Our Resurrection Hope
Easter Sunday came and went, a gorgeous sunny day in my town. My sweet church congregation was dressed in their finest Easter outfits and the school auditorium we worship in was transformed by hopeful beauty. We sang joyful songs about life defeating death and Jesus triumphing over the grave.
After the service, families took pictures, children hunted for easter eggs, and my son and I left to visit my husband’s grave. We scrubbed off goose droppings, cleared away dry pine needles, and rinsed off the hint of pollen that will soon coat everything. Despite the beauty of flowering trees and the sound of chimes moving in the soft breeze, we couldn’t avoid the stark reality that death has not yet been fully overcome. One can’t ignore death while scrubbing a tombstone.
Did you experience this tension on Easter too? We who are widowed celebrate eternal life in the midst of a story that has been transformed by death. Perhaps this was your first Easter without your beloved: an Easter marked far more by sorrow than hope. If so, maybe you embraced the terrible sadness of the cross on Good Friday but the joy of Resurrection Sunday felt like salt in the festering wound that your beloved’s death left behind. Or maybe, like me, you’ve made it through a few Easter’s since your spouse died and still feel like you’re living in a perpetual Saturday: you aren’t in the agony of watching death unfold but the one you love and long to see again is still in the grave.
In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul ponders what it means to have a risen Savior. Does Resurrection Sunday really change anything for us who have faith in Jesus but live in a world full of brokenness and death? His thought exercise takes us to the brink of despair: What if Jesus never rose from the dead? What if his body was stolen, his crucifixion a hoax and his disciples fools who’d rather be killed than admit they were wrong?
He concludes that, “if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.” 1 Corinthians 15:14-19
It’s painful to ponder these things. We don’t want to live a wasted life full of wasted sorrows. We fear that our faith may prove itself to be foolish in the end. We watch our spouse take their final breath and realize that everything hinges on faith. Are they experiencing life with God? Are they being judged for their sin? If their faith was misplaced, there is no hope: all that is left is the finality and decay of death.
It’s tough to write and even harder to comprehend. We want our loved one’s life to count. We want them to live forever. We want to see them again. Everything in us fights against death being the end. But wishful thinking and “meaning-making” cannot extinguish hell's flames. Simply wanting something to be true has never made it thus.
But Paul continues. After facing the worst possibility of wasted faith, he assures us that our faith is not in vain.
“But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death.” 1 Corinthians 15:20-26
Oh what glorious hope this is!
Jesus did indeed rise from death to new and everlasting life. He overcame death, never to die again. In his death he took on all our sin and then, out of the very same power through which he created the world, he raised himself back to life. His very real resurrected body could eat, drink and be touched and also dwell forever in God the Father’s presence, never again to be subject to death, pain, or decay.
And because he beat death, he gives the gift of eternal life to all who trust in him. The grave is no longer the end. No, it has not yet been fully overcome and we still long for that day when Jesus will return and rid his creation of death forever. But though my husband’s body is still in a grave, marked by death and decay, his soul is safe with the Lord. And one day, like Jesus, he too will be raised bodily to everlasting life.
This is a hope I cling to, more than three years from my husband's death. It’s the truth I remind myself of when my mind shudders to think of what has happened to the body of the man in whose arms I felt so safe. It’s the hope I have in the perpetual Saturday of waiting until Jesus returns again and finally defeats death once and for all.
Because of the resurrection, I have hope even in sorrow. The resurrection means that all my husband gave up to follow Jesus was worth it. The resurrection means that all he told others about Jesus was true. He is with the Lord, experiencing fullness of joy and one day we will worship Jesus together in resurrected bodies. And if your husband’s faith was in Jesus, you have this sure hope too. One day, we will rejoice together as the last enemy is destroyed and death becomes a distant memory.
Because of the resurrection, we can join with those who’ve gone before us, living in a world full of death and sorrow and yet singing this hymn of praise:
Crown him the Lord of life,
who triumphed o'er the grave,
and rose victorious in the strife for those he came to save;
his glories now we sing
who died and rose on high,
who died eternal life to bring,
and lives that death may die.
(Crown Him with Many Crowns by Matthew Bridges)
