... the power of the resurrection ...

“… the power of Jesus Christ’s resurrection …” (Philippians 3:10)Sooner than later everyone runs into it.The elderly gentleman whose path I crossed last week did. You could tell that he used to do most everything by himself. He used to repair his own vehicles. He built the barn behind his house. If the tree that had fallen on the side of house five years ago he would have cut it up himself. But now he could just watch and cheer me on. I thought, “Someday that could very well be me.”The young woman lying in the hospital bed did. Young and sick just don’t seem to go together, at least they shouldn’t. There she was hooked up to monitors and IV lines, at the mercy of the disease and the doctors and nurses trying to fight it. When I left I thought, “That could very well be me.”The parents who asked me to come over did. Their daughter is making bad decisions. She is on a straight path of ruining her life, hurting herself and others in the process. Mom and Dad are at their wits’ end. When I started my car I thought, “I have kids. That could very well be Susie and me.”The faces on the TV screen did. In a way they are almost interchangeable. This was a documentary about refugee camp that has become a place with no way out, but it could just as well have been a documentary of people caught in a deadly drought, or of a crime and drug infested neighborhood, or of victims of a natural disaster. I thought, “I am glad that’s not me,” but it very well could be.The family gathered around the bed did. The no longer conscious, shrunken shell of their Mom, Grandma, and sister was still breathing, barely. But it was just a matter of time. No one was going to stop the inevitable. We all wished it would come sooner than later. I couldn’t help but think, “One day this will be me.”The man in the casket suspended over his grave did. The Honor Guard had conducted their ceremony, fired the gun salute, and carefully folded the flag and presented it. I spoke the benediction. Mourners laid flowers on the casket. Then we stepped back and watched it disappear into the ground. As we were walking away the grave diggers started to cover the grave. I thought, “Whatever was left death took it. Took it from everyone laid to rest here, every last bit. It doesn’t matter whose marker I read, or how fancy the grave stone is, all here have been rendered powerless.”The feeling and the reality of powerlessness is as inescapable as it is dreaded. It diminishes us. It is both humbling and humiliating. Human dignity is lost. Fear and helplessness are its companions. It challenges the slightest glimmer of hope. And it doesn’t matter, in the end each one of us will lose the fight. Whatever power was ours it will not be buried with us under that last shovel of dirt.There is, however, a grave that has been gloriously empty for the past 2000 years. Not because someone has dug it up, or because tomb raiders invaded it. It is empty because who was laid there walked out. Evil, the brokenness of this world, Satan, sin and death all tried their best to render Jesus Christ powerless. All of them failed. He rose from the dead. He alone can help us escape the condemnation of sin and the curse and power of death. You and I can live and be buried in real hope if we trust in and live with Jesus Christ. Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?" John 11:25-26 (NASB) This Easter, if you have never done so, make a beginning with Jesus Christ – believe and follow.This Easter, remember that power of Jesus’ resurrection calls us more than comfortable holy huddles behind church walls, but to go where evil, sin, injustice, lostness, suffering, disease, fear, worry, darkness, hopelessness, powerlessness, and death prevails.Jesus is risen! Love you, Pastor Hans