2023-10-15 A Meditation on Consigned to Death

“12 Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? 13 But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. 14 And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. 15 We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. 16 For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. 17 And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. 18 Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. 19 If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. 20 But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. 21 For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. 23 But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. 24 Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. 25 For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. 26 The last enemy to be destroyed is death. 27 For “God has put all things in subjection under his feet.” But when it says, “all things are put in subjection,” it is plain that he is excepted who put all things in subjection under him. 28 When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all.” (1 Co 15:12–28 ESV)

As those consigned to death, the Christian’s bout with Resurrection is a bout with a persistent and welcome sentence overturned. We finally had nothing more to run on. We finally just said “Enough with it”. We finally just surfaced plainly, unapologetically, directly, as inimical to Law. We were Grace standard-bearers, notwithstanding that any proper Law-adherent would blanche and disapprove. We couldn’t care any more. We had to find Life on the other side of the end of all morality and self-righteous parading. We had to, in short, let the Spirit enter in and soothe and revive some Blanket Hope beyond the meritorious fasts and personal accolades.

Such was the enigma and question that killed Christ. It is a question mark, as to what is the Imago Dei that we strive to uphold. What, exactly, makes us brothers and sisters in Him? What is our gold standard and Ideal up ahead that we strive for? How, if we swear by anything, can we expect any understanding or sympathy, if our faith is built on Grace and not on the “obvious” merits of Law? If we are a mangled and disengaged corpus, the worse for the bandits of time and trials of sin, then on what terms and on what good flag and nation do we labor onwards for?

We labor onwards because Resurrection only occurs where there has been a death. Resurrection is the surprise Gift that says, “Here you faltered, but no worry, the EMT is racing to the scene”. Resurrection is a corner turned, a no-man’s land breached, a beachhead of come what may. Resurrection is that A.A. meeting where, “They kind of get it… but always they forget”; “I don’t forget”. We don’t forget the sweeping temptations to sin. We don’t forget the lazy haste to claim absolution without doing so in the Name of a guilty life sentence. His life sentence. His dutiful submission to the judgment that not just He but all of us deserve. Yet in His case, more is true: He was innocent.