Not a Waiting Game

Once again the Easter season has reached us. The world remains a volatile place, from COVID still keeping people apart, from wars and rumors of wars bringing terror, from car accidents and sudden heart attacks, from missed alarms and spilled tea.

Hectic stress, it permeates our lives and makes some days unbearably heavy.

It’s a comfort to know that Jesus has prepared a place for us beyond this life.

As he says, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. … And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going” (John 14:1, 3-4 NIV).

When Easter comes around, it seems easy to remember that Jesus’ death, his sacrifice, was for our eternal salvation.

The gospel, the good news of Christ, is that “He lives.”

Thanks to him, so do we.

We needn’t worry about eternal damnation, an existence where today’s stress is nothing, not even paltry in comparison. God has made a way for us to be with him, to live with him for all eternity. If we can just hold on, our future is secured.

But is that all that Jesus’ sacrifice means? Important as salvation from eternal separation and a happy future in the great beyond may be, that is certainly not the whole story.

As someone mentioned to me in a church service the other day, this oftentimes single-minded focus on salvation of the spirit strikes far below the mark of truly honoring what it is Jesus has done for us. The gospel of Christ is a holistic approach, touching on all aspects of life, and I want us to pay attention to those other aspects.

“He lives” means more than the defeat of death and an eternity with God, for that alone ignores the ability to live with God here, to grow with him now. Looking only at the future strikes as something thought by “mere infants in Christ” (1 Corinthians 3:1b NIV), a stage which Paul urges us to grow out of.

We do not live now in limbo, waiting for Jesus’ return. We must realize that we have already begun a new life here:

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come” (2 Corinthians 5:17 ESV).

We are not called to stay the same as we used to be. God has given us his Spirit, opened the door for us to grow in him. While still being in this world, the gospel calls us to work towards our perfection, to make God’s presence known in our daily lives.

Similarly, “He lives” also means a restored relationship with the whole Godhead, and with each other as well: “...in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation” (2 Corinthians 5:19 ESV).

We are peace-bringers, workers of love, reaching out to heal broken people and rebuild the bridges of relationships. Rather than ignoring the aggressions in this world, we are called to stand against them, to create opportunities for change.

With an active war going on in Ukraine and more passive hatreds manifesting in other arenas, this feels especially poignant now. We must maintain our compassion as we find our own ways to encourage compassion in others.

“He lives” also isn’t only about the mental or spiritual. Some doctrines see the physical as wholly depraved, inherently evil, and therefore of secondary importance to the spiritual “true selves” that will last through eternity.

On the contrary, Jesus shows that the way we treat the physical can be just as important as the way we treat the spiritual. He gave sight to the blind. He purified the leprous skin. He fed thousands of people.

And his teachings permeated his followers—Peter, for example, commanded a lame man to walk, healing his malady. We have hope in the physical restoration here. Our own restorations (and the restorations we help initiate) may not always be as mystically glamorous as healed eyes or the lame walking—though I must testify that such things do occur.

My own weak eyes, requiring glasses to read, were healed when a young lady whom I never met prayed over me years ago.

But other restorations may go unnoticed when they shouldn’t.

Adopting a healthy eating habit or getting enough sleep, for example, are also examples of restoration. The way we treat our bodies can still be an act of worship. When Jesus sacrificed his body for us, I believe he expects us to accept that the sacrifice was for our bodies as well.

Yes, Easter does help us remember Jesus’ sacrifice and its eternal ramifications, but the gospel of Christ isn’t a message urging us to merely survive the hectic stress of this broken world, awaiting a day when we’re beyond it.

The holistic gospel is about thriving in the midst of suffering, transforming the world just as we have been transformed. This is no waiting game. Let us go out and preach the good news. Let us live restored lives and guide others to do the same.