Tag: resurrection

Christian living, religion, World Religions

Christian Reflections on the Tirthankara

Posted on by Jay Givens

In Jainism, the central figures are twenty-four Tirthankaras.  The word Tirthankara means “ford-maker,” one who creates a path through the river of death and rebirth (samsara) to the shores of Jain heaven (siddha-sila).  They are seen not as gods or redeemer figures, but as pioneers who discovered and taught the path that all Jina (conquerers) can follow.  Jains revere the statues of Tirthankaras, they meditate on them, reflecting on their life and manners in order to discover how to follow after them.  Mahavira, the final Tirthankara, was the son of a king, who renounced his royal luxuries and adopted poverty and an ascetic lifestyle to attain liberation from the cycle of death and rebirth.

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Jesus’ life is similar in many respects to Mahavira’s.  Like Mahavira, Jesus was the son of a king.  But his father was not the king of a realm in India; his father is the King of Loka (the universe).  Like Mahavira, who renounced his plush life for a humble life of homeless poverty and insult, we are told that Jesus, “did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant” (Phil 2:6-7).  Both men had a small group of disciples with whom they wandered the countryside, preaching and teaching parables about “the beauty of poverty, of spirit, of meekness, of righteousness, of mercy, of purity, of peace, and of patient suffering. . . [and] how much greater a thing it was ‘to be’ than ‘to do’, and how perilous ‘to have'” (Stevenson, The Heart of Jainism, 1915, 291-92).  Whereas the Tirthankaras pioneered a path through the river of samara, Jesus alone has the most accurate knowledge of how to ford the river beyond this life, for he alone has made the journey twice, from heaven to earth and from earth to heaven.  Therefore, he is the True Tirthankara.  Through his double-crossing, he is not only a pioneer but also a perfecter of this crossing (Heb 12:2).  In fact, he himself is the Tirtha, the Ford (John 14:6).

A key concept of Jainism is that we do not see all of reality.  There is a manypointedness (anekantavada) to ultimate reality that is far beyond our human comprehension.  Christianity has always viewed the cross of Christ as a manypointed act beyond our full understanding.  It is sacrifice, substitution, ransom, satisfaction, victory, example.  One view of the cross is the moral influence theory of Peter Abelard.  Abelard saw the cross as the great demonstration of God’s love that enkindles a similar response of love within us.  This is similar to the Jain approach to the Tirthankaras.  As Paul Dundas notes,

Ancient tradition . . . is emphatic that worship of the fordmakers does not actually elicit a response from them but rather brings about an internal, spiritual purification in the worshipper[.] . . . So, while it might be the case that worship destroys karma, such an effect is regarded as having been brought about by the inner transformation which worship effects.

Paul Dundas (The Jains, 1992, 180)

How much greater Jesus is to both inspire and respond? A scribal addition to the Jain text Tattvarthadhigama (1.1) states, “I bow to him who is the guide on the path to liberation, the destroyer of mountains of karmas and the Knower of the principles of the universe, so that I may attain these qualities belonging to him.”  This could be a prayer of any Christian to Jesus, “the pioneer of their salvation [who was made] perfect through what he suffered” and so he can now “bring many sons and daughters to glory” (Heb 2:10).  Although Jains see the Tirthankara as an example and not a redeemer, still they can pray, “Lord, you’ve become almighty, omniscient.  I want to be just like you.  Give me the power and the wisdom to do this, so I can leave this world and attain salvation” (Salgia, Areopagus 7:3, 1994, 36).  This almost sounds like Paul’s admonition to Christians to continue working out their salvation with fear and trembling by becoming more and more like Jesus, who has been exalted to the highest place (Phil 2:1-13).

While Christians affirm that Jesus was fully human and learned obedience from his suffering (Heb 5:8-9) and that through this he has made a ford to the shores of liberation (moksha), we cannot agree with Jains that there is not a higher being who can assist us with attaining this liberation.  The cross has always been a confrontational object to every group of humans, whether as “a stumbling block to Jews, foolishness to Gentiles,” (1Co 1:23) or weakness to Jains.  The supreme ethic of Jainism is ahimsa, non-violence to all creatures.  The second is aparigraha (non-attachment), because the chief problem that keeps me (my jiva or “self”) from attaining liberation is “attachment”: the desire for things or longing for relationships.  Yet the story of the cross reveals a desire for own ways that is achieved through violence.  We humans put to death the very one who came from heaven to reveal the ford back to the Father, the path to the shores of liberation.  All of us—Jain or not—in one way or another have violently rejected his forgiveness and love.  We have clung to the self, to our own selfish desires.

The resurrection, however, reveals Jesus as the Conqueror (Jina) over sin, death, rebirth, and any other enemy that keeps us from liberation.  Through his rising from the dead, Jesus demands recognition not only as the human Tirthankara of Tirthankaras but also as the Living Kara, the Creator of the universe.  Anyone who would follow this one to the shores of moksha must be willing to fully practice aparigraha by letting go of that to which she or he is most attached: the self and its preservation.  “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.  Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit” (Gal 5:24-25).

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Bible, Jesus, sermon

Beloved Daughter

Posted on by Jay Givens

Happiness comes and goes. Sorrow and suffering can be with us for years or can come upon us suddenly. Yet we can find hope in the midst of sorrow. We can trust in the Trustworthy One in the depths of our despair. Mark 5:21-43 tells the story of a man and a woman from two very different lives, though both know sorrow and suffering. The story tells us of a father who fears losing his daughter and a woman who long ago lost the hope of being called daughter. Throughout the story, we see Jesus acting intentionally to take on our uncleanness in order to make us clean, to make us whole, and to give us hope.

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An Outcast Woman; a Beloved Daughter

We first meet a man who seems to have it all. He has a family. As a synagogue ruler, he has prestige in his community. Most likely, he is middle to upper income to have the time to serve as ruler. Yet at the moment we meet him, none of this matters to him. He is losing his daughter. He is desperate to save her.

The woman we meet partway through the story has likely lost everything. We are told she has an issue of blood that has not ceased for twelve years. That is, something about her body does not allow her menstrual cycle to ever fully stop. According to Jewish Law, women were ritually unclean during the days of their period. She has been unclean for twelve years. Like a leper, she would have to call out to those who came near her, “unclean!” to warn them not to come into contact with her. If they did, Jewish Law said they also became unclean until they performed a ritual cleansing. So this woman has probably has lost her family during the years. At the least, she has become a source of public shame for them because everyone in the town knows she is theirs. She is isolated from her community and the touch of others. All dignity is gone. She is an object of scorn to be avoided. She has been stripped of her personhood.

For twelve years, the woman had been unclean, suffering from humiliation and struggling with pain. We’re told she spent all she had on doctors but her condition only got worse. The man’s daughter was twelve years old. What a different life she had lived. Twelve years of love, joy, the benefits of wealth, and the loving touch of family. Twelve years ago, her mother had life come from her womb. But for the past twelve years, the woman had only death coming from her own womb.

Years of Grueling Anguish; Days of Sudden Sorrow

The woman for twelve years suffered physically and psychologically. She also lost all of her money, unlike the ruler who probably was middle to upper income. Yet in the story, she appears to still have hope for recovery. She is willing to try to touch Jesus’ garment to see if he might have healing power to help end her suffering. Despite her loss of family, community, and money, she still had hope. Where she had been suffering for years, the man had only suffered a few days (maybe a few weeks). His daughter was ill. He was in despair. His hope, his faith, was in tatters. His money, his power, his family and community connections–none of it could solve the problem he faced of his daughter’s grave illness. While Mark uses describes the girl as his “little daughter,” Luke tells us she was his monogenes, his “one and only” daughter. She was his life and her life was ebbing away.

We have no idea how the woman handled her illness when it first appeared, but we do know how she handled it now, twelve years later. Although she suffered greatly and had lost everything, we never hear her complain or cry out. Later, when Jesus gets to the man’s home, the family and friends of the girl are wailing and causing a commotion. Yes, the girl was dead, and likely some who were there were professional mourners. But the sudden illness and loss of this young life created sharp emotions and led many to cry out loudly in their grief.

Public Restoration

The man clearly was seeking to find Jesus in his despair. We are told that “when he saw” Jesus, he fell at Jesus’ feet. Though he had prestige in his community, he humiliated himself in public with this act. He knew the crowds could see him and hear his pleas that Jesus would heal his daughter. He literally says, “My little daughter is at the end.” This is a final act of desperation. She is about to die. He went to seek the healer. Perhaps, like his colleagues, he had mocked Jesus before. Now, however, he was pleading for Jesus to help him. He wanted Jesus to save his daughter from death and give her life. The word sozein can mean healing, but it can also mean salvation. Jesus intentionally acts in the moment. He departs to go with the man.

We then encounter the woman in the story. She doesn’t seek out Jesus as the man had. We are told that she “hears about” Jesus. We’re told crowds are around Jesus and Jairus as they travel. No doubt some were talking about the healer and how he was on the move to do it again! The woman also wanted to be saved from her infirmity. She wanted to be healed. Unlike the man’s public actions, however, she hoped to be healed privately without anyone knowing. She thought she could just sneak up behind Jesus and touch his robe. That would be enough to heal her. She didn’t want to be a bother to anyone. She didn’t want to cause a fuss.

Immediately, she knew she was healed. Mark says she could feel the “fountain” of flowing blood “dry up.” She was freed from the affliction. Literally, it says she was freed from the whip, the common belief of people that God was actively punishing those who suffer for something they must have done wrong. At the same time, Jesus immediately knew power had gone out from him. We then see his second intentional act. He does a 180 to look behind him. He asks who touched him and looks from person to person in the crowd. The disciples are incredulous. “Jesus,” they reply, “how can you ask that! This crowd is constantly pushing up against you.” But Jesus looked into the eyes of each person until eventually the woman couldn’t stand it.

Jesus forced this private act to become public. Unlike the bold though desperate synagogue ruler, the woman fell to Jesus feet trembling in fear. She told him the whole story. She had hoped for a private healing to avoid what was now occurring. Jesus would know that this unclean woman had touched him. She had made him ritually unclean. Would he be upset with her? He had been on important business and she now had interrupted him. What’s more, if the disciples are telling us the truth, she must have bumped into many others in her attempt to touch Jesus. How many did she make unclean just now? How would they respond, since she didn’t cry out “unclean” to warn them? Would they be angry and stone her for her transgression of the Law? For twelve years, she had been alone and unnoticed. She was nothing to these people except as an object to be feared and avoided. Why, she wondered, did Jesus make her visible?

Jesus doesn’t reply with anger or rebuke. Instead, he called her “daughter” and told her that it was “her faith” that healed her. Jesus made this public so she could be welcomed back into community, into his kingdom. More than that, we welcomed this woman who had probably not had family connections for twelve years into his own family. Moreover, he honored her by saying it was her faith, not his power, that had healed her. Jesus made himself a servant to her needs and showed his love through inviting her into relationship and restoring her to community. She wanted healing, but he told her to go with “peace” for she was no longer unclean but cleansed (the Greek word hygiēs from which we get “hygiene”) from the whip.

Private Reunion

Part of the reason Jesus honored the woman was to welcome her back to her community. Another reason was for Jairus. He probably saw this woman as a distraction who was wasting precious minutes that his little girl couldn’t afford to lose. Indeed, while Jesus was speaking the good news to the woman, members of Jairus’ community came with the worst news imaginable. His daughter was dead. “Why bother the teacher any longer?” they asked. If they shared the skepticism of many Jewish leaders, this might have been said sarcastically. Why bother with “the teacher” any longer?” Not the healer, notice. The woman had feared public exposure and was forced to face it. Now, the man faced something even worse: the fear that all hope is lost. His little girl was dead.

For the third time, Jesus does something very intentional. He first went with the man. He then looked and found the woman. Now, he intentionally ignores the words of these messengers. He tells the father, “Don’t fear. Just trust!” Perhaps Jesus pointed toward the woman nearby who, despite her fears, showed great faith and now stood there healed. Again, Jesus seems to honor the woman as he encourages the man.

Jesus and the father go with three of Jesus’ disciples to the man’s house. We are not told that they stopped at a mikvah for a ritual cleansing to purify themselves from the woman’s unclean touch. So Jesus apparently entered Jairus’ home unclean. This made Jairus’ home unclean and all within it–including Jairus himself–unclean. What we see is that Jairus cared less about rituals than about relationship. He was willing that he and his whole family become unclean like this man if Jesus could give him back his daughter. In this way, he also identified himself with the woman and her faith.

Jesus was possibly mocked by his disciples (or the crowds) when he asked who touched him. He may have been mocked by the messengers who said the girl was dead. Certainly, he is laughed at and ridiculed for saying the girl wasn’t dead but just asleep. Jesus then ran everyone except the parents and his disciples out of the house. Doing this forced Jairus, a man who had been in the public eye as a leading member of the community, to learn the importance of privacy and intimacy.

Then, for the second time that day, Jesus was made unclean. The first time, it happened to him when the woman touched him. This time, he intentionally took the hand of the dead girl. Then, where power unconsciously went out from Jesus to the woman, Jesus consciously touched the girl and gave a verbal command to rise up. He calls her “little girl,” not “daughter” because the girl already had a family. She had a father who loved her and believed she would live again. Immediately, she stood up and walked around. Maybe she was walking to each of her parents to hug them. As the woman was freed from her affliction, the girl was freed from the power of death.

Not only was this a private healing and reunion for the family, but Jesus made sure the privacy continued for several minutes. He told the parents not to share what had happened, that is, don’t shout out to the crowd outside. He then told them to get the girl something to eat. As the family shared table fellowship, Jesus and the disciples exited the house. Not only did Jesus still bear the “uncleanness” of the woman and the girl, but he had to endure the mocking of the crowd as he passed them by. No doubt they continued to laugh at his ignorance, not knowing the difference between death and sleep! How could he be a great teacher if he was so unaware? But Jesus bore the mocking to allow community and restored relationship to thrive inside the home.

Final Thoughts

What do we learn from this story? First, we see that Jesus doesn’t truly become “unclean” from his contact with the women. Instead, his life-giving power flowed out to these women and made them whole, healing and restoring life to them. He also restored the woman to community and the girl to her family. Believers in Jesus are called to the same engagement with others. We are to enter into the messiness of life and seek to heal and restore community. We even have to bear mocking or misunderstanding to do the work of the kingdom.

Second, we see that it is not physical contact with Jesus that saves or makes one whole. It was the woman’s faith. It was the father’s faith. Trusting in Jesus to save and heal is something we can do the same as the woman. Though Jesus is no longer on earth, he now sits at his Father’s right hand and can bear our uncleanness and make us how.

Third, both women teach us about the Kingdom of God. The woman gives us hope that in the kingdom, whatever troubles we encounter in this life, they are not the end of the story. We will be freed and healed to experience peace and wholeness. The girl helps us see that our greatest need is to be raised to new life in Christ. This life is not something we can bring about apart from Jesus any more than the dead girl could raise herself. There is also the hope of reunion with those we love in the kingdom. Also, the verbs used of the girl, “rising up” and “standing up” are both used of the resurrection in other parts of the New Testament. Her rising to new life came after only a short period of death. Though we die, it is but a twinkling of an eye and then we will be raised to new life in the new heavens and new earth.

Today, your life might be full of struggles or it may be filled with joy. You may be in the midst of years of suffering a debilitating disease or enduring a long, lingering death. You may be experiencing a rapid loss of a loved one or a sudden change in fortune. In all situations, we are called to trust in Jesus. He is the source of our healing, life, and wholeness. He welcomes us all into community as he saves and heals us. He calls you beloved son. He calls you beloved daughter.

Beloved Daughter (Mark 5:21-43)

3
psalms, sermon

Dedicating the Temple

Posted on by Jay Givens

According to the Talmud, Psalm 30 was used in the dedication of the temple by Judas Maccabeus and his brothers in the year 165 B.C. Later, Jews began to read this text during Hanukkah, the annual celebration that grew out of this dedication. In the psalm, an individual prayer to God for salvation expands to become a corporate expression of praise of this salvation. And so, Christ committed his spirit to his Father on the cross. Three days later, Christ was raised to life. The Lord’s Supper helps us reflect on how this personal story of salvation, through the power of the Holy Spirit, becomes a corporate reality for all of us who place their faith in Christ. We are his body, his temple, so each time we partake of the Lord’s Supper, we dedicate the temple anew for our service in the name of Christ to the glory of God.

In the psalm there is a movement from death to life. Verse 1 speaks of being rescued from enemies. Verse 2 praises God for healing and giving hope. And verse 3 is one of many inversions found in the poem–that God brought the psalmist “up from the realm of the dead” and kept him from going “down to the pit.” This inversion is found in the Lord’s Supper. In the crucifixion, Jesus died. The bread and the wine remind us of his death. They remind us of our own death as well. But God did not leave Jesus in the grave. The resurrection is a story of hope. Just as God raised Jesus from the dead, the same Spirit will raise us. We are a new humanity in Christ. We are already becoming part of the New Creation to come. In the Lord’s Supper, the bread and wine remind us of Christ’s death but the corporate nature of the celebration–the body of Christ gathered together–is itself the visible hope of the resurrection.

Another idea in the psalm is a movement from sorrow to joy. Verses 6-8 tells us that at one point, the psalmist felt invincible. When he was prosperous, he thought that nothing could move him. (Note how self-centered verse 6 is, the number of times the first person “I” appears.) But then something happens to the psalmist, perhaps an illness (since v. 2 references healing). Whatever the event, it was when the LORD “hid his face” that the psalmist realized God alone is the true source of his prosperity and life. It was only because the LORD favored him that he had stood strong like a mountain. When God hid his face, the psalmist discovered his folly, but also that the LORD is merciful and “my help” (v. 10).

The mercy of God is manifest in verse 5, where the psalmist tells us God’s anger is but a moment, but the LORD’s favor lasts a lifetime. So when those dark times come, we weep, but we have hope that morning is coming, and with it joy. Verse 5 uses the Hebrew concept of day, which starts in the evening. You see this idea most vividly in the Genesis 1 story of creation, and it was evening and it was morning. Sorrow comes at night but joy will overcome it as light overcomes darkness. The momentary sorrow of Jesus’ death was overcome with joy for Mary Magdalene when she realized the man talking to her was not the gardener she presumed but the Tree of Life himself. We see the frustrations of life overcome with ecstatic joy when Peter dives out of his fishing boat to swim to the shore where he sees Jesus his Christ standing.

Verse 5 also says that our wailing and sackcloth are turned into dancing and joy (which could also be translated as mirth, gaiety, pleasure). This imagery is of our funeral becoming a wedding, which is exactly what God did through the cross and resurrection. The Lord’s Supper symbolizes God’s destruction of death and bestowal of life. When we celebrate the Lord’s Supper, it is an anticipation of the great wedding feast of the Lamb in the new creation. As we gather at the table, we confess our struggles, our sorrows, and our failings. But through the bread and wine, we celebrate Christ’s triumph over death, the Spirit that raised him from the dead now living in us, and we confess anew our faith that we will be raised to everlasting life in his Kingdom.

Finally, the psalmist uses imagery of moving from silence to singing. Verse 9 asks the questions, what benefit is there if I die and am silenced? What good is it if I become dust? Can it praise you? The ancient Hebrew idea before belief in the resurrection of the dead was that you had this life and this life alone in which to serve and praise God. The dead were silent and they could not act. But God’s desire for us is not for us to be silent (and so not to be dead). We are to worship our Creator and sing songs of our Redeemer. Verse 4 tells us the faithful ones sing praise to the LORD and his name. Verse 12 encourages us to let our hearts sing and not be silent, to praise our God forevermore.

The story of Jesus confirms that God’s purpose is not for us to die and become dust. Jesus’ death defeated all of our enemies–sin, death, and the grave. But more than that, his resurrection confirms the promise of our coming new life in the new creation when all will be raised. Because of this, we are called to rejoice and proclaim the good news! Thomas, though full of doubts and questions, upon seeing Jesus proclaimed, “My Lord! My God!” The two on the road to Emmaus started the day believing all hope was gone. But after walking with Jesus unaware and finally recognizing him as he broke the bread, they said to one another, didn’t our hearts burn as he spoke? They risked the dangers of traveling by night to return to Jerusalem in order to sing the good news of Jesus’ conquest of death to the disciples there. Each time we approach the table, we may come with doubts or questions, but together we celebrate the triumph of Jesus’ victory over death and rejoice in his sovereign rule of his kingdom at the Father’s right hand.

And so, as we celebrate the Lord’s Supper, we remember both the death and the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. We celebrate his conquest of death and triumphal rising to everlasting life. We lay on the table all of our sorrows and discover anew the joy of Jesus’ promises and of his community of believers. Though we may approach the table in silence, we are forced to break that silence with proclamation of the good news and songs of praise to our Redeemer. At the table, we dedicate ourselves again as his Temple and consecrate ourselves to be servants to those in need and heralds of the good news.

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“Dedicating the Temple” Psalm 30
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Jesus, sermon

First Fruits of the New Creation

Posted on by Jay Givens

In 1 Corinthians 15:20-27, Paul sees the resurrection of Christ as God’s promise and sign guaranteeing the resurrection at the end of the age. Jesus is the firstfruits of the coming harvest. The new creation began with an empty tomb. Even with the threat of COVID and social distancing, Jesus is Lord and God is putting all enemies–even the coronavirus–under his feet.

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Family

Graveside Message for Bluefford G. Hancock

Posted on by Jay Givens

BlueffordWe gather today to remember the life of Bluefford Gordon Hancock. Many of the Bible passages I will read today were marked in Bluefford’s Bible as important passages to him. Yesterday, George Ray said Bluefford emphasized it was important to understand the different types of soil and how each can affect a tree when it is planted. That reminded me of a parable Jesus told.

“A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.” (Matthew 13:3b-8, NIV)

The seed was the gospel of Jesus Christ. The soil is one’s heart, how one responds to the gospel message and to Jesus. Bluefford was good soil. He produced a crop a hundredfold more than what was sown. Many of you here today are part of that crop. You are part of the fruit Jeremiah mentions in chapter 17 of his book,

“Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.” (Jer 17:8-9, NIV)

Bluefford had a star beside the first part of that verse, “blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him.” This was very descriptive of Bluefford. He loved his Lord and sought to trust him more each day. Even when periods of drought came, such as in the last days of his life, when his body was in pain, yet he bore the green leaves of life for he drank deeply from the river of life that his Savior Christ Jesus provided to him. With the prophet Habakkuk, he could say, “Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food . . . yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Savior.” (Hab 3:17-18, NIV) This call to praise God even in the difficult times of life was not only bracketed in Bluefford’s Bible, it received both a check mark and a star. I imagine that was shorthand for a Bluefford truism, “Son, you can take that to the bank!”

The Christian hope has always been rooted in the belief of the resurrection of the dead. This hope grows out of the teaching and life of Jesus Christ himself. When Jesus’ friend Lazarus was dead and in the tomb for four days, Jesus stated to Lazarus’ sister Martha,

“Your Brother will rise again.”

Martha answered, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”

Jesus said to her, “I am the Resurrection and the Life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.” (John 11: 23-26, NIV; emphasis mine)

What did Jesus mean that those who believe in him would never die? It could not mean physical death, for we know from the story of Jesus that he himself died on the cross and was buried in a tomb. But that wasn’t the end of the story. The witness of the first Christians was that God raised Jesus from the dead three days later. In the Revelation, Jesus proclaims, “Do not be afraid. I am the first and the last. I am the living one; I was dead, and behold I am alive forever and ever. And I hold the keys of death and Hades [the grave].” (1:17b-18, NIV) Because Jesus holds the keys to the grave, we can have confidence that this is not the last word in the story of Jesus’ servant, Bluefford Gordon Hancock. He will certainly live again. Bluefford was confident of this, for not only were these words bracketed in his Bible but he wrote the words “Rev 1:18” at the top of the page and had those words underlined!

Now, in the story of Lazarus, Jesus—who had just emphasized that he was the foundation for the Christian hope in the resurrection of the body—did an interesting thing. Jesus knew that he was the resurrection and that those who believe in him would live again. He knew that he was about to raise his friend Lazarus from the dead. Yet when Jesus arrived at the tomb, John’s gospel tells us, “Jesus wept. Then the Jews said, ‘See how he loved him!’” (John 11:35-36, NIV) So it is ok for us today to mourn the loss of Bluefford. Jesus himself experienced the impact of death; he wept when confronted with the reality that death cuts us off from those we love. Even though death did not have the final word in the story, for Jesus raised Lazarus back to life, Jesus cried because of the momentary separation. Bluefford felt that momentary separation from his wife Katie, his daughter Penny, his brothers and other family members, but now that separation has ended. We feel the separation today, so it is ok to grieve, to cry, but as Paul told the Thessalonians in his first letter, Christians are not

to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope. We believe that Jesus died and rose again and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those [like Bluefford] who have fallen asleep in him. According to the Lord’s own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left till the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And we will be with the Lord forever.

And then Paul says, “Therefore, encourage each other with these words.” (1 Thess 4:13-18, NIV; emphasis mine) Paul’s words were words of encouragement. Those who believe in Christ will be with Bluefford again, when the dead are raised and Christ brings his eternal kingdom in all of its fullness. For the Christian, death has no sting, no victory, because it does not have the final word (1 Cor 15:54-55).

John had a vision of the kingdom of God in the Revelation,

I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. . . . I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” (Rev 21:1-4, NIV)

So it is ok to shed a tear today for the loss of one who was so significant in our lives. But one day, those who are in Christ will be raised to eternal life. On that day, God himself will wipe away any remaining tears. He will mend our broken hearts and heal our broken bodies.

The beauty of that restored creation described in the Revelation must have thrilled this old horticulturalist’s soul. For John writes,

Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the trees are for the healing of the nations. No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. (Rev 22:1-3, NIV)

But what is underlined in that passage is not the trees of life, nor their fabulous yield rate, nor even the medicinal value of the plants. What Bluefford underlined in this passage was the phrase, “his servants will serve him.” In fact, flipping through his Bible, one finds verse after verse marked with calls to serving others, caring for others, loving others. If you want to know how to honor Bluefford, it would be to fall in love with his Savior Jesus Christ as much as he was and to be a servant of Christ daily in the lives of others. That is what Bluefford was looking forward to in the next life, and what he did so faithfully in this one.

Now there have always been those who questioned this belief Christians have in the resurrection of the body. Paul addressed these questions in his first letter to the Corinthians:

But someone may ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come?” How foolish! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or of something else. But God gives it a body as he has determined, and to each kind of seed he gives its own kind of body. . . .
So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural [soulish] body, it is raised a spiritual body.

If there is a natural [soulish] body, there is also a spiritual body. . . . The first man was of the dust of the earth, the second man from heaven. . . . And just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall we bear the likeness of the man from heaven. (1 Cor 15:35-38, 42-44, 47, 49, NIV)

The famous preacher D. L. Moody once noted many people call this passage from 1 Corinthians 15 the “burial service.” But, Moody argued,

I think it is an unfortunate expression. Paul never talked of ‘burial.’ He said the body was sown in corruption, sown in weakness, sown in dishonor, sown a natural body. If I bury a bushel of wheat, I never expect to see it again, but if I sow it, I expect results. Thank God, our friends are not buried; they are only sown! (Great Sermons on the Resurrection, p. 61)

So, for now, we do not bury the body of Bluefford Hancock as we might put away something that has served its purpose. We do not even bury Bluefford as we might hide away a great treasure we seek to protect. Instead, we sow him into the ground this day, knowing that one day the Lord Jesus Christ will raise him from the dead. And we can hear the voice of Christ even now saying to him, “Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!” (Matt 25:21, NIV)

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Family

Graveside Message for Katie Lou Hancock

Posted on by Jay Givens

katie lou hancockWe gather today to remember the life of Katie Lou Harris Hancock, a devoted wife, honored mother, and beloved grandmother. We come to commit her into the care of her Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, whom she loved and served. We know that in the final years of her life, she suffered from the effects of Alzheimer’s, but even so we recall Paul’s words to the Corinthian church in his second letter. “We do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” (2 Cor 4:16-18, NIV)

The Christian hope has always been rooted in the belief in the resurrection of the dead. This hope grows out of the teaching and life of Jesus Christ himself. When Jesus’ friend was dead and in the tomb, Jesus stated to Lazarus’ sister Martha,  “Your Brother will rise again.”  Martha answered, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”  Jesus said to her, “I am the Resurrection and the Life. He who believes in me will never die.” (John 11: 23-26, NIV; emphasis mine)

What did Jesus mean that those who believe in him would never die? It could not mean physical death, for we know from the story of Jesus that he himself died on the cross and was buried in a tomb. But that wasn’t the end of the story. We also know that God raised him from the dead, that he could not stay dead. So we find in the Revelation that Jesus proclaims, “Do not be afraid. I am the first and the last. I am the living one; I was dead, and behold I am alive forever and ever. And I hold the keys of death and Hades [the grave].” (1:17b-18, NIV) Because Jesus holds the keys to the grave, we can have confidence that this is not the last word in the story of Katie Lou Hancock. She will live again.

Now, in the story of Lazarus, Jesus—who had just emphasized that he was the foundation for the resurrection of the body in which Christians hope—did an interesting thing before ultimately raising his friend Lazarus from the grave. John’s gospel says, “Jesus wept. Then the Jews said, ‘See how he loved him!’” (John 11:35-36, NIV) So it is ok for us today to mourn the loss of Katie Lou Hancock. Jesus himself wept at the impact of death, how it cuts us off from those we love. He wept even though it was a momentary separation—for he raised Lazarus back to life soon after. Therefore, it is ok to grieve, to cry, but Paul told the Thessalonians in his first letter to them that Christians are not

to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope. We believe that Jesus died and rose again and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those [like Katie] who have fallen asleep in him. According to the Lord’s own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left till the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel, and will the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And we will be with the Lord forever.

And then Paul says, “Therefore, encourage each other with these words.” (1 Thess 4:13-18, NIV; emphasis mine) These were words of encouragement. Those who believe in Christ will be with Katie again, when the dead are raised and Christ brings his eternal kingdom in all of its fullness. John had a vision of this kingdom in the Revelation,

I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. . . . I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” (Rev 21:1-4, NIV)

On that day, Katie will look full into the eyes of Bluefford, her children, and her grandchildren, and know each one by name. It is this belief in the resurrection of the dead that allows Christians to say death has no sting or victory over us (cf. 1 Cor 15:55), for when Christ appears, Katie—along with all Christians both dead and living—“shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.” (1 John 3:2, NIV) It was always Katie’s hope that each one of you would be part of that great day, would know Jesus Christ as your Lord and your Savior. If you do not know Jesus in this way, I would be happy to speak to you later about this.

Now there have always been those who questioned this belief Christians have in the resurrection. Paul addressed these questions in his first letter to the Corinthians: “But someone may ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come?” How foolish! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or of something else. But God gives it a body as he has determined, and to each kind of seed he gives its own kind of body. . . .

“So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural [soulish] body, it is raised a spiritual body.

“If there is a natural [soulish] body, there is also a spiritual body. . . . The first man was of the dust of the earth, the second man from heaven. . . . And just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall we bear the likeness of the man from heaven.” (1 Cor 15:35-38, 42-44, 47, 49, NIV)

The famous preacher D. L. Moody once noted many people call this passage in 1 Corinthians 15 the “burial service.” But, Moody argued, “I think it is an unfortunate expression. Paul never talked of ‘burial.’ He said the body was sown in corruption, sown in weakness, sown in dishonor, sown a natural body. If I bury a bushel of wheat, I never expect to see it again, but if I sow it, I expect results. Thank God, our friends are not buried; they are only sown!” (Great Sermons on the Resurrection, p. 61)

So, for now, we do not bury Katie Lou Hancock as we might put away something that has served its purpose. We do not even bury her as we might hide away a great treasure we seek to protect. Instead, we sow her into the ground this day, knowing that one day the Lord Jesus Christ will raise her from the dead. As John said in his first letter, “And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.” (1 Jn 5:11-12, NIV)

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