Christian Burial and Transhumanism

And welcome to the American Churchman podcast. I'm your host, John Harris. We are going to be talking about transhumanism today, and I want to just plug TruthScript really quick. If you go to truthscript .com, scroll down to the bottom, you can find the Donate tab.

You can also find the Publish tab. If you like what we're doing and you want to participate, that's how you do it. Like I said, my name is John, and my co-host is Matthew Pearson. As always, here on this 4th of July week, it is summer.

Summer's in full swing. Of course, it's always summer in Florida, but in New York, it's actually summer right now. And I just had a big thunderstorm, which reminded me of that while I was trying to do work outside.

So that's how my day has been going. How's yours been going, Matthew?

It's been fine.

Just been doing some work, you know, just working today, but I'm not looking forward to the heat tomorrow because tomorrow I'll be pressure washing all day. So I'll really be feeling it, but no, today's been fine.

I've been looking forward to this cast as always.

So here we go.

Yeah.

I just did pressure washing and it seems fun. Before you do it, you're like, oh, it'll be so refreshing. And then when you're halfway into it, you're like, this is terrible.

Yeah, well, I'm at least getting paid for it. So that's the thing, you know, is when you get a paycheck, it's nice.

And it is nice to like see something get clean or, you know, I don't know what you're washing, but I don't know if you like to see the change. Like painting is like that too, where you see the fruits of your labor right there in real time, which is kind of cool.

Oh yeah, for sure, for sure.

Doxing, Internet Lingo, and the Meaning of "Crash Out"

Yeah, so, hey, I got a question for you. We're going to get into this attribute, but I, so I just saw recently, like within the last hour, people on X were saying, this is, this is totally random, right?

But that murder, okay, sorry, doxing is murder. Not like it's like murder, but it is murder. And I had multiple people telling me that. And I was like, I was a little confused. I think I might know where they're coming from, but because you're Matthew Pearson and you're younger and you're in with the cool things and all that, do we even say cool anymore?

What's going on? What am I missing? What, do you know what that's about?

I have not seen such a thing actually on Twitter recently, but I mean, my guess as to, yeah, my guess as to how that would be or why that's being said or how that should be interpreted is that doxing is akin to, you know, character assassination because somebody is intentionally concealing their identity due to a job they're in or a position they're holding.

And by somebody leaking that information, you're intentionally ruining and upending their lives in such a manner that like, it's basically like, it's practically a murder. It's obviously exaggerated, but that would be my guess as to why people are saying doxing is murders because you're upending someone's own livelihood.

Yeah, that's, okay. So I was on the right track then. I thought, okay, this must be

That's just a guess, Matt.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's a good guess though because you guessed the same thing that I was guessing and I checked right before the podcast with a few other guys and they were saying something similar, so.

Okay.

But doxing now, I don't even know what it is because I've had guys tell me that I, so I had someone tell me that I murdered them. They're still alive, but I murdered them or I tried to murder them, I should say.

So some people say it's murder. Some people say it's attempted murder. And we actually, we have Romans 8 shaman who's saying right now it's attempted murder. Okay, so some people are telling me right now it is murder though.

Anyway, so they said that I murdered them because I used their first name, which is publicly available and that was doxing. And I don't know, like in my mind, doxing is you expose where someone lives and expose them to their enemies who might be crazy enough to go hurt them or murder them.

That's, I always thought like that was doxing, but I get, I don't know, maybe there's a broad definition. What do you think doxing is, Matthew? What is doxing in your mind when you hear that? Oh, I can't hear you.

Sorry, I had my mic muted. I would say that doxing is basically like the public releasing of information about somebody who otherwise remains anonymous online.

Or whatever.

And I would say it would be doxing regardless of whether the information is publicly available or not. It's one thing to say, oh, well, their name is literally in the bio of their post or whatever, or oh, they say, follow my sub stack and the link to the sub stack, it uses their name.

But it's another thing if like stuff is like maybe a bit more difficult to access or come by or whatever. So there's like a lot of debate over that because some people like to get hyper-autistic about what the definition of doxing is because, oh, if there's any public information about you at all, you obviously, that's not being doxed, that's just presenting public information.

But the point being is that some people are just, they don't get all the blind spots, I guess, or whatever. But yeah, I guess that's just how I would define doxing is the releasing of someone's information from someone who's otherwise anonymous, or I guess the more technical term pseudonymous basically.

But yeah, I mean, you see controversy like this all the time, like with the whole like Watson watch thing, controversy with him releasing dissident soaps, like real name or whatever, even though it was tied with the company, he was called like a doxer because regardless

It was publicly available, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, but like, regardless of that, like people are otherwise operating under a pseudonym. And so like, but the thing is, is that not everybody goes out of their way to find that information. So there are certain like plebs and fiends out there who like, they're not gonna go and find that stuff.

But when somebody else who is willing to makes it public, it draws more negative attention.

Man, this is, okay, I'm glad I'm talking to you about this because this is such a broad way of conceiving of this. This could be anything from, yeah, highlighting something publicly available, like a name to releasing someone's address to Antifa.

Like that is such a big spectrum in my mind. But I'm glad I gotta be up on the internet lingo. I thought I was pretty up on it, but you know, it's within like the last two or three weeks that I finally understood what crashing out was.

So maybe I'm behind. I keep hearing people say it. Actually, you've even said it. And I was sort of like nodding along assuming, I'm like, oh yeah, crash out. Okay, that means like, you know, I don't know.

Like you're just kind of not putting any effort in or you're just kind of like careless. But now I realize crash out means that you're like, you're like a plane going down in flames and you're choosing a hill to die on, which was very foolish usually.

So now I get it now, but. I'm a millennial.

The big thing with internet lingo and just language in general is that based off context and things of that nature, definitions change like all the time. And it's like circumstantial. You have to look at how it's being used contextually.

And like, that's just the reality of language. And that's like, you know, that happens all the time with words. So if I say the word save right now, that could mean I'm saving someone from getting hurt or I'm saving somebody from getting in trouble for not doing their laundry or the Lord Jesus saved me from sin, death, and the devil.

But in the King James, when you read the word save, it does have that general meaning. But you know, like I think it's the King James in Galatians where Paul says, far be it for me to boast in anything, save the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.

When in English we hear that nowadays, he's like, wait, how was the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ saved? No, what it means is like, far be it for me to boast in anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.

So, you know, language just does that, so.

Yep, and it's quicker online, so. All right, well, if you're listening and you're a millennial or older, you may have been educated already. This podcast is already worth it for you because you know what doxing can mean and you know what crash out means.

But we're gonna talk about things even more important, much more important. I'm gonna let Matthew take it away. We're gonna do our attribute of God.

The Almighty God

Of course, yeah.

So our attribute today is going to be God as Almighty. So what's fun is that I actually, I looked in a few places for this. I looked in Richard Moeller's dictionary. I looked in Herman Bovink's Reform Dogmatics, and I did not actually find a single section on God as Almighty, but nevertheless, I came up with something regardless.

And I'm gonna have some Bible verses in the beginning, of course. And this will actually end with a quotation from the Heidelberg Catechism, which is a bit helpful at helping us understand what it means for God to be Almighty.

The first verse that we will be reading from is Jeremiah 32, verse 27, where the scriptures say, behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh. Is there anything too hard for me? And then the second scripture verse is Revelation 1, verse 8.

This one's a bit more nail on the head. And speaking of God as Almighty, you'll see in a second, the scripture says, I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.

So it's kind of like right out in the open there. But when we speak of God being Almighty, Almighty, we speak of it as both an attribute of God and a name which is predicated of God by virtue of this attribute.

As an attribute of God, God being Almighty, it predicates of God a complete and total power which he has as the eternal, infinite, simple, and sold God possesses and exercises by his eternal decree. Thus, God has the power to, because God is Almighty, he has a power to create from nothing, to grant eternal life, to grant just decrees to the righteous and punish the wicked, and to orchestrate all things whichever come to pass.

So God as Almighty, this attribute is a vindication of God as sovereign. So it's a vindication of his sovereign rule because God being Almighty, this grants him the grounds on which he rules as a sovereign on which he reigns, because no one can claim to be God who is without the supreme and infinite power which he possesses.

So this then also, this connection with sovereignty and God being Almighty, this overflows into the idea of Almighty not just being an attribute, but a title for God. Notice how in that Revelation 1, verse 8 verse, he calls himself the Almighty.

Almighty as a title for God, it basically states, this ties again into sovereignty, but it states that God claims right over all things by virtue of his power. This is because all things are subjected to him as he made all things, and thus he presides as the sovereign and judge over all creation.

He's the giver of life and he is the law giver, the one from whom all authorities derive their own power. So God as Almighty grants might to his creation, to men, to beasts. So man possesses power in the same way that God possesses power, but only insofar as it is granted to them by this Almighty God.

To abuse or transgress this power is actually a grave injustice because it is actually insulting to God's own power because the power which they exercise wrongly is a participation in God's own power and thus to misuse this power and act unjustly is to blaspheme God himself.

But that would basically be the idea of God being Almighty. And from this, there actually is a wonderful, practical application that we take from this. One of the things that God has the ability to do being Almighty is the ability to grant eternal life, to change your status.

You go from being someone who is under the wrath and condemnation of God in time to being granted access to the throne of God, to eternal life because you have the Lord Jesus Christ as your advocate who pleads your case before the Father.

And because God is Almighty, he can pardon you of your sins, he can redeem you. And so a place we can go to see this is actually, where we'll end, it will be the Heidelberg Catechism question and answer 26.

And the question is this, what do you believe when you say, I believe in God, the Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth? And the answer to that is that the eternal father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who out of nothing created heaven and earth and everything in them, who still upholds and rules them by his eternal counsel and providence is my God and father because of Christ the son.

I trust God so much that I do not doubt he will provide whatever I need for body and soul and will turn to my good, whatever adversity he sends upon me in this sad world. God is able to do this.

Why?

Because he is Almighty God and desires to do this because he is a faithful father. So God is able to do all these wonderful things because he's Almighty. And why does he do it? Because our status has been changed.

We have been adopted. He is no longer just the judge over us, but he now is our unfaithful father. And that is the attribute of God as Almighty in a nutshell.

So I got a little daughter and she is just learning to walk. And when she looks at me, she'll put her hands up, right? Cause she wants me to pick her up or help her walk. Or she looks at me as like stronger, more powerful, obviously.

And I know that's obviously a very imperfect parallel because it's not even close to, God is the source of all our life, right? And you could say, I guess my daughter, I'm the source of my daughter's life, my wife and I, but not in the same way.

But there is this dependency that she has and a recognition that she's incapable at such a young age. And I think that's my reaction to this attribute of God. And it should be our Christian reaction, right?

That he is capable of moving any mountain. And whatever situation you find yourself in, I mean, that is the application. God is powerful enough to get you through it and bring a positive end, a positive conclusion.

There must be a complete dependency on him because of this. That's the application of my mind. And when we try to walk, when we can't, when we try to do things that only God can do, we fall down, we look silly, right?

And so there are things that are gonna always be beyond the scale that God's given us and that's where we have to leave it to him. So that was the initial thought I had. What do you think of as far as application?

I mean, that's gotta be one. I'm sure there's others.

Yeah, I think for application, the big thing about application in, I would say like in regard to sermon or just in regard to just doing theology in general for your own personal study is further establishing the relational characteristics of God in relation specifically to you.

So thinking, okay, like we should study theology and the things of God in and of themselves because it is valuable in and of itself because God is of infinite value and we of course will benefit. But like part of the big thing with Almighty is like how that question or how the answer to the question from the Heidelberg Catechism ended there was how it spoke of how God is able to because he's Almighty, but God desires to because he is a faithful father.

So the very fact that God can be our father derives from the fact that he is all powerful and Almighty. So I think part of that is there's a comfort in the fact that God loves and cares for you.

Why?

Because he is able to do so. His desires and affection for you are grounded in his ability to do that. And you may wonder, well, why does God need an ability to do that? Isn't it very easy to just love someone?

And to that, you just need to laugh and think, okay, when somebody wrongs you, how easy is it to love them? I find it incredibly difficult to love those who do me wrongly. It's very hard if you feel very betrayed, even if you forgive someone, it's difficult for trust to be restored.

That has to happen over a period of time. And even if it does happen over a period of time, trust may never fully be restored, even if they're forgiven. But in the snap of a finger, in an instant, God decided to take you in.

He made you his, he adopted you, he claimed you as his own, he marked you as his. And so the fact that God has the ability to do that, that God has saved you from sin and salvation shows that stems from him being Almighty.

And also the fact that we're not necessarily promised a peaceful life necessarily, or a life of flourishing and all that. But regardless, God is able to carry you through the trials. Why is he able to?

Because he is Almighty.

Yeah, so I think another thing is, I'm gonna go out on a limb. This is kind of, I guess, a bold thing to say in a way, but I don't think most pastors, oh man, that's such a, I really am going out on a limb saying this.

Uh-oh.

Most, all right, I'll say it this way. Most of the popular pastors, I don't say all pastors, but most of the popular pastors, I don't know if they believe this completely. And we struggle in our own lives at times to fully trust God, right?

And to believe that he actually is powerful enough to meet a situation. But doing the work that I've done, especially living through 2020, I think the fear of man, the fear of the government especially, and power, powerful institutions.

We really did see an experiment in real time where so many Christian institutions and a lot of them with pastors on their boards and pastors who are writing for them and running them, they showed where their true fear is, who they really thought was powerful, who they really thought made the rules.

And it doesn't seem like it was the Lord Jesus Christ who said to meet on Sunday or to, the Lord Jesus Christ who doesn't put any racial or ethnic barriers between someone and the gospel or church leadership or any of these things that the Bible talks about, understanding the word.

But there was a lot of people that went along with all of this, right? So anyway, I think just a good dose of stories that from the scripture and maybe even from church history that reinforce this attribute of God and really believing this attribute of God cures that.

Because it's the fear of God that he can, what does Jesus say, right? Fear the one who can kill, to destroy the soul in hell over the person who can destroy the body. God's truly almighty, even when it looks like everyone else is scary and powerful and can hurt you.

So, and dox you. So, I figured I'd get that in there. Let's maybe switch gears a little bit here. We do have comments coming in and I wanna remind everyone, if you do have a comment or a question to share, you can do that during the course of this.

We're gonna talk a little bit about the last week. Was it last week or the week before? I can't remember when we last did a pod. I think it was last week.

Last week, yeah.

We talked about AI, right? Right, so you got most of it though. We talked about AI and one of the things that we kind of maybe skipped along the surface on is this idea of transhumanism. And AI is seen as a means to that end.

Transhumanism is the end that many utopians and futurists are banking on. They actually have a optimism about technology that we're going to get to the point where things like Neuralink are going to help us bind with technology, connect to AI.

We're going to be able to connect to the internet of things and have all the available knowledge that humans have amassed at our fingertips and possibly cheat death. I mean, that's the ultimate goal here because if we can switch out parts, if we can have, let's say, we can grow parts of our body in labs, organic biological material using cloning technology and that kind of thing, then we can effectively just transplant organs.

We can take our consciousness. Maybe we can download it. I mean, there's all kinds of directions that people think this goes. And it's kind of scary to talk about that. People, Christians especially, I think, get nervous.

I think the dispensational folks start to think in terms of like, this is the mark of the beast and we're going to be raptured out of here soon and that kind of thing. But I think everyone gets a little nervous with this kind of talk.

But I think we do need to talk about it because it's an alternative religion in a sense. It's an optimism in man's perfectibility and that sin won't keep us back. We will actually have eternal life. So we'll cheat the curse that God put on man because of death, right?

The day that Adam disobeyed God, that was the day that he would surely die. And death is separation, separation from the body. And Adam degraded and eventually died. It took him a while, but we're going to get to this point, supposedly that some people think we're not going to have death anymore.

I don't know if you listen to these guys. I reference Ray Kurzweil a lot because I used to listen to him years ago, not because I was into what he said, but because I was curious about what he said because it was so weird.

But he has that belief. He takes like an incredible amount of supplements every day. And he thinks if he lasts long enough, he may be able to actually live forever. And you think it's nuts, but there's people who actually really believe this at very high levels, very smart people, right?

So what do we do as Christians? How do we respond to this kind of thing? So do you, I don't know if you read anything or know anything about this. You want to add to any of that, Matthew?

I haven't looked too deeply into this. I have my obvious concerns though, but I'm more familiar with the case of Brian Johnson and not the liver King Brian Johnson,.

The roided out freak,.

But the weird vegan Brian Johnson that takes like a million supplements a day. And it's like, has like all these like red lights on them all the time and like does these things. And he like injects his own younger son's blood into himself to make himself a younger, whatever.

I can tell you haven't heard of that, John, but I've seen some of what he does. And yeah, it's very odd, but I think one of the funniest things about that is like, obviously maybe they say, oh, you can live like long insofar as you're preventing natural death from occurring.

But I mean, the thing is, is that if they think they can just like live forever, like there are still, you know, the Lord numbers everyone's days. And even if you do manage to prevent, you know, dying from natural causes, like they're very obviously is still the chance of, you know, something catastrophic happening.

And to me, it seems as if it's just man attempting to, you know, subvert the sovereignty of God, failing to realize that, you know, providence is out there and providence is over you. You do not escape the eye of providence.

And part of providence includes the day of your death. And it's not the same thing as like, you know, the ancient Greek understanding of fate where there wasn't sort of a rhyme or reason for it. Even the gods were subjected to fate.

Even Zeus bowed down before fate, but like there's a very particular reason behind death. And like, it happens because of the fall and the Lord has a good reason behind it all. Even if we in this life don't fully understand it.

Yeah. Wow. I have not, I mean, I've heard about that, but I didn't know anyone who was publicly saying they were doing that with blood.

That's

Yeah, he is.

Yeah.

And you gotta think about, like I haven't really processed this deeply, but why is that disturbing? Right? Why is that? Like you could, he probably thinks it's no big deal. Like my son's fine. Right? But it's like, I don't know.

Like the life is in the blood. There is something sacred about this. And when you go, I mean, I've given to a Red Cross like once in my life, because I hate trying blood, but I know it's a good thing and people do it.

My dad does it all the time. And you're giving them your life in the case of an accident or something. And I don't know, there's just, there's something I can't quite quantify in words about it, but taking that from, taking that life force from your child like that just seems out of the created order.

It just seems like out of step, wrong. Something's demonic about it or just weird.

John, if it helps you feel any better, in the private chat, I just sent an article where it says, I'm no longer injecting my son's blood. And then it says, Brian Johnson, he abandons the blood infusions for just plasma exchange.

So he's just getting his good plasma now.

Yeah.

So he stepped away from the blood.

Well, nevermind. It's all is well and good.

Yeah.

Well, we have an article and I'll just read, it's pretty short. So we'll just go through it. But this is an article that describes some of this issue. And I don't know. I just think it's good to go through.

We could just stop. Let me, I'm trying to, can you see that? Everyone can see that, right? Okay, good. I switched screens. So the case for Christian burial, a remedy for transhumanism by Doug Steffi. Society's approach to death, he says, and dying has fallen on hard times.

Euphemisms such as passing away and celebration of life aim to ease the sting of death. Death and dying is frequently outsourced to nursing homes and hospitals, preventing the mortality of loved ones from serving as a memento mori, remembering that you shall likewise die.

I've noticed a parallel cultural trend, cremation and replacement for longstanding custom of burial. He's absolutely right on this because I've noticed that too. And usually it's economic factors, but it seems like everyone's cremated today.

I don't know if you noticed that, but when I was a kid, it wasn't that way quite as much. It just seems like that's accelerating. So anyway, this shift is evident to anyone who attends a funeral somewhat regularly and statistics confirm those observations.

According to the Cremation Association of North America, the percentage of Americans who chose cremation rose from 38 in 2009 to almost 62 in 2024. The National Funeral Directors Association expects that number to eclipse 80 by 2045.

With those numbers in context, only 3 .6 of Americans chose cremation in 1960. I'm gonna stop there for a moment and just like take a breath and analyze that, because I'm sure there's economic factors, but boy, I have to think this has something to do with trying to kind of, I don't know, not be confronted with death and things that make you uncomfortable.

Churches don't really actually have graveyards anymore. That's not even something that's, all the modern churches that you see, even if they look like traditional buildings, of course, most look like strip malls or some kind of a corporate building now, but even if they look like a traditional building, I've yet to see one that takes into account a cemetery.

That just doesn't happen. And how many of those kinds of things are we separated from now? We don't kill our own animals, right? Less people are hunting, less people are on farms. We're so separated from death.

And this is just one more example of that in my mind, because when you go to a funeral, and I'm not trying to knock anyone by the way, I understand there's situations and I get it, but when you go to a funeral and it's a cremation and all you see are pictures there, it is sad, but there is something about a casket, especially an open casket, my goodness, but just a casket, knowing that there's a shell in there, there's a body in there, it sobers you up in ways that I just don't think happen when it's cremation.

So some people have never been to an open casket actually. Have you been to one, Matthew, an open casket?

No, I don't believe I have. Actually, no, I have been to an open casket funeral. There was someone I knew back during high school and he passed away tragically. And I went to his funeral last year and his was an open casket.

Okay, yeah, so I've been to several of those and it's sobering, I guess, when that happens. You can see the shell of the person at least. Anyway, the article goes on and it says, man justifies the choice to cremate financially over concern for the environment or for familial flexibility.

These, however, fail to explain the aforementioned universality of Christian burial, at least until very recently, regardless of time, place, cost, or convenience. These justifications may indeed be secondary motivations for cremation, but I would contend that the Christian acceptance of cremation is just one effect of a more serious underlying cause, an understanding of Christian anthropology that diminishes the value and goodness of the body in a way that is at odds with both scripture and the Christian tradition.

So I'll just be open a little bit. So my wife just like maybe two years ago, almost now, her mother died unexpectedly. And they go back a long ways in the Catskill Mountains and they have a family funeral.

Actually, it's land that belonged to their family that they gave to, I guess, the town and they made it into a funeral, or sorry, what am I saying, a graveyard. And so there's a lot of extra costs, just so people know this.

There are a lot of extra costs that obviously go into preserving a body and that kind of thing. But if you're not concerned with that, if you can do a funeral very quickly, then you don't have to pay, a lot of those fees go away.

So I just, food for thought, we just went through this and you can save substantial amount. Obviously, it helps to have your own plot and everything like that. But yeah, it's very expensive if you just go to like a normal graveyard or cemetery and you wanna put a body there.

But he talks about the universality of this. He says that Christians have long maintained that humans are created as both body and soul while angels are exclusively spiritual and animals exclusively physical.

Mankind has been uniquely created by God as being a composite of both the physical and spiritual, possessing both a body and a soul is central to what it means to be human. The church has little difficulty with the soul.

It is eternal, important and in need of redemption. The body on the other hand is where uncertainty sets in. Is the body temporary, eternal or partially both? If it's temporary, then how important is it?

Is the body in need of a redemption? The answers to these questions will affect how we handle the physical bodies of those whose souls have departed. The reformed tradition provides some helpful clarity.

Westminster says that bodies of believers being still united to Christ do rest in their graves until the resurrection. And Matthew Henry comments that their souls are in his presence and their dust is under his care and power.

It also says in the Westminster that all the dead shall be raised up with self, same bodies and none other all though with different qualities. In short, the body remains in union with Christ and under his care after death.

And that same body will itself be raised in glory while we must balance these truths with passages that emphasize the mortality and lowliness of our earthly bodies. It is also true that our bodies eternally a part of who we are.

Our body is perishing not into nothingness or replacement but rather into death and resurrection. Maybe we'll stop there for a moment and talk about this. Jesus obviously had a resurrected body which was different.

I mean, he went through walls, but he also had the scars in his hands and he was recognizable that that was Jesus even though his body was different. And we're told that that's the kind of body we're going to have.

We're gonna have a resurrected body. And I don't know what that looks like, but this has been part of the Christian tradition to bury. And so many questions come up with this. Like, well, what if you die at sea?

What if fish eat you? What if you were cremated? And like, what's gonna happen then? Is it, are you just, how does God figure that out? Because that's such a puzzle, right? And I don't know the answer to that, but I trust God because he's all powerful.

He's, as we've talked about, right? He's mighty and he can figure that out. But there is, it is odd to me that for thousands of years, this is how Christians in general treated this. And all of a sudden, this is the anomaly that we don't do this anymore.

So thoughts, Matthew?

Yeah, a few. First off, like a very important principle, which is it's very common in the Christian tradition, but it's been made popular in recent years due to discussions about Christian nationalism and things like that.

But it's like a very true principle that grace doesn't destroy nature. And so part of the idea of like the funeral with the traditional burial is like, yes, maggots and worms and just the course of time and things like that may erode at this body.

Regardless though, God will one day raise it up. And not only will he raise it up, but he won't cast it away, he will make it anew. God will put back together what sin has taken apart. And the fact that Christ rose again bodily goes to show that Christ not only lived in the body a perfect life, but he died a perfect death.