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News | Nate Talks: Death and the living hope
8 April 2009
Nathan Morgan Locke, Christianity Explored's Youth Evangelist, considers how celebrity mortality could spark debate on the claims of Christ
On arriving home after my first day working at Christianity Explored, I found a postcard that had been pushed through the letterbox. On the back was a warm welcome to the Christianity Explored team from Rico Tice, my new boss, and some words of encouragement as I began my job.
On the front was a black and white photograph of some people disembarking from an aircraft, revealed on closer inspection to be Air Force One, the American presidential jet. I turned again to the back of the card and read the caption:
President and Mrs John F. Kennedy arriving at Love Field, Dallas, Texas on November 22nd 1963.
Then it hit me that the photograph was taken the very day that Kennedy was shot. Here was a picture of a man arriving at the place of his death. Rico’s not-so-subtle message effectively read: “Welcome to the team, look out for bullets.”
The eminently quotable Dietrich Bonhoeffer once wrote, “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” (see Mark 8:34-37). Rico, it seems, was saying something similar.
JFK’s assassination was certainly one of those, “Where were you when you heard?” moments. You may remember the passing of figures such as Martin Luther King Jnr, Elvis Presley, John Lennon, Tupac Shakur, Kurt Cobain, Diana, Princess of Wales, Heath Ledger or, most recently (and somewhat orchestrated), Jade Goody.
In 'more developed countries' the breakdown of families and communities means that we can be less involved in other people’s lives and deaths. Medical advancement has improved infant mortality rates and we place those approaching death in professional care. Health and safety warnings seem to imply that we can avoid death altogether if we will only follow the guidelines.
Thus in a society that does its best to ignore death, celebrity mortality is a safe subject. But the reality of our own death and the loss of our nearest and dearest remains complicated. Death is something with which we all have to come to terms, wherever we live.
“I am the Resurrection”
In John’s gospel, Jesus arrives in Bethany to meet with two sisters, Mary and Martha. Their brother, Lazarus, has just died, and Jesus is a close friend coming to join with them in their mourning; and so we read that Jesus wept.
A peculiar conversation takes place between Jesus and Martha:
Jesus: Your brother will rise again.
Martha: I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.
Jesus: I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?
Martha: Yes, Lord, I believe you are the Christ, the Son of God, who was to come into the world.
Jesus here is claiming, and Martha seems to agree, that he brings hope in the face of death. There is no need to fear it nor try to pretend that it doesn’t happen, but through trusting in him we can find ourselves living even though we die.
Jesus went on to prove this by raising Lazarus from the grave and (most impressively) by walking from his own tomb too.
So much of our time in ministry (and particularly youth ministry) can be spent trying to convince people of their need for Jesus; his relevance in their lives. Perhaps a good way into the conversation can be the universal reality of mortality.
Some look for hope in the form of the current US President, Barack Hussein Obama. But at Easter Christians rejoice in the living hope, resurrection hope in the face of death, which can only be found in Christ our Lord and Saviour.
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