Most of my life I knew death was real. I had pets die. My grandfather died. I even had peers die. Time went on and I grew up. I lost two more grandparents and a few friends. Death was a momentary discomfort but life went on for me.
Death was just a thing. Death was just a thing until it came to my house. That moment of death lingers in dark corners. It haunts my sleepless nights. It triggers feelings of impending doom and overwhelming fear…
For a moment.
Then I remember the moment that the resurrection came to my house.
The night of my sons death was an entanglement of life and death. Physical death was happening before my eyes. In my arms. In an ambulance. In that moment of overpowering death, my thoughts, perhaps divinely, were directed to a heavenly scene. I saw what he was seeing. I saw peace. I saw love. I saw a place where life had dominion.
The resurrection of a man name Jesus became my defense that night. It shielded me from demonic accusations. It protected me “what if’s.” It established me in a truth that was bigger than that moment of death.
…
“At this time there was a wise man who was called Jesus. And his conduct was good and he was known to be virtuous. And many people from among the Jews and other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned him to be crucified and to die. And those who had become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that he had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion and that he was alive; accordingly, he was perhaps the messiah concerning whom the prophets have recounted wonders.” (Arabic translation) –Flavius Josephus, court historian for Emperor Vespasian
On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. -Luke the Physician
“Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep.” Saul of Tarsus later known as the Apostle Paul
“I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live.” – Jesus of Nazareth
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