The doctrine of the resurrection, however questioned by heretics and
erroneous persons, yet is such a truth, that almost all the holy
scriptures of God point at and centre in it.
There is a poor dry and wrinkled kernel cast into the ground; and
there it lieth, swelleth, breaketh, and, one would think, perisheth.
But behold, it receiveth life, it chippeth, it putteth forth a
blade, and groweth into a stalk. There also appeareth an ear; it
also sweetly blossoms, with a full kernel in the ear. It is the same
wheat; yet behold how the fashion doth differ from what was sown.
And our BRAN will be left behind, when we rise again. The body
ariseth, as to the nature of it, the self-same nature; but as to the
manner of it, how far transcendent! The glory of the terrestrial is
one, and the glory of the celestial is another.
"It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power." At our first
appearance, the world will tremble. Behold, the gates of death and
the bars of the grave are now carried away on our shoulders, as
Sampson carried away the gates of the city. Death quaketh, and
destruction falleth down dead at our feet. What then can stand
before us? We shall then carry such grace, majesty, terror, and
commanding power in our souls, that our countenances shall be as
lightning. Then shall death be swallowed up of victory.
Glory is the sweetness, comeliness, purity, and perfection of a
thing. The light is the glory of the sun, strength is the glory of
youth, and gray hairs are the glory of old age. That is, it is the
excellency of these things and that which makes them shine.
Therefore to arise in glory, it is to arise in all the beauty and
utmost completeness that is possible for a human creature to
possess, in all its features and members inconceivably beautiful.
Sin and corruption have made mad work in our bodies as well as in
our souls; 'tis sin commonly that is the cause of all that deformity
and ill-favoredness that now cleaveth to us, and that rendereth us
so dishonorable at our death. But now at our rising, we shall be
raised incorruptible; we shall appear in such perfection that all
the beauty and comeliness, sweetness and amiableness that hath at
any time been in this world, it shall be swallowed up a thousand
times told with this glory.
The body when it ariseth will be so swallowed up of life and
immortality, that it will be as if it had lost its own human nature.
You know that things which are candied by the art of the apothecary,
are so swallowed up with the sweetness and virtue of that in which
they are candied, that they are now as though they had no other
nature than that in which they are boiled. Just thus, at the last
day, it will be with our bodies. We shall be so candied by being
swallowed up of life, that we shall be as if we were all spirit;
when in truth, it is but this body that is swallowed up of life.
The body is also gathered up into glory, but not simply for its own
sake, or because it is capable of itself to know and understand the
glories of its Maker, but that it has been a companion with the soul
in this world, and has also been its house, its mantle, its cabinet,
and tabernacle here: it has also been that by which the soul hath
acted, in which it hath wrought, and by which its excellent
appearances have been manifested; and it shall also there be its
copartner and sharer in its glory.
In this world the soul of the regenerate is a gracious soul; and in
that world it shall be a glorious one. In this world the body was
conformable to the soul as it was gracious, and in that world it
shall be conformable to it as it is glorious. Yea, it shall have an
additional glory to adorn and make it yet the more capable of being
serviceable to and with the soul in its great acts before God in
eternal glory.
If a man receive the mercy of the resurrection of the body, what a
bundle of mercies will be received as wrapt up in that. He will
receive perfection, immortality, heaven, and glory. And what is
folded up in these things, who can tell?
As to the manner of the change of the body in its rising, this
similitude also doth fitly suit: as, 1. It is sown a dead corn, it
is raised a living one. 2. It is sown dry, and without comeliness;
it riseth green and beautiful. 3. It is sown a single corn, it
riseth a full ear. 4. It is sown in the husk, but in its rising it
leaveth that husk behind it.
Further, though the kernel thus die, be buried, and meet with all
this change in these things, yet none of them can cause the nature
of the kernel to cease; it is wheat still. Wheat was sown, and wheat
arises; only it was sown dead, dry, and barren wheat, and riseth
living, beautiful, and fruitful wheat. "God giveth it a body as it
pleaseth him; but to every seed his own body."
All the glory that a glorified soul can help this body to, it at
this day shall enjoy. That soul that has been these hundreds or
thousands of years in the heavens, in the bosom of Christ, it shall
in a moment come spangling into the body again, and inhabit every
member and vein of the body, as it did before its departure. That
Spirit of God also, that took its leave of the body when it went to
the grave, shall now in all perfection dwell in the body again. I
tell you, the body at this day will shine brighter than the face of
Moses or Stephen, even as bright as the sun, the stars and angels.
"When Christ who is our life shall appear, we shall appear with him
in glory."
Christ has showed us what our body at the resurrection shall be, by
showing us in his word what his body was at and after his
resurrection. We read that his body after he was risen from the
dead, though it yet retained the very same flesh and bones that did
hang upon the cross, yet how angelical was it at all times, upon all
occasions! He could come in to his disciples with that very body,
when the doors were shut upon them. He could at pleasure, to their
amazement, appear in the twinkling of an eye in the midst of them.
He could be visible and invisible, as he pleased, when he sat at
meat with them. In a word, he could pass and repass, ascend and
descend in that body with far more pleasure and ease than the bird
by the art of her wing.
Now I say, as we have in this world borne the image of our first
father; so at that day we shall have the image of Jesus Christ, and
be as he is. 1 Cor. 15:49.
To mount up to heaven, and to descend again with pleasure, shall
with us in that day be ordinary. If there were ten thousand bars of
iron, or walls of brass, to separate between us and our pleasure and
desire at that day, they should as easily be pierced by us as is the
cobweb, or as air by the beams of the sun. And the reason is,
because to the Spirit, wherewith we shall be inconceivably filled at
that day, nothing is impossible; and the working of it at that day
shall be in such nature and measure as to swallow up all
impossibilities. "Who shall change our vile body, that it may be
fashioned like unto his glorious body"--now mark--"according to the
working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself."
Nay further, we do not only see what operation the Spirit will have
in our body by the carriage of Christ after his resurrection, but
even by many a saint before his death. The Spirit used to catch
Elijah away, no man could tell whither. It carried Ezekiel hither
and thither. It carried Christ from the top of the pinnacle of the
temple into Galilee; through it he walked on the sea. The Spirit
caught away Philip from the eunuch, and carried him as far as
Azotus.
Thus the great God has given us a taste of the power and glory that
are in himself, and how easily they will help us, by possessing us
at the resurrection, to act and to do like angels; as Christ saith,
"They that shall be counted worthy of that world and of the
resurrection from the dead, they shall not die, but be equal to the
angels."