“Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.”

Coping with Death

From ancient times, death has been seen as the tragic irony of human life. Mankind has an inborn drive to plan, build, and dream, and to seek meaning beyond our immediate existence. But we also have the self-awareness to know that all our striving will come to nothing, it all turns to dust by the ultimate destroyer of death.
People seek to cope with this tragedy in various ways.

The actor John Le Mesurier, who played Sergeant Wilson in the old TV series of Dad’s Army, gave the world one final laugh when he wrote his own obituary, published in the Times after his death in 1983. It read “John Le Mesurier wishes it to be known that he conked out on November 15th. He sadly misses family and friends.”

This reminds me of one approach to coping with death, which is to treat it as the ultimate cosmic joke, something we can never understand, and can only laugh about.

Another worldly response is to deny reality by pretending we can somehow overcome death by the greatness of our achievements.
I read an article by an aging journalist who was busy attending funerals for people he had worked with; he said he was tired of hearing eulogies that were works of fantasy and fiction. He longed for a more honest view, he wanted to remember the real nature of his friends, with their bad manners, bad temper, and self-pity.

Death is tragic because Satan claims it as his final victory over all of God’s creation.
We were created in God’s image, and our world was very good, but because of our sin our finest hopes, loves, and dreams, and our glimpses of spiritual life, are all lost forever in permanent separation from God and his blessings.

Jesus’ victory over death

In contrast to our human pretence about death, our Lord Jesus approached his death on the cross with complete realism and honesty, He saw it clearly as the ultimate battle with sin. In the garden of Gethsemane he was sorrowful and deeply distressed, but His response was to pray more earnestly. He prayed for his disciples, and for all who would believe through their message, He prayed for you, and me.
He chose this path in his infinite love for each one of us.

Through his sacrifice on the cross, He removed the guilt of our sin, and took it on himself to the grave.

And in rising from the grave, He overcame the power of sin and death for all who believe in Him.

John 11:25-26 reads, “…I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live. And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die.”
And Romans 6:5 gives the wonderful promise, “If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection”.

Our death to sin

Our verse shows that when through faith we are united with Jesus, we find that we too have already died with Him.
Colossians 3:3 also tells us, “For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.”
When Christ died on the cross, our old self, being enslaved to sin, was crucified to set us free, and we are born again to a new life in Christ.

As we receive Jesus’ gift of forgiveness and true life in Him, like John Le Mesurier we also give our own obituary, for our old sinful self, which we gladly leave behind as dead to us forever. It’s our testimony, but here there is no room for comedy or self-glorification, for our old sinful selves were offensive and completely unacceptable to God.

Jesus has turned the tragic irony of human existence into the celebration of His glorious victory, given to all who believe in Him.

In Jesus, death has lost its sting, and the death of our old sinful selves is now history.