life, death, and other small concepts...

Disclaimer: I can’t take the credit for this one. The following theological thoughts were ruthlessly and un-regrettably stolen from a certain fiancé of mine.

This last week at the youth ministry at our church (Easter Sunday!), Kevin planned on preaching out of Luke 24 but never got the chance to. Tatiana and I refused to accept this and made him take us to Dairy Queen and preach it to us anyways. Turns out it was a good thing we heard the gospel that day, because the message needed to be preached.

His sermon was centered on the concepts of life and death. We are taught as Christians that we once were dead,, but now we are alive in Christ. Just as Jesus Christ rose from the dead, we too find life upon entering into relationship with God. But if we enter into LIFE at the same time we enter into this relationship with God, then what were we for all the time leading up to that? We would say all those years were a part of our “life” but if we didn’t have life yet, then what’s left for us to be? Dead.

Praise God we aren’t stuck in death. Thank Jesus that through him, we can be eternally separated from the hopelessness of death. But after we take that step and become followers of Christ, we should be living in that life. The problem that raises now is how could we possibly know how to “live like we’re alive” if our whole “lives”, we really were dead. Any paradigm we have for “what life is” was formulated and defined within the confines of death. In Luke 24:5 the angel says “why do you look for the living among the dead?” We live among the walking dead all the time. Many of us are still dead. If we aren’t, We can at least remember what it was like to be dead. And even in life, many of us still are living according to the norms of death.

This was an Easter sermon, and honestly, I usually gloss over those thinking, “I’ve heard this before. This is for people who still need to find Jesus.” But in reality, I live in death all the time. Thank God that he is merciful and loves me all the same. But the choices I make and the things that I think about can so easily turn into the confining things of death.

After we get married in September, Kevin and I are planning to get a house. By choosing to buy one here in Hermiston we are making a pretty big commitment to living here, doing ministry here, and in the future, raising a family here. That idea finds much favor with me. I grew up here. My whole family lives here. I went to elementary school and middle school, high school and college here. It’s not that I couldn’t have left, but that I was one of the few who didn’t want to. I met Kevin here and we are getting married here. It works for me. I know it well. It’s comfortable.

And that would be exactly what death wants for me. He would want me to believe that the best thing I can do on this earth is find comfort in controlling what I can of my life. Because I am so used to doing what I think is best for me and most enjoyable for me, it is so difficult to believe that maybe someone out there knows something better than the comfort I’ve created around me. If I want to be living in life I have to recognize that there is only one person who knows life and truth in its purest form. I have to believe and hope for the things that I can’t see. If true life for me is here in Hermiston, then I’m blessed to be here, but if it ends up being any other place doing any other thing, I want that… because life, even in it’s worst form, is still so much better than death at it’s best.