Reflection on Death - Part 2

            Imagine this headline in today’s newspaper: Cure Found for Death! Newspapers would soon be sold out. Every television and computer would be tuned to the news channels. Everyone would be scrambling to find out what this fantastic announcement had to say. But suppose the article or news report under the headline reported that a traveling teacher has announced that he personally is the cure for death — he has not made a scientific discovery, nor a new medical breakthrough, nor found some secret fountain of youth — but by revelation he has proclaimed himself as the source of life and immortality! We might begin to suspect that he’s just another religious teacher who has gotten carried away with delusions of self-importance, even if he has raised a few dead people back to life. And when we read about his claim that the only way to escape death is to believe in him, we’d say, “How preposterous!” Perhaps its not surprising that relatively few people take Jesus’ bold statement seriously — “He who believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die” (Jn. 11:25-26). After all, it’s probably the most startling claim that anyone has ever made! Why should anyone believe it? We should believe it, not because Jesus raised Lazarus after he had been dead for four days, but because Jesus Himself arose after He died for us — and because He still lives today! The Lamb that was slain is in the midst of the throne, and He has sent forth from the throne the very spirit of His life into us by the power of the Holy Ghost! It is a glorious fact, for we have received it! Christ alone has the credentials to claim that He can give life and immortality to men!

            Death takes in this whole dreadful realm of sin, weakness, fear, sorrow, pain, heartache, rebellion, strife, war, sickness, sadness, torment, and trouble in which men walk without the peace and joy and transforming power of God in their lives. Men need to know that they are dead even while they walk about in a body that appears to be alive; a Christless death in which they are dead to God, dead to Christ, dead to virtue, dead to truth, dead to purity, dead to righteousness, dead to peace, dead to joy, dead to reality, dead to promise, dead to hope, dead to the bright world of the spirit. A man abides in this death throughout all the decades, centuries, or millenniums of his existence until he is awakened by the voice of the Son of God. It was this very truth that Jesus was making clear to us when He said, “He that hath the Son hath life, but he that hath not the Son of God hath not life…” Though such a one should live in the extreme fullness of earth’s pleasures, yet HE IS DEAD while he lives, a stranger to Christ, a stranger to the realm of eternal realities, a stranger to that higher world of spiritual things, and an enemy of God.