We can know a lot about our resurrection bodies. Why? Because we’re told a great deal about Christ’s resurrected body, and we’re told that our bodies will be like his.

“Beloved, we are God’s children now; it does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2, RSV).

“Just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall we bear the likeness of the man from heaven” (1 Corinthians 15:49).

Though Jesus in His resurrected body proclaimed that he was not a ghost (Luke 24:39, NLT), countless Christians think they will be ghosts in the eternal Heaven. I know this because I’ve talked with many of them. They think they’ll be disembodied spirits, or wraiths. The magnificent, cosmos-shaking victory of Christ’s resurrection—by definition a physical triumph over physical death in a physical world—escapes them.

If Jesus had become a ghost, there would have been no resurrection, and redemption would not have been accomplished. But Jesus was not a ghost; He walked the earth in His resurrection body for forty days, showing us how we would live as resurrected human beings. In effect, He also demonstrated where we would live as resurrected human beings—on Earth. Christ’s resurrection body was suited for life on Earth. As Jesus was raised to come back to live on Earth, we, too, will be raised to come back to live on Earth (1 Thessalonians 4:14; Revelation 21:1-3).

The risen Jesus walked and talked with two disciples on the Emmaus road (Luke 24:13-35). They asked Him questions; He taught them and guided them in their understanding of Scripture. Though they didn’t know it was Jesus until “their eyes were opened” (v. 31), suggesting that God prevented them from recognizing Christ, they saw nothing different enough in His appearance to suggest that His resurrected body looked any different from a normal human body. In other words, they perceived nothing amiss. They saw the resurrected Jesus as a normal, everyday human being. The soles of His feet ­didn’t hover above the road—they walked on it.

We know that the resurrected Christ looked like a man because Mary called Him “sir” when she assumed He was the gardener at the tomb (John 20:15). Jesus spent remarkably normal times with His disciples after His resurrection. Early one morning, He “stood on the shore” at a distance (John 21:4). He didn’t hover or float—or even walk on water, though He could have. He called to the disciples (v. 5). He started a fire, and He was already cooking fish that He’d presumably caught Himself. He cooked them, which means He didn’t just snap His fingers and materialize a finished meal. He invited the disciples to add their fish to His and said, “Come and have breakfast” (John 21:12).

On another occasion, Christ suddenly appeared in a locked room where the disciples were gathered (John 20:19). His body could be touched and clung to and could consume food, yet it could apparently “materialize” as well. How is this possible? Could it be that a resurrection body is structured in such a way as to allow its molecules to pass through solid materials or to suddenly become visible or invisible?

We shouldn’t assume that Christ’s body will look exactly as it did before His death and resurrection, or that our bodies will look exactly as they do now. During Christ’s transfiguration, the appearance of His face changed, and His clothing “became as bright as a flash of lightning” (Luke 9:29). Likewise, Elijah and Moses are described as appearing “in glorious splendor” (Luke 9:31).

Christ may literally shine in His Kingdom on the New Earth. John says of the city, “The Lamb is its lamp” (Revelation 21:23). Christ appeared to Paul and blinded him on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:3-9).

Likewise, Scripture promises us that “the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father” (Matthew 13:43), and “will shine brightly like the brightness of the expanse of heaven . . . like the stars forever and ever” (Daniel 12:3, NASB).

Once we understand that Christ’s resurrection is the prototype for the resurrection of mankind and the earth, we realize that Scripture has given us an interpretive key to understanding human resurrection and life on the New Earth. Shouldn’t we interpret passages alluding to resurrected people living on the New Earth as literally as those concerning Christ’s resurrected life during the forty days He walked on the old Earth?

When Paul speaks of our resurrection bodies, he says, “The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; 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. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body” (1 Corinthians 15:42-44).

When Paul uses the term spiritual body (v. 44), he is not talking about a body made of spirit, or a nonphysical body—there is no such thing. A body, by definition, is physical—flesh and bones. The word spiritual here is an adjective that describes the body; it doesn’t negate its meaning. A spiritual body is first and foremost a real body or it would not qualify to be called a body. If our bodies became spirits, Paul could have simply said, “It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spirit,” but that’s not what he says. Judging from Christ’s resurrection body, a spiritual body looks and acts like a regular physical body most of the time, but it may have (and in Christ’s case it does have) some physical abilities beyond what is currently normal.

In this video, I share a quote from N.T. Wright about how the term “spiritual body” is often misunderstood:

Many of us look forward to Heaven more now than we did when our bodies functioned well. Inside your body, even if it is broken or failing, is the blueprint for your resurrection body. You may not be satisfied with your current body or mind—but you’ll be forever thrilled with your resurrection upgrade.