Some skeptic is sure to ask, “Show me how resurrection works. Give me a diagram; draw me a picture. What does this ‘resurrection body’ look like?” If you look at this question closely, you realize how absurd it is. There are no diagrams for this kind of thing. We do have a parallel experience in gardening. You plant a “dead” seed; soon there is a flourishing plant. 1 Corinthians 15:35,36 MSG

I helped my grandpa with his garden a lot as a kid. The first year I was promoted to putting the seeds in the ground, I was surprised when my grandpa put some that were bright pink in my hand. I was certain that nothing I’d ever seen come from his garden was that color, so I asked him, “What kind of plant comes from these seeds?”

I was not expecting him to say, “Corn!”

A few weeks later Grandpa caught me out in the garden digging up a little corn seedling. The plant was green, as it should have been, but I was curious what had happened to the pink seed.

It wasn’t there, of course. It had been transformed!

No matter how brightly colored, the seeds that were planted were already “dead” the day they were laid to “rest” in their burial plots in my grandpa’s garden. They remained underground in the seed cemetery for a few weeks while undergoing the process of germination, which is “the development of a plant from a seed after a period of dormancy,” or “the process of something coming into existence and developing.” 

The whole process of “coming into existence” is dirty and not easily seen, but in this invisible work the old (seed) makes way for the new and flourishing (plant) growth.

In trying to explain resurrection to the Corinthians Paul draws a parallel to gardening, and rightly so! We’re all of us seeds–all different shapes and sizes and colors. We all exist in this dormant form until we allow our seed selves to be buried, planted, “laid to rest.” Then the work of germination begins–the dirty, unglamorous work of living this life while keeping in mind the coming resurrection.

“Dormant” can mean “sleeping,” but that doesn’t necessarily mean “nothing is happening.” Tulip and daffodil bulbs “sleep” most of the year while waiting for the right catalysts to greet us with new spring beauty. Paul was trying to encourage some signs of coming growth and germination in the Corinthians, some indicators of the new life to come already taking root, even while they wait for the coming resurrection.

The Good News is that new life–resurrection–IS coming. It’s made possible by Jesus, and what a day that will be! All of us transformed and sprouted forth in new and glorious growth! 

God, help us to focus today not on the dirt all around, but on the hope we have in Your resurrection, and the promise of new life ahead. Amen.