On Resurrection...

If you are expecting to read a deep, thoughtful and spiritual explanation on resurrection, you don't know me very well. (= I can talk spiritual things with the best of them, but I much prefer to look at the lighter things in life. This is meant to be a humorous contemplation on many of the theories of resurrection that I came across during my time at BYU.

Today while I was waxing my miss-stash (as far as I know I made that up so I'm trademarking it!) it got me thinking about resurrection. At BYU I had a few teachers that were conflicted on what resurrection actually was. Was it being "reborn" with your body totally whole, not a single hair from your head missing? Or was it a progression as one of my teachers grimly said, that as you perfect yourself your body perfects as well? As I weighed out both options I thought that I would much rather return in a perfected state, however both have their perks and checks. Lets go over them.

What really got me thinking about resurrection was a comment made by my sister-in-law while we were walking to my house one sunday.

"Do you think we really are restored to our perfected state?" She asked.
"I don't know," I said considering the question. "Supposedly we are resurrected without missing even a single hair."
"Every hair?" She asked, a hint of worry in her voice. "Because there are a few that I really don't want back."
At this point we both started laughing hysterically but the question got me thinking.

Alma 11:44 states "... and even there shall not so much as a hair of their heads be lost; but everything shall be restored to its perfect frame..."

I guess the most important question is, what defines head? Is it from your neck up, or your scalp? Because if it's from the neck up, ladies we will probably be looking like the moses in the old "Ten Commandments" movie, which is frightening. At least those of us who have waxed over our life will. Thats a lot of hair accumulated.

This I am not looking forward to.

If it means on your scalp, I will finally have a gorgeous full head of hair since mine has always been "fine"- ok, thin. And all you lucky girls with long thick hair in this life will look like "Cousin it" in the next life. Ok, maybe not really.

But my grim teacher that taught of progression had a stranger take on resurrection.

He explained to us that if we were buried with an arm missing or a leg missing we would be resurrected with that part missing still. If we were good that part would be returned to us slowly. This idea did not jive. In fact quite a few things in this class didn't jive with what I'd been taught over my life and I couldn't help but have this conversation with him.

"So, what you're saying is that if we die with a part missing we are resurrected without that part?" I questioned.
"Yes." He answered.
"And as we become perfected that part returns to us?" I asked with skepticism in my voice.
"Yes" He affirmed.
"What if you're missing your head?" I asked.

Needless to say someone else got to ask some questions.

But I had some questions of my own. If for some reason you lost your hand what would the progression look like? Will it look like the hand on Peter Pettigrew in Harry Potter, all silvery and qhostly with super strength? As we progress will it grow more real until finally it's an arm or leg? Or will it grow centimeter by centimeter?

Can you imagine all the pirates that would be displaced by this? What would you call them after their nicknames no longer work? Captain Hook would just have to go back to something like Captain Larry, which is not nearly as cool.

Or if we didn't lose any appendages would be just be resurrected looking like Rosie O'Donal with her Edward Scissorhands hair cut until we slowly became beautiful by perfection? I just couldn't see it.

Anyhow, this blog was a bunch of silly what-ifs and not meant to be taken seriously. I do believe in resurrection but I believe that we are resurrected in our most perfect state, sans the excess hair, and that all personal perfection that we pursue is WITHIN and private between ourselves and God. I don't believe that Heavenly Father would punish us by resurrecting us imperfectly and then allowing everyone to see our progress and how long it takes us to perfect ourselves. He is not in the business of humiliation. Otherwise we are all in for an interesting ride eventually. What do you think?



(By the way in an effort to find more cool pirate nicknames to make fun of I found a ridiculous amount of pirate sites that generate a pirate nickname for you. Mine was: Holly "Cannonball Butt" Moore. What? It's scary how accurate that is.)