Death is a pestilence and an aberration. We attempt to avoid and cheat death, because we fear it. It feels wrong somehow, even though it is inevitable. In the same way that there is beauty and awe in the cry and first breaths of a newborn, there is a depth of sorrow and injustice in the final dying breaths of a loved one. God feels the same way. On one level, that statement seems surprising, because after all, isn’t death a part of life, and when we die, don’t we get to be with God? On another level, of course God feels the same way – He is the creator and bringer of life, so death is the antithesis of what it is like to be in His presence. So why is there death? Is it truly evil? The answer to these questions touches on larger truths of the nature of death and subsequently the nature of life – in all its fullness.

In the beginning God created. He spoke and it was. He commanded the laws of the universe into motion, and chaos gave way to order and harmony. Order then gave way to life as God spoke it into existence. He delighted in it all and called it ‘good’. He made humanity in His ‘likeness’ and called us ‘very good’. He gave humanity and all of creation a mandate to ‘be fruitful and multiply’, to make more life and to engage in the act of creation he had set in motion. He gave another special mandate to humanity, to maintain order, harmony and to care for His ‘good’ world. But the pivot of this story was a choice humanity had to make – to follow God’s mandate and command, or to reject it by eating from a tree whose fruit would allow them to redefine what exactly ‘good’ meant. We all know what happened next. This ‘fall’, was not simply the failing of humanity; it was the beginning of relational, spiritual and physical death as we and all of creation were severed from God’s life-giving, order-maintaining presence. The spiritual and physical worlds tore apart. Chaos crept back into God’s good and ordered world, as His presence was forcibly hid. So in the same way that God authored life, humanity authored death.

There was another tree in this garden utopia, called the Tree of Life. Something fascinating happened at this point of the story: as Adam and Eve were ushered out of Eden, an Angel with a flaming sword was appointed to guard the way to the Tree of Life, so that no one could eat of it. Why? Was God adding insult to injury by preventing humanity from accessing an easy fix to the problem of death? No! God prevented Adam and Eve from accessing and eating from the Tree of Life because at this point, for God to allow us to live forever in this fractured state would be to ensure our damnation. For just as heaven is called ‘eternal life’, where we are forever in the presence of the God who creates and sustains life; hell is an ‘eternal death’, whereby those who reject God will be eternally separated from Him, the source of life. So God restricted the reach of death by limiting our life.

The story goes on as we see individuals, tribes, nations and empires continue down the dark and chaotic path that sin ushered us on. A path that bred violence, injustice, subjugation and evil. A path that has culminated in death for every living thing – physical death, relational death, societal and spiritual death. This grieved God. This was as far from His Eden as could be imagined. So what was the answer, what could be done? God’s solution was to put death to death. He was going to break the cycle of chaos, sin and death by letting that same evil consume and exhaust itself on the author of all life. As the sinless Son of God died on the cross, He bore on himself every sin humanity ever had and ever would make. All that would separate us from God, was placed onto Jesus – and He experienced separation from His father. God died. And on the third day He rose again, leaving death in the grave. Jesus ushered in a new order of things – death would no longer have the final say. Sin doesn’t have to be our default instinct. The carnage and death that our sin incites is no longer irreparable. A new tree of life was planted, but it was not an arbitrary shrub that would grant us immortality when we eat of it’s fruit; He was a person that would enable us to deny our evil impulses and urges and offer us a better way. A way that would lead to order, beauty and life. This is the way of Jesus and this is the redeeming hope we have through Him. We as human beings and heirs of Adam and Eve, still have the choice: to choose God’s way, accepting His son as our savior and Lord, allowing Him to define what is ‘good’ and what is ‘evil’ in our lives and in our world, or to continue down our destructive sinful paths that ultimately lead to ruin, separation and death. To be reunited with the life-giving-order-sustaining being we call God, or to continue to choose to be disconnected from Him.

And so, what does this mean for me now? Death remains a reminder of how the world is not as it should be. It is a manifestation of our world’s anguish at it’s current state, and the grief we feel when a loved one dies is the epitome of that anguish. But as a follower of Jesus, I know that God made a way through sin and death so that we can find Him again – so that we can find life again. The mistakes and sins I’ve made no longer have to define me. The impact of sin, with all of it’s turmoil, chaos, grief and agitation, are now curable. And the grave is no longer the final punctuation to our mortal struggles. So no matter how much grief we might feel, there remains an unshakeable hope that flows just beneath the surface. A hope that says, one day, the sin, injustice, chaos and death we have wrought on ourselves and God’s good world will be wiped completely away by The One who overcame it all, by giving all, to make all things new. A hope that I will meet Him face to face, beyond the shores of mortality and forever dwell in His perfect life giving and life fulfilling presence. God offers this hope for us, free for the taking, out of His amazing grace and mercy, to all. It costs you nothing, except that it costs you everything. And while it doesn’t guarantee a life without grief or pain, it does guarantee the hope that lies just beyond the veil and God’s very own strength, encouragement, peace and presence to face it all today.