3:2 What future event is John alluding to here?

(cp 1Cor 1:6-8; Php 3:20; Col 3:4; 1Th 1:10; 2:19-20; 3:13; 5:23; 2Th 3:5; 2 Ti 4:8; Tit 2:13; Jas 5:7-9; 1Pe 1:7; 1Jn 2:28). Together with 1Jn 3:2 these scriptures all allude to what is known as the "rapture" of the church.

This is when Jesus comes again to take all the saints of God - Old Testament and New Testament alike - both living and dead, back to heaven with Him at the first resurrection (cp Jn 5:28-29 with 14:1-3; 1 Cor 15:51-58; 1Th 4:13-18; 2Th 2:7).

At this time, as we saw in 1Cor 15:53, every saint of God will receive a new body (cp 1Cor 15:35, 38-49, 53; Php 3:20-21). Believers' bodies will no longer be weak mortal bodies, subject to death and decay. They will be immortal, supernatural bodies like Christ's resurrection body (cp Lk 24:36-43; Jn 20:19-20, 24-31).

Believers too will be able to walk through walls, like Jesus. We learn from these scriptures also that bodies will be flesh and bone, and that we shall be able to partake of food as Jesus did.

It is only in the resurrection - in their glorified, immortal bodies - that believers will be able to see Christ as He is. That is what John means in 1 Jn 3:2 (KJV), when he says, "...it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is." We could never see Jesus as He really is through physical eyes in a mortal body.

We can only look on His glory through spiritual eyes in an immortal body. The all-inclusive promise of the rapture - being taken up with Christ in glory, and seeing Him as He is, should encourage Christians to live even holier lives than they do (cp 1Jn 2:28, 3:3).

The rapture is a purifying hope - the source of inspiration and consecration for all sincere Christians (cp Eph 5:25-27; Col 3:1-6; 1Th 3:12-13; Jude 20-24). See also comments on 1Cor 15:35, 15:51-58, Php 3:20-21, 1Th 4:13-18, Tit 2:13, 1Pe 1:7.

1 John