What is the difference between resurrection and being brought back to life?
Resurrection differs from a return to life. It is God's unique, sovereign act of raising a dead human being not to die again but to eternal life. One brought back to life must die again. Resurrection brings the just to immortality in God's presence and the lost to the second death. Christ is the first fruits of them that slept.
Les explains that resurrection is not just being brought back to life. It is the unique, sovereign act of God whereby He brings back from the dead a human being who has died, not to die again, but to a life of eternity. He reminds us that when God breathed into man the breath of life, man became a living soul, separating him from other life because man's soul or spirit is immortal, though the body is not. Revelation speaks of the resurrection of the just to a life of immortality in God's presence. The lost are resurrected to a life separated from God, the second death, but they still continue through all eternity. Les notes that some groups teach the lost are annihilated, but that does not line up with Scripture; they will suffer and experience regret and feeling throughout all the eons of eternity. Christ was the first person to ever experience resurrection, and that is why He is called the first fruits, plural, of them that slept.