House on the Rock

The mechanized whir of a coffee bean grinder roared through the Starbucks lounge as my friend leaned in, eyes watery and full of compassion. Her hands encircled a steaming espresso, her voice barely above a whisper:
“How are you handling this so well?”

I glanced down at my phone lying face-up on the table. The lock screen revealed a picture of Mom. I let my eyes linger on the blonde bangs that framed her perfectly-tanned skin before being ripped to the floor by radiation. Tears stung my eyes as I thought about how pretty she was. How fast she declined. How the smile that was once a staple of my life was finally resigned to a steely stiffness. The most important woman of my world, slid into a bag.

There was nothing glamorous about her death. A body once so strong and fit withered, in a matter of weeks, to atrophy. A heart so full and steadfast slowed to one final beat, and then silence. I still shudder at the pictures displaying her frailty, desperate for that lock-screen smile marking the ease of a once-healthy life.

I sighed at the sincerity of that coffee-shop question. There was no boast I could bring. The entire survival of my day-to-day rested on one thing:

“Well, honestly, because of the resurrection.”

It wasn’t something I said to earn a spiritual gold star. Not some rote Sunday School answer forced in the presence of a Christian friend. No, it was truly the lifeblood of my very existence. The truth that brought me through soul-crushing sorrow. The breath of precious air amidst a suffocating new reality. Yes, the only way I could handle my mom’s death was because of the resurrection.

Jesus endured a far more unglamorous death. He suffered an agonizing final few hours — drinking His Father’s wrath to pay for the sins of a world who would continually turn against him. But His murder ends in majesty as death is trampled by the victory of a King who could not stay dead — He rose so that death is defeated instead. And not only death, but sin and Satan once and for all. And this changes everything. After all,

If the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. Those, then, who have fallen asleep in Christ have also perished. If we have put our hope in Christ for this life only, we should be pitied more than anyone.

1 Corinthians 15:17-19

If not for the resurrection of Jesus, Christianity would be a fairy tale. Our eternity would be torment. Mom’s story would have had a horrific ending — cancer, then eternal separation from God in Hell, because that would mean Jesus didn’t truly overcome sin. We’d be forced to live that reality again and again with every life that was lost.

But if indeed the resurrection is true, then victory is ours in King Jesus. We are made alive because He is alive. Death becomes a doorway into everlasting life, and all who surrender to Him — though they die — get to live. Where, then, is the sting of death? Swallowed up in the victory of Christ.

At the time of my mom’s passing, death was not just a thief, but a vindictive transformer who flipped upside-down the sweetness of life we had known. Health became helplessness. Light became dark. The joy we once knew became a long and weary journey on which we were forced to embark.

But in the light of the resurrection, we have a different outlook. Jesus is not just a Savior, but a victorious transformer who flips our lives to a sweetness beyond anything we deserve. Helplessness becomes hope and wholeness. Darkness becomes light. The long and weary journey ends with everlasting life.

The body that my mom died in — crippled by cancer and stilled by strokes and seizures — is not the body she’s in anymore. She’s alive, healed, whole. Waiting for the entire bodily resurrection that will come to all creation at Christ’s return.

Because of the resurrection, we get to picture her walking streets of gold rather than rotting in ground just south of State Road 32. Because of the resurrection, there is hope that we who know Jesus will one day dwell in resurrected bodies free of any sickness or sin. We’ll spend eternity with Jesus and we’ll see our Mom again.

Because of the resurrection, our biggest enemy is a defeated enemy.

This changes everything.