TONIGHT WE said goodbye to our friend, Irene. Over the years there were many visits with her in the nursing home as we shared communion, prayed, read scripture and talked. We were not sad to learn that she was finished with this earthly, perishable body because she was ready for her new spiritual, imperishable body. She believed, as we do, that Christ has had victory over death. Physical death is the enemy that enables us to enter into the place that has been prepared for us (John 4: 1-4). Death itself will one day be destroyed, and then, we all, along with Irene, will be handed over to God when Christ delivers the kingdom to God the Father.

How wonderful the way Paul describes the resurrection body!
"The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body."

"For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed . . . ."