The flesh, the new creature, and the body to come
Scripture's anthropology of the human is precise. The human is dust-around-spirit — the dust from the earth, the spirit breathed in directly by God. The dust is what distinguishes the human from God. The deliverance from the dust is the centre of the gospel.
The two-component creature
"Yahweh God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." — Genesis 2:7
Two components, both real. Dust from the ground — the earthly material that ties humans to the created world they were given dominion over. Breath (neshamah) from God himself — direct from the Creator, not derivative. Together they form a living soul (nephesh hayyah). The combination is what humanity is.
God himself, by contrast, has no dust:
"God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”." — John 4:24
This is the asymmetry. The Creator is pure spirit; the creature is spirit-with-earth-around-it. The earth around the spirit is not evil in itself (Gen 1:31 — "God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good."), but after the Fall it becomes the medium through which corruption operates, and at death it returns to its source:
"You will eat bread by the sweat of your face until you return to the ground, for you were taken out of it. For you are dust, and you shall return to dust.”." — Genesis 3:19
"and the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to God who gave it." — Ecclesiastes 12:7
The components separate at death. The dust returns to the ground; the spirit returns to God.
The first Adam and the last Adam
Paul develops the doctrine in 1 Corinthians 15:
"So also it is written, “The first man Adam became a living soul.” The last Adam became a life-giving spirit. However, that which is spiritual isn’t first, but that which is natural, then that which is spiritual. The first man is of the earth, made of dust. The second man is the Lord from heaven. As is the one made of dust, such are those who are also made of dust; and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. As we have borne the image of those made of dust, let’s also bear the image of the heavenly." — 1 Corinthians 15:45–49
"Now I say this, brothers, that flesh and blood can’t inherit God’s Kingdom; neither does the perishable inherit imperishable." — 1 Corinthians 15:50
Two image-categories: earthy (Adam, dust, mortal, corruptible) and heavenly (Christ, spirit, immortal, incorruptible). The first is what every human is by natural birth. The second is what is put on through union with Christ. The earthy must give way to the heavenly before the kingdom can be inherited.
Born again — the entry
"Jesus answered him, Most certainly I tell you, unless one is born anew, he can’t see God’s Kingdom. Don’t marvel that… marvel that I said to you, ‘You must all be born anew." — John 3:3, 7
A second birth, of a different order from the first. The first is from flesh; the second is from the Spirit ("That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit." — John 3:6). The kingdom is invisible to the once-born. Must is the operative word — no exception, no alternate path.
Death of the old, alive to Christ — the mechanism
"Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, we will also be part of his resurrection; knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be in bondage to sin. For he who has died has been freed from sin." — Romans 6:3–7
The mechanism by which the new creation is appropriated: union with Christ's death and resurrection. The old man is crucified with him. The shed-and-be-made-new movement is not self-improvement; it is incorporation into a death and resurrection that happened in history, made personally effective through union with the one in whom they occurred.
The OT antecedent of the renewed-spirit doctrine stands in David's penitential prayer:
"Create in me a clean heart, O God. Renew a right spirit within me. Don’t throw me from your presence, and don’t take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation. Uphold me with a willing spirit." — Psalm 51:10–12
David asks for what Christ purchases — a created clean heart, a renewed right spirit. The OT shape of the doctrine the NT names as new creation.
The new creature — the result
"Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new." — 2 Corinthians 5:17
The Greek for new creature is kainē ktisis — new creation. The same word (ktisis) used of the original creation in Genesis. Christ creates the believer the way God created the cosmos — ex nihilo, by speech, the new replacing the old without continuity-of-substance carried over.
"that you put away, as concerning your former way of life, the old man that grows corrupt after the lusts of deceit, and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new man, who in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of truth." — Ephesians 4:22–24
"and have put on the new man, who is being renewed in knowledge after the image of his Creator," — Colossians 3:10
Put off / put on. The image-of-God (§11, §17) is renewed in knowledge — the original imaging restored after the corruption that the Fall introduced. Not a different image; the original image clarified and re-formed.
Paul names the operational form of the renewal:
"Therefore I urge you, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service. Don’t be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what is the good, well-pleasing, and perfect will of God." — Romans 12:1–2
The body is presented; the mind is renewed; the will of God is proved by the resulting life. Dokimazete — the same root as 2 Cor 13:5 (the self-examination word from §13) — the renewed mind tests what is good.
The renewal is progressive, not punctiliar:
"But we all, with unveiled face seeing the glory of the Lord as in a mirror, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord, the Spirit." — 2 Corinthians 3:18
The image-of-God (§11, §17) is progressively re-formed in the believer who beholds Christ. From glory to glory — incremental, ongoing, by the Spirit.
The life that follows
"For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared before that we would walk in them." — Ephesians 2:10
"I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. That life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself up for me." — Galatians 2:20
"For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain." — Philippians 1:21
The new life is prepared (Eph 2:10 — for good works, which God prepared before that we), Christ-centered (Gal 2:20 — and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me.), and oriented toward the eternal (Phil 1:21 — to die is gain). The plan was given before the walking began. The walking happens by faith in the one who gave the plan.
The final shedding — the resurrection body
"For we know that if the earthly house of our tent is dissolved, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal, in the heavens. For most certainly in this we groan, longing to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, if indeed being clothed, we will not be found naked. For indeed we who are in this tent do groan, being burdened, not that we desire to be unclothed, but that we desire to be clothed, that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life." — 2 Corinthians 5:1–4
"body is sown perishable; it is raised imperishable. It is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power. It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a." — 1 Corinthians 15:42–44
"For our citizenship is in heaven, from where we also wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will change the body of our humiliation to be conformed to the body of his glory, according to the working by which he is able even to subject all things to himself." — Philippians 3:20–21
"Behold, I tell you a mystery. We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we will be changed. For this perishable body must become imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality." — 1 Corinthians 15:51–53
The final shedding is at the resurrection. Mortality is swallowed up of life (2 Cor 5:4). The natural body is replaced by the spiritual body — same person, different mode. Change, not annihilation. The earthy is finally put off; the heavenly is fully put on.
The sequence is: born once in the flesh → born again in the Spirit (entry) → old man crucified, new man put on (process) → resurrection body at the last trump (completion). Three stages of progressive shedding-of-the-earthy and putting-on-of-the-heavenly. The new life began at regeneration; it is completed at resurrection.
See: Genesis 2:7; 3:19; Psalm 51:10–12; Ecclesiastes 12:7; John 3:1–8; 4:24; Romans 6:1–14; 8:1–17; 12:1–2; 1 Corinthians 15:35–58; 2 Corinthians 3:18; 4:16–5:10; 2 Corinthians 5:17; Galatians 2:20; Ephesians 2:1–10; 4:17–24; Philippians 1:21–23; 3:7–21; Colossians 3:1–11; 1 Thessalonians 4:13–18; 1 Peter 1:23.