A Scripps Howard News Service article records that "most Americans don't believe they will experience a resurrection of their bodies when they die, putting them at odds with a core teaching of Christianity." And how!

According to the article, only 36% of those surveyed indicated they’d definitely answer “yes” to the following question: "Do you believe that, after you die, your physical body will be resurrected someday?"  Thirty-six percent! As painful as that is to absorb, it gets worse!

Fifty-four percent said they do not believe in a resurrection of their body at all! Another ten percent have no opinion one way or the other.

All we have to do to see how seriously debilitating this particular issue is to the Body of Christ’s effectiveness in reaching the lost in the late hour we’re living in is open the Word of God.

1st Corinthians 15:12-18:

Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?

But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen:

And if Christ be not risen, then [is] our preaching vain, and your faith [is] also vain.

Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not.

For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised:

And if Christ be not raised, your faith [is] vain; ye are yet in your sins.

Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished.

So, how say 54% of Americans today there is no resurrection of the dead, assuming the results of the Scripps Howard/Ohio University poll are representative of the nation’s depth of understanding of the Christian faith? Al Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, hit the nail squarely on the head, in my opinion, when he said the following, as noted in the article:

"This reflects the very low state of doctrinal preaching in our churches.  I continually am confronted by Christians, even active members of major churches, who have never heard this taught in their local congregations.  We have a lowest-common-denominator Christianity being taught in so many denominations that has produced a people who simply do not know some of the most basic Christian truths."

This is what politically correct, “seeker sensitive” churching, which is spreading like a cancer across America (and likely the entire world) produces! Many churches today are so afraid of frightening or offending someone that they duck all matters related to Bible prophecy, a portion of which addresses the fact that each and every person who dies, both believer and nonbeliever, will be resurrected to bodily appear before Jesus Christ to be judged someday!

The Christian who dies will be resurrected to appear before Christ’s Judgment Seat to receive whatever rewards they may be entitled to based on their service to Him, as seen in 2nd Corinthians 5:10:

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.

The nonbeliever who dies without accepting Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior will appear before Him at the Great White Throne Judgment where they will be consigned to spend an eternity in a literal lake of fire from which there will be no escape or hope of rescue, as seen in Revelation 20:11-15:

And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them.

And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is [the book] of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.

And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.

 And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.

And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.

 Why do Christians need to be convinced there will be a resurrection of their bodies?

If you are a self-proclaimed Christian who is unsure Christ is risen, you’re a Christian by your definition alone. Likewise, if you’re professing to be a Christian while in denial there will someday be a resurrection of your body if you should die prior to Christ’s return to Rapture His Church, I am likewise in doubt of your salvation, as you should be yourself!

Faith in Christ’s resurrection, at the very least, is absolutely critical to your salvation! Without faith in the resurrection, there is no foundation upon which to build a relationship with Christ! Why? Because two living individuals are required to form a relationship, naturally, and Scripture tells us that unless one has a relationship with Christ, there is no hope of salvation. With the heart one believes unto righteousness and the heart can not be in a relationship with that which isn’t alive!

Romans 10:9-10:

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.

For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

Why do the lost need to be convinced there will be a resurrection of their bodies?

Church, the stakes could not be higher than they are where this issue is concerned! Those we fail to convince of Christ’s resurrection, as well as the fact they, too, will someday be resurrected will, in all likelihood, never come to grasp their absolute need to come to know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior! Without faith in a resurrection and a subsequent judgment, there is nothing left for the lost to do but eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow they will die, never to exist in the flesh again.

It’s the Church’s responsibility to teach the Word of God to the lost in its entirety! Why? Because God didn’t give us sixty-six books of the Bible, one of which explicitly details the fact there is going to a bodily resurrection of the lost that will see each and every one of them cast into a lake of fire from whence the smoke of their torment will ascend forever and ever, for us to tip-toe around the portions which make people squirm in their seats! A little conviction now and then is a good thing, believe it or not!

Christians, pastors, and church bodies, it’s time for us to get serious doctrinally!

2nd Timothy 3:16 tells us: All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

Only 36% of 1,007 people surveyed recently indicated they’d definitely answer “yes” to the following question: "Do you believe that, after you die, your physical body will be resurrected someday?" What does that irrefutably demonstrate? There's a lot of weak doctrinal teaching going on, which is leading to a nation weak in faith! A nation weak in its faith may well forget its God altogether, which I humbly submit is well on its way to becoming a reality in America, which is anything but good news!

Psalms 9:17:

The wicked shall be turned into hell, [and] all the nations that forget God.

Is there anyone who has read my website’s numerous commentaries detailing how current events seem to be lining up with the Bible’s prophecies that are yet to be fulfilled who fails to realize that this is no time for the Church to be standing on wobbly doctrinal legs? There is way, way too much at stake!

2nd Timothy 4:1-5:

I charge [thee] therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom;

Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears;

And they shall turn away [their] ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.

But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry.