From “How to become a Christian”: Chapter 5 – Why should we bother to become a Christian?
I would also just mention, in passing, that in my experience people often get confused as to how exactly God can manage to resurrect people whose bodies have decayed away centuries ago. Some people’s bodies have even been cremated and so are totally obliterated. Many have asked me how it can be possible for God to raise them to life again. Some have asked me if God uses the very same physical remains and even whether He has to retrieve all the atoms of carbon and hydrogen and so on that were in our bodies when we were alive.
The answer, in my view, is probably best explained by saying that all God needs is the information that was used to form our bodies in the first place. That is all contained within the DNA in our genes. That is really just a complex code which arranges every part of our physical make up. So, I expect God will just recreate us in accordance with our DNA.
It doesn’t matter what physical material God uses and whether they are the same atoms or different ones. Indeed, even as we live now, the atoms of which we are made are continually changing and being replaced. We are not the same person physically today that we were a few years ago. Most, or all, of the atoms in our bodies will have been replaced over that time. So, it’s a non-issue.
As for where the information about our DNA is now, it is simply stored in God’s memory. He knows the DNA codes for every person He has ever created. So, when He recreates them, i.e. resurrects them, He will just speak their bodies back into existence. He spoke everything into existence in the first place in Genesis chapters one and two when He tackled the far larger job of creating the entire universe.
That said, when God resurrects us He will not make us exactly as we are now. We will be entirely recognisable as ourselves, but we will be perfect. Any faults, defects or imperfections will be gone. So, any handicapped person will no longer be handicapped. They will be whole and perfect.
