The Bible doesn’t mince words about how we should view death: it is our “enemy.” And we naturally fear our mortal enemy. Unless, of course, we know that we can defeat the enemy. And that is what resurrection promises.
Like you, I don’t want to die. I’ve had several very close brushes with death.
As a kid, a congenital defect nearly took my life, leaving me with one functioning kidney.
In 2006, I suffered an aortic dissection. My wife, Linda, saved my life by performing CPR on me in our family room.
After a 12-hour surgery to repair the aorta, I was in a coma for four weeks with Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) which also nearly killed me. I had two open-heart surgeries in one year to reconstruct my ascending aorta and replace my aortic valve.
In 2016, I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease that attacks the smallest blood vessels in my body (which puts my lungs, eyes, and yes, my one kidney, in jeopardy). I must have infusions of Rituximab every six months to keep the disease at bay. This led to another brush with death. See below.
In 2018, I nearly died because my colon failed due to ischemia. After several weeks in the hospital and ICU, they removed my colon.
Due to that emergency, I was forced to miss a Rituxin infusion, which resulted in my kidney nearly failing. After being in the hospital for a whole month (yes, the entire month of August 2018!), my kidney finally healed enough to not go into total failure.
In September 2023, I contracted COVID, which in my immunosuppressed state, nearly took my life. I was in and out of the hospital for three months (including several days in the ICU) because my lungs were suffering from cryptogenic organizing pneumonia. I am still recovering from this.
Resurrection and the Defeat of Our Mortal Enemy
The Bible doesn’t mince words about how we should view death: it is our “enemy.” And we naturally fear our mortal enemy.
Unless, of course, we know that we can defeat the enemy. And that is what resurrection promises.
The Apostle Paul wrote just that in the most marvelous part of the Bible on resurrection, the fifteenth chapter of his first letter to the Corinthians. He makes it crystal clear that Jesus was raised from the dead. And because of that, we too are promised resurrection.
Death will be defeated because we will rise again, physically, in bodies that will never die again. God’s reign puts all his enemies under his feet, and “the last enemy to be destroyed is death” (1 Cor. 15:26). When that happens, we will be able to sing, “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” (1 Cor. 15:55).
Jesus promises us victory over death because he had victory over death on Easter morning.
A Very Real, Very Physical Resurrection
In his wonderful book, Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church, N.T. Wright says,
If after his death he (Jesus) had gone into some kind of non-bodily existence, death would not be defeated. It would remain intact; it would merely be redescribed… But this is precisely what Paul is denying. Death is the last enemy, not a good part of the good creation; and therefore death must be defeated if the life-giving God is to be honored as the true Lord of the world.
I tell people that one of my greatest privileges as a pastor was to officiate at funerals. They look at me as if I’ve lost my mind.
But at every funeral, I get to say, “Death is awful, isn’t it?”
And all those with wet eyes in the room look up at me and nod their heads.
Then I say, “But Easter means that death has been defeated. Jesus died on Good Friday, but he then arose from the dead on Easter! And because of that, death is defeated. Your loved one is with Jesus in heaven. But that’s not the end of the story! Someday she’s going to return to that body that you see lying in the casket. Just like Jesus, she will rise from the dead, too!”
After one funeral service, a kid said to me, “That’s Cool! Like The Walking Dead!”
Not exactly the response I was looking for.
The dead will rise, alive and well. But they won’t be “the walking dead.” They will be “the walking truly alive!”
They will be made imperishable, pristine, sinless, and ready for eternity, living life as it was always meant to be, in perfect relationship with others, and most importantly, with God.
Suffering and death are very real things in our world, and we need resurrection hope to get us through.
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Photo by Strauss Western on Unsplash