Bible

What Happens When We Die? Can the Resurrection Unlock Eternal Life?

Ben Thomas

Going deeper

The following is a summary of Ben Thomas‘s interview with N.T. Wright, produced by OCCA The Oxford Centre for Christian Apologetics.

It remains life’s greatest mystery: what happens when we die? Is death truly the end? And how can we ever know? For centuries, philosophers and theologians have debated the nature of life after death, offering hypotheses ranging from extinction to reincarnation. In mankind’s search for answers, we frequently blend Greek philosophy with Christian terminology, resulting in a vague hope of “going to heaven” that lacks the robust power of the historical Gospel.

In a recent conversation with theologian and author N.T. Wright, OCCA’s Ben Thomas explored what difference Jesus’ resurrection makes in approaching this question. To move beyond the myths of Platonism and into the historical reality of the New Testament is to discover a hope that is not about escaping this world, but about the renewal of all things.

Why the Resurrection Matters

When we speak of resurrection, it is essential to be clear about what we mean—and just as important to be clear about what we do not mean. The Christian claim is not that Jesus somehow returned to ordinary life after a brief interruption, as though death were merely paused and then restarted. Nor is it the claim that his “spirit lived on” while his body was left behind.

The New Testament insists on something far more radical: Jesus passed through death and emerged on the other side into a new kind of bodily life—one that death no longer has any power over. This claim stands at the very centre of Christianity. Without it, there is no gospel worth preaching. As the Apostle Paul said with stark clarity, if the Messiah has not been raised from the dead, then faith itself is empty and futile [1].

History tells us that first-century revolutionary movements routinely ended when their leaders were executed. Nobody in the ancient world went around saying, “Never mind—he’s been raised from the dead.” People then knew as well as we do now that when you are dead, you stay dead. That is precisely why the early Christian proclamation was, and remains, so astonishing.

Unpacking the Myths

To grasp the force of the resurrection, we must remember the range of beliefs about death that circulated in the ancient world. Epicureans believed death meant dissolution into atoms. Stoics thought individuals were absorbed back into a vast cosmic soul. Platonists believed the soul was immortal and would eventually escape the “prison” of the body to return to the heavens.

It is worth pausing here, because many modern people assume this last view—escaping the body to go to a spiritual “heaven”—is what Christianity teaches. It is not. That is Platonism [2]. Christianity proclaims not the abandonment of creation, but its renewal.

Within Judaism, belief in resurrection emerged sharply during periods of persecution, such as the Maccabean period [3]. Faithful Jews declared that the God who made the world would not abandon it, nor would he abandon those who gave their lives in obedience to him. Resurrection was about God’s justice beyond death, rather than the avoidance of death.

What Makes Jesus’ Resurrection Unique?

When Jesus raised Lazarus, he brought him back to ordinary mortal life—a life that would, inevitably, end again. But Jesus’ own resurrection was something altogether different. It marked the beginning of God’s “new creation” [4]. What happened to Jesus on the third day was not the end of the story; it was the start of a new one.

In the resurrection, God the Creator was doing in the middle of history what he had promised to do at its end. This has enormous implications. The resurrection is about the future of the world rather than simply about what happens to individuals after they die. It suggests that matter matters to God.

The Implications for Today

This perspective is why Christianity has always generated extraordinary creativity: care for the sick, the founding of hospitals, the pursuit of justice, and the making of beauty. These are not distractions from “spiritual” concerns; they are foretastes of God’s promised future. They point ahead to the day when heaven and earth will be renewed.

Seen from this perspective, modern attempts to defeat death through technology alone—such as transhumanism—appear deeply troubling. While medicine is a gift, the dream of extending our present biological condition indefinitely ignores our fundamental brokenness. An eternity of our present, flawed state would not be salvation; it would be a tragedy. True hope lies in transformation, not mere extension.

Conclusion: Jesus’ Resurrection Brings Hope

So, is death truly the end? The Christian message is both more realistic and more hopeful than the alternatives. It acknowledges that death is a real enemy, but one that has been defeated. As John Donne famously put it, “One short sleep past, we wake eternally, and death shall be no more” [5].

The resurrection does unlock eternal life, but not as an endless continuation of the status quo. It unlocks life as transformation. The risen Christ is the first sign that the old world of decay and death does not have the final word. God is making all things new, and he invites us, even now, to live as people shaped by that future. That is the hope that stands at the heart of Christianity.

References

1 Corinthians 15:14-17, The Holy Bible.

N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church, HarperOne, 2008.

2 Maccabees 7, The Apocrypha (reflecting Jewish martyr theology).

N.T. Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of God, SPCK, 2003.

John Donne, “Holy Sonnet X: Death, Be Not Proud,” 1633.

Learning More

OCCA The Oxford Centre for Christian Apologetics was established in 2004 to raise up the next generation of evangelist-apologists. By 2021, around 350 emerging evangelists from around the world had studied on the OCCA one-year programme. This course equipped each of them to share and defend the gospel message and to come alongside others to help them with their intellectual objections and heartfelt concerns about the Christian faith. Subscribe to our weekly newsletters to see our latest articles from our team of speakers.