III. That these same vile bodies shall be changed into glorious bodies.
1. I prove it from the nature of the resurrection. It will not be a resurrection unless that which fell rise again, and that which was dead be revived. Therefore the same bodies which were buried in the grave shall be raised up. If the same body were joined to another soul, or the same soul united to another body, it would not be the resur- rection of the same man. Neither at the latter day do we expect a new creation, but a restitution ; not a production of a new body, but the raising of that which we had before. These houses of clay, these habitations of flesh, must again receive their old inhabitant. Nothing dieth but the body, and when we died we died in no other body but our own, and therefore we cannot be said to revive and rise again, but in our own flesh, and in our own body.
2. I prove it from the testimony of scripture, which is full and preg- nant to the purpose : John v. 28, 29, ' Marvel not at this, for the hour is coming in which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth ; they that have done good to the resurrection of life, and they that have done evil unto the resurrection of damnation.' Who shall come forth ? They who are in the graves ; that is, men with respect to their bodies, the same bodies wherein they lived on earth, and which were laid in the grave. So again, Job xix. 26, 27r ' And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God : whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another, though my reins be consumed within me.' 'In flesh' showeth the reality, 'my flesh' showeth the identity and propriety ; it is not a stranger's eye, another eye, but ' these eyes ' shall see him : Rom. viii. 11, 'He that raised up Christ from the dead shall quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.' So that it is this mortal body which is quickened, and which at the resur- rection becometh spiritual and incorruptible. Once more, 1 Cor. xv. 53, ' For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.' Not that another body shall succeed in place of this, but this very body shall be changed ; not in substance, but qualities. So here in the text, ' Who shall change our vile bodies ; *
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not a body which was never ours, nor never vile, but the same body that was once ours, and was once vile. Again, Rev. xx. 13, ' And the sea gave up the dead which were in it : and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them.' But if the same bodies did not rise, neither the sea nor the grave would give up their dead. That shall rise again which the grave giveth up, which the sea giveth up ; there- fore the same body which was buried shall be revived. Thus the scripture is full in the proof of it, as of the resurrection, so of the resurrection of the same numerical body.
3. From the final cause of the resurrection, which is that every one may be judged, and receive according to the things done in the body : 2 Cor. v. 10, 'For we must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ, that every one may receive the things done in the body, accord- ing to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.' The things were done in the body, and therefore not only the soul but the body must be punished and rewarded. As Tertullian pleadeth, Should Marcion be raised up for Valentinus, and the peccancy of one body be punished in another that never offended ?
4. From the pattern of Christ ; such a body as Christ had in the resurrection and ascension, such bodies shall we have : ' For our vile body shall be made like his glorious body ; ' and he rose as ' the first- fruits of them that slept,' as the representative head, 1 Cor. xv. 20 ;
1 And he that raised up the Lord Jesus, shall raise us up also by Jesus,'
2 Cor. iv. 14. Now the body in which Christ rose was the same body which was assumed of the virgin, which was nailed to the cross, laid in the grave ; and with the same body he entered into heaven, and there remaineth the same according to substance and lineaments that it was here upon earth, only changed in qualities. So our bodies remain the same in substance, only freed from the quality of its abasements, and endowed with glorious qualities fit for the heavenly estate ; and look, as the decays and reparations of our bodies do not make them cease to be the same bodies we bring with us into the world, so neither the change they undergo by death, nor the glorious qualities wherewith they are endowed when raised again, do make them other bodies for substance than now they are.