19 September 2020

But someone will ask, ‘How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?’
Fool! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies.
And as for what you sow, you do not sow the body that is to be, but a bare seed, perhaps of wheat or of some other grain.
So it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable.
From 1 Corinthians 15: 35-37, 42-49, NRSV

St Paul is being a bit harsh when he calls someone who ask about how resurrection works a fool. They are very reasonable questions and, if truth be told, most of us ask them or something very similar. How can we not wonder how resurrection works! Paul offers a useful image in likening it to sowing seeds. When we plant a sunflower seed, for example, we put something barely a centimetre long into soil where, after a few days, stops being a seed – a root and shoot emerge using the seed as a source of energy for growth. Eventually, the sunflower might reach over 2m high with a flower that radiates the sun and, eventually, itself becomes a head of hundreds of seeds. This offers so much hope! Our body is the seed that is planted – but from it – well, who knows what glory it will become!

• • How do you feel when you hear Paul’s comments about asking serious questions?
  • What would you like your risen body and life to be like?

Dare to dream the dream – what would you like your resurrection body to be like – and to be able to do?