Questions on the Afterlife: "In heaven will we still be male and female?"

In Jesus’s teaching on marriage in the New Creation, he declares that there will be no more marriage in the resurrection (Luke 20:34–36). In that teaching, Jesus says that the children of God will be “like angels”. Some interpret this statement to suggest that humans will become genderless in the New Creation.

But this interpretation doesn’t seem to line up with the rest of what the Bible teaches. Remember, we will spend eternity in the New Creation in our resurrected bodies. Those resurrected bodies will be real, authentic human bodies that have a great deal of continuity with our current bodies. In other words, while your resurrected body will be glorified, purified, and perfected, it will still look like you!

Gender is a God-created aspect of humanity. What’s more, when Jesus appeared in his own resurrected body, he was still male (John 20–21, especially John 20:15). Jesus’s resurrected body is the firstfruits of our own resurrected bodies (1 Corinthians 15:20). It seems that we will spend all eternity as male and female, just as we are today.