Death Into Life

A Sermon based on I Kings 17:17-24 and  Luke 7:11-17.

Given on June 9, 2013 at St. Timothy Lutheran Church, Charleston, WV

 

Is it just me, or are people today preoccupied with the dead and the undead?

We've had a recent rash of Vampire books and movies, tons of Zombie stories, not to mention a TV series called Pushing Daisies and another called Ghost Whisperers. That one kind of interests me as a counselor. Jennifer Love Hewitt plays a perky little Marlo Thomas '”That Girl” double who has been newly married, has just opened up an antique store and who has a side line of helping earth-bound spirits pass over to the other side. She's a kind of therapist/social worker for spirits who have unresolved issues with the living. 

 

When she connects the dots for her unhappy clients, then the spirits can 'go to the light' and leave the living alone. - No mention of Heaven or Hell in these cases – I suppose we'd have to have another series for that...

Now most of these stories involve people going from living to dead or from dead to undead. Generally, they're not about going from death to life – although there are a couple of exceptions. In Pushing Daisies, the dead come back for 60 seconds or less, just enough time to give vital information about how they died - And in the recent movie “Warm Bodies' – a sensitive young Zombie comes back to life through the power of human love.

But this is probably the closest this genre gets to the kind of narratives we have in today's reading - two stories of the dead being brought back to life.

In the first case, we have Elijah raising a widow's son – and in the second case also the raising of a widow's son, this time by Jesus. 

 

In the first case, Elijah had a prior acquaintance with the widow. He had asked her to make him a pita bread with her last bit of flour and oil, and then provided her an inexhaustible supply of both that lasted her 'many days'.

In the case of the widow of Nain, Jesus had no prior acquaintance with the family, but was moved by compassion for the widow's loss.

In both cases, a widow gets her son back – no little thing considering that in those days a widow's son would have been the sum total of any Social Security she could expect to ever have.

In both cases the sons are brought back immediately to their mothers, and in both cases, there is an immediate recognition of the office of Prophet – even the language of recognition is similar:

“Now I know that you are a man of God and that the word in your mouth is truth.” (I Kings 17:24) “A great prophet has arisen among us! God has visited his people!” (Luke 7:16 )

Now just after this incident in our Lucan passage, Jesus sends word to John the Baptist in prison, confirming the nature of his identity, citing his works as proof: “the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the poor have the good news preached to them, and the dead are raised! (Luke 7:22)

Raising the dead then, is one of those signature activities that confirm one's prophetic status – and also seems to increase people's discernment of prophets considerably!

Both of these stories are engaging to be sure, but I believe that what we have here is more than just cool stories about prophets establishing their Bona Fides. Rather, these are prophetic actions that point to the 'Big Holy Audacious Goal” of our faith: Resurrection Life!

In John 10:10, Jesus is quoted as saying, “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” John 1:4 states, “In him was life and the life was the light of men.”

In John chapter 6:35, the day after feeding the 5,000, the people come back to Jesus asking for bread from heaven – manna, just like their forefathers ate. Jesus replies, “I am the bread of life” - causing the Jews to take offense and grumble. 

 

But Jesus goes on to explain that whoever believes in him has eternal life, will be raised up on the last day, and that whosoever eats of Jesus, the bread of life, will live forever; the bread that he gives is 'for the life of the world'. (Jn. 6:47-51)

Notice what Jesus does not claim for himself: He's not “Jesus of Nazareth, Vampire Slayer”, “Jesus, son of Zombie Killer”, or Jesus Christ (Holy) Ghost Whisperer!”

No!, He claims to be something far greater – 'the Way, the Truth and the Life”, the exclusive means of salvation: “no one comes to the Father but through me,” (John 14:6) says Jesus. A pretty remarkable claim for anyone who does NOT happen to be the Lord of Life!

What we have on offer, then, is Life – Resurrection Life. But before we can understand Life, we must first look at death, the enemy of Life.

Remember that when God created man, he placed him in the Garden and said to him, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day you eat of it you shall surely die.” (Gen. 2:16,17)

You know the rest of the story – how Eve was tempted to eat by the serpent, how she gave Adam to eat of the fruit, and he willingly went along ... how God subsequently caused the ground to be cursed on account of Adam's sin, and then made him to live by the sweat of his brow until such time as he physically died and returned to the earth - ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

Perhaps the most painful thing however, was being driven out of the Garden – out of the intimate Presence of God. This loss of Communion with God, this excommunication, was and is, the essence of Death. The separation of Death also invaded the physical world, as God spilled the blood animals in order to get their skins to clothe the nakedness of the first couple.

Not only do we suffer separation from God and the Environment, but because of the guilt of sin, there is now psychological separation from oneself, and ultimate distrust and separation between the man and the woman. These are all effects of of the Original Sin, all aspects of the Separation of Death.

The Apostle Paul tells us in Romans 5:12 that as sin and death entered the world through one man, Adam, so the free gift of god also came to us through one man, Jesus. But whereas Adam's sin brought death to all, Christ's free gift of Grace brings 'life to many'.

And just as the essence of death is Separation, the essence of life is Communion – living in the Presence of God, experiencing the restoration of fellowship with Him, and healing in all our relationships, starting with ourselves, then with others and even into the Environment around us.

This last point brings us to the nature of Resurrection Life. When Jesus said that the Bread that he gave would be for the Life of the World, what was he talking about? I suggest that it was tied to the Resurrection in that the physical world was intended by God to be a means of our communion with Him.

You know, he could have created us as disembodied spirits, living a life of Pure Being without bodies and without physical reality at all. In fact, there are some who think that the reason Satan and his legions rebelled against God in the first place was because they were offended by God's intention to put a being made in his own image into a crass physical body – and then to send his own son, the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world – into the world in physical form was too much for the high and mighty Lucifer to swallow. At any rate, physical stuff was created by God to be a vehicle for, and a means of Communion with God.

And remember, Communion IS life. The Life of the World is what God wants for us – Resurrection Life that heals this 4-fold separation, this 4-fold death. 

 

What then is the relationship between the Resurrection Life and Death?

In a word, they are Enemies.

Several weeks ago, during Senate hearings on the death of four Americans in Benghazi, Senator Elijah Cummings, referring to a eulogy he gave at a relative's funeral, said, ...'that death is a part of life...we have to find a way to make life a part of death.”

Based on our texts today, I would suggest to you that neither Jesus nor Mr. Cummings namesake would agree with that statement. Neither one of them would agree that the main purpose of our faith is to find a way to make better funerals! In fact, they were both more apt to wreck funerals than to assist them!

Theologian Alexander Schmemann says it this way: “Christianity is not reconciliation with death. It is the revelation of death and it reveals death because it is the revelation of life. Christ IS this life. And only if Christ is life is death what Christianity proclaims it to be – namely the enemy to be destroyed.” (For the Life of the world, pg. 99,100) Revelation 20:14 says as much. Death and Hades will be thrown into the lake of fire at the Great Judgment of all things.

It's for this reason that the text of one of the great Easter Hymns of the Orthodox church proclaims, “Christ is risen from the Death, trampling down death by death, and upon those in the tombs bestowing life!” The icon of the Harrowing of Hell graphically depicts what the hymns sings – that Christ came to destroy death, not to offer help for better funerals!

Although suffering and death have entered this world through the sin of Adam their very existence in the world is abnormal. Christ triumphs over our archenemy Death, and transforms death into Victory by his own death on the Cross.

So how does this Resurrection Life manifest itself? How do we enter into it, Participate in it? In a word, through the Church.

Alexander Schmemann again:

“The church is the entrance into the risen life of Christ. It is communion in life eternal” (Schmemann, pg. 106) (repeat for emphasis)

Think of that! The church is our Participation – right now – into the Resurrection Life! The Church, as flawed and fallible as it is!

But it only makes sense. What is the church by Nature? The Body of Christ. And how specifically do we become the body of Christ? 

 

By virtue of God adopting us – by Grace – into his family and then filling us with his own Self in the person of the Holy Spirit. The church is, by Nature a Communion, not an organization. It is the Union of all the faithful who have ever lived or ever will live. That's why we talk about “The communion of the saints.” It's all of us who enter into the Resurrection Life of Christ.

And this leads us into the clearest, most direct participation in the Risen Life...That Table (pointing). What do we do there? We Commune! The Body of Christ comes together in its local expression and 'lifts up our hearts' to the lord. We go up to heaven and heaven reveals itself to us as we eat the food and drink of new and unending life in Christ.

Just as the Jewish people eat a Seder meal every Passover, and so renew their participation in their Covenant with God, so too the church eats the New Passover Meal at the communion table, participating in the New Covenant of His Blood poured out for us.

Just as the Jewish people had to eat the Passover lamb in order for the Angel of death to pass over them, so too we must eat the Lamb of God in order for death to passover us and for us to enter into the fullness of His resurrected life. Communion then is not simply a ceremonial taste of bread and wine but life itself. Communion IS life! It is by definition the opposite of separation, which is, by definition, Death. 

 

So if if this is so important, can a Christian still be a Christian and not participate in the life of the Church or in Communion? To answer that, let's think about the nature of family life.

During my teen years, I lived near St. Paul Minnesota – 1,000 miles away from my extended family here in WV. My dad had siblings in Houston, TX, Lexington, Ky, Atlanta, GA, and Miami, Fl. I don't ever remember a Counts family reunion. My wife, on the other hand, used to go with her family almost every Sunday to Grandma's house for fried chicken dinner, and extended family gatherings were frequent. That doesn't mean that she liked or got along with every one of her relatives, but she did know them and did participate in their lives to a greater extent than I could with my extended family.

Can you be a Christian without going the Church? Yes, by God's grace, you can. But what you don't get is Participation in the LIFE of the church through regular Communion with the very Risen Christ! This is what God offers us – and what we in turn have to offer the world.

Let's go back and think about the sons and widows from our readings. Imagine yourself in the place of the mother. In a moment your sadness and loss turns into incredible astonishment and joy. Your only son, your hope for the future and your very heart has come back to you from the place where no one ever returns. It is a day like no other, a day you will never forget and never tire of telling.

Imagine yourself as the son. You pass from life into death and then into life after death - and you're just getting settled in when you suddenly awake to your family and a funeral procession! Imagine your confusion, and the look of astonishment on the faces of the people who surround you – laughing and crying all at once. Imagine what it might feel like to live out your natural life knowing that it's all 'granted time' – that you are here in this world because God took pity on your mother and gave you back to her for her comfort. And demonstrate his glory. Imagine your life as a continual demonstration of the reality of God in this world.

If you can do this, you can catch a vision for how we as Christians ought to be living out our Resurrection Life in this world – full of astonishment, hope and abandon. Let me also suggest three key things as practical aids for our daily walk through Resurrection Life: 

1)  Commune Regularly – both at church at home in private. It's a great privilege we have been given – to have intimate fellowship with the Lord God almighty – to actually become a friend of God and to realize his friendship is constant and will never leave us! Take advantage of it daily!

2)  Live Gratefully – Find ways of expressing your thanks to God by receiving the good things of this world as a vehicle to Commune with Him – and then offer these things back to him as an offering. This is the nature of being a believer/priest. 

3) Tell somebody! This is great stuff – the greatest stuff in the world. Don't keep it to yourself. Tell your story and invite others to come to church with you to experience this Communion, this Resurrection Life we offer in Jesus' name.

Three simple things. May God grant us the Grace, the Power and the Love to do them. AMEN.