Christians are about to enter the season of Lent which leads us to the most glorious celebration of our calendar – Resurrection Day. Many get all excited about Christmas, making a big build-up to the holiday but when Easter arrives, it’s almost an afterthought. It’s the BIG day! Everything we believe about our faith hangs on the factual event of Christ’s bodily resurrection. Timothy Keller, in The Reason for God, states the case. “If Jesus rose from the dead, then you have to accept what He said; if He did not rise from the then dead, then why worry about any of what He said?” The Scripture says, "And if Christ has not been raised, then all our preaching is useless, and your faith is useless." (1 Corinthians 15:14, NLT)
The Resurrection of Christ was the event that caused the first generation of disciples to give their lives to travel the length and breadth of the Empire to declare a whole new truth about the meaning of human existence! Would they have willingly died for a lie? Would they have given up their homes, their families, their comfort to spread a falsehood? That makes no sense at all. They were seized by the hope that “all things are made new” and that God had not abandoned them to the grave. It was Good News worth living and dying to tell!
When I was younger, I must confess that I didn’t give a whole lot of thought to the Resurrection. It just seemed like the end of the story, cool, nice, affirming. My life on earth stretched out ahead of me. Death was real but distant. Aches and pains that signal the aging of the body were just a joke about ‘old people.’ Eternal life was something I talked about and accepted, but all the while I was very much taken up with life, right here, right now. I still love life! My newest grandchild arrived in this world yesterday and I would like to be around to see her dance with her Dad at her wedding! There’s a whole lot of loving yet to do.
But, mortality and death are real now, too. I regularly stand in a field of stones now, visiting the plot of ground marked by a piece of granite where my Dad’s body rests. I am less optimistic about my ability to change things around me, too. These words from the Bible are more than a phrase to me: "We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has?" (Romans 8:22-24, NIV) I’ll be preaching the Resurrection with much more eagerness this year!
It isn’t just the hope of a body and soul reunion, a new existence that is without pain or parting that grips me. It is the whole idea that God loves this Creation – including you and me- enough to promise a Divine intervention, an infusion of glorious life that is unimaginably wonderful. We weep, but not as those who are hopeless. We feel sorrow, but not as those engulfed with despair.
Here’s a word from the Word. Let it dry your tears today. May the Spirit of God make it living Truth for us.
"For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet." (1 Corinthians 15:22-25, NIV)
"When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.” (1 Corinthians 15:54, NIV)
"Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain." (1 Corinthians 15:58, NIV)
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A footnote -
CoffeeBreak may be sent out sporadically over the next two weeks. I will be visiting a surgeon today to consult about a serious medical issue that is complicating life at this time. So, if you don’t see my musing in your email, I thank you, in advance for your prayers for me.
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