Tuesday: We Need Death

The word of God is alive and active.  It cuts more keenly than any two edged sword.  Hebrews 4:12

So often in Holy Week we hurry to the resurrection, and yet in order to truly greet the risen Christ, we must first embrace death.  In part, yes our physical death, in that we should not fear it for we are eternal people.  Apparently more people are scared of spiders than of death, but perhaps that speaks more to our human sense of immortality until the moment our mortality is made real to us.  But in Holy Week there is no escaping death.  Without death there is no life.  Without sorrow there is no joy to follow in the morning.  We live in a world where we attempt to avoid decay and death, just ask the plastic surgeons or the medical charlatans who are as real today as those who peddled elixirs in the wild west.

Jesus speaks openly of his death on numerous occasions, and relates it in today’s reading to the grain of wheat that falls, in order that many seeds can be made.  If the grain of wheat doesn’t die, then life cannot come.  Jesus’ death enables all people to come to him, and through him, the way, the truth and the life to the Father, Mother, God of us all.  And yet it goes against anything we can truly comprehend, except if we have ever been in the situation of giving up our life for another.  Paul knows this and reminds the people in Corinth and us today that we preach a crucified Christ which causes Jews to stumble and is foolishness to non-Jews.

Notice what he says – we preach a crucified Christ.  Not we preach a risen Christ or resurrected Christ but a crucified Christ.

Death plays a central role in Holy Week and to circumvent by moving from the celebration and expectations of Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday without stopping at Good Friday is to lose something so significant, that words can’t express it fully.  Absolutely, we are people of the resurrection, but to be resurrected we need to die first.  Not literally of course, but as Jesus said:  we need to pick up our cross and follow him.

Isaiah prophesied that Jesus would be a light for all nations to show people all over the world the way to be saved.  For Jesus, it was in the moment of death, lifted up on the cross that he brought about life for all people, Jew and Gentile, for you and me.  Absolutely, we need the resurrection, but we also need to bow at the foot of the cross, and recognise that it is in his death there is life.

Remember this, especially when it does feel dark and dangerous,
‘The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overpowered it.’ John 1:5

What are your thoughts, fears and hopes when it comes to death?  How does knowing that in death is life encourage or inspire you?  How might that help you truly welcome the risen Christ?

Collect/Prayer:  Almighty God, you Son Jesus Christ taught the people the way of righteousness and judgement.  Grant us a ready mind and willing spirit to learn from him all that you would teach us, and keep us watchful for his coming and diligent in his work; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord.

Isaiah 49:1-7
Psalm 71:1-14
1 Corinthians 1:18-31
John 12:20-36