Saved: Glorification

TEXT

READ 1 Corinthians 15:42-49

Introduction

It’s amazing how knowing our destination can help us on the journey.

When Heather and I were engaged, I lived 8 hours away. An 8-hour drive by yourself isn’t the most exciting way to spend a day, but as I drove, I thought about the time we’d spend together. I’d remember the plans we would make for the wedding. And it would make the drive easier - not because the drive was any different, but because my mindset was. I was driving with my destination in mind.

On the other hand, I can remember driving down to LA from Ohio because we were going to my grandfather’s funeral. There was nothing enjoyable about that drive. I spent most of the drive dreading the destination and remembering the past. It made an already long drive even longer because I didn’t really want to get there.

When Paul wants to encourage his Christian brothers and sisters, he consistently points to their destination.

In 1 Thessalonians, he reminds them not to grieve without hope since there is a resurrection coming when God will make all things new. And here, in 1 Corinthians 15, Paul does the same thing. He says, “Don’t give up. Keep going. Persevere. For just as Christ was raised in glory, so will we be.”

He’s saying, “Keep the destination in mind.” We may have to deal with a lot of problems in this life - flat tires, overheating engines, low oil, high gas prices, you name it - but when we pull into the driveway, it will have been worth it all.

That is the power of meditating on the doctrine of glorification. We are destined for glory. And the more we remember that, the better equipped we’ll be to face the problems and circumstances of this life.

So, what does it mean to be “destined for glory”? Paul gives us a brief rundown here in 1 Corinthians 15.

Destined for Incorruption

Paul recognizes that our bodies decay. They break down. They get sick. They don’t work the way they used to. That’s what Paul means here when he says that our bodies are “sown a perishable body.”

I was talking to Sis Wanda last night and she was sharing about how her eyesight was getting dimmer, making it harder to get around. When we’re young, most of us don’t think much about that. Our bodies feel incorrupible - imperishable - invincible.

But as we age, we start to feel that corruption. If you’re like me, you can hear your knees popping when you go up the stairs. You notice that eating certain foods can leave you with a pain in your stomach. Our eyesight starts to get blurry. And one day, these corruptible, mortal bodies eventually wear out.

Our hearts runs out of steam, leaving our fingers and toes colder than they used to be. Our lungs quit working like they used to, making it difficult to breathe.

And eventually, we die. And when our friends and family gather around our casket, they’ll look at us and say, “Doesn’t he look good?” But we all know that we won’t. Our bodies are corruptible. And that corruption begins the moment our hearts stop.

When we’re lowered into the earth, we are sown in corruption - a body that is breaking down, decaying. As the Book of Common Prayer says, “earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.”

And that would be the end of the story.

But Christ’s resurrection offers us a promise that it isn’t. If we are united to Christ by faith, then our destiny is not in corruption or decay or death or dust. Our destiny is in glory. It is in incorruption and resurrection. And this is why Paul says that our bodies are sown perishable, but raised imperishable.

We are raised with a body that works the way God intended - no creaky, painful joints. No dim, blurry eyesight. No hearing loss. No broken limbs. No diabetes or cancer or stomach ulcers.

We are destined for an imperishable body - a body that’s no longer subject to decay or death. A body like Christ’s, that may still bear certain marks of this earth, but which will never be broken or damaged again.

That is our destiny. We are destined for incorruption. And if that’s the case, then shouldn’t we begin praising God for it now? Shouldn’t every pain and creaking sound in our bodies be a reminder of our destination? Shouldn’t it make us long for the glory of incorruption - and begin living as if that truly is our destiny?

Destined for Glory

Paul goes on to say that our bodies are sown in dishonor.

Do you remember, in Genesis 3, when Adam and Eve eat the fruit… the Bible says that both their eyes were opened and they knew they were naked, and they were ashamed?

Because of sin, their bodies - the physical essence of who they were - these remarkable creations that have been fearfully and wonderfully made - became a source of shame. And it’s been that way ever since.

Just think of how little most people like to look in the mirror or see pictures of themselves. Or think of how many people try to do everything they can to change their bodies, hoping they can mold them into something they can be proud of. And yet, few people are.

I think of the celebrities who spend tens of thousands of dollars on surgery to keep themselves looking young. When all they do is make themselves look fake.

I think of people - people who are, by every standard, attractive - and yet, they can’t post a picture to Facebook without smoothing out every wrinkle and distorting themselves.

Or I think about those who deal with gender dysphoria - people who think that if they could only change their bodies, then they’d finally experience peace and would be “happy.”

But they aren’t. Why? Because most of us feel like our bodies are dishonorable. We all have things about ourselves that we wish we could change - our weight, our height, our skin tone, our hair color, you name it. And the older we get, the more we feel this way.

It’s enough to drive a person insane.

And yet, Paul reminds us that we’re not destined for dishonor. We’re destined for glory - for beauty - for a body that manifests the very presence of God. A body we can be proud of - not because it’s the best when compared to everyone else. But because it is a creation of the almighty, holy, and good creator. It’s a gift - one of our greatest gifts. And it’s part of who we are.

In the resurrection, we’ll no longer look at our bodies as something dishonorable. Something we wish we could alter or change. We’ll finally view them as the glorious gifts they are. And if that is our destiny, then shouldn’t we begin to live and think that way now?

Destined for Power

Paul also says that our bodies are sown in “weakness.”

Do you ever feel weak?

A couple of years ago, I went with a handful of guys on a Tuesday morning at 5AM to work out. We started a little run and came down to the church parking lot where they had cinderblocks. We did all kinds of exercises - or rather, they did all kinds of exercises and I struggled to keep up.

By the end of our little excursion, I felt weak. My heart was pumping so fast, I thought it would explode. And I just wanted to crawl back into bed and go to sleep.

Maybe you’ve felt that kind of weakness before.

Or maybe you’ve experienced other kinds of weakness in the body. Remember that time that Jesus asked his disciples to stay up and pray with him? After he prayed for a bit, he came back and found them sleeping. He woke them up and said, “Keep praying! The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.”

Maybe you’ve experienced that kind of weakness… you’ve wanted to do the right thing, but found actually doing it difficult. You know you need to read your Bible or pray, but your eyelids feel like they weigh a hundred pounds. You know that the temptation will only lead to problems and regret, but your body seems to move on its own.

Our bodies are weak. We’re frail. We can’t do half as much as what we’d like to be able to do. We watch the olympics and see these people who are able to do incredible things with their bodies. And yet, I’m sure that if you asked them, even they would recognize that their bodies are weak.

But Paul says that weakness doesn’t have the final say. We may be laid in the ground in weakness - death is, after all, the ultimate expression of our weakness - but we will be raised in power.

That is our destiny. We’re destined for the glory of God’s strength and power. We’re destined for bodies that don’t collapse after a few minutes of exercise. We’re destined for bodies that are like the energizer bunny - they keep going and going and going.

We’re destined for bodies that make the Olympians look like nothing. Not only physical strength, but a flesh that doesn’t hamper our will. We’re destined for a body that is as strong as our spirits.

And if that’s the case, then shouldn’t we begin living as if that’s going to be true? Shouldn’t our weakness remind us of our destiny?

Paul understood that this was the case from personal experience. He tells us that he had some kind of weakness - a messenger of Satan he calls it. And he asked God to remove it three times. But God comes and says, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”

Our bodily weaknesses should remind us of God’s strength - and our dependence on God’s strength - and of the promise he’s made to raise us and empower us with his strength so that we’re no longer subject to bodily weaknesses. And that won’t be the case because we’ve somehow worked up the strength to be all we can be. It will be because we fully rely on him for our strength. And since his strength is infinite, ours will be as well.

Destined for Spirituality

Paul goes on to say that our bodies are “sown a natural body” but raised a “spiritual body.”

Now, the way this is written, it could give us the false impression that Paul is saying, “Our physical bodies are put in the grave, and we become disembodies spirits, almost like ghosts.”

But that is not what Paul is saying here.

For Paul, this “natural body” is a body that is governed by natural desires. It’s a body that’s subject to an animal nature. Why do people succumb to temptation? Why do they live in sin? Why do they do horrific things? Because they’re governed by their urges and needs of the moment.

Think of Eve’s first sin. Why does she take the fruit and eat it - even after God has said, “Don’t do that”? Scripture tells us that she notices how it’s good for food, how it’s pleasing to the eye, and how it’s desirable for gaining wisdom.

She’s thinking naturally - like an animal. So she takes and she eats and she passes it to her passive husband. And he eats. They have no regard for the spiritual consequences. They’re focused on the moment.

And that’s a picture of all of us apart from Christ.

I watched a documentary this week about a young man who’d been lying to his parents about college - he said he’d just graduated, but he hadn’t. He’d been using their money to do whatever he wanted.

And so that he didn’t get caught, he hired someone to kill them. They went out to dinner for a celebration of his achievements. But when they arrived home, a man was waiting in the home. He killed the young man’s brother and mother. And he shot the father and man.

I was left asking… What drives a person to do such a thing? The answer: a body governed by the animal nature. That young man had dug himself into such a hole through lies, deceit, and theft, that the only way he knew to get out was to kill his own family and have himself shot.

Now, that may be an extreme example… but all of us would follow a similar path apart from Christ. It might not be murdering your family, but lies? Deceit? Theft? Hatred? Gossip? Apart from Christ, we’d all act like animals. And if you put us under enough pressure, we’d all do horrific things.

As we look at our past, there are likely plenty of things that we’re ashamed of. Things that we did because we were acting more like animals and less like God.

And that sin only serves to alienate us from one another and from God. It creates division and leads to further sin. That’s what we’ve been seeing in our study on Genesis on Wednesday nights.

But that is not our destiny. Paul says that we are destined for a spiritual body. Remember, this isn’t an invisible, ghostlike body. It is a body that is governed by the Spirit rather than the animal nature. It’s a body that’s no longer subject to temptation or sin. It’s a body that’s oriented wholly to God and his will.

And if that’s our destiny… then why would we submit ourselves to sin right now? Wouldn’t it make sense to begin living in light of that destiny right now?

Bearing the Image of the Heavenly Man

Paul concludes this passage by saying “Just as we have borne the image of the earthy, we will also bear the image of the heavenly.”

In the same way that we have lived with Adam’s nature - subject to Adam’s weaknesses, dishonor, corruption, and animal nature - so will we bear the image of the heavenly man, Jesus. In other words, we are destined to be transformed fully into the image of Jesus.

And while this glorification won’t be complete until we see Jesus face-to-face as John says in 1 John 3, it’s something that we begin to experience today.

In Paul’s second letter to the Corinthian church, he writes: “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit.”

Paul tells the Corinthian Christians that as we look at Christ today - as we see his glory - his incorruption, his beauty, his power, and his spiritual nature - we are transformed into that same image right now. “From glory to glory”, Paul writes.

In other words, spiritual transformation is possible right now. We look forward to our glorification - and it keeps us persevering - but we also begin experiencing it right now. We get glimpses of his power, his glory, his incorruptibility, his spiritual nature right now in our lives. And as time passes - even as these bodies become weaker - we are transformed. Genuinely transformed.

And that transformation is possible for each one of us. That destiny of glory is available to you and me. But we must pursue God to experience it. We must seek him. We must ask him for that kind of transformation - and then make ourselves available to experience it.

Are you living with his hope burning within you this morning? Is this transformation into glory already taking place in your life? Are you pursuing him?

Our destiny doesn’t have to be the grave. It can be his glory. But we’ve got to run after it. And if we will, our running won’t be in vain. Let’s run together.