Twenty-Fifth Sunday after Trinity – Tuesday

So also is the resurrection of the dead. – 1 Corinthians 15:42.

God giveth to every grain its own body when it comes forth, and not another.  A blade of barley never grows from a grain of wheat.  And more than this: from each and every seed-corn the body of just this one seed-corn grows, and not that of another.  And yet the glory of the growing seed-corn is far and immeasurably greater than that of the seed which was laid into the ground.  So also is the resurrection of the dead.

Every man will rise with a human body, not with a body of an altogether different nature.  Moreover, every man will rise with his own body, not with a wholly new and strange one.  You will be yourself again, and not another.  But the glory of our resurrection body will be so immeasurably great that the difference between it and our present body will be as great as between heaven and earth.

Let me illustrate this, citing words of Scripture. “All flesh is not the same flesh, but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds.  There are also celestial bodies and bodies terrestrial” (1 Corinthians 15:39-40).  In the resurrection you will not receive a different flesh, a different body, but your human flesh, your own human body.  And now as regards the glory: “The glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another. There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; for one star differeth from another star in glory.  So also [as respects the glory] is the resurrection of the dead” (1 Corinthians 15:40-42).  There your body will far, far excel your present body in glory and splendor and celestial properties, though it will still be the same body.

This is the sure and certain hope for all believers, since “faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1).

PRAYER – Lord, my God, I am but dust and ashes, and do not know how long I shall remain here below.  Soon, possibly even today, death may visit me.  And yet, by Thy rich grace, I shall live forever.  Lord, through Thy Word, continue to give me a glimpse of eternity and show me, with the eyes of faith, “the glory which shall be revealed in [me]” (Romans 8:18).  Lord, I am Thine own through Jesus Christ, my Savior, the Conqueror of death, in whose name I confidently come to Thee and to Thy throne of grace.  Amen.

Then these eyes my Lord shall know,

my Redeemer and my Brother;

in His love my soul shall glow;

I myself, and not another!

Then the weakness I feel here,

shall forever disappear.

(TLH) 206, st. 6