by demanding that Thomas put his finger in the nail holes in His hands, and thrust his hand into the wound in His side made by the Roman soldier's spear. Then after a few words to Thomas He again disappeared as mysteriously as before.
Without stopping to consider Jesus' other appearances to His Disciples we pass to His Ascension. It clearly proves that He had at that time His "Glorified Body," for He could not have ascended in His "physical body" if it had not been endowed with Resurrection POWER, for the change from the "physical" to the "Spirit Body" did not take place until after He had passed beyond the cloud. Acts 1:9. As the SAME Jesus is to come back in LIKE MANNER (Acts 1:11), He is not only to reappear from the Heavens in a cloud at His Second Coming (Luke 21:27), but it will be the SAME Jesus that ascended. That is, the physical body that Jesus shall assume when He comes back will be the same "nailed pierced" body in which He appeared to His Disciples, for when He comes back at the "Second Stage" of His Coming and reveals Himself at the Mount of Olives (Zech. 14:4) to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, "every eye shall see Him, and they also which PIERCED Him (the Jews)." Rev. 1:7. The return of Jesus in His "nailed pierced" body is necessary for His identification by the House of Israel. Zech 12:10. John 19:37.
While the body in which Jesus arose was the same body that was laid in the tomb and had not seen corruption (Acts 2:25-27), it does not follow that our resurrection body will be the same that we possessed at death, though it will be the same in identity.
As further proof of the transforming power of the Resurrection body, we have the visit of Moses and Elijah to the earth, when they appeared on the Mount of
Transfiguration to Jesus and three of His Disciples. Luke 9:28-36. Moses had died and been resurrected and had his Resurrection body (Jude 9), otherwise He could not have appeared with Elijah, who had been caught up without dying and had his "Glorified Body" (2 Kings 2:11), for the spirits of the dead cannot return to the earth until they get their Resurrection body. Their appearance on the Mount in bodily forms that were recognized by Peter (Mark 9:5) was proof that they could transform their "Spirit Bodies" into visible material bodies. And the fact that Jesus as He prayed was "Transfigured" (Transformed) before the Disciples, that is was seen in the "TRANSITION STAGE," His "Soulish Spirit Body" illuminating his physical body, thus revealing His DEITY, just as when an electric light is turned on it illuminates the receptacle in which it is confined, and to whose shape it conforms, is evidence that Jesus, as the Son of God incarnate in the flesh, had the power, before He died and rose from the dead, of transforming Himself. For only on this supposition can we account for His walking on the sea. Note the similarity of His appearance on the sea, to His appearance to His Disciples in the upper room at Jerusalem. In both instances He first appeared as a "Spirit," and then visualized Himself in His physical body. Matt. 14:26-27. Mark 6:49-50. As the sea was stormy, "tossed with waves" (Matt. 14:24) by reason of a "great wind" (John 6:18), and the Disciples were in the "midst" of the sea, or halfway across, the inference is that Jesus by changing from His "physical body" to His "Spirit Body" transported Himself from the shore to the middle of the Lake, and it was while still in His "Spirit Body" that His Disciples first saw Him and thought He was a "Spirit," and then, as He spoke the words—"It is I; be not afraid," He again assumed His physical body. As to His and Peter's walking on the water in their physical bodies, we have no explanation, other than it was miraculous, Jesus having employed some higher law of which we as yet know nothing. We must not forget in this connection that Jesus as the "ANGEL OF THE LORD" had the power before His Incarnation of assuming bodily form. Gen. 16:7-14, and other references.
SPIRIT TRANSFORMATION
That the power to transform or change the "Spirit Body" into a "physical body" and back again is a
LAW OF THE "SPIRIT WORLD"
is clear from the fact that all angelic beings seem to possess it, as seen in the visits of angels to Abraham (Gen. 18:1-8), Lot (Gen. 19:1-3), Daniel (Dan. 8:15-17), Zacharias (Luke 1:11), Mary (Luke 1: 26-35), the shepherds (Luke 2:8-15), the women at the Tomb (Matt. 28:5-7), Peter (Acts 12:5-10), and John (Rev. 1:1, 17:7). The change or transformation is made somewhere within the limits of the earth's atmosphere. Take for illustration the appearance of the angel to Manoah, the father of Samson. Judges 13:15-20. When the angel ascended he went up in the "FLAME of the altar," showing that the change in his bodily form began as he entered the flame, otherwise his "physical" body would have been consumed. This is additional proof that the "Spirit" body is not affected by fire. It is also worthy of note that the transformation may be only of a part of the body, as in the case of the "Hand-writing on the Wall," when only the "fingers" appeared. Dan. 5:5. Back of the fingers, but invisible, must have been the person of the one who wrote, for fingers cannot write of themselves.
The "Law of Transformation" will also account for a number of occurrences otherwise unexplainable. For instance, the "Catching Away" of Philip. Acts 8: 39-40. After the baptism of the Ethiopian Eunuch we read that the "SPIRIT OF THE LORD" caught away Philip and transported him to Azotus, some 25 miles away. From this we see that the "Spirit of the Lord" has the power to make invisible and transport a human being from one place to another. This is confirmed by the experience of the Prophet Ezekiel. In Ezek. 3:14-15, we read "The SPIRIT lifted me up, and took me away," and the Prophet found himself at Tel-abib, on the river Chebar, among those of the Captivity. This "catching away" of Philip and Ezekiel may explain how Paul was "CAUGHT UP" to Paradise. 2 Cor 12:1-4. Paul tells us that when he was caught up he did not know whether he was "IN his body," or "OUT of his body." As Paul tells us that the event happened 14 years before he wrote his second Letter to the Corinthians, which was about the time he was stoned at Lystra and dragged out of the city as dead, but arose and re-entered the city (Acts 14: 8-20), some suppose that while Paul's body lay as dead, that only his soul and spirit were caught up to Paradise, while his body remained in a state of "suspended animation," or that he actually died and was resurrected. If the event occurred at the time of his stoning at Lystra, Paul was not caught up in his body, for his disciples never lost sight of his body (vs. 20). If however the event occurred at a time when there were no witnesses, Paul may have been "caught up" as was Enoch and Elijah and then brought back to the earth.
The Apostle John while a prisoner on the Isle of Patmos tells us (Rev. 4: 1-2) that a "DOOR WAS OPENED IN HEAVEN," and a voice said—"COME UP HITHER," and that immediately he was "IN THE SPIRIT," that is, his body took on its "SPIRIT FORM" and he was "caught up" to Heaven. Later on in the seventeenth chapter (Rev. 17: 1-3) John says that one of the "Seven Angels" which had the "Seven Vials" said to him—"Come hither; I will show unto thee the Judgment of the 'Great Whore' that sitteth upon many waters," and adds—"So he carried me away IN THE SPIRIT into the Wilderness." The time required for John to see all he describes in the Book of Revelation shows that it was more than a mere vision, that John was transported "IN THE SPIRIT," that is, in his "SPIRIT BODY," to Heaven, where there was revealed to Him in "Motion Picture" form the things that are to come to pass in the "Day of the Lord." The difference however between Paul's experience and John's is, that Paul heard things that it was "unlawful" (forbidden) for him to utter (2 Cor. 12: 4), while John was commanded to write what he saw and heard. Rev. 1: 19.
XVII
The Resurrection
The Scriptures speak of three kinds of resurrection. 1. NATIONAL. This refers to Israel who are now nationally dead and buried in the "Graveyard of the Nations," but who are to be revived and restored to their own land. Hosea 6:1-2. 2. SPIRITUAL. This refers to those who are spiritually dead in "Trespasses and Sins." Eph. 2:1-6. Eph. 5:14. Rom. 6:11. This is a "Present Resurrection" and is going on continually. Every time a soul is "born again" there is a passing from "death" unto "life," a "Spiritual Resurrection." John 5:24. 3. PHYSICAL. This is of the dead body. The "Spirit" of man does not die, it goes back to God who gave it. All that goes into the grave is the body, and all that can come out of the grave is the body.
THE RESURRECTION OF THE BODY
Jesus clearly and distinctly taught a resurrection "from the grave."
"Marvel not at this; for the hour is coming in the which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good unto the 'Resurrection of LIFE,' and they that have done evil unto the 'Resurrection of DAMNATION.'" John 5:28, 29.
Here Jesus teaches the resurrection of both the "Righteous" and the "Wicked." The Apostle Paul taught the same thing.
"And have hope toward God, which they themselves also allow, that there shall be a resurrection of the Dead, both of the Just (justified), and of the Unjust (unjustified)." Acts 24:15.
"For as in Adam all die (physically), even so in Christ shall all be made alive (physically)." 1 Cor. 15:22.
That the Apostle means "physical" death, and "physical" resurrection here, is clear, for it is the body, and not the spirit that he is discoursing about, and so the Universalist has no "proof text" here for the doctrine of "Universal Salvation."
These passages clearly teach that there is to be a resurrection of "all the dead," and if we did not look any further, we would be led to believe that the Righteous and the Wicked are not only to rise, but that they are to rise at the "same time." But when we turn to the Book of Revelation we find that the Righteous are to rise "before" the Wicked, and not simply precede them, but there is a space of a 1000 years between the two Resurrections. Rev. 20:4, 5.
"And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them."
This refers to the saints of the First Resurrection, who, represented by the "Four and Twenty Elders" of Rev. 4:4, are seen seated on thrones surrounding the Throne of God.
"And I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the Word of God, and which had not worshipped The Beast, neither His Image, neither had received His Mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they LIVED and Reigned With Christ a THOUSAND YEARS."
These are the "Tribulation Saints." John first saw them in their "martyred" condition (as souls), then he saw them rise from the dead (they lived again), and they, with the First Resurrection Saints, reigned with Christ a Thousand Years.
"But the rest of the dead (the wicked), lived not again until the 'Thousand Years' were finished."
