DYNAMIS!
A publication of St. George Orthodox Christian Cathedral
Wichita, KS
Death and Resurrection: St. Mark 12:18-27, especially
vs. 27:“He is not the God of
the dead, but the God of the living....” In
today’s Gospel, the Lord Jesus addresses not only the reality of death,
but also the greater coming reality, the defeat of death in the resurrection
promised for our mortal bodies.
Undeniably, it is the common lot of mankind that all die, that everybody
shall fall in time, that every single body to whom God gives life also shall
languish and go down into the grave.
Yet, straight in the teeth of universal death, the Lord Jesus draws our
attention to the witness of Holy Scripture in opposition to the
“...Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection...” (vs. 18).
Centuries before Christ, the Prophet Isaiah, moved by the Holy Spirit,
confessed to God: “The dead shall rise, and they that are in the tombs
shall be raised, and they that are in the earth shall rejoice: for the dew from
Thee is healing to them...” (Is. 26:19 LXX).
In refuting the Sadducees and their fanciful tale of a
woman married in serial fashion to seven brothers, the Lord Jesus teaches three
truths about resurrection of the body: 1) that the promise of resurrection for
our bodies arises from the nature of God as Life and Life-Giver, 2) that
resurrection shall occur in the general resurrection, sometime after each of us
dies, and 3) that each of our mortal bodies shall be raised as the Apostle
says, to “newness of life” (Rom. 6:4), in a “spiritual
body” (1 Cor. 15:44), which Christ Jesus
already has manifested.
Anciently, the People of God already had learned to look to
God as the Source of life, a truth we ourselves hear regularly in the Vesperal Psalm: “Thou wilt take their spirit, and
they shall cease; and unto their dust they shall return. Thou wilt send forth Thy Spirit, and
they shall be created; and Thou shalt renew the face
of the earth” (Ps. 103:31,32 LXX). Thus the Lord has ordained life and
death for all flesh. He gives life
and takes away our breath. We live
and die - the great mystery of life and death. However, the dramatic announcement of
the Lord Jesus in this passage “concerning the dead [is] that they
rise” again (vs. 26).
The Lord Jesus reminds us of what He had said to Moses from
the burning bush: “I Am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the
God of Jacob” (Ex. 3:6). The
Lord Jesus’ point clearly is that God speaks in present tense. “Now, in the present, I Am the God
of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”
He does not say, “Centuries ago I was the God of the Patriarchs.” God the Lord is He Who renews the face
of the earth and restores the dead to life. Of course, for God is the
Life-Giver! He is Life and the One
from Whom all life derives and exists.
As St. Cyril of Alexandria adds, “God created all things for
incorruption, as it is written...‘He hath swallowed up death, having
waxed mighty, and God shall again take away all weeping from every countenance;
He shall remove the reproach of the people from the whole earth’”
(see Is. 25:8).
One of the reasons the Sadducees denied the reality of
resurrection - just as do our modern-day secularists - is because they could
only see and touch death. Hence,
men do not accept the Apostolic witness that Christ is risen, “and has
become the firstfruits of those who have fallen
asleep” (1 Cor. 15:20). Resurrection for mankind is a future
gift that God has for those who unite themselves now to Christ and partake now
of His Resurrection power for new life.
“For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made
alive. But each one in his own order:
Christ the firstfruits, afterward those who are
Christ's at His coming” (1 Cor. 15:22,23).
Physically, in the resurrection, men’s bodies shall
be like the body of the risen Lord, as St. John of Damascus says, “such
that it entered through the closed doors without difficulty and needed neither
food, nor sleep, nor drink,” for they shall be “like angels in
heaven” (Mk. 12:25).
Thy cross do we adore, O Christ, and Thy holy Resurrection
we praise and glorify.
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