Job 19:23-27; 1 Corinthians 15:51-57; St Mark 16:1-8
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!
Pastors see lots of death. There was a pastor in England about 400 years ago named John Donne who saw a lot of death. Sickness, fever, contagion, plague. So he wrote a poem about death. One of the most famous poems in the English language. It’s numbered Holy Sonnet 10, but its known better by its title name: Death, be not proud.
But a good question is, Why not? Why shouldn’t death be proud? Just look around you. To the human eye it looks like he never loses. He gets all of us and our loved ones. Why shouldn’t he stand tall and thump his chest at little?
“Death, be not proud?” Why not, Pastor Donne? We fight him but he never loses. We fight him with mammograms, air bags, and brisk walks. With fight him with hair color, cholesterol screening and avoiding McDonald’s. Some people now freeze there bodies. Others have taken to incorporating tech and robotics in a way to pass on their consciousness. But nothing works. Stave it off for awhile, he’ll still win. Death is patient. Life expectancy might be doing up, be he doesn’t mind. If he doesn’t get you at 80, he’ll get you at 90.
“Death, be not proud.” But shouldn’t he be? Death is Lord in our culture. Lord Death you might call him. He commands respect. Remember how the Israelites considered God’s Name so sacred and so holy they wouldn’t eve utter it? So they figured out other ways to say the same thing out of respect. That’s what we do with death! Fallen asleep. Gone to a better place. Passed on. We don’t even like to say the word! Or think about it. We don’t even have mortuaries or funerals anymore, we have parlors and celebrations of life.
Death is Lord. We live in a culture of death. Death is seen as the answer to problems. That’s why suicide rates are skyrocketing. That why “Right to Die” legislation is being pushed and fourth-trimester abortions have been legalized in several states. Because death is seen as the answer. The cure. The solution. Its not.
“Death be not proud?” Why shouldn’t he be? Death even casts such a wide shadow. We live in it. From the time we are conceived and born he haunts us. He scares us. And he gets us to live scared and fearful of the future. We say that fear and worry is normal, its only human. But all fear is sinful because it’s self-regarding. Fear is always concerned with one’s self. Therefore its always sinful and always self-centered. Just another form of death, you might say.
Death be not proud? Why wouldn’t he be?
Why? Why could Pastor Donne right a poem that mocked death? Why? Because of what happened this day. Death is proud. And his jaws are greedy. But today we hear the truth about how he went too far. He bit his teen into the One who is Life. The One who calls Himself the Resurrection and the Life. Our crucified and risen Lord Jesus Christ, who shows us why death has no reason to gloat. Because Jesus rose from the dead to show us that death has been defeated. That He is Lord.
Death and Life have contended in that combat stupendous. The Prince of Life who died, reigns immortal.
That’s why Jon Donne wrote a poem mocking death. That’s why Job taunts death, For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last He will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. My heart faints within me!
This is why the angel preaches to the Church: Do not be alarmed. Fear not. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen. He is not here.
And this is why St Paul mocks death when he says, O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? Death we now mock you. Because our Lord has come in the flesh and we know exactly where that sting went - right into His hands, His feet, His side.
So get off your high horse, O Death. Be not proud. Because our Lord Jesus humbled Himself and rode a lowly donkey into Jerusalem to face you down on a Cross and destroy you forever. Stop your strutting, O Death, for Jesus has come to stagger to a Cross and answer for all our faithless worry with His Blood. O Death, stop thumping your chest, for the chest of God has been wrapped and laid in a grave and on the Third Day rose again that we might get a glimpse of our future. So that when our chest, our legs, our perfected bodies come forth from the grave on the Last Day, we too will see with our own eyes and laugh with derision at you, O Death.
“Death be not proud.” We taunt you. You are defeated. We mock you this day and on the day of our earthly death when we are laid in the grave. For even there you haven’t won. O grave, you are dead, empty, and have lost all claim on us. Jesus lives. You have no victory. No sting. Even there we are not dead, because all who believe in Jesus Christ never die. They are with Him always even in death, waiting with Him in Paradise as we wait to be reunited to our bodies on the great Day of the Resurrection.
For now we believe it, but on that Day we will see Death’s defeat. On that Day the dead will rise, everyone out of the grave, alive, will spring forth and face the rising Son. No one, no, not one, will stay in the grave. You have lost, O Death.
They will be divided, sure. The sheep and the goats, the chaff and the wheat, the unbelievers and the believers. For the living, risen God is not like Lord Death. He claims no dominion by power, even though power is rightly His. He does not force Himself. He will not steal. He does not demand. Those who do not want Him, who choose you, O Death, who chose to remain in hell, to turn back to the grave, to persist in impenitence and make for themselves their own way, by their own laws, with their own culture where Death is Lord and just wants them to “happy” and understands and rejects those old, moralistic attitudes of the Hebrews.
Yes, they’ll get what they want: They can go to hell. They will be raised only to be returned, to go with what is just, what is theirs, to go back to Lord Death.
But to all who believe in Christ Jesus, who are baptized into His death and resurrection, who eat and drink His crucified and risen Flesh and Blood, who hear and trust His gracious Word of forgiveness. For them, O Death, you have no reason to be proud. Jesus has conquered you, you bitter tyrant. The Lord of Life will bestow on them what they do not deserve and didn’t earn, but is given by His perfect life and immaculate grace. Oddly, the last will be first and the sinner will be saints. They will go with their God, their true Lord, with Jesus, into heaven to enjoy there the reunion of the ages.
For now, those people live in, but not of, this culture of death. They live as people who are free. As people whose bodies are indestructible, immortal, and soon to reign in the new heaven and the new earth with the Lamb who was slain, yet lives, and is worthy of all blessing, honor, glory and might.
Death be not proud, though some have called you
Mighty and dreadful, for you are not so;
For those whom you think that you overthrown, die not, poor death,
Nor can you kill me.
Death be not proud. Jesus has defeated you.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!
Pastors see lots of death. There was a pastor in England about 400 years ago named John Donne who saw a lot of death. Sickness, fever, contagion, plague. So he wrote a poem about death. One of the most famous poems in the English language. It’s numbered Holy Sonnet 10, but its known better by its title name: Death, be not proud.
But a good question is, Why not? Why shouldn’t death be proud? Just look around you. To the human eye it looks like he never loses. He gets all of us and our loved ones. Why shouldn’t he stand tall and thump his chest at little?
“Death, be not proud?” Why not, Pastor Donne? We fight him but he never loses. We fight him with mammograms, air bags, and brisk walks. With fight him with hair color, cholesterol screening and avoiding McDonald’s. Some people now freeze there bodies. Others have taken to incorporating tech and robotics in a way to pass on their consciousness. But nothing works. Stave it off for awhile, he’ll still win. Death is patient. Life expectancy might be doing up, be he doesn’t mind. If he doesn’t get you at 80, he’ll get you at 90.
“Death, be not proud.” But shouldn’t he be? Death is Lord in our culture. Lord Death you might call him. He commands respect. Remember how the Israelites considered God’s Name so sacred and so holy they wouldn’t eve utter it? So they figured out other ways to say the same thing out of respect. That’s what we do with death! Fallen asleep. Gone to a better place. Passed on. We don’t even like to say the word! Or think about it. We don’t even have mortuaries or funerals anymore, we have parlors and celebrations of life.
Death is Lord. We live in a culture of death. Death is seen as the answer to problems. That’s why suicide rates are skyrocketing. That why “Right to Die” legislation is being pushed and fourth-trimester abortions have been legalized in several states. Because death is seen as the answer. The cure. The solution. Its not.
“Death be not proud?” Why shouldn’t he be? Death even casts such a wide shadow. We live in it. From the time we are conceived and born he haunts us. He scares us. And he gets us to live scared and fearful of the future. We say that fear and worry is normal, its only human. But all fear is sinful because it’s self-regarding. Fear is always concerned with one’s self. Therefore its always sinful and always self-centered. Just another form of death, you might say.
Death be not proud? Why wouldn’t he be?
Why? Why could Pastor Donne right a poem that mocked death? Why? Because of what happened this day. Death is proud. And his jaws are greedy. But today we hear the truth about how he went too far. He bit his teen into the One who is Life. The One who calls Himself the Resurrection and the Life. Our crucified and risen Lord Jesus Christ, who shows us why death has no reason to gloat. Because Jesus rose from the dead to show us that death has been defeated. That He is Lord.
Death and Life have contended in that combat stupendous. The Prince of Life who died, reigns immortal.
That’s why Jon Donne wrote a poem mocking death. That’s why Job taunts death, For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last He will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. My heart faints within me!
This is why the angel preaches to the Church: Do not be alarmed. Fear not. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen. He is not here.
And this is why St Paul mocks death when he says, O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? Death we now mock you. Because our Lord has come in the flesh and we know exactly where that sting went - right into His hands, His feet, His side.
So get off your high horse, O Death. Be not proud. Because our Lord Jesus humbled Himself and rode a lowly donkey into Jerusalem to face you down on a Cross and destroy you forever. Stop your strutting, O Death, for Jesus has come to stagger to a Cross and answer for all our faithless worry with His Blood. O Death, stop thumping your chest, for the chest of God has been wrapped and laid in a grave and on the Third Day rose again that we might get a glimpse of our future. So that when our chest, our legs, our perfected bodies come forth from the grave on the Last Day, we too will see with our own eyes and laugh with derision at you, O Death.
“Death be not proud.” We taunt you. You are defeated. We mock you this day and on the day of our earthly death when we are laid in the grave. For even there you haven’t won. O grave, you are dead, empty, and have lost all claim on us. Jesus lives. You have no victory. No sting. Even there we are not dead, because all who believe in Jesus Christ never die. They are with Him always even in death, waiting with Him in Paradise as we wait to be reunited to our bodies on the great Day of the Resurrection.
For now we believe it, but on that Day we will see Death’s defeat. On that Day the dead will rise, everyone out of the grave, alive, will spring forth and face the rising Son. No one, no, not one, will stay in the grave. You have lost, O Death.
They will be divided, sure. The sheep and the goats, the chaff and the wheat, the unbelievers and the believers. For the living, risen God is not like Lord Death. He claims no dominion by power, even though power is rightly His. He does not force Himself. He will not steal. He does not demand. Those who do not want Him, who choose you, O Death, who chose to remain in hell, to turn back to the grave, to persist in impenitence and make for themselves their own way, by their own laws, with their own culture where Death is Lord and just wants them to “happy” and understands and rejects those old, moralistic attitudes of the Hebrews.
Yes, they’ll get what they want: They can go to hell. They will be raised only to be returned, to go with what is just, what is theirs, to go back to Lord Death.
But to all who believe in Christ Jesus, who are baptized into His death and resurrection, who eat and drink His crucified and risen Flesh and Blood, who hear and trust His gracious Word of forgiveness. For them, O Death, you have no reason to be proud. Jesus has conquered you, you bitter tyrant. The Lord of Life will bestow on them what they do not deserve and didn’t earn, but is given by His perfect life and immaculate grace. Oddly, the last will be first and the sinner will be saints. They will go with their God, their true Lord, with Jesus, into heaven to enjoy there the reunion of the ages.
For now, those people live in, but not of, this culture of death. They live as people who are free. As people whose bodies are indestructible, immortal, and soon to reign in the new heaven and the new earth with the Lamb who was slain, yet lives, and is worthy of all blessing, honor, glory and might.
Death be not proud, though some have called you
Mighty and dreadful, for you are not so;
For those whom you think that you overthrown, die not, poor death,
Nor can you kill me.
Death be not proud. Jesus has defeated you.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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