18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.
21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.
+
Are you an unrighteous fool?
Paul calls those of false religions, ‘fools.’ They worship cows and cats, ancestors departed and places on earth destined to destruction. They seek bearded sages or force upon the downtrodden ideology of glorious conquest.
Consider the glory of the LORD, the heavens and the earth. NO big bang nor pain-stakingly slow sequence of unlikely perfect events could have created the earth upon which we walk or this miraculously intricate body which walks upon it.
The vastness and perfection of the heavens is immeasurably beyond the comprehension of created man(adam).
Think about those who are unrighteous. Think about the sins these inflict on you. Consider their sins against many, these sins of the ungodly, who will be called to account at the Judgment seat by the LORD who they refuse to worship. Paul describes these. You can likely put many faces to Paul’s long descriptive list of unrighteousness.
28 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.
29 They were filled with
all manner of unrighteousness,
evil, covetousness, malice.
They are full of envy,
murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness.
They are gossips, [30] slanderers,
haters of God,
insolent, haughty, boastful,
inventors of evil,
disobedient to parents,
[31} foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless.
32 Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.
+
We see the faces of those who deserve God’s wrath. In all fairness, when will the LORD finally destroy the evil of the unrighteous?
How long, O Lord, until Your Holy wrath consumes the evil which plagues us?
A fair question. How long will God contend with their evil? … their evil … evil?
flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.
whoever does not believe is condemned already. John 3:18b
As was the man of dust, so also are those who are of the dust, and as is the man of heaven, so also are those who are of heaven. – 1 Corinthians 15:48 ESV
I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.
Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed–
Death & Life of our Body & Soul
My dear fellow mortal,
You will die, as will I. Living cells will falter on that appointed day. The spirit of life will no more enter your lungs or pump renewal through your once fast-beating heart.
And what of the flesh they discard as a worn-out sock? Your body will be buried or burned. You will perish in the earth or be consumed in the fire.
They may say a few last kind things about you… a few kind words as your soul rests at last… rest in the peace of death… comforting words your ears will not hear… words to your mourners finally considering the awakening and the judgment of your soul… and theirs.
Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God of his great mercy to take unto himself the soul of our dear brother here departed, we therefore commit his body to the ground;
earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust;
in sure and certain hope of the Resurrection to eternal life, through our Lord Jesus Christ; who shall change our vile body, that it may be like unto his glorious body, according to the mighty working, whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself. – 1662 Book of Common Prayer
Your death is certain; your resurrection from death is not.
Yet there is one certain hope. (What were the words?)
“through our Lord Jesus Christ; who shall change our vile body.”
Yes, the death and decay of our body is certainly a vile thing. Yet followers of the Way, believers in the Truth, the living body of the Life we have in Christ Jesus cling not to this failing flesh, but to the sure and certain hope of the Resurrection to eternal life, though Christ our Lord and Savior.
The burial ceremony from the Book of Common Prayer points back to the original and continuing sin in all of us.
By the sweat of your face
you shall eat bread,
till you return to the ground,
for out of it you were taken;
for you are dust,
and to dust you shall return.”
Jesus, the Son of God, Messiah in the flesh, was crucified for our sins. He died and was buried [Good Friday, we call it] and rose from the dead on the third day [Easter, as we celebrate].
Christ paid the highest price for our sin. Do we not owe Jesus an unpayable debt? This is why Christians call Christ Jesus, our Lord. He IS our Saviour.
NO other religion offers forgiveness of our sins or eternal life in a resurrection body! Yet Jesus spoke of who He came to save [John 3] and NOT ALL will be saved.
18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.
everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed.
19 And this is the judgment:
the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. 20 For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed.
Sinners do not obey God and humble their flesh before Jesus their Lord; He IS the Christ, judge of all mankind.
Flesh failing or taken can no longer proclaim the glory of God and grace of Christ Jesus.
Are you a sinner, captured in failing flesh?
Can your sorry soul stand before Almighty God? Can you endure the wrath we deserve for our many many sins? Will you not faint at the judgment seat of Christ?
*
Lent is a time of preparation for the resurrection of the dead, a time of consideration of those who will be raised either to the terrible face of our sin or the loving grace of Christ Jesus whom we have honored as our Lord. You may not have even until Easter, in the year of our Lord, 2016; for some will be suddenly taken and breathe no more.
Ashes to ashes, we are reminded on Ash Wednesday. Repent of your sin and prepare your heart to bow down to Jesus Christ as Lord over you life, Jesus who IS and will return. Jesus Christ who will embrace only those He loves, we who call Him, “Lord.”
“I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live,26 and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?”
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.2 He was in the beginning with God.3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.4 In him was life, and the life was the light of men.5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.2 The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.
Genesis 2: 7 then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.
9b The tree of life was in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden,17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”
22 Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat, and live forever—”23 therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken.
Genesis 5:5 Thus all the days that Adam lived were 930 years, and he died.
+
If there is one time in our mind we really would like to question the indisputable inerrancy of the Bible it is probably a quote of the devil’s question in the garden:
He said to the woman, “Did God actually say…?” – Genesis 3:1b
Follow Satan’s deceiving question with whatever evil your mind may conceive, but the premise is false answer of Satan.
4 But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die…
Walk up to Eve or Adam and ask either of them if what Satan has assured them as enticement to sin is true?
Yes, every one of us knows that we will surely die! Therefore, what is our hope? (And I remind us now that the Bible is God’s guaranteed word.)
God IS, the LORD exists before time and measurement of creation; God IS, the LORD remains after the time of creation can no longer be measured. This is unfathomable to our limited created mind (which now has the knowledge of good and evil). This is why we must believe by faith.
Have you ever considered how different our world would be without sin? Have you ever dared to think what it would be like to NEVER die, while living in a Paradise of God’s love?
Consider the resurrection by faith: that the LORD who created all things, the LORD who created each particle of your flesh and bones, your brain and body, your heart and soul; that the LORD who made you can make you eternal!
We can be raised from the dead to a life God intended! Praise our Lord Jesus Christ!
Evidence of Christ’s resurrection is well-documented, yet still not believed by those not saved from death by their own sin and disobedience. They do not want to believe God. By their own will many will not bow down to any, even God the LORD!
Evidence of the resurrection, which some of the Jews did not believe, is presented in scripture even before the Cross of Christ Jesus. Some always refuse to obey God in spite of the evidence of scripture.
Is faith by evidence of scripture so far beyond the evidence seen only by your eyes which can deceive?
Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death, and he was not found, because God had taken him.
By faith Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen, in reverent fear constructed an ark for the saving of his household. By this he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.
By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going.
Do you believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ by faith, when you know ‘you will surly die’?
18 And she said to Elijah, “What have you against me, O man of God? You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son!”
+
Is that what you think of Easter? Is that what you think of all the hope of the empty tomb of Jesus? Where is your faith?
+
20 And he cried to the Lord, “O Lord my God, have you brought calamity even upon the widow with whom I sojourn, by killing her son?”
21 Then he stretched himself upon the child three times and cried to the Lord, “O Lord my God, let this child’s life come into him again.”22 And the Lord listened to the voice of Elijah. And the life of the child came into him again, and he revived.
23 And Elijah took the child and brought him down from the upper chamber into the house and delivered him to his mother. And Elijah said, “See, your son lives.”
Indeed, the Son lives! He IS resurrected from the dead.
The hand of the Lord was upon me, and he brought me out in the Spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of the valley; it was full of bones.2 And he led me around among them, and behold, there were very many on the surface of the valley, and behold, they were very dry.3 And he said to me,“Son of man, can these bones live?”
What do you think: When you run to the place where the body should be, do you have faith in the resurrection?
5 Thus says the Lord God to these bones: Behold, I will cause breath [It is the same word as in the beginning, Gen. 1:2] to enter you, and you shall live.
6 And I will lay sinews upon you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live, and you shall know that I am the Lord.”
7 So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I prophesied, there was a sound, and behold, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone.8 And I looked, and behold, there were sinews on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them. But there was no breath in them.
+
Is that what you say of the body that has died?
“There is no breath in them. They are dry bones forever.”
The Prophet Ezekiel is witnessing creation of a man by the Spirit of God! – resurrection from the bones of men who have died!
Thus says the Lord God: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain, that they may live.”
10 So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army.
+
Resurrection at the command of the Living GOD! Men dead, given life from the dust of our bones!
Do you hearken to the upward call of the Voice of the Living One?
Resurrection! Do you believe this?
This is 600 years before Christ Jesus. This is the same time even Jews persecuted their own Prophets. This is the time of Jeremiah who they threw into a pit to die. This is a time when Daniel would interpret handwriting on the walls for Kings who had destroyed Jerusalem in 607 BC; a time when the faithful were led as captives into Babylon, as before Moses had led Israel from the slavery Egypt.
It is the LORD who brings floods on all of the earth. It is the LORD who parts the sea before the Hebrews to pass over. It is the LORD who commands spirit into the lifeless body, which lies in the tomb of hopelessness.
11 Soon afterward he went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a great crowd went with him.12 As he drew near to the gate of the town, behold, a man who had died was being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow, and a considerable crowd from the town was with her.
13 And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, “Do not weep.”14 Then he came up and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And he said, “Young man, I say to you, arise.”
15 And the dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother.
16 Fear seized them all, and they glorified God, saying, “A great prophet has arisen among us!” and“God has visited his people!”17 And this report about him spread through the whole of Judea and all the surrounding country.
+
I have sat through memorials for my mother and for my wife…
They lay in the grave without sinew to embrace me in the flesh; lifeless rest, without spirit to have compassion on me… Is there hope for these?
Yes! I say. In Christ they live. By their faith, their bones will hearken to the upward call of Jesus, when at last He will return once more on the clouds of Heaven… and then the Judgment.
Even with evidence of the Prophets and witness of Jesus, the Son of Man raising a boy from the coffin and giving him back to his mother: many refused to believe. Yet the work of the resurrection is never finished until Jesus says, “It is finished.”
Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha… 5 Now Jesus loved [agapaō] Martha and her sister and Lazarus…
8 The disciples said to him, “Rabbi, the Jews were just now seeking to stone you, and are you going there again?” …
14 Then Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus has died,15 and for your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”16 So Thomas, called the Twin,said to his fellow disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”
+
Not a lot of faith here from a disciple who knew Jesus raised the boy at Nain from the dead. Fear and doubt: how easily we forget our faith in the Lord when our flesh is at stake. We are just like him though; for we would want to put our hands in the wounds of the nails.
We pray for Jesus to heal the inevitable sickness leading to death of a loved one, when their true sickness is the sin of our souls.
17 Now when Jesus came, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days.18 Bethany was near Jerusalem, about two miles off,19 and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them concerning their brother…
21 Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.22 But even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you.”
23 Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”
24 Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.”
25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live,26 and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?”
27 She said to him, “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God,who is coming into the world.”
… 32 Now when Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet, saying to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”
… 38 Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone lay against it.39 Jesus said, “Take away the stone.”
… “Lazarus, come out.”
44 The man who had died came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth.
Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.”
The Plot to Kill Jesus
45 Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what he did, believed in him,46 but some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done.
47 So the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered the council and said, “What are we to do? For this man performs many signs.48 If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.”
+
Jesus Christ is not the only one to ride into Jerusalem in triumph. The Table of Sacrifice for the Temple is prepared. The proof of the resurrection, even in the person of Lazarus, is evidence!
“Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the LORD,” shout some.
Then when it is time for the Sacrifice, many flee. Many betray the Lord to hold onto their comfortable sins. They shout, “Crucify Him! Crucify Him.“
Like a Lamb he is led to the slaughter, scourged for the punishment of our sins, and nailed to a tree with the curse of our unrighteousness.
“Crucify Him! Crucify Him,” we witness by the fruit of our quick run from the Cross after we worship most Sundays. Yet He loves us so much.
Christ died for our sins.
For the Tomb will be empty…
And so will be yours…
The Savior returns.
+
Do you believe this?
+
Cookie Consent
We use cookies to improve your experience on our site. By using our site, you consent to cookies.
Used to monitor number of Google Analytics server requests
10 minutes
__utmb
Used to distinguish new sessions and visits. This cookie is set when the GA.js javascript library is loaded and there is no existing __utmb cookie. The cookie is updated every time data is sent to the Google Analytics server.
30 minutes after last activity
__utmc
Used only with old Urchin versions of Google Analytics and not with GA.js. Was used to distinguish between new sessions and visits at the end of a session.
End of session (browser)
__utmz
Contains information about the traffic source or campaign that directed user to the website. The cookie is set when the GA.js javascript is loaded and updated when data is sent to the Google Anaytics server
6 months after last activity
__utmv
Contains custom information set by the web developer via the _setCustomVar method in Google Analytics. This cookie is updated every time new data is sent to the Google Analytics server.
2 years after last activity
__utmx
Used to determine whether a user is included in an A / B or Multivariate test.
18 months
_ga
ID used to identify users
2 years
_gali
Used by Google Analytics to determine which links on a page are being clicked
30 seconds
_ga_
ID used to identify users
2 years
_gid
ID used to identify users for 24 hours after last activity
24 hours
_gat
Used to monitor number of Google Analytics server requests when using Google Tag Manager
1 minute
_gac_
Contains information related to marketing campaigns of the user. These are shared with Google AdWords / Google Ads when the Google Ads and Google Analytics accounts are linked together.
90 days
__utma
ID used to identify users and sessions
2 years after last activity
Marketing cookies are used to follow visitors to websites. The intention is to show ads that are relevant and engaging to the individual user.
Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God of his great mercy to take unto himself the soul of our dear brother here departed, we therefore commit his body to the ground; 
