Humanity 2.0

Jesus had a habit, after his resurrection, of showing up in a locked room and shocking everybody. Imagine, sitting in a circle with the others, worried that the temple police were going to show up and haul you off, and suddenly there's Jesus, whom you thought was dead, standing in the middle! I imagine that was quite a surprise! But why did he do that? There are many reasons but I think one was to show them their own future. Let's look.

Hebrew scripture is full of word pictures about "in that day" -- some of them about God's appearance in power, some about the land blossoming into greenery and fruitfulness. Word pictures, as good as they are, don't hold up to an actual experience, do they? Jesus made sure to appear to his disciples, multiple times over 40 days, in various situations, and even had them touch his crucifixion wounds. One major reason was to reassure them that he really was raised from the dead and that they could announce that because of that, Jesus really was the Messiah. That's a major theme of the proclamations in the rest of the New Testament.

I think another important reason was to show what resurrection life would be like for them too. These were people who would have to face persecution and trouble like we have not seen in our sheltered Western experience: prison, beating, caught up in a mob threatening their lives, and much more. When your life is on the line, wouldn't it be an encouragement to know that even if you die at this moment, you get to come back with a "Body 2.0" -- all the advantages and none of the disadvantages?

Jesus was cool. He got to walk through walls, create food and a fire at will (John 21:9) move from place to place at the speed of thought, and not have to worry anymore about being tired or aging. The disciples got to see his "2.0 body" and be encouraged, and they wrote a little about the experience for us.

We can be encouraged too, even as we all age and wonder what's next for us. Because the Holy Spirit lives in us and gives us the mind of Christ (1 Cor. 2:16), we already know what new life in Christ is like. One of these days we'll have the new "2.0" body to go with it, because that reality awaits each one of us also. Cool!

We'll keep looking at what this "new life in Christ" means, through the rest of the Easter season and into Pentecost. Stay tuned!