We are alive with Jesus

It was my turn to lead chapel at our Christian college today.  I'll share here the transcript of that message.  If you prefer video, you can access the archived version of the streamed video here.  

- David Sellnow

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Zombies are everywhere.  You can’t escape them … at least not on TV or at the movies.  Bela Lugosi starred in the first feature-length zombie film in 1932, and over the years, the zombie infestation has grown exponentially – especially recently.  There were 20 zombie movies in 2004, 21 in 2005, 23 in 2006 … altogether more than 200 zombie movies in the last decade or so.   And then there’s television, where the zombies just keep coming and coming.  The Walking Dead is the most watched show in cable television history. And the companion series, Fear the Walking Dead, set a record for the premiere of a new show with over 10 million viewers in one night. Zombies are dominating us.

I’m not planning to preach at you about whether you watch zombie shows or not.  What I’d like to talk about is whether we are zombies.  A zombie is a corpse that walks, a dead person going through the motions of life that isn’t really alive.  Does that description ever fit us?  I don’t mean physically, but spiritually.  Let’s think about what dead bodies do, and apply that to the life of our souls. 

Think of a zombie, a corpse.  Dead bodies decompose.  They decay.  What would a dead soul be like?  A person whose behavior goes from bad to worse.  Someone whose bad habits grow like pus and fungus.  You don’t get stronger or healthier day by day, but just the opposite – your spiritual life gets yuckier all the time.  Are you ever like that?  Aren’t we all often like that?

Think of a zombie, a corpse.  Corpses stink with a foul odor.  The smell is repellant, offensive.   What would a dead soul be like?  A person who gives off a foul odor emotionally, spiritually.  Maybe someone who’s always in a foul mood.  You repel people by your irritability or harshness.  Are you ever like that?  Aren’t we all often like that?

Think of a zombie, a corpse – like the zombies of the movies.  What are they like?  They have no feelings.  No thoughts.  No mercy.  They don’t communicate with you; they just destroy you.  What would a zombie soul be like?  A person who is dead to the feelings of others, who exists only for his own appetites.  You don’t love.  You don’t care.  You just trudge from one moment to the next in a mindless existence, causing harm to everyone in your path.  Are you ever like that?  Aren’t we all often like that?

We are believers in Jesus and in his resurrection from death.  And we know that Jesus’ resurrection means our own resurrection to eternal life one day, our bodies restored from the grave and revived to live forever with the Lord.  We have evidence of what that kind of resurrection will be like.  During his time on earth, Jesus resurrected some dead people as firstfruits examples of his power over death.  And when Jesus raised people from death back to life, he didn’t create zombies.  When he gave a young girl back to her father Jairus … when he gave a young man back to his mother, a widow, at Nain … when he gave a brother, Lazarus, back to his sisters Mary and Martha at Bethany … in every case Jesus brought back persons who were dead and made them fully alive.  And at our resurrection at the last day, the same will be true.  Jesus won’t be unearthing us from our graves as the walking dead, as some sort of reanimated corpses.  We will be completely alive, renewed, transformed.  Death will be swallowed up in victory.   Jesus doesn’t create zombies.  He resurrects his people to full, complete, unlimited life – life that will go on eternally.

And—this is important, my friends—the resurrected life which we receive from Jesus we have received already now.  We have already been brought back from death to life.  I want you to think about the resurrection that has already happened in you, and how that resurrection affects your life.  We are not zombies.  We are alive with Jesus.

Listen to what we learn of Jesus from his apostle Paul.   Listen to what the resurrection of Jesus means in our lives already now.

          What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

          For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin— because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.

          Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.

          In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore  do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires.  Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.   (Romans 6:1-14)

Maybe now you understand why I started this message with so much zombie talk.  How often are we like spiritual corpses in our lives now?  We have an outer appearance of life but don’t really live.  We have been raised to new life by Christ our Savior, and yet we backslide again and again into dead things, sinful things, habits of rot and ick and decay.  We have the power of new life from Jesus rushing through our spirits, by his Spirit … but somehow in spite of that we become cold in our hearts, loveless in our ways, unthinking in our actions. 

My brothers, my sisters, that is not who we are!  We are not zombies!  We are alive with Jesus!  The apostle Paul wrote to remind us, to encourage us, to instill a further word of the gospel in us.  We have been saved by Jesus Christ.  We have been raised from death to life by the power of Jesus’ resurrection.  And so we stand up and move forward in that power as we live our lives.  We live “under grace,” as Paul said, in the power of God’s grace in Jesus.  We live whole new lives of grace.

Everything I said before about the way zombies and corpses function is false as applied to us now, in our resurrected spiritual lives.  We are new, we are alive, we are refreshed and full of life in Christ.  We exude a pleasant spiritual aroma to those around us, making them want to be around us because they can sense the breath of God’s Spirit in our attitudes and words.   We grow more and more alive as more and more the love of Christ invigorates us and motivates us.  Just the opposite of mindless and soulless, our lives now in Christ are mindful of the persons around us, reaching out in relationship, seeking to connect with the hearts and souls of others through the message of Christ.  We exist more for the sake of others than for ourselves or our own appetites.  Not dead but alive, we walk, we run, we dance through life in joy in the Lord.  We are active, energetic, lively for the Lord’s work and for serving one another. 

That’s how living people live – and that’s who we now are.  We are the living people of God, alive by the power of Christ’s resurrection.  "We were buried with Jesus through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. …   Offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life."

Now, I should also say this.  This new life we live is never easy.  Our spirits, raised up now with Christ, want to run with him and walk always and only in his ways.  But as long as we live on this earth, we still carry with us something of that old zombie self we all had at the start.  A little later in this same letter to the Romans, the apostle Paul said this:  “Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me.  For in my inner being I delight in God’s law;  but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me.  What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?”  (Romans 7:21-24)

“This body of death” is that old sinful nature that still affects us.  It’s like we’re all still carrying a corpse on our backs – or more accurately, still have all those corpse-like tendencies inside of us.  So we will still sin.  We will still succumb to the stench and rot that characterizes us as sinners.  But we have hope.  We have confidence.  We have daily renewal.  We can renew our strength, because we have an answer.  When Paul asked, “Who will rescue me from this body of death,” he gave the answer right away:  "Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord! (Romans 7:25)

We are not zombies.  We are alive with Jesus.  Yes, there’s still something of a zombie lurking inside of each of us.  But we have a Savior.  We have Jesus and the power of his resurrection.   “Just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.”  And so we will!  By the power of Jesus’ resurrection, we are alive!