Christ on the last day will raise the bodies of all men and women from the dead, and unite them with their souls forever.
This is an article in both the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed. Jesus will call to life the bodies of those who are already dead, while for those who survive until that day such a change will take place in their bodies, that in a moment they will die and awaken to a new life.
1 Thess. 4:16 – “For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the archangel’s call, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first…”
All will arise, those in the grace of God, as well as those in mortal sin. This resurrection will take place in a moment.
Jn. 5:28-29 – “Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice 29 and come forth, those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of judgment”.
This resurrection of the body will be to prove God’s justice and to honor Jesus. God’s justice demands that the body take part in the triumph. This will be the same body as we have now, glorious if we are among the just, hideous, if we are among the wicked, without defect of any kind, and immortal.
It is not beyond God’s power to rejoin the scattered elements of our bodies. If He could create us out of nothing, He can reassemble that which already has had existence. Many of the cells and components of our bodies are regenerated many tomes in this life, yet we still have the same bodies. Thought of the resurrection of the dead makes Christians careful in the burial of the dead (see also cremation).
1 Cor. 15:51-52 – “Lo! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed”.
The bodies of the just will resemble the glorified body of Christ.
Phil. 3:21 – “who will change our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power which enables him even to subject all things to himself”.
Belief in the resurrection is a great comfort. Christians do not believe that the dead are lost to them. There is the possibility of reunion.