These considerations may well lead us to, at least, general outlines
on which a confident and peaceful hope may fix. For example, they
lead us to the thought that that redeemed body is no more subject to
decay and death, is no more weighed upon by weakness and weariness,
has no work beyond its strength, needs no sustenance by food, and no
refreshment of sleep. 'The Lamb which is in the midst of the throne
shall feed them,' suggests strength constantly communicated by a
direct divine gift. And from all these negative characteristics there
follows that there will be in that future bodily life no epochs of
age marked by bodily changes. The two young men who were seen sitting
in the sepulchre of Jesus had lived before Adam, and would seem as
young if we saw them to-day.
Similarly the redeemed body will be a more perfect instrument for
communication with the external universe. We know that the present
body conditions our knowledge, and that our senses do not take
cognisance of all the qualities of material things. Microscopes and
telescopes have enlarged our field of vision, and have brought the
infinitely small and the infinitely distant within our range. Our ear
hears vibrations at a certain rate per second, and no doubt if it
were more delicately organised we could hear sounds where now is
silence. Sometimes the creatures whom we call 'inferior' seem to have
senses that apprehend much of which we are not aware. Balaam's ass
saw the obstructing angel before Balaam did. Nor is there any reason
to suppose that all the powers of the mind find tools to work with in
the body. It is possible that that body which is the fit instrument
of the spirit may become its means of knowing more deeply, thinking
more wisely, understanding more swiftly, comprehending more widely,
remembering more firmly and judging more soundly. It is possible that
the contrast between then and now may be like the contrast between
telegraph and slow messenger in regard to the rapidity, between
photograph and poor daub in regard to the truthfulness, between a
full-orbed circle and a fragmentary arc in regard to the completeness
of the messages which the body brings to the indwelling self.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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