Simeon Stylites (Stylites is from the Greek word stylos, meaning “pillar”) was a fifth-century Christian (ca. 390–459) who practiced severe treatment of the body. Although it is hard to imagine, he lived for thirty-seven years on a small platform on top of a pole near Aleppo, Syria, in an attempt to secure a place in heaven. Over the years, the height of the poles increased from thirteen feet to about fifty feet. The platform on which he lived was only about three feet square. Several other Christian ascetics followed his example.
Such severe mistreatment of the body finds no real support in the Bible, especially if one uses them in an attempt to get to heaven or be holy. Listen to what Paul said about asceticism.
Why, as though you still belonged to the world, do you submit to its rules: “Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!”? These rules . . . are based on merely human commands and teachings. Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence. (Col. 2:20–23)
The basic problem with people is not the human body itself but the sinful desires inside us that control our body. While every true believer will go into the presence of Christ and God at the moment of death, all of us still await the resurrection, when we will receive an amazing resurrected body incapable of death or decay. The resurrection of our bodies will take place when Jesus returns for his followers (1 Thess. 4:16–17).
What kind of body will it be? Jesus himself had a fully human, physical body. And after his resurrection, his body was still a human, physical body subject to being seen (John 20:25) and touched (v. 27). He could walk (Luke 24:15) and eat (vv. 40–44). He also told the disciples, “Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have” (v. 39). Flesh and bones. That’s a physical body. But we would never say that Jesus’ resurrected body was not spiritual.
There is considerable continuity between Jesus’ nonresurrected and resurrected body. A few early witnesses to his resurrection did not recognize him at first. But after a brief time, all his followers who confirmed that he had truly been raised from the dead recognized him as the Jesus they knew formerly.
Paul wrote that Jesus “will take our weak mortal bodies and change them into glorious bodies like his own” (Phil. 3:21 NLT). Jesus’ resurrection is the master design for our resurrection. We will have physical bodies because he has a physical body. Somehow we think heaven will be nonphysical because something physical cannot also be spiritual. But this is not what the Bible says. “Spiritual” is not opposed to what is physical.
Paul does call our future, resurrected body a “spiritual body”: “Our bodies . . . are buried in weakness, but they will be raised in strength. They are buried as natural human bodies, but they will be raised as spiritual bodies” (1 Cor. 15:43–44 NLT).
Anything that can be called a “body” has physical characteristics. A “spiritual body” doesn’t mean ghostly or ethereal. It means our bodies will not sin, die, disease, or decay. They will be able to generate only godliness. Our eyes will never lust, our tongues will never lie, and our hands will never hit others.
Christians have debated as to what form Christ-believers will have between death and the resurrection. This stage of our existence is sometimes called the “intermediate state,” i.e., the time in heaven after death before we get our new resurrected bodies. When a Christian dies, his spirit goes to be with Jesus, where he immediately experiences incredible joy. At the resurrection the “dust” of our dead body is raised out of the grave, miraculously transformed, and joined to our spirits.
Some have suggested that we will have a temporary body of some sort in this intermediate state. Once, when Jesus was transfigured on a high mountain, Moses and Elijah of the Old Testament era appeared with him in bodies that were visible to the three disciples with Jesus (Luke 9:28–36). If we can judge from this incident, believers in the intermediate state awaiting the resurrection have some kind of bodies suited for heaven.
FOR FURTHER STUDY
Luke 16:19–31; John 5:28–29; Acts 10:41; 24:15; 1 Corinthians 15:12–20, 35–49; James 2:26; 1 John 3:1–2