Death Sucks, part 2

While I never would have chosen to experience the death of my son, my newfound awareness of just how much death sucks has given me a greater appreciation for what may be the central truth of the Bible.

God used death to create the object lesson that permeates Scripture.  One we don't really care to talk about or emphasize.  One that probably didn't make it onto your Sunday School coloring sheets.  This object lesson is quite politically incorrect.  And yet it is the object lesson that is a flashing neon arrow directing you to the one truth you MUST know to be a Christian.

Sacrifice.  From the moment when God slaughtered those animals to provide clothing for Adam and Eve, He ordained a system in which His people were required to routinely, systematically, frequently kill animals.  Drain the blood from their bodies, hack them apart, and burn them up.  A large chunk of the first five books of the Bible are devoted to telling God's people exactly how, when, and where they were to perform sacrifices. 

I can only imagine what living around so much death must have been like.  Surely those Old Testament people knew just how much death sucks.  They couldn't get away from it!  It was an all-pervasive part of their worship of God.

Why?  Why would God want to constantly parade the hideous ugliness of death before the eyes of His people?  Put very simply, because He wanted them to know how hideous and ugly their sin was.  And how much it was going to cost Him to deal with their sin once and for all.

God's people slaughtered animals, hundreds of thousands of them, year after year, whenever they needed to confess that they had failed to meet God's perfect standard of holiness.  The ugly death of those animals was to remind them of what their sin looked like to God, and what the true consequence of their sin was - not the violent death of a sheep or a cow, but their own eternal death in hell, separated from God.

But the bloody death of all those animals could never make a sinful person perfect in the eyes of a holy God.  It was just a picture.  A picture of the ugliness of sin, yes.  But also a picture of the most amazing love.

"Jesus died on the cross to save us from our sins."  How often have you heard (or said!) those words? I've found that in the last few weeks, I can't hear them or say them without crying.  Because death sucks.  When I hear the word, I can't help but think of my lifeless little baby in my arms.  Kissing his cold forehead.  Seeing his tiny little coffin.

My son died in the arms of his family, who love him so much.  He died peacefully.  God's Son was made into a public spectacle, killed in an ugly, violent, painful way.  There were no whispers in His ear and kisses on His cheek.  No tears falling from smiling faces onto His gently swaddled body.  Just  shame, pain, hate, darkness, and loneliness.  Even His Father forsook Him.

Jesus was the perfect sacrifice.  The sacrifice to end all sacrifices.  He and His Father planned that ugly death so that I could live.  So that a perfect God could declare my ugly sins forgiven, paid for by the Perfect Sacrifice.

I'm glad I know now how much death sucks.  It reminds me of the eternal death I deserve and helps me understand how much my salvation cost Jesus.

And I'm even more glad that Jesus isn't a lifeless body buried somewhere in the Middle East.  He is alive, and coming back to allow me to enjoy the eternal life He purchased for me (and my son!).  The chapter in the Bible that teaches Christ as the Perfect Sacrifice ends with these words:

so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin, to those who eagerly await Him. ~ Hebrews 9:28