My nephew is a big sports enthusiast. A few years ago, in trying to help him understand the Gospel, I began with the “Fall”, Adam’s and our rejection of God’s purpose for and rule over our life, and the all-pervasive, devastating consequences this had on all of God’s good creation – mankind in particular. As examples of this devastation, I told him I believed that before the Fall, if Adam had played one on two basketball with Lebron James and Michael Jordon in their primes, Adam would have scored every time he got the ball, and James and Jordon would have never gotten off a shot. Other related speculative thoughts I’ve had is that if pre-Fall Adam had competed in our modern-day Olympics he would have scored a perfect 10 in every event he competed in, and Eve would win every beauty contest she entered.
This admittedly is speculation. However, our Fall from grace, from the beauty, the magnificence, the perfection in which God created us was profound. Adam and Eve in their original state were the most excellent of beings in their physical bodies, in their intellectual and emotional capacities and most importantly in their capacity to image the nature and character of a holy and righteous God. They were given the privilege and responsibility of, through marriage between a man and a woman, reproducing and filling the earth with like beings, fellow image bearers of God who would enjoy and be enjoyed by God and one another (Genesis 1:27-28).
We are told in Genesis 2:25 that they were naked and not ashamed, which I take to mean that they measured up perfectly to the glorious image of God in which they were created, body and soul. Shame, which is a very distressing emotion, comes from a sense of being deficient or defective, of not measuring up to a standard. In their perfect state they had no reason to ever experience shame as we do today.
However, that all quickly changed when in their believing the devil over God, they disobeyed God’s one command and immediately the glorious image of God in which they were created began to change (Genesis 3:1-7). Their physical appearance became instantly corrupted, such that out of unbearable shame they tried to cover themselves – to hide their bodies from each other (This is where the word “yuck” came into the human vocabulary). Their bodies, created immortal, would now deteriorate, grow weak and die (Genesis 3:19), as would all mankind who would proceed from them (Romans 5:12).
In their soul they are filled with the painful emotions of shame, guilt and fear, causing them to try to hide from God. And when confronted by God, instead of taking responsibility and pursuing God’s mercy and forgiveness, they attempted to deflect the blame for their sin with Adam blaming God and Eve the devil.
Thus, they no longer were fit to live in the presence of a holy and righteous God, as they and their sin corrupted progeny (us) were banished from His glorious presence and given over to the corrupting power of sin (Genesis 3:23-24) (Romans 1:24-32).
BUT GOD, because of the great love in which He loves mankind (John 3:16) (Ephesians 2:4-7), would make a way for men and women to be redeemed from this desperate condition, forgiven of our sin, declared righteous, reconciled to God and restored to the glorious beings we were created to be, such that though these sin corrupted bodies we presently live in will die in weakness and shame, they will be raised again in glory and power to image that of the first resurrected man, Jesus Christ, never to experience weakness, corruption and death ever again (1 Corinthians 15:42-49).
When our resurrected Savior, who through His sinless life and sacrificial death defeated death and the Hell on our behalf, appears at His second coming, He will appear in a human body that will manifest the glory and beauty of God, including the nail scars in His hands, feet and side, which represent the perfections of His redeeming love (John 20:20-28). And thus, in our resurrected bodies we will image that same glory and beauty (minus the scars) in our own unique way.
Our bodies in imaging the beauty and glory of God will be much like in appearance as the body in which Jesus appeared in Mark 9:3, which is referred to as the transfiguration. He is not naked, but clothed in a white garment, the whitest of white, signifying the moral purity that is manifested in the beauty and perfection of our new humanity.
It will be a body perfectly capable of enjoying all of the aspects of God’s glorious Kingdom and carrying out our heavenly employment with great ease whatever that may be. Our bodies will be vital and active, working in perfect accord with our minds and wills and thus will never sin, never age, never be sick or infirmed and never die. In the course of His post resurrection appearance Jesus’s body appeared to be able to transcend time, space and matter, and this could be a quality of our resurrected body.
In our resurrected bodies there will be no ugliness or disfiguration, no disease, disability or weakness, all of which in this world is a result of sin. Jonathan Edwards writes “Even the best of men are, on earth, imperfect. But not so in Heaven. There will be no pollution or deformity of offensive defect of any kind, seen in any person or thing, but everyone shall be perfectly pure and perfectly lovely in Heaven”.
We will have our own distinct appearance, gender and ethnicity, much like we have today (1 Corinthians 13:12), uniquely imaging differing aspects of God’s beauty and artistry for His and one another’s enjoyment.
Our five senses will function perfectly, enabling us to enjoy the ever increasing, ever diverse pleasures found in God’s immediate presence (Psalm 16:11) as well as in His renewed earth and universe. Our eyes will behold beauty, splendor and wonders that are unimaginable to us now; our ears will hear glorious music and singing that sooths and thrills and excites our soul as well as sounds coming from all of creation that honor and glorify God. Our voices will speak words and sing songs that both edify and entertain others and glorify God. We will smell fragrances that bring continual delight. We will enjoy food and drink of an infinite variety just as Jesus enjoyed with His disciples in His resurrected body (Luke 24:36-43).
We will not be married in Heaven (Matthew 22:30) and thus sexual intimacy which God created to be enjoyed within marriage will not be needed as God will provide a multitude of far superior pleasures for us to enjoy both relationally and physically in our new bodies throughout eternity.
Finally, there has always been the question of what age we will appear in Heaven. I believe that we can expect that our resurrected bodies will always appear with the freshness of youth so valued in this world. Beyond that I do not know.
Randy Alcorn, however, in his book Heaven proposes that within the maturity and perfection of our bodies there will be the qualities of the youthfulness Jesus valued in children (Matthew 19:14). Quoting Jonathan Edwards, he writes “The Heavenly inhabitants remain in eternal youth. Heaven will be full of children… even if we look like adults. What we love about children is their joy, exuberance, curiosity, laughter and spontaneity. In Heaven, whether or not anyone is the size and appearance of a child, we’ll all be childlike in the ways that will bring joy to us and our Father”.
I pray you will ponder all of this with a joyful anticipation of that day when we will no longer see through a glass dimly, but then face to face.
Grace and Peace ×