An Apocalypse

Resurrection. When I say the word resurrection what comes to mind? Maybe you doubt that people come back from the dead. Thanks to popular television and movies perhaps the word resurrection conjures up zombies. Perhaps the idea is incredibly unbelievable and therefore ridiculous.

Resurrection is the foundation of the Christian faith. That may come to a shock for some people. Christian’s, I feel, talk a lot about Jesus death, death on a cross, saving blood, sacrifice, etc. However, the number one thing the apostles and first followers of Jesus wanted to talk about was the resurrection.

People don’t come back from the dead, that is our current understanding of the world. Even ancient people would assume that people don’t come back from the dead and if they did, there would be someone who helped facilitate that. Think of the story of Jesus and Lazarus or Elijah bringing a widow’s son back from the dead. There was always an agent on behalf of God doing the raising. With Jesus, there was no agent. It was God.

Something else that is interesting to note is that Jesus isn’t just brought back from the dead. He is made new. Jesus becomes a sign, symbol, and the embodiment of new creation. Jesus is both fully himself and so much more. Never in the gospels do they make it seem like Jesus is different because he is God. Quite the opposite, Jesus is somehow more fully human and ready to participate in the kingdom to come/age to come/new creation.

This event leaves Jesus’ followers to reorient there lives. It becomes an apocalyptic event! Their world is different. To quote the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, “their world got flipped, turned upside down.” The disciples and apostles spend the rest of their lives reorienting themselves to this new possibility. They also spend the rest of their lives trying to tell people about the resurrection. The suffering and death of Jesus are never separated from the resurrection of Jesus.

I invite you into the discussion we are starting to have on Friday Nights at 6 pm about Jesus and the resurrection. What does it mean for the resurrection of Jesus in the way the eyewitnesses describe, mean for you? Does this have apocalyptic impacts on your life and view of the world? How does your “compass” change because of the resurrection? After all, we are invited into the resurrected life of Christ.