What if you could just leave behind all your physical ailments and disabilities and inhabit a new body that allowed you to do things you never dreamed possible?
What if someone offered you a new body?
What if you could just leave behind all your physical ailments and disabilities and inhabit a new body that allowed you to do things you never dreamed possible? The latest blockbuster film, Avatar, explores this very theme.
The film is set on the fictional planet of Pandora where, because the atmosphere is hostile to the human explorers and settlers, they use genetically engineered bodies called avatars to interact with the natives. Through advanced technology, the humans, through their brain function and reflex, are then able to control these avatars as if controlling their own bodies.
The film's protagonist, Jake Sully, a paraplegic ex-marine, is able to walk again when controlling his avatar body. In his real life, he is confined to a wheelchair—but with his avatar, he is able to not only walk, but also explore an entirely new world previously unavailable to him with a stronger, more agile body.
Ah, but the science-fiction movie world is, of course, a product of imagination. Pandora and its alien population doesn't really exist, nor does the technology to produce or control avatars. It's all a bunch of impossible science fiction...isn't it?
Well, most of it. But you may be surprised to find that the idea of a new body is not only possible—it's promised. In one of its futuristic sections the Bible speaks about a coming event called the resurrection, when people will actually inherit new bodies. The apostle Paul saw way beyond sci-fi writers of today when he described it this way: "The body is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption. 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" (1 Corinthians 15:42-44).
We go through life now with the bodies we're given. Some are strong and healthy, others fragile and weak, but all eventually succumb to disease and pain and suffering and, ultimately, death. But at the return of Christ those who have chosen to follow and obey God are promised to, quote, "be changed—in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality" (1 Corinthians 15:51-53).
Unlike sci-fi, these spiritual bodies God is offering to replace our physical bodies will be unaffected by any of the physical issues we face now, and will have amazing abilities to perform feats we can't begin to dream of, and it will be for eternity!
As I left the theater last night I couldn't help but think...avatars? Great stuff for movies, but they don't even come close to the real thing! Science fiction? Interesting and entertaining, but if you want to go light years ahead in imagining the future, take a look at what God is promising!
What if someone offered you a new body?
What if you could just leave behind all your physical ailments and disabilities and inhabit a new body that allowed you to do things you never dreamed possible? The latest blockbuster film, Avatar, explores this very theme.
The film is set on the fictional planet of Pandora where, because the atmosphere is hostile to the human explorers and settlers, they use genetically engineered bodies called avatars to interact with the natives. Through advanced technology, the humans, through their brain function and reflex, are then able to control these avatars as if controlling their own bodies.
The film's protagonist, Jake Sully, a paraplegic ex-marine, is able to walk again when controlling his avatar body. In his real life, he is confined to a wheelchair—but with his avatar, he is able to not only walk, but also explore an entirely new world previously unavailable to him with a stronger, more agile body.
Ah, but the science-fiction movie world is, of course, a product of imagination. Pandora and its alien population doesn't really exist, nor does the technology to produce or control avatars. It's all a bunch of impossible science fiction...isn't it?
Well, most of it. But you may be surprised to find that the idea of a new body is not only possible—it's promised. In one of its futuristic sections the Bible speaks about a coming event called the resurrection, when people will actually inherit new bodies. The apostle Paul saw way beyond sci-fi writers of today when he described it this way: "The body is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption. 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" (1 Corinthians 15:42-44).
We go through life now with the bodies we're given. Some are strong and healthy, others fragile and weak, but all eventually succumb to disease and pain and suffering and, ultimately, death. But at the return of Christ those who have chosen to follow and obey God are promised to, quote, "be changed—in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality" (1 Corinthians 15:51-53).
Unlike sci-fi, these spiritual bodies God is offering to replace our physical bodies will be unaffected by any of the physical issues we face now, and will have amazing abilities to perform feats we can't begin to dream of, and it will be for eternity!
As I left the theater last night I couldn't help but think...avatars? Great stuff for movies, but they don't even come close to the real thing! Science fiction? Interesting and entertaining, but if you want to go light years ahead in imagining the future, take a look at what God is promising!
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