Counting on Rising from the Grave

by Jim Elliff

I've been reflecting some on the future, the new world, and the resurrection of the body. What will happen tonight when you sleep? Will you die? Can you say you know for sure what will happen? Thomas Watson said, "We are more sure of rising from the grave than we are of our beds."

The resurrection of Christ is the guarantee of your bodily resurrection. That experience, witnessed by the apostles, was so incredible that they made it the centerpiece of their story the rest of their days. But he is only the first fruits of the harvest, according to Paul. We are the rest of that harvest. We obtained a future resurrected body in the gift of salvation through Christ, and we can be sure it will happen.

Be encouraged by that truth as you rest tonight. Think, "If I do not rise tomorrow from my bed, I will certainly rise from the grave when Christ returns." "To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord," Paul also taught us. Our souls will be in heaven when we die. But the resurrection of the body completes the gift of life to us. One day you "will be preserved, body, soul, and spirit" in the future world. Count on it if you are His child. Like the apostles before us, find courage in the fact of the resurrection.