Insight

THE UNAVOIDABLE THINGS

BY TOM GROVE

It’s the time of the year when we are reminded of the two things in life we can’t avoid. Interestingly, in 2019, the reminders come less than a week apart. On April 15, we come face-toface with the reality that we cannot avoid taxes (I guess you could if you like wearing orange jumpsuits). We send out forms and our money to that faceless government agency known by its acronym, IRS. We have fulfilled our responsibility and, for another year, we don’t think much about this annual reminder.

Then, just six days later, we come face-to-face with another unavoidable thing. This reminder takes the shape, not of a 1040 government form, but of a tomb. It serves as a stark reminder that this is in all our futures – death. No one can avoid it. Sadly, the reminders of the unavoidable fact of death comes to us not only on Easter weekend, but many times throughout the rest of the year. It can come in a doctor’s office when a diagnosis is given, it can come at a bedside when a last breath is taken, and it can come in a funeral home or a cemetery when goodbyes are said to loved ones. Sometimes we see it a long way off, and other times it arrives unexpectedly. Still, it always does eventually show up. However, the tomb we gaze to on Easter weekend differs from any other tomb in the world. It is a tomb that is empty because the One who inhabited it for a short time defeated death.

Standing before another tomb, the words spoken by Jesus in John 11 give believers everywhere hope beyond death. He said, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?” This is the assurance every believer can hold on to as they stand before the tomb of a loved one. This is the assurance every believer has as they look in the mirror and are reminded that, while death is inevitable, it is not final.

I faced this reality last summer as my family and I traveled to Pennsylvania to attend the funeral service for my stepfather. As I stood before the casket containing the body of the man who helped raise me, those words that Jesus declared nearly 2,000 years ago, “I am the resurrection and the Life,” comforted me. As a pastor I had read those words countless times at funerals, but the words became more real than ever before in that moment. I had the assurance that it was not ‘goodbye forever’ but ‘so long, until we meet again.’

And so, as we are faced once again with the reminders that we can’t avoid death and taxes, our eternal hope is found in the One who is the Resurrection and the Life.