April 6, 2003
Fifth Sunday in Lent

LECTIONARY READINGS
from the Revised Common Lectionary

Jeremiah 31:31-34
Psalm 51:1-12 or
Psalm 119:9-16
Hebrews 5:5-10
John 12:20-33

[Underlined text will take you to sermons on the lectionary text underlined]
[Worship materials are included on the underlined page]

“Life After Death”
John 14:1-6

“If a man die, shall he live again?”

Job’s ancient question has been on the lips of millions throughout the ages.  Sometimes in fear, sometimes in faith…sometimes in the midst of intellectual inquiry and sometimes in the midst of personal pain; but always with a longing for truth…

“If a man die, shall he live again?”

For a certain period of time in our more recent history, the question was deemed unfashionable in theological circles.  The issue of life after death was dismissed as irrelevant…especially for mature thinkers.

To deal with the issue of eternal life was to come dangerously close to the unthinking and overly emotional religion of the “Pie in the sky by and by” people.

When I went to seminary in the mid-sixties, one sought answers to this question of life after death only in the most sophisticated and abstruse terms answers that no one could really understand like this little quote from Paul Tillich’s, Systematic Theology:

“Since Eternal Life is Life and not undifferentiated identity and since the Kingdom of God is the universal actualization of love, the element of individualization cannot be eliminated or the element of participation would also disappear.”  (p. 414 S.T.)

That is Dr. Tillich’s way of answering our question with a “Yes”; however, it is followed on that very same page with Dr. Tillich’s “No” which is expressed in terms which brought the same question to my mind that his “Yes” did:

            “What in the world does that mean?”

I remember a 12 week seminar which I took in seminary which focused on Dr. Tillich’s theology…its was a tremendous seminar because it had only six students in it and the professor had studied at the feet of Tillich.

We came to the end of the seminar to spend the last two sessions discussing Tillich’s answer to job’s old questions…”If a man die, shall he live again?”  We studied, discussed, argued, quoted from his writings and appealed to our professor to tell us a plain “Yes” and “No?”

But all to no avail…. there was no clear answer from Tillich!

I am convinced that the mainline church has pretty much followed Tillich’s lead with this issue…particularly in having no clear answer for this question of Job’s which holds a place in our being.

I am not so much concerned for the great thinkers or the theologians or the seekers after profound truths to delight the intellect.  My deep personal concern to speak a word of hope in the face of Job’s question comes out of spending times with God’s ordinary people who have walked through days of pain and grief when death visited someone deeply loved.

There was the time when the parents of a beautiful 16 year old girl came to the hospital after an auto accident to discover the girl had been killed…and through heart breaking tears, the mother asked, “Do you believe in heaven?”

There was the older man walking out of the intensive care unit with a little brown bag filled with the belongings of a wife he just lost…the second such loss in a few short years…a lonely, crushed man who said, “She had such faith…do you think there was really anything to it?”

I think it is very important for us to speak the words of hope which were spoken to the disciples by the Master himself:

            “Let not your hearts be troubled!”

*****

The mood I want to communicate today is by way of affirming in faith rather than that of debate.  Though I often enjoy the stimulation of philosophical debate, I don’t want to enter such an arena today.  Such discussions have been carried on throughout the ages from Plato to Alfred North Whitehead and Bertrand Russell and I am not competent to either add or to take away.

When we find ourselves in the midst of grief and pain because death has come we could care less what the philosophers have to say…we want the presence of God.  When one has missed his beloved over the space of time, he seeks not a dissertation on the nature of love but a kiss on the lips.

Intellectual questing and scientific inquiry is at the heart of human nobility, but is only a part of reality.  When we enter the are of human love, or depth of feeling, of the power of emotion, we are in new territory.

When we come to the longing of the soul for relationship with something divine and the searching of the heart for meaning beyond our mortality, we are moving into a place where we can know more by faith than by five senses.

“If a man die shall he live again?”

May I offer to you today a simple, clear and concise “YES!”  I believe that one who dies can live again.  I have come to trust that God has reached out to us in Christ to share in our pain, our grief, our mortality and our quest for life beyond death.

Jesus’ words to his disciples were clear and they were specific about hope that reaches beyond death.  Remember that the twelve who were with him in his last hours were extremely troubled, they were heartbroken, they were afraid and they grieved because their hopes and dreams were somehow going to die with Jesus.  And he speaks:

“Don’t let your hearts be troubled…you trust God…trust me too.  There is room for you where I am going and I won’t abandon you…I will come and get you so you can be where I am…when death comes and it seems as though I am gone… don’t be afraid… I am going to prepare a place for you.

Now notice!  This is specific language…it affirms hope beyond death…it promises that there is a place with him beyond this life and it is clear that the way to this life is a simple trust in him.

Life after death is not based on intellectual ability or the ability to believe things that are hard to believe.  It is not based on being such a tremendous good person that God simply wouldn’t be able to turn you down.  It is not dependent upon joining the right religion or signing the right statement of faith…it is the promise of Christ to those who simply reach out in trust that they will not be abandoned in the shadows of death…

            “I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.”

The ground of hope for a Christian is not some argument or the intrinsic ability of the human soul to survive death but rather a simple trust in the very clear promise of Christ to not forsake us in death.

As I deepen my relationship with him, as I grow and mature in a kind of a relationship of love with God, I come to a deeper understanding of his care for me.  And as I grow more and more familiar with this Jesus of Galilee, I grow more and more confident that I can trust his promises.  If anyone can keep a promise, he can!

Our ability to trust the Master is like trusting a friend.  I have a friend whom I dearly love…a friend I trust and depend upon.  If you were to come to me with an accusation that would reflect upon his integrity and especially upon his good faith with me, I would without hesitation deny the charge.

I would do this, not because of some counterproofs or some intellectual statements about his integrity and good faith…I would deny your charge purely and simply because I trust and love my friend and I know better in my own heart.

This is as close as I can come to why I trust this Jesus.  It isn’t so much my head as it is my heart that tells me I can trust him to care for me everlastingly!  I can give all kinds of intellectual reasons why I love my wife…but when it gets right down to it…I don’t know WHY I love and trust her…I just know in my heart it’s right and good!

Perhaps you read Dr. Moody’s book, Life after Life.  It tells the story of 150 cases of death or near death experiences that purport to show that there is indeed something that goes beyond this life.  It is even a stimulating and supportive book for people who face grief.

But it is not the foundation of my belief and trust in God’s care for me beyond my own death.  I guess it is like my relationship with Judi.  There’s lot’s of proofs or signs of her love that are the foundation of my trust in her love.  It is still in what I know in my heart and in what transpires in our relationship.  After twenty years, the pretenses are all over!  The love that endures goes beyond the illusions of perfection and expectations of eternal bliss.  Genuine love penetrates the surface until it is grounded in the heart of a relationship where it can not be explained…but it CAN be experienced!  And I like it that way!

Nevertheless, it is good to have a sign of that love now and then.  How many times do we go through the experience of knowing that we are loved but wanting nevertheless to hear it.

            “I LOVE YOU!”

What an experience to hear that!  And if we should perchance also receive a hug and a kiss from our beloved then we are very near the same territory that God’s grace is all about!

I personally believe that the “near death” experiences that people report where they come into contact with a reality and a joy that tells of a dimension beyond this life are kind of like the kisses of a lover.  They do not produce the relationship but are rather the result of the relationship.

I do not believe in life after death because someone has had a “near death” experience of joy and peace…but rather I trust that these experiences have been genuine because I already trust the promises of Christ.

It was in this sense of a “Sign of his love” that I remember the experience with a woman in a former parish.  When her husband died and I spent some time with her at the wake, she seemed possessed with a peace and a calm about her husband’s destiny that was unusual.

She told me then of an experience she had wherein she almost died.  As she came out of what we could call the “valley of the shadow of death” she remembered being a little disappointed at having to leave the peach and joy of what she called her “Green Valley.”  She said that the experience was beyond description.

She was sure and trusted very deeply that her husband, Ralph, was there with the Master.  She did not need assurance or intellectual reinforcement of the faith that there is life beyond death…she simply said that she knew.  She was an inspiration to me.

She died two years later and I was there just after she died.  She had been in the hospital in a coma for two days before her death…but on the day she died, she became conscious and was talking away to the nurse who sat by her bed.  She had long since made peace with her mortality and longed to, in Paul’s words; “…depart and be with the Lord.”  In the middle of the nurse’s final sentence to her, Alvina looked toward the ceiling…back at the nurse and with her finger over her lips said to the nurse…”SShhh!  I’ve got to go now” and closed her eyes and died!

For me, that kind of experience is no longer proof of anything, but rather another sign of God’s care and love…it is as the lover’s kiss which does not prove the love, but simply reflects the love.