UP FROM THE GRAVE HE AROSE

Yesterday, I was visited by a Jehovah's Witness, and after a brief conversation, he gave me two magazines and left. I get that a lot. It seems Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses do not feel comfortable discussing the Bible with someone who actually knows what it teaches. I noticed three things about Mark: first, he certainly acted like a Christian should act (polite, soft spoken, concerned for my soul, etc.); second, he knew what mainline Christians believe, and he limited his conversation to those things we acknowledge as truth; and lastly, he avoided addressing doctrines over which we would disagree. I have found this to be the approach of most of my "uncomfortable visitors."

Their goal is to tell us what they know we believe, in an effort to appear as just another denomination of Christianity. If they revealed their false teachings up front, before we relax our guard, they would immediately be exposed as "counterfeit," and have no chance of "devouring us" (Matt. 7:15; 1 Pet. 5:8). That is why it is extremely important for our churches to obey the third part of the Great Commission: "teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you..." (Matt. 28:20). Unless new believers are properly instructed in the Word of God, they are easy prey for the cults.

Something in those two magazines stood out "like a sore thumb." They kept referring to Christ's resurrected body as being a spiritual body, rather than a physical body. And, if one were to look at their Bible references, they would find that Jesus did rise having a spiritual body (1 Cor.15: 42-50). However, as with all Bible doctrines, the entire revelation of God's Word on a topic must support an interpretation, and not a single, individual passage.

After the resurrection Jesus ate (Lk. 24:42-43). He showed people His hands and feet, with the nail prints in them, and people even grabbed His feet and worshiped Him (Matt. 28:9; Lk. 24:39, 42-43; Jn. 20:25-27). The enemies of Christ and the early Church could not refute the bodily resurrection of Christ; in Acts 2:31-32, there was no challenge to Peter's sermon, and in Acts 25:17-19, the efforts of the Jews to disprove Paul's declaration of the resurrected Christ were futile.

And then there are the prophecies which refer to the bodily resurrection. Job said, "And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God" (Job 19:26). The psalmist wrote, "For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption" (Ps. 16:10). Corruption refers to the decay of the physical body; if Christ's (thine Holy One) body was to be a spiritual body, what difference would it make if His physical body decayed? And Paul prophesied that born again believers will be raised in the same fashion as Christ: "But if the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you" (Rom. 8:11). "For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection" (Rom. 6:5).