Friday, April 10, 2015

Irrational thinking about death

For the second time in a week, I'm moved to write about this thing we call death. It has been a very difficult week for such. Our son's father-in-law died yesterday, so it is a bit reflective to think about it for a second time. But I'm here today to tell there is some good news, that grief will not linger though it hurts so terribly. I'm here today to tell you there is some Good News.

When I called up my Bible source on the Internet this morning, this is what I found ... "While we were still weak, at the right moment, Christ died for ungodly people. It isn't often that someone will die for a righteous person, though maybe someone might dare to die for a good person. But God shows his love for us, because while we were still sinners Christ died for us." Romans 5: 6-8

What a statement. What an idea. What a premise.

Christ died for ungodly people as well as the righteous. While I was still sinning, Christ died for me. While I was still making all those terrible, horrific choices, Christ died for me.

John Wesley says this most famously that when he went to a meeting at Aldersgate in London all those years ago that he felt his heart strangely warmed. "I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death."

I read a blog the other day from an atheist who was talking about the religious freedom legislation peppering the country. He said Christians are unstable and have a completely irrational viewpoint, citing evolution and resurrection as his proof.

Well, I can't speak for others because I'm too unstable, but I do have an irrational viewpoint. See, I believe irrationally that Christ died so that one day I might live, eternally. I believe that his shed blood somehow irrationally means I have been freed from my sins. I believe in eternal life, after life, everlasting life promised by the wholly irrational pages of the wholly irrational Bible. I truly do.

I believe that Christ saves us, remakes us, takes us and does this not because of any specialness on my part. Instead, while I was yet a rational being, he died for me.

The apostle Paul gave us some good news when he wrote this, "Listen, I'm telling you a secret. All of us won't die, but we will all be changed -- in an instant, in the blink of an eye, at the final trumpet. The trumpet will blast, and the dead will be raised with bodies that won't decay, and we will be changed. It's necessary for this rotting body to be clothed with what can't decay, and for the body that is dying to be clothed in what can't die. And when the rotting body has been clothed in what can't decay, and the dying body has been clothed in what can't die, then this statement in scripture will happen: Death has been swallowed up by a victory. Where is your victory, Death? Where is your sting, Death?"

We will have the last irrational laugh over death because He had the first last irrational laugh over death when he walked out of an empty tomb.

I understand this statement, idea, premise is hard to imagine and understand for some. I have no idea why I didn't get it for decades and suddenly the light went on, but completely irrationally, it did.

And I was changed, in the blink of an eye so that I could await the final trumpet and get my new, slim, head-full-of-hair body.

Grief is hard. Tears are quite wet. Pain is quite real. That's rational.

But Jesus beat the grief, severed the curtain between God and ourselves, and stormed the gates of heaven with a shout and a laugh. That's irrational.

But true. I bet my life on it.

No comments: