THE DEFEAT OF DEATH

Psalm 16 is the third psalm used by Handel in Messiah. It is also used in the New Testament book of the Acts of the Apostles by St. Peter (Acts 2) and St. Paul (Acts 13) to present the Gospel to their contemporaries. Why did they use this psalm? Jesus himself used similar language to refer to himself (Mark 12:35-37) and may have used this psalm in his post-resurrection explanations to the disciples (Luke 24:44). Here is what Peter said in Jerusalem at Pentecost:

 “God raised Jesus from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him. David said about him: ‘I saw the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Therefore, my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will live in hope, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay. You have made known to me the paths of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence.’” (Acts 2:24-28)

Peter then goes on to argue that David, who wrote these words, was not talking primarily about himself, but prophetically about his anointed descendant. “Seeing what was ahead, he spoke of the resurrection of the Christ [‘The Christ’ (Greek) and ‘the Messiah’ (Hebrew) both mean ‘the Anointed One’], that he was not abandoned to the grave, nor did his body see decay. God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of the fact.” (Acts 2:31,32) The body of David was in his tomb, so his words refer to the Messianic King who was to come. These words were fulfilled in Jesus and in no other; therefore, Jesus must be the Messiah.

The physical resurrection of Jesus established his divine credentials: “who as to his human nature was a descendant of David, and who through the Spirit of holiness was declared with power to be the Son of God by his resurrection from the dead.” (Rom.1:3,4)   He is the Victor over death. It was impossible for death to keep his hold over him.

That victory is shared with all those who follow him. Handel trumpets these glad tidings of good things using the words of 1 Cor.15:20-22. “Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.”

While we have heard this message many times imagine how it sounded to people for the first time? This was a revolutionary message. Those who heard it and received it for the truth found that it transformed their lives. William Barclay comments:

“To the early Church the resurrection was all-important. We must remember this – without the resurrection there would have been no Christian Church at all. When the disciples preached the centrality of the resurrection they were arguing from experience. After the Cross they were bewildered, broken men, with their dream gone and their lives shattered. It was the resurrection that changed all that and turned them from cowards into heroes.” (Acts, Daily Study Bible, p. 27)

How does the resurrection of Jesus change us? Can you think back to when you first heard about the resurrection of Jesus? What sort of impact did it make on your thinking? Has it become so familiar to you that it has lost its force and its effect? How does the fact of the resurrection of Jesus, his victory over death, and our sharing in it impact our view of life and death? What would our attitude to death be if Jesus were not raised from the dead?

I was eleven years old when my grandmother suffered a heart attack. We were very close. I went to the movies with her and loved her peanut brownies. She lived just a few houses away from us and I visited often to play in her yard with her little Yorkshire terrier. I remember when he died and we buried him there. I also enjoyed feeding her pet budgerigars, the leftovers of an aviary of many parakeets that was in our back yard. My mother’s younger brother and sister, Lloyd and Jill, were still living with her. When I visited her after her attack, she was pale and listless as she lay in bed. There wasn’t much you could do for her condition in those days before heart bypass surgery and blood-thinners. She lingered for a few days, but a blood clot developed. Early in the morning I heard Lloyd running into our place with the news that she had died. She was only fifty-nine years old. My mother was inconsolable. I could not understand how she could have died and left us. It did not make sense to me. How could a person who was so full of life one moment, die and leave us? Where did she go? It was illogical to me that a life that was full of meaning and purpose could cease to exist. What happened after death? What was the purpose of life if it ended so abruptly? It all seemed so pointless. Her death precipitated many questions in my mind. At that time I read the historical novel, The Egyptian, by Mika Waltari, (the son of a Lutheran minister in Finland) which was made into a movie starring Jean Simmons, Victor Mature, Gene Tierney and Peter Ustinov. I saw it the next year when I was thirteen. It explored the religions of Egypt, and the search for an answer to death.

Just three years after my grandmother’s death, during a renewal weekend at our church I heard, with a hungry heart, it seemed for the first time, about the resurrection of Jesus and the promise of resurrection for all those who are in Christ.   Of course, I had heard it before. I had celebrated it every Easter Sunday of my life. I had affirmed my faith in it every time I recited the Creed. Yet, it seemed for the first time, the reality of it hit me. Death does not have the last word. It was impossible for death to keep its hold on Jesus, and on me, if I am trusting in him.

The words of the psalm now take on new and riveting meaning.

“Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices: my body also will live in hope, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay. You have made known to me the paths of life; you fill me with joy in your presence.”

What do these words mean to you? Do they liberate you from the culture of death, as they did me so long ago? Do they give you the confidence of knowing that there is more to life than this mortal life? Do they give you something to live for beyond the grave?

You see how crucial the fact of the resurrection of Jesus is?

“If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.” (1 Cor.15:17-19)

Can you now imagine the impact this message had on its hearers in the first century, and on all who have heard it for the first time down through the centuries to today? If this is true it changes so many things. Death is not the end. All spirits and powers that oppose the God of life will be destroyed by Christ. “He won’t let up until the last enemy is down – and the very last enemy is death!” (1 Cor.15:25,26 The Message)

Do you believe this? Do you live this? If so, let your heart be glad and your tongue rejoice.

(Excerpted from Ted Schroder, SOUL FOOD, Volume 3, 275-278)