How Exactly Are the Dead Raised?

Someone will ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?”
1 Corinthians 15:35

It seems that the false teachers at Corinth were asking these questions cynically. That may be why Paul's first response is, “You foolish person!” (15:36). It’s not foolish to ask questions; it’s foolish to ridicule God’s truth (Gal. 6:7). But having rebuked the cynics for pouring scorn on the resurrection, Paul offers an answer.

Q: “How are the dead raised?”
A: “What you sow does not come to life unless it dies” (15:36).

God said, “You are dust, and to dust you shall return” (Gen. 3:19). How could a body that has returned to the dust be raised again? Suppose you plant a sunflower seed in the ground. The seed disintegrates. It dies. But when the seed dies, a new life begins. Paul says, “Look at the world of seeds and plants, and you will see that this happens all the time.” For a person who is in Christ, death is how we get into the glorious new life God has promised.

Q: “With what kind of body do they come?”
A: “What you sow is not the body that is to be, but a bare kernel” (15:37).

The life of the seed that disintegrates in the ground continues in the plant. But the two are very different. What comes out of the ground is not a giant seed. It is a sunflower, and it is far more beautiful than the seed from which it came. The sunflower is not the seed put back together. And the resurrection body is not the recomposing of the bodies we have now. “God gives… to each kind of seed its own body” (15:38). In the same way, God will give us new bodies that will be far more glorious than the ones we have right now.

Do you think about the resurrection with more cynicism or wonder? What is your response to Paul’s analogy and explanation?