Death to Life
Ephesians 2
1 As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, 2 in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. 3 All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. 4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions — it is by grace you have been saved. 6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7 in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. 8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith — and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God — 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
On Sunday we saw two daughters. One dead, her father advocating for her. One, as good as dead, as she was cast out of society as unclean. Two daughters needing restoration of life. Both being restored through Christ. One actively grasping at the robe of Jesus to take healing that she needed. One passively laying, not even knowing she was waiting. Life restored because of faith of a father who came to Jesus on his knees begging and the faith of the woman who came on her knees to sneak in and touch the robes of Jesus. Life came to each in their place of death and dying.
This is the place of the church. Our beginning is with them. In one way or another life has been given to those of us who had no life left in us. We were physically wandering the world. Alive in the way we all walk through our lives. But Paul reminds us that we were also dead already. Sitting in our sins. Trying to live in the way we wanted. Isaiah looked to the days of the Messiah and saw the hope for life in the reality of our need for that same life.
Isaiah 53.6
6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to our own way;
and the Lord has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.
We lived in the ways of our own choices. Choices that let us determine what is best. Choices that put ourselves, our desires, ahead of all else. Directly going against the command of God from creation. We were to take care of the whole of creation. Not to use it for whatever we want. But to keep it and make it what God intends. The same for how we treat ourselves and those around us. And from the beginning we want to make it about us, not about God and his gift of creation.
Paul reminds us that our ways lead to our death, and to the death of creation. We show up like these two daughters. We are in need of life. Life needs to be restored in us. Life that restores us to being who God intended. Life that restores the creation to what God intended. We can come on our knees for ourselves and receive the gift of life the Jesus offers. We can come on our knees for others around us that they see the gift of life available to them.
We can keep trying our own way. Or we can receive the way of grace and have life.