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2 Corinthians 5:1, Biblical lifespans, Death, Genesis 1: 29-31, Genesis 2: 16-17, Genesis 3: 21, glorified bodies, John 11:31-35, Psalm 90: 10
“It wasn’t supposed to be this way.” A frequent lament when someone dies. And that is true. God did not create life for it to end in death. When Adam and Eve were created and given dominion over the garden, God said all was good. There was no death or dying. People or animals did not even kill for food.
And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day. (Genesis 1:29-31)
There was one law that God set for Adam about what he could eat. And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” (Genesis 2:16-17) Of course, Adam did eat of this tree, and death entered this world. God was merciful and did not kill Adam immediately, but he did begin to age and die that day. And death came to the garden, as God killed animals to cover Adam and Eve, so they were not constantly reminded of their sin. And the Lord God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them. (Genesis 3: 21)
As a biologist, I am fascinated to look at how quickly the span of life degraded after the aging (dying) process began. If you look at the lifespans in Genesis, most men lived about 900 years until after the flood. Then lifespans decreased quickly through the generations, most living 100 years less than the previous one. By the time the Psalms were written we read: The years of our life are seventy, or even by reason of strength eighty; yet their span is but toil and trouble; they are soon gone, and we fly away. (Psalm 90: 10)
But God never planned to leave it this way. He planned to send His son, to obey Him perfectly, as Adam did not, and to redeem His people to eternal life in a new heaven and new earth with Him. This is why Jesus came to earth, to be incarnate as a man, yet still fully God. And as a man, we read that he was affected by death. When his friend Lazarus died, even though he knew He would raise him again, He saw the pain and the heartache death caused, and He was moved. When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. And he said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus wept. (John 11:31-35) Jesus, who came to defeat death, knew it wasn’t supposed to be this way.
As believers in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, we need not fear death. Jesus died on the cross and paid the death penalty required for our sin, then rose again in a glorified body, with which he ascended into heaven where he sat down at the right hand of the Father. This is where the angels will conduct us at the moment of our death. For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.(2 Corinthians 5:1)
This is the good news of the Gospel- that we can be reconciled to the Father, and that one day when Christ returns, we will be reunited with our glorified bodies (see post Marriage Matters) and that we will live forever with him in a perfect new creation, where there is no death or dying. This is the way it is supposed to be.
Soli Deo Gloria,
Diane