So how should we conceive of Christ's resurrection body today? Christ in his exalted state still has a human nature; he did not "enter back into God's own existence." But Christ has exited this four-dimensional space-time continuum. Therefore, perhaps we might say that his human nature does not now manifest itself corporeally. Compare a tuning fork which is plucked and begins to hum. If the vibrating fork is placed in a vacuum jar, though it continues to vibrate, it does not manifest itself by a humming noise because there is no medium to carry its vibrations. Similarly, Christ's human nature, no longer immersed in spacetime, does not manifest itself as a body. But someday Christ will return and re-enter our four-dimensional space-time continuum, and then his body will become manifest. In the new heavens and the new earth Christ will be corporeally present to his people. Christ, then, has a human nature which is manifested as his physical resurrection body when he exists in a spatio-temporal universe (WLC).
Follow-Up: It seems to me that Christ’s possessing a human nature in the time between his ascension and return does not necessitate his having a human body during that time, anymore than my possessing a human nature during the intermediate state between my death and resurrection requires that I have a body during that time. Someone whose body has been vaporized in an explosion, for example, has no body at all during the intermediate state, not even a dead one, yet he is still a human being. Why? Perhaps we could say that he is a human being because his soul was united with a human body. For that reason he is not an angelic being or some other sort of being. But we can say exactly the same about Christ in his ascended state. Moreover, as the tuning fork illustration makes clear, Christ’s human nature is not at all incomplete in such as state; it’s just that he’s not in the environment (namely spacetime) in which his human nature would manifest itself as a body.
Follow-Up: It seems to me that Christ’s possessing a human nature in the time between his ascension and return does not necessitate his having a human body during that time, anymore than my possessing a human nature during the intermediate state between my death and resurrection requires that I have a body during that time. Someone whose body has been vaporized in an explosion, for example, has no body at all during the intermediate state, not even a dead one, yet he is still a human being. Why? Perhaps we could say that he is a human being because his soul was united with a human body. For that reason he is not an angelic being or some other sort of being. But we can say exactly the same about Christ in his ascended state. Moreover, as the tuning fork illustration makes clear, Christ’s human nature is not at all incomplete in such as state; it’s just that he’s not in the environment (namely spacetime) in which his human nature would manifest itself as a body.
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