Resurrection of the Body

Acts 3:12-19

I John 3:1-7

Luke 24:36b-48

Have you ever seen a ghost hunter show? Ghost hunting teams travel to supposedly haunted locations to gather evidence of supernatural beings. The teams sometimes include a purported psychic who calls out to the spirits asking their names, how they died, and the like. The teams set up all kinds of technological gizmos designed to capture evidence of specters. Night vision cameras are strategically placed around the vicinity. Digital thermometers are installed to record sudden drops in environmental temperature. And my favorite piece of equipment is the Spirit Box. This is a radio that continuously scans AM and FM frequencies to hopefully intercept a spirit’s communication. They may be trying to speak to us through radio waves.

On “Buzzfeed Unsolved: Supernatural” a ghost hunting duo was investigating the so-called “Demonic Bellaire House” in southeast Ohio. Late in the night, the investigators were listening intently to the static of the Spirit Box scanning radio frequencies in search of supernatural communication. The investigator asked the ghost, “Is anyone here who was here before this house was built?” And he heard a message, “Spaghetti.” Then he said, “Tell us your name.” And they heard another message from beyond the grave, “Apple tater.”

So I don’t think these ghost hunters were successful in proving that a ghost was truly present in this house, but that doesn’t stop others from trying.

In our Gospel reading, Jesus is doing the opposite. He is trying to prove to his disciples that he is not a ghost. He is trying to prove that he is a flesh-and-blood person. “Look at my hands and my feet! Touch me if you need to. I’m alive!” And after Jesus shows his wounds and body as proof of his bodily resurrection, he chomps down a fish dinner in front of them. Ghosts can’t do that, right? 

Why does Jesus go to such great lengths to prove that he is a flesh-and-blood person raised from the dead and not a ghost? Why is it so important that Jesus was bodily resurrected from the dead? In another reality, Jesus could have appeared to his disciples as an indisputable spirit. He could have come with the message, “I was dead, but look! I am free from my earthly body. No more pain, suffering, or loss for me and the same will be true for you. Death merely sets your soul free from the prison of your body.” But he didn’t.

So what’s the big deal? Why is bodily resurrection so important? Honestly, bodily resurrection is messy and it’s much more difficult to believe in than the escape of our souls. Bodies are a mess, right? Muscles and minds get tired, bones break, bruises spread, we forget things, we have trouble breathing, we get diseases that bring pain or death. Wouldn’t it be simpler to just do away with the whole thing and be ghosts or spirits? That’s the popular image for what happens after we die. When we die, many talk about how our ethereal souls leave our bodies and join God and all our loved ones in a non-physical realm free from pain, loss, and suffering in a place we often call “heaven.” The witness of scripture- especially in the body of the risen Christ, seems to indicate that such a state, at the very least, is temporary. Our ultimate destination, as Scripture attests and we confess in the Creeds is “the resurrection of the body and life everlasting.” 

To believe in the resurrection of the dead takes a lot of faith. Not only are our bodies broken, but our world is broken too. War, poverty, injustice, suffering. It is easier to believe that God is giving us a way off of this godforsaken planet than to believe God is going to fix or redeem this mess.

Take the war in Gaza as just one seemingly beyond repair example. Can we really believe that God is going to fix the mess of conflicts in the Middle East? Centuries of animosity between peoples, nations from around the world sticking their hands into the conflict making it more complicated and ugly, thousands of people killed, millions of people displaced. And God is going to somehow right that whole situation? Wouldn’t it be easier to believe that God’s hands are washed clean of the whole mess and created an escape plan so all believers will get a good life in heaven when they die?

Can God save our world from war and famine? Can God save our world from disease? Can God save our world from intolerance and hate? Can God save our world from indifference and corruption? Can God save our world from death? Those are much more difficult questions to answer than, “Can God help us escape from war, famine, disease, hate, corruption, and death?”

Jesus’ bodily resurrection proclaims to us that God has not given up on this world. There is no sin too great to forgive, there is no injustice too wrong to right, there is no pain too great to heal, and there is no death too strong to destroy.

Jesus’ bodily resurrection proves that when God declared of Creation, “This is good!” God meant it. God created this world to be good, just, beautiful, and full of life. God created us human beings to be without shame or fear, to be loved and aware of that love, to be at peace and dignified. To have, as Jesus put it, “Abundant life.” God is not ready to give up on our bodily lives and our physical world. There is plenty of God-ordained good to be had. 

Jesus’ bodily resurrection tells us that we are less concerned about going to heaven when we die, and more sure that heaven does and will surely come to us as Revelation promises and the Christ child’s very presence proves. It means that this mortal life and temporal existence is the stage by which God’s salvation work is played out. It means that we don’t have to wait until after we die to experience life in Christ. It starts right now.

There’s a band that I listened to a lot in college called The Hold Steady and they have a concept album called “Separation Sunday” about a girl named Holly who leaves her religious home and gets mixed up in a lot of shady characters, hard drugs, and other problems. The last song on the track is called, “How A Resurrection Really Feels” and it starts,

“Her parents named her Hallelujah, the kids they called her Holly

And if she scared you then she’s sorry, she’s been stranded at these parties

These parties they start lovely

But they get druggy and they get ugly and they get bloody

The priest just kinda laughed, the deacon caught a draft

She crashed into the Easter mass with her hair done up in broken glass

She was limping left on broken heels

And she said, “Father, can I tell your congregation how a resurrection really feels?”

Holly came home to God and found a loving deity who had never forsaken her, always forgave her, and would give her abundant life over and over again no matter how much of a mess her lived life was. Resurrection is not a ghost. Resurrection can be held. Resurrection is found in the risen body of our Lord Jesus Christ. Our bodies and our world are not beyond redemption. The risen Lord proves that the power and life of resurrection begins here and now.