United in Resurrection

Topics to deal with: who will be resurrected, rapture, physical resurrection vs. spiritual only, what happens to the dead in Chrsit and those still alive when Christ returns.

Matthew 17:9 NRSV

As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus ordered them, “Tell no one about the vision until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.”

The Apostolic Fathers Chapter 7

1 ‘For everyone who does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is an antichrist’; and whoever does not confess the witness of the Cross is of the devil; and whoever perverts the sayings of the Lord to his own evil desires and says there is neither resurrection nor judgment, that one is the first-born of Satan. 2 Therefore, let us abandon the vanities of the crowd and their false teachings; let us return to the word which was delivered to us from the beginning. Let us be watchful in prayers and perverse in fasting, beseeching the all-seeing God in petitions ‘not to lead us into temptation,’3 as the Lord said: ‘The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.’

Acts 24:15 NRSV

I have a hope in God—a hope that they themselves also accept—that there will be a resurrection of both the righteous and the unrighteous.

The Lectionary Commentary, Volume 2: The Acts and the Epistles (The Second Readings) Seventh Sunday after the Epiphany, Year C (John P. Burgess)

In this respect our passage offers particularly rich homiletical possibilities for churches in North America that are struggling with their own questions of life and death. Paul speaks of the body “sown in dishonor … raised in glory … sown in weakness … raised in power” (v. 43). Dishonor and weakness characterize not only mortal bodies but also the church. Just like the church in Corinth, many churches in North America today are rent by disagreement. The issues may be ones of personality (“I belong to Paul,” “I belong to Apollos”), ethics (human sexuality seems to pose enduring concerns!), or theology. The church falls prey to envy, rivalry, and factionalism. One part of the church even files litigation against another (see 1 Cor. 6).

Romans 6:4–11 NRSV

Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin. For whoever has died is freed from sin. But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. The death he died, he died to sin, once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.

Acts 24:25 NRSV

And as he discussed justice, self-control, and the coming judgment, Felix became frightened and said, “Go away for the present; when I have an opportunity, I will send for you.”

1 Thessalonians 4:14 NRSV

For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have died.

The Lectionary Commentary, Volume 2: The Acts and the Epistles (The Second Readings) Seventh Sunday after the Epiphany, Year C (John P. Burgess)

Paul extensively explores the image of the church as the body of Christ (see chap. 12). Like a human body, the church is composed of many different parts, and each part has its rightful part to play