Series: The Berean Examinations — Study B04 (Study Edition)

"See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have." — Luke 24:39

HAVE YOU EVER WONDERED...

  • What happened to Jesus' body on the third day?
  • Does taking his body back "cancel" the ransom?
  • What kind of body will you have in the resurrection?

A RECEIPT IS NOT A REFUND

1 Suppose a man pays an enormous debt on your behalf. The creditor accepts the payment — and hands back a receipt. Has the receipt undone the payment? Of course not: the receipt is the proof the payment was accepted. Keep that picture close; it will untie this study's hardest knot.

2 Jehovah's Witnesses are taught that Jesus was raised not in his body but as a spirit creature — that "Jehovah God evidently disposed of Jesus' fleshly body in his own way" (Insight on the Scriptures), and that the risen Jesus materialized temporary bodies to appear to his disciples, as angels once did. Why teach this? The reason is serious and reverent: the ransom. If Jesus laid down his human life as the price, then — the argument runs — taking it back would revoke the payment. That argument deserves a real answer, and it will get one.

1, 2. (a) What does a receipt prove? (b) What do Witnesses teach about Jesus' resurrection, and for what reverent reason?

THE EVENING THE QUESTION WAS ASKED

3 Here is the remarkable thing: this exact question came up on the first Easter evening — and Jesus himself answered it. When he appeared, the disciples "were startled and frightened and thought they saw a spirit" (Luke 24:37). Notice: they drew the very conclusion under examination — he has been raised as a spirit.

4 Read Luke 24:38–43. Jesus corrects them — in terms: "See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have." Then he asks for food and eats broiled fish in front of them. He does not merely prove he is alive; he names the spirit-interpretation and denies it: a spirit does not have what I have. Ask yourself gently: if he actually was a spirit in a materialized body, what would that demonstration have proved?

3, 4. (a) What did the disciples think they were seeing? (b) How did Jesus answer them — and what did he deny?

THE EMPTY TOMB HAS A LOGIC

5 At Pentecost, Peter built the church's first sermon on a psalm of David: the Messiah "was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption" (Acts 2:31). Peter's argument is a contrast: David's flesh decayed in a tomb still occupied; the Messiah's flesh did not — because that body rose, leaving the tomb empty. Now test the disposal view against the sermon: if God quietly disposed of the body, the flesh escaped corruption by destruction — and the empty tomb proves nothing at all. Peter's whole argument depends on the body that went in being the body that came out.

6 Jesus had staked a promise on the same fact. Read John 2:19–21. "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up... he was speaking about the temple of his body." The it that rises is the body that was destroyed — John says so himself. A spirit-resurrection would leave that promise unkept.

5, 6. (a) What does Peter's Acts 2 argument require? (b) What "it" did Jesus promise to raise?

DOES RESURRECTION CANCEL THE RANSOM?

7 Now the reverent objection from paragraph 2 — and Jesus answers it personally, in advance. Read John 10:17–18. "I lay down my life, that I may take it up again... I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I received from my Father." The laying-down and the taking-up-again are one commission from one Father. The resurrection is not the ransom refunded; it is the ransom receipted — "raised for our justification" (Romans 4:25): God's public announcement that the payment was accepted. The price was the life poured out in obedient death — and that death forever happened, and was forever accepted. The receipt does not undo the payment. It proves it.

8 In fact, the ransom argument, followed through, would break our hope too. Christ is "the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep" (1 Corinthians 15:20) — the first sheaf that shows what the harvest will be. "He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit" (Romans 8:11). As the sheaf, so the field: if his body stayed surrendered, ours would too.

7, 8. (a) What "charge" did Jesus receive from his Father? (b) What does "firstfruits" mean for our resurrection?

"A SPIRITUAL BODY" — WHAT KIND OF BODY?

9 But does Paul not say "flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom" and that Christ "became a life-giving spirit"? Read those phrases inside their own chapter — a chapter answering one stated question: "With what kind of body do they come?" (1 Corinthians 15:35). A "spiritual body" (v. 44) is a Spirit-powered body — just as the present "natural body" is soul-powered, not made of soul. "Flesh and blood" is an idiom for frail, mortal humanity — which is why Paul's own next line explains it: "nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable." And his solution is not losing the body but changing it: "this mortal body must put on immortality" (vv. 53–54).

10 Here, a genuine concession: the Witnesses are right to reject a crude resuscitation. Lazarus came back mortal; Jesus rose transformed — immortal, glorified, with capacities beyond ours. That is why he could enter locked rooms — and note carefully: in the very scene with the locked door, he shows Thomas his wounds and invites his touch (John 20:26–27). Transcendent and touchable, in one paragraph — on purpose. And Paul tells us what that glorified body means for you: "he will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body" (Philippians 3:21). His glorious body — present tense, in heaven now. The man Christ Jesus (1 Timothy 2:5) is still the man.

9, 10. (a) What question governs 1 Corinthians 15? (b) What concession is owed — and what does Philippians 3:21 promise you?

📖 KEY SCRIPTURES IN THIS STUDY

Luke 24:36–43 · Acts 2:29–32 · John 2:19–21 · John 10:17–18 · Romans 4:25; 8:11 · 1 Corinthians 15:20, 35–54 · John 20:26–27 · Philippians 3:21

💬 TALKING WITH A WITNESS FRIEND

Affirm first: "We agree on something enormous: the dead sleep and the hope is resurrection — not an immortal soul escaping. I want to talk about what the resurrection is like, because I think it's even better than you've been told." Three gentle questions:

  1. "Could we read Luke 24:36–43 together — what do we do with 'a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have'?"
  2. "Peter said the Messiah's flesh did not see corruption (Acts 2:31). If God disposed of the body, what did Peter mean?"
  3. "Jesus said, 'I have authority to take it up again — this charge I received from my Father.' Does taking it up again cancel the ransom — or complete it?" Handle with care: This doctrine shapes how your friend pictures Jesus now — and their own beloved dead. Never say they "deny the resurrection" (they affirm one, differently constituted). Ask only in trust, never in triumph.

✅ IN REVIEW

  • On Easter evening the disciples thought Jesus was a spirit — and he denied it in those very terms, then ate fish.
  • Peter's empty-tomb argument requires that the Messiah's flesh never saw corruption — because that body rose.
  • The resurrection is the ransom's receipt, not its refund — the taking-up-again was part of the Father's own charge.
  • A "spiritual body" is a Spirit-powered body — transformed, not discarded: "changed," "putting on" immortality.
  • The firstfruits shape the harvest: his glorious body is the template of yours (Philippians 3:21).

Sources for the teachings examined: Insight on the Scriptures, "Resurrection" and "Jesus Christ"; Reasoning from the Scriptures, "Resurrection." For the full evidentiary treatment, see the complete Study B04 in this archive.

Hear, O Israel: Yahweh our God, Yahweh is one — and he is not the God of the dead but of the living: he raised the man Christ Jesus, flesh that saw no corruption, hands still scarred, alive forevermore — and the same Spirit will give life to your mortal body, on the morning the graves open.