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Death and dying

Sunday, April 4, 1999

John 20:2
"They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don't know where they have put him."

In the movie "Patch Adams," which Andi and I saw yesterday, Patch stands at his friend's casket and talks to her. Later he stands at the edge of a precipice, over a vast valley of trees and talks to . . . that's the question, isn't it? Talks to whom? Who is out there, anyway?

During his monologue with the sky and the forest, a butterfly flies onto his arm. His friend had told him how much she envied the caterpillars, who would one day leave their troubles and fly away into the blue skies. When the butterfly touches him it is as if she touches him, and he walks away from the cliff back into his life.

Jesus' resurrection changed forever the way we look at death. Death is the beginning of something. There is no longer any sense to be made out of talking to caskets. They are not there; they have risen! Jesus was (in Romans 8:29) the firstborn among many brothers; he was also the first to die and rise again among many brothers.

    "This is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins." -- 1 John 4:10

He walked the path and made it straight for us; we can follow him if we want to. When we look for God, he is not hard to find. Patch Adams was looking in the wrong place, out in the abyss rather than within himself. In there, inside ourselves, that's where we live and die and live again, finding Jesus.



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