Classic Christianity – Your New Body – 9-21-26
~ Beloved, we are now children of God, and what we will be has not yet been revealed. We know that when Christ appears, we will be like Him, for we will see Him as He is. – 1 John 3:22
Folks, we need to remember that Jesus is flesh and bone at this very moment in time. He is not simply a spirit being. He can be touched, spoken to, carry on a conversation with, walk alongside with, and see and hear Him when in His physical presence. Jesus proved that after His resurrection where he shows up grilling some fish to eat on the beach, and even eats and drinks food Himself. And also when appearing to them in a room and Thomas had been doubting earlier, thinking that the other Apostles were simply seeing a ghost. But Jesus declares that He was not a ghost.
Today we also have a tendendency to equate Jesus to only a ghost being. But we are told that Jesus is flesh and bone. So when we go to be with Jesus, the very last moment we are in our mortal bodies, and that mortal body expires, for whatever reason, we are then clothed in our new immortal bodies of flesh and bone, and appear before Him just as He Himself is. This is important to remember to keep this in perspective. And yes, the new bodies of flesh and bone can do amazing things, like go through doors, but it is still every bit as real as our current bodies we reside in. But we get a glorious heavenly body upgrade! It’s called a glorified body that God made for us. And He Himself clothes us in it.
And even the Apostle Paul clearly taught that in the book of 1 Corinthians 15, where he explained different kinds of flesh. The reason for his explaining the different kinds of flesh was not to simply say there were different types of flesh, but to show the difference between flesh and blood flesh of the mortal person, and the new flesh and bone flesh of the immortal person. This is key. Paul was not saying that the flesh and body is no more. He was saying that we get a flesh and body UPGRADE!
35 But someone will ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come?” 36 You fool! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. 37And what you sow is not the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or something else. 38 But God gives it a body as He has designed, and to each kind of seed He gives its own body.
39 Not all flesh is the same: Men have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds another, and fish another. 40 There are also heavenly bodies and earthly bodies. But the splendor of the heavenly bodies is of one degree, and the splendor of the earthly bodies is of another. 41 The sun has one degree of splendor, the moon another, and the stars another; and star differs from star in splendor.
42 So will it be with the resurrection of the dead: What is sown is perishable; it is raised imperishable. 43I t is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power. 44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. 45 So it is written: “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam a life-giving spirit.
46T he spiritual, however, was not first, but the natural, and then the spiritual. 47 The first man was of the dust of the earth, the second man from heaven. 48As was the earthly man, so also are those who are of the earth; and as is the heavenly man, so also are those who are of heaven. 49 And just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so also shall we bear the likeness of the heavenly man.
Where, O Death, Is Your Victory?
50 Now I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. Revelation 21:1,2
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Pray to God:
Do you really want to know the WHOLE Truth of what is going on today?
Lord Jesus, teach me the truth of the world today and give me the wisdom to know the truth and identify the lies of the devil. Thank you God.”
~ In this message, Bob George teaches about what happens to believers after death and at the rapture, emphasizing that every person will face death but that Christians have the sure hope of being “absent from the body and present with the Lord.” He explains that our current bodies are temporary “tents” made of flesh and blood that will return to dust, while the real person—the soul or human spirit—goes to be with God and will one day receive a new, glorified, imperishable body. Drawing from 1 and 2 Corinthians, he contrasts natural and spiritual bodies, the first Adam who gave physical life and Jesus, the last Adam, who gives spiritual life through the new birth by the Holy Spirit. He clarifies that Christians will appear before the Bema seat of Christ for an appraisal of their works (not a judgment for sin, since all sin was judged at the cross), and he encourages believers to view physical decline and death not with despair but as a passage from dishonor to glory, guaranteed by the indwelling Holy Spirit.
“Now let’s turn over to chapter 15 in 1 Corinthians, verse 35. Chapter 15, verse 35. Now someone may ask, then, well, how are the dead raised, and what kind of a body will they come? You know, there’s some people, the ones with all these abs, say, I hope it’s mine. When you get to look like me, you say, “I hope it isn’t mine. What kind of a body is it going to be? Is it going to be an old body? Going to be a new body? Going to be me at 20 or me at 80? You know which one I’m hoping for. But you’re not going to get either one of those. He said, “What kind of a body will they come? He said, “How foolish! When you sow, does when you sow does not come to life unless it dies. Remember that, guys. Unless a seed falls into the ground and dies, it abides alone. And we’re going to abide alone until we die. It’s only when we die that we’re really going to live eternally. When you sow, do you not plant the body that you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or something else. But God gives it a body as He has determined, and to each kind of seed He gives His own body. All flesh is not the same. Men have one kind of flesh, animals another, birds another, fish another. There are also heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies. But the splendor of the heavenly bodies is of one kind, and the splendor of the earthly body is another. The sun has one kind of splendor, the moon another, and the stars another. And star differs from star in splendor. So you’ve got all kinds of bodies, but they’re all different.” ~ Bob George
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Bob George 0:30
What happens to you when you either die a natural death or what happens through accidental death? All of us are going to die, aren’t we? We are born to die, and so it’s not the case of if; it’s just the case of when. And we want to know what’s going to happen to us. What what goes on is that the end? Some people believe that’s it. When you when you die, that’s just the end of it. You just disappear, and that’s all. But God and His Word didn’t say that, and God sent His Son Jesus to this earth in order to tell us not only how to live here on this earth, but to tell us what’s going to happen to people at such time that we are absent from the body and present with the Lord.
There’s only two things that are going to happen to believers at the end of this life, one is we just die of a natural death and become immediately absent from this body and present with the Lord. In the Scripture, it tells us that flesh and blood will never inherit the kingdom of God, and so we know something about this body of mine. It’s never going to go into the presence of God. It came from the earth. It’s going to return to the earth. So this body, no matter what kind of a shape it’s in, good or otherwise, it’s going to go and I laughingly say become worm food because it’s going to go back to the earth. Flesh and blood’s not going to inherit the kingdom of God. So you have natural death, and then the Bible talks about an event that is going to take place in some time in the future, called the rapture of the saints, and you all heard about that, and that’s the time when the believers will be snatched out of this earth, and will go to meet the Lord in the air. That’s called the rapture. I quite frankly think most of us are going to die a natural death before the rapture occurs, but we don’t know because it could occur at any time. And there it tells us that when that does occur, that the saints, the people who have been in Christ and have died prior to the event of the rapture will already be with Jesus. They will return in the air with Jesus, and then it says those who remain back, who remain, will go to meet us in the air. If we’re there before the rapture occurs, let’s say this whole room is gone by then, and we’re all with Jesus. When the rapture occurs, we will all go to be with Jesus, and then the people who are here will go to meet us in the air. So those are only two ways you get into heaven: through natural death and through the rapture. Are we all together on that?
So it says that when this, we know that when this earthly tent, which this body of ours is called an earthly tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, and that building means a body, an eternal house in heaven. In other words, we this body of ours is going to be made eternal. We’re going to not this one. We’re going to get a new one. It’s called a glorified body. And the reason I say that is a lot of people think this is going to be transformed. Well, the Bible says that flesh and blood’s not going to inherit the kingdom of God, and this body’s flesh and blood. And so, if it’s flesh and blood, it’s not going to inherit the kingdom of God. But it says we’re going to get a glorified body. It says you have a natural body and you have a spiritual body. What’s going to go to the presence of God is your spiritual body. Natural body is going to go into the grave. That’s why people say, “Well, do you bury people or or cremate them? Said it really doesn’t make any difference. It’s going to turn into dust either way. If you were a Christian and in an airplane accident that blew up, your body would turn into would be burnt, wouldn’t it? So I don’t think there’d be you know something wrong with that. Or if you were in a fire, your body would be burnt. I think the Christian what they did was there’s a certain sanctity to the body of ours, and that’s why they did prepare it and bury it, because they said that if it came from God, then let’s have some respect for it, and that’s fine. But the issue is that it’s going came from the dust, and this body of ours that we see is going to return to dust.
And so what happens to the real you, which is the invisible you? The real you is not this flesh and blood, is it? This is a tent. This is a house. It’s like your home is not the house. You got the house. The home is you. You can sell a house, but you can’t sell a home, and so the issue is that the home is the real you. It’s the invisible you. It’s called the soul or the human spirit, which is made up of the mind and the emotion and your will. Are we together on that? And that is your soul, and that is what is going to go. Your your spirit, the human spirit that has now been indwelt by God, is going to go into the presence of God, and this body is going to go into the grave at the rapture same thing. Now we’ve talked about this, and and again, I’m not dogmatic on these things at all because we don’t know. But there is two things that could happen at this thing called the rapture. What is normally taught is that on the day of the rapture, that we who are in Christ, that this body of ours is just going to go into the presence of God. We’re just going to be gone. And if you’re an airplane pilot, well, all of a sudden there ain’t going to be a pilot. And if you’re driving down the car in the freeway in your car and you’re born again, the rapture occurs. So just won’t be by driving. You’ll be gone. That’s one thought. Your body is going to disappear. Well, I say on that that could be, but the Bible says that flesh and blood is not going to inherit the kingdom of God, doesn’t it? And so the idea, if that’s true, then why? How is my body going to go in the presence of God when it goes? When He said I came from the dirt, I’m going to return to it. And so there’s a possibility that at this rapture that may not be what happens, and but it’s taught that it is, and it may be right. We we won’t know. We spend a lot of time talking about things that we don’t know, but what we do know is the glorified body is what’s going to enter in the presence of God. So if this body does get flashed up in the air, God’s going to have to do with something with it from the time it leaves until it gets there. He’s going to have to do something with it, like get rid of it. And I’m not saying that he can’t do that. I’m just saying it’s not normative that he does things like that. So there’s another possibility that at the rapture, that those who are in Christ leave their body, just like you do at physical death. The body goes to the ground, and the real you goes in the presence of God. Now, one of the reasons I think that’s a possibility is because the antichrist is going to be in existence during that period of time, and wanting to take over not only the world but to tell you see those Christians, those bunch of troublemakers out there, and I believe that it’s a possibility that the antichrist could sit there and say, you know all these troublemakers out there called Christians. Look at them; they’re all dead. And then he comes to the conclusion, and we got to bury him. Can you imagine if that occurred? The job of burying every born-again Christian who is in existence at the time of the rapture and burying them. You imagine that what a what a job that would be. It’s possibility, isn’t it?
And so I’m not going to get dogmatic either way because the chances at my age of going naturally is a lot better than going with the rapture. So I’m I’m kind of looking more forward to that. Some you younger folks, while you’re rapturing people, and that’s okay, but I’m just saying, don’t get all dogmatic on that because we don’t know. We do know one thing: when the Bible says flesh and blood’s not going to inherit the kingdom of God, we know that’s true, and that means that this isn’t going. That’s for sure. This isn’t going. Now, what God does with it, whether it falls dead just like a natural and then I go, or whether He changes it in the air, I don’t know. The Bible does say that we’ll all be changed. We will not all sleep, and we but we will all be changed. Remember that passage: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed. We put that on our nursery, on the door to the nursery.
Now, we’re told that we have a new body in heaven, not built with human hands, and meanwhile, as long as we’re in this body of ours, we groan, longing to be clothed of their heavenly dwelling, because when we’re clothed, we won’t be found naked. And while we are in this tent, this body of ours, we groan and are burdened because we don’t wish to be unclothed to be clothed of their heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. In other words, these things are mortal; they’re they’re temporary, but it’s going to be swallowed up by life, total life, eternal life. Now it is God who has made us for this very purpose and has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come. This is written to Christians, guys. It’s written to us so that we can know that the Holy Spirit of God, who lives in us, is the deposit, the guarantee that what they’re saying is going to happen to us is going to happen. And the reason I know what’s going to happen to me when I die is because the Spirit of God lives in me, and it’s a guarantee of that happening. And so it talks about the fact that, therefore, we are always confident and know that as long as we’re at home in a body, we’re away from the Lord. In other words, we’re away from the physical presence of God. We still experience Jesus in our hearts, but we’re away from the totality of God, which will happen at our death. At our death, we will go and say, “See Him as He is, and become what? Like Him. Isn’t that good news? That’s why it says that our being conformed to the total image of Christ is not something that’s up for grabs. It’s going to happen to us. Some of us He’ll have more work to do than others. Now, we live by faith right now. We live by faith, not by sight. And we’re confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord. And so we make it our goal to please Him, whether we’re at home in the body or away from it. For we must all appear before the. It’s called the judgment seat, translated, but it’s really the bema seat, the bema seat of Christ.
Now the bema seat is still in existence in Corinth, and that’s where he is writing to here. If you go there, you will see a place called the bema seat. It was where the athletes finished their race and got the rewards, called the bema seat, so this is not a judgment, guys. When this is not a judgment, it’s called an appraisal, and the word is appraisal. We look at that. Oh boy, we’re going to be judged. Going to be judged. No, your works are going to be appraised, and those things that we have done in the energy of the flesh in order to draw attention to ourselves is going to be burnt, and it’s going to become wood and stubble. It’s a lot of stuff in Christian work today that people go out and do at the energy of their flesh. You do it to draw attention to yourself instead of attention to Him.
Paul says we’re not important. What’s important is Him, and that’s why it says to keep our eyes on Jesus, not ourselves. Because when that when that occurs, our works are going to be appraised, and we’re going to receive from Him what is due while in the body, whether good or bad. Not a judgment. A judgment is can be. I’m going to get you Now why isn’t there judgment there? Have our sins already been judged? Okay, is there going to be another judgment for our sins? No. When was that judgment for our sins? It was at the cross 2000 years ago. And what was the verdict? It was guilty, and what was the punishment? Death, and who took it? Jesus. How much of it? All of it. How much is left for you? None. That’s why it says there’s no condemnation awaiting you who belong to Christ Jesus, because the law of the Spirit of life has set you free from the law of sin and death.
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Bob George 14:23
Born into this world under the law of sin and death. We’re under that law. We’re held prisoner by it. We’re dead spiritually. The law of sin and death. We’re dead, with an opportunity of receiving life, and the only life that came to this earth that is available to you and me is the resurrected life of Christ Jesus, and that’s why He said, “I am the resurrection, I am the life, and whosoever believes in me, though he were dead spiritually, he will live spiritually, and whosoever lives and believes in me will never die.” Do you believe that? You see, when we go, the Bible doesn’t even say we die; just says we go to sleep in Jesus. We just change locations. That’s why, to me, folks, that death of a Christian-that-that you say the sting of death has been taken away. We have many people here in the congregation have lost loved ones, and and to watch people go through that with with the the love of God in their hearts, they’re not grieving. It says like the heathen do, not sitting around just grieving. It’s the fact that yes, I feel bad about this, and I’m lonely, and I wish they were here, but I don’t wish they were here because I know where they are, and because I know where they are, I would never bring them back if I could, because they’re in the presence of Jesus, they’re away from all of this stuff down here, these wars and sin and all the things that we’re wrapped up in, and watching kids destroy themselves, and watching countries destroy itself, and we’re free from that, never to see it again. And would you bring them back? No way. Would I bring my father back, my mother back, my sister-in-law, brother-in-law? No, no million years. My sister? No, oh, they’re with Jesus, and so there’s people look at you like you’re kind of hard hardest, hard hearted. But when I buried my sister, there was joy in my heart. Why? Because Eileen’s with Jesus. This is just a body here. I told Amy when I die, put on my tombstone. Go home. I’m not here, and I hope she does that because that’s true. I’m not going to be there. I don’t know who you’re visiting. You’re not visiting me. I’m not there, and so we have to understand the truth of that. So again, resurrection is a part of this Christian life.
Now let’s turn over to chapter 15 in 1 Corinthians, verse 35. Chapter 15, verse 35. Now someone may ask, then, well, how are the dead raised, and what kind of a body will they come? You know, there’s some people, the ones with all these abs, say, I hope it’s mine. When you get to look like me, you say, “I hope it isn’t mine. What kind of a body is it going to be? Is it going to be an old body? Going to be a new body? Going to be me at 20 or me at 80? You know which one I’m hoping for. But you’re not going to get either one of those. He said, “What kind of a body will they come? He said, “How foolish! When you sow, does when you sow does not come to life unless it dies. Remember that, guys. Unless a seed falls into the ground and dies, it abides alone. And we’re going to abide alone until we die. It’s only when we die that we’re really going to live eternally. When you sow, do you not plant the body that you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or something else. But God gives it a body as He has determined, and to each kind of seed He gives His own body. All flesh is not the same. Men have one kind of flesh, animals another, birds another, fish another. There are also heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies. But the splendor of the heavenly bodies is of one kind, and the splendor of the earthly body is another. The sun has one kind of splendor, the moon another, and the stars another. And star differs from star in splendor. So you’ve got all kinds of bodies, but they’re all different.
And so we’re told that when we die, this body’s like a seed. Well, you see, you plant a seed of corn; it doesn’t sprout out a seed; it sprouts out ears of corn. Something totally different than what it’s planted. So we don’t know what we’re going to look like. Sure, hope it’s better now, but we don’t know, do we? But he said it’s going to be different, and we keep visualizing what it’s going to be. We don’t have a clue. We do not have a clue what it’s going to be, because he says it’s a seed, and I’m going to give you the kind of body. It’s going to be a glorified body. It’s going to be different than anything you’ve ever had before. Is that good news, guys? Is to me. It becomes better news the older you get.
Now, he says there’s a natural body. Now, where did we get our natural body from? Mom and dad. Remember, Nicodemus was talking. You must be born again, not of human passion and plan. That’s not from your mom and dad’s will, but from the Spirit. So you’ve got a natural body and you have a spiritual body. So there’s a natural body. There’s also a spiritual body. And so it is written: the first man, Adam, became a living being, and the last Adam, a life-giving spirit. Now, who’s the last Adam? In the scriptures, do you all know? Well, I’ll tell you, Jesus is called the last Adam. He’s a life-giving spirit. First Adam gave us physical life. The next Adam, last Adam, gave us spiritual life. The spirit did not come first, but the natural.
Now, folks, again, let me give you an example. You need to know these things as an example in Mormonism. Mormons believe that you’re alive in heaven spiritually. A whole bunch of spirits running around up there looking for a body to enter into, and so that’s why they encourage the Mormons to have babies, bunches of them, in order to give a place for the spirits to live. So they believe first came the spiritual, and then came the natural. Right? What does the Bible say? First comes the natural, and after that the spiritual. So totally off, totally off, totally contrary to what the Scripture says, is Mormon doctrine, and it all starts with that premise that you’re alive spiritually, and then you get a body to live in, and right there is where the whole thing went off, where the Bible says, no, no, no, no, no, you or nobody was alive before you were alive physically. You were alive physically, and then God gave you His Spirit. So first came the natural, and then came the spiritual. In the natural body that we were born into this world with, were we born again? Repetition, but were we born into this world alive spiritually or dead spiritually? Dead spiritually. We were born in Adam, the first Adam. As Adam became, we became. Nobody came out of his mom’s womb saying, “Praise Jesus. We were born dead spiritually. Are we together on that, guys? And a dead person needs only one thing. What is it? Life. Now we already had. If we were born physically, already had physical life, didn’t I? So what am I missing? Spiritual life. There’s you have natural life and spiritual life. So what am I missing? Spiritual life, and spiritual life only comes to us through what the Bible refers to as new birth, being born again of the Spirit. And Jesus explained that, didn’t He, to Nicodemus? They didn’t know that. HEBREWS didn’t know that Old Testament people didn’t know that Jesus had to reveal that to us that I came to this earth in order to give you something that you do not have, life. Now, when the apostles walked with Jesus for some three and a half years, did they have life? No. Was Peter saved? No, John? When did they get life? On the day of Pentecost. On the day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit of God left heaven and came to indwell permanently believers to bring us alive spiritually. We were already alive physically. Now we need spiritual life, and it was only on the day of Pentecost that the apostles, and from that day forth, we became permanently spiritually alive. Are we together on that?
So, with the Gospels, during the Gospels, were the apostles born again? During the Gospels? No. Why? Well, Pentecost hadn’t occurred. Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection hadn’t occurred. So now, do you wonder why Peter screwed up and Thomas doubted, and and they went from one mistake to another? They did not have the power of the Spirit living in them. They’re like you and me trying to practice religion without Jesus, they were a picture of you and me playing religion before we knew Jesus. I played it for 36 years, went to church, played religion, but did not know Jesus, and therefore had no life, and therefore no power to live a life that he wanted me to live, let alone what I wanted to live. Are we together? So he’s saying to us that you’ve got to be born again. There is now he talks about when that occurs. He said the body that is sown perishable, it is raised imperishable. Now you will note, if you make notations, guys, sometimes good to mark your Bibles. I put circles around there. It is. It did not say it will be.
There are some people that believe when you die that your body is not raised until the end times, I don’t know where the soul goes. It gets just kind of flops around there. You know, we got a body now, but as soon as you die, you’re homeless. And some people believe that, but again, it doesn’t say that. It doesn’t say the body that is sown perishable will be raised imperishable. It says it is raised imperishable, so the minute it’s sown, it’s raised. It’s sown a perishable body. These things are perishable. It’ll be raised imperishable. No more death. No more death. You now will possess the full extent of what’s called eternal life. It’s sown in dishonor. It’s raised in glory, guys. How many of you saw pictures of _____ ____? How many of you saw those pictures? Was that sad or is that sad? I would tell you something. Outside of her makeup on, which you couldn’t get rid of, I guess. She didn’t look any different than my mom did when she died. My mom was a beautiful woman, but she died of of disease that had taken her body and ravished it. Teeth falling out, couldn’t talk. When she died, she was sown in dishonor. There was nothing about her body to be honorable. Nothing. Sin ravaged. Sin ravaged the body of ______ ____, sin ravages if you live long enough that aging is going to ravish your body. Is that right or wrong? I don’t care what you think about it. I don’t care how many positive thinking you do. It ain’t going to work. That’s what age is. But you know what that does? It prepares you for heaven because you realize there’s anything down here to look forward to, it’s sown in dishonor, but it’s raised in glory. My mom was raised in glory.
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