Read: 1 Corinthian15-16
It is hard for me to remember the mindset of the people of that day but there was a huge argument about resurrection. Paul explains to them that resurrection is the crux of Christianity; without it we have no hope. Before Jesus rose, no one had risen from the grave. Enoch and Elijah never went to the grave. In verse 20 of Chapter 15, Paul says that Christ became the first fruits of them that slept. He rose on the feast they called First Fruits. He was the first fruit to rise out of the ground.
Death was brought into the world when Adam sinned. It was taken out when Jesus rose from the dead but we won’t see the manifestations of that till Jesus comes back and throws Death into the Lake of Fire. We know by faith that our Christian brothers and sisters that have died have passed into eternal life but one day we will see eternity and the manifestation of it.
Paul explains a spiritual concept in verse 46: first the natural, then the spiritual. We are born first of the flesh, then of the spirit. Adam was a type of Jesus (Romans 5:14), but he was born first of the natural. Sin entered through Adam that it might exit through the spiritual Adam, Jesus. We are born of the earth but we are the image of God. Our first birth is our natural birth, but our rebirth or spiritual birth is our salvation in Jesus. When the trumpet sounds and Jesus comes back to earth, our bodies will raise to be with our spirits in heaven and we will have a new body that is not ashes or dust.
Until then we are to be stedfast, unlovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, because we know that our labor is not in vain.
Lord, let us live today with eternity in mind.
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