It’s sad enough that Gnosticism has worked itself so deeply into popular Christianity that we’ve replaced the bodily resurrection of the saints to a new heavens and earth; with a hazy idea about living on as disembodied spirits in the heavenly ether.

Sadder still is that we have somehow managed to inoculate ourselves against the truth by messing with the doctrine of the Incarnation of Christ.

When I preach bodily resurrection, I always start with Christ’s resurrection as the pattern for our own. After all, 1 Corinthians 15 is the most extensive treatment in Scripture of both the physical resurrection of Christ, and the physical resurrection of the Church. So, St. Paul very clearly connects those dots: But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept (1 Corinthians‬ ‭15‬:‭20‬ ‭KJV‬‬).

When he says Christ is the firstfruits, that means if you want to know what our own resurrection will be like, you look at the resurrection of Christ. The resurrected Christ could be seen and heard and felt. He ate fish. He didn’t eat because He needed to eat, but to prove that His body is solid. And He specifically says, a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have (Luke‬ ‭24‬:‭39‬ ‭KJV‬‬).

But nearly every time I have taught this venerable old doctrine—which the Apostles Creed simply calls the resurrection of the body, and you are supposed to believe to be a Christian—I get the strangest pushback. Without fail, someone will come to me and say: But didn’t Jesus put away His human body when He returned to Heaven?

I always ask them where they got that from, and most can’t give an answer. Occasionally, I will hear: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption (1 Corinthians‬ ‭15‬:‭50‬ ‭KJV‬‬).

To that, I point out that the whole point of 1 Corinthians 15 is defending bodily resurrection. Flesh and blood in this context doesn’t mean body. It means mankind in his fallen mortality. This is why Paul clarified by saying: neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. He turns right around to show that the problem of our corruption—how we are prone to both moral and physical decay—will be solved by resurrection:

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. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.
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1 Corinthians‬ ‭15‬:‭52‬-‭53‬ ‭KJV‬‬, emphasis added

Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God simply means that, in our fallen state, we cannot dwell in the new heavens and new earth (cf. 2 Peter 3:13). It is not saying that resurrected humanity will not have bodies. And it certainly says nothing about the body of the ascended Christ!

I’m surprised that more don’t go to v45, which is a notoriously difficult passage: And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.

I’ll come back to that verse at the end. But the general rule is you let the plain passages guide your interpretation of the difficult ones.

Plainly speaking, we are told that Christ is the firstfruits of the resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:20); meaning that our own will be patterned after His. And the resurrected Christ plainly states that He is not a mere spirit, but has flesh and bones (Luke 24:39). This we have already observed.

But notice this. In Acts 17:31, St. Paul says that God hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead (KJV‬‬). Christ will return to earth to judge the living and the dead as a resurrected man. A human man. Human men have bodies.

And see this. Paul also says: For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus (1 Timothy‬ ‭2‬:‭5‬ ‭KJV‬‬). Christ, in heaven, mediating for His people, is a man. The reason He alone is qualified to mediate between God and humanity is because Christ is both God and man. Again—men, humans, have bodies.

See here, Paul also says that when Christ returns to earth from heaven, He shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body (Philippians 3:21 KJV). Christ has a body, a resurrected body. And when He returns, He will still have that resurrected body, and will give His saints resurrected, glorified bodies, like His own.

And again, see Colossians 2:9: For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily (Colossians‬ ‭2‬:‭9‬ ‭KJV‬‬). It doesn’t say that God used to dwell in the human body of Christ; but that God, in all His fullness, dwells in Christ’s body now.

The plain texts teach us that the Incarnation doesn’t have an expiration date on it. When Christ joined the divine nature to human nature by His Incarnation, this is forever. And why shouldn’t it be? Humanity is the handiwork of God. Before sin corrupted human nature, God called it very good (Genesis 1:31). Christ put on glory when He put on a human body, for God crowned mankind with glory at our creation (Psalm 8:5).

The Incarnation didn’t end at the Ascension, and it will not end when we are glorified. When God the Son assumed humanity, it was forever.

So then, What does Paul mean when he says Christ, the last Adam, was made a quickening spirit?

We know that it cannot mean that Christ ceased to have a body.

What you’ll want to do is peak the immediate context, 1 Corinthians 15:42-44 and 46-49. V45 is the centerpiece, and sums up with a sort of poetic brevity what those other verses are saying.

So, vv42-44: So also is the resurrection of the dead. It—that is, our fallen, mortal body—is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: it is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power. Notice that the same body that is sown, like a seed, is the one that is raised, in its perfected state. This fits with Paul’s analogy from vv36-37, that the resurrection of the human body is like planting a seed, then harvesting wheat or barley. He continues: it is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. Here’s what you absolutely must know to understand anything the Bible says about something being spiritual. It doesn’t mean “non-physical.” Spiritual means having its origin from the Holy Spirit. So for instance, spiritual gifts (1 Corinthians 12:1) are gifts given by the Holy Spirit: Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit … [T]he manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal (1 Corinthians‬ ‭12‬:‭4‬, ‭7‬ ‭KJV‬‬). So when Paul says: There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body, he is thinking in terms of two cosmic epochs of life: natural, represented by Adam, the first man, and federal head of all humanity; and spiritual, in Christ, the last Adam, and federal head of those who believe in Him.

Now, the natural is not bad; at creation, it is very good; but it has been corrupted by sin. Yet, from the beginning God did not intend to keep life at the natural level forever. He did not create humanity immortal. We would still have needed to eat from the Tree of Life to be immortal, and that only after we had passed the probation of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil (Genesis 2:9, 17; 3:22: Revelation 2:7). For fallen humanity, though, the only way to the spiritual epoch is through Christ, who has become for us the Tree of Life by His resurrection.

Again, though—spiritual doesn’t mean non-physical. It’s speaking of its creation by the Holy Spirit.

And this is all born out by vv46-49: Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual. The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is the Lord from heaven. As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. Every human bears the image of Adam, the natural man, the man of earth: And Adam … begat a son in his own likeness, after his image (Genesis 5:3 KJV). But all of us who have believed in Christ will bear the image of Christ, the Man from heaven: But we all … are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord (2 Corinthians‬ ‭3‬:‭18‬ ‭KJV‬‬). Notice here how it is the Holy Spirit who makes us into the image of Christ?

To be an image means to be physical, to have a physical form. Spiritual bodies, as we see referenced in v44, cannot mean “a body made of spirit.” That’s an impossibility like a squared circle or a married bachelor.

This is where v45 comes in. Because it’s the door which leads us from natural vs. spiritual bodies in vv42-44; and Adamic humanity vs. resurrected humanity glorified in Christ in vv46-49.

And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.

The first clause obviously a reference to Genesis 2:7: And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. But one thing you must understand is that living soul is not speaking of Adam as an individual. The Hebrew phrase for living soul, nephesh chayyah also refers to animals in Genesis 1:20-21, 24, where it is translated as creature that hath life, and living creature. The point is, living soul is not referring to Adam as an individual; but to the quality of biological life. Adam shared with the animals a natural life, and that natural life was not immortal by default, as we observed above. Adam and his offspring could only receive immortality by passing their probation and being allowed to eat from the Tree of Life.

God made the first Adam a living soul. This is the natural man. And then, the last Adam was made a quickening spirit. Christ is the second Adam, the heavenly Man. In His humanity Christ has become for all who believe in Him the vanguard of the resurrection life, as Adam was for natural human life. This life is created by the Holy Spirit, and Christ is the prototype (or firstfruits) of this new spiritual existence for all who believe.

The idea here is not that Christ became a spirit, i.e., shed His human body. Rather, it is that He himself imparts this life, from the Spirit, to those who believe in Him. Just as God breathed natural life into Adam’s nostrils, eternal spiritual life is and shall be given in and through Christ to those who believe in Him.

Thus:

He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. (But this spake he of the Spirit …) (John‬ ‭7‬:‭38‬-‭39‬ ‭KJV‬‬)

… because I live, ye shall live also. (John‬ ‭14‬:‭19‬ ‭KJV‬‬)

When it says Christ became a life-giving sprit, it refers to Him as the prototype of the spiritual life—new-creational, immortal, imperishable, incorruptible; as Adam is the prototype of the natural life; mortal and corruptible.

The Incarnation does not end at the Ascension. The assumption behind that idea is truly an insult to God, which is that it is degrading to have a body. But human bodies are the handiwork of God, and like the heavens, they declare His glory. It is precisely as the fullness of God dwelling in a human body that Christ is the image of the invisible God; the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person (Colossians 1:15; Hebrews‬ ‭1‬:‭3‬ ‭KJV‬‬). And He will never cease to be that for us, not even in the world to come. For it is written that: the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes (Revelation‬ ‭21‬:‭3‬-‭4‬ ‭KJV‬‬). The tabernacle of God shall be Christ Himself, and His resurrected hands—the hands that bled for us—shall wipe away our tears.

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