A day is approaching when the bodies of the redeemed will be altogether for the praise of God’s glory. They are bodies of humiliation now: they will be bodies of glory then for Christ will have come and raised or changed them.
The resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ is the pledge and proof of this, as chapters 15:20-23 shows: “Christ the First fruits, afterward they that arc Christ’s at His coming.”
The burial of a believer’s body is spoken of as seed sown, and the fruit is borne in resurrection. Dead and buried it will burst forth soon in resurrection life! The sleeping time will give place to the glorious awaking! The eighth day, or the first day of the week often speaks of the resurrection day; and eight distinctions, or glories, are to mark our bodies for the praise of the living God soon, as this chapter clearly shows:
1. A quickened body (36, 45).
2. A raised body (42).
3. In incorruption (42).
4. In glory (43).
5. In power (43).
6. Spiritual (44).
7. Heavenly (49).
8. In immortality (53).
“When this corruptible shall have put on incorruptibility, and this mortal shall have put on immortality,” we may truly say, God will eternally be glorified in our bodies.
Oh! for grace to glorify Him increasingly in them now, as we await the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
H. J. Vine.