Since I have retired I have developed a new hobby. It is called sleeping. I love to sleep. After 34 years of averaging 6 hours sleep a night it is nice to now get 8 or more. In fact I have to set the alarm or I would probably sleep the entire day away. There is an old saying “I fell dead asleep.” Today we will see that is not far from wrong.
Jesus has bodily claimed to be the Bread of Life, the Light of the World, the Gate, and the Good Shepherd. These claims have almost resulted in him being stoned to death twice. He left the pastures and went to the Jordan where John had been baptizing.
While He was there He received word that his friend Lazarus had fallen deathly ill. The disciples waited for him to leave but Jesus said “This illness will not lead to death but rather so that I will be glorified through it.”
Two days later Jesus decided to head to Judea to visit Lazarus. Fearing for his death, the disciples were against the trip. Jesus said “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him.” They did not realize that Lazarus had died.
When they arrived in Bethany, they discovered that Lazarus had been in the tomb for four days. His sister, Martha, met Jesus and said “You are too late.” Jesus told her that her brother would rise again. She agreed on the last day that the world would exist he would indeed rise up.
John 11:25-26 “Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Anyone who believes in me will live, even after dying. Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die. Do you believe this, Martha?”
Again using the Hebrew name for God, Jesus states that He and He alone has the power to rise from death to life. The word “resurrection” meant to go from a prone position to a standing position. He further states that He is the sustainer of life. Only through Jesus is eternal life offered. There is a promise made that all who believe in him will live even after death. In fact if they look to him as that sustaining life force they will never, ever die. This time of year can be a bit depressing. We seem to miss our loved ones who have departed this world even more. I lost a brother when I was 17. He was only 24, a father of two small children. He died from a brain tumor. I know he was a Christian.
His death devastated my dad. He lost a lot of his motivation. He could no longer continue living in the area. So we moved 500 miles away. I was uprooted in my junior year in high school and lived a rather lonely life as a teenager. I blamed God, or at least what I understood God to be. So how could Jesus make such a statement that those “who believe in me will never die.”?
The problem is not in trying to understand Jesus and his statement. The problem is understanding death through his view point. To understand his claim to be the resurrection and the life, we must first understand death. And to understand death we must have a lesson in Greek.
There are three words that are associated with death or dying. The first word is “apothnesko” It meant to die a mortal death. We find this word used in Romans 5:6 “When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners.”
He died the death of a mortal. It was a physical death. He literally died. I googled “What is death?” and found there were 2 trillion 810 million sites where I could go and have this question answered. The most plausible answer is death occurs when the ability to live ends. His ability to live ended due to massive amounts of blood loss, dehydration, and the inability to breathe.
The Bible makes it clear that He died a mortal death for us while we were still sinners. He died a mortal death for us to break the power of sin. He died a mortal death and was resurrected.
The next word associated with death was “koimao”. It meant to fall asleep. We find this word used in Acts 12:6 “The night before Peter was to be placed on trial, he was asleep, fastened with two chains between two soldiers. Others stood guard at the prison gate.”
It is obvious that Peter is not dead as he is fastened with two chains between two soldiers while being guarded. If he were a dead body there would be no need for such security. This same word is used when Jesus is asleep on the boat during the storm that frightened the disciples.
However, let us look at how this word is used in Matthew 27:51-52 “At that moment (when Jesus died) the curtain in the sanctuary of the Temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, rocks split apart, and tombs opened. The bodies of many godly men and women who had died (fallen asleep) were raised from the dead.”
The word used to describe a mortal death is not used here. Instead we find the same word used to describe Jesus and Peter at rest. The implication is that these godly men and women had fallen asleep and were now awaken by the one who claimed to be the only resurrection and giver of life.
In 1 Thessalonians 4:13-15 we discover both of these words in use. “And now, dear brothers and sisters, we want you to know what will happen to the believers who have died (fallen asleep) so you will not grieve like people who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died (a mortal death) and was raised to life again, we also believe that when Jesus returns, God will bring back with him the believers who have died (fallen asleep).
We tell you this directly from the Lord: We who are still living when the Lord returns will not meet him ahead of those who have died (fallen asleep).”
What we see here is the Lord’s perspective on those who have left our presence. While it is appropriate for us to grieve, we are not to grieve as if there is no hope of seeing our loved ones again. When we say “good night” to our spouse or our child, we do not grieve. In God’s economy our loved ones are just sleeping.
When we fall asleep, we are resting. This passage also tells that believers are resting in the presence of the Lord. They will continue to do so until they return to this earth with Jesus.
Did you know most dreams last only about 30 seconds? The ones we remember are usually the one we had just before we woke up. We remember all the details and think we will never forget them. But as the day goes on the details get fuzzy and soon most of our dream has been forgotten.
In God’s economy, our lives are like that. James 4:14 states “How do you know what your life will be like tomorrow? Your life is like the morning fog—it’s here a little while, then it’s gone.” In the scope of eternity our lives are but dreams. Unless the Lord returns, one day we will fall asleep and find ourselves in his presence. This life’s memories will fade like a dream.
This is why Jesus said “That is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life—whether you have enough food and drink, or enough clothes to wear. Isn’t life more than food, and your body more than clothing? (Matthew 6:25) He is reminding us to put everything we do into an eternal aspect. Our food, our drinks, our clothes, all these material things are but vapor.
The third word associated with death is katheudo. This word was associated with a natural sleep. We find it used in John 11:11. “Then he said, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but now I will go and wake him up.” The disciples reply to that was “Lord, if he is sleeping, he will soon get better!” They thought Jesus meant Lazarus was simply sleeping, but Jesus meant Lazarus had died.”
The reason they thought that was because Jesus used the word for a natural sleep and not the word for a mortal death. In God’s economy, death is a natural phenomenon. While it is true that the word says each person is destined to die (a mortal death) once, the eternal separation from this world is but a natural sleep to God.
To Jesus, Lazarus was asleep. To his sisters, Mary and Martha, to all those who had come to comfort them and to the cynical Jews, he was dead and already starting to rot. The fear of death had grasped them all.
In 2007 “The Bucket List” starring Jack Nicholson was released. It was the story of two elderly gentlemen trying to accomplish feats on a list of things to do before they died. Their hope was that death would spare them long enough to accomplish their goals. In an interview with Nicholson before the release of the film he reflected on his own personal life.
“I use to live so freely. The mantra for my generation was ‘Be your own man!’ I always said, “Hey, you can have whatever rules you want - I’m going to have mine. I’ll accept the guilt. I’ll pay the check. I’ll do the time.’ I chose my own way. That was my philosophical position well into my fifties. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve had to adjust…we all want to go on forever, don’t we? We fear the unknown. Everybody goes to that wall, yet nobody knows what’s on the other side. That’s why we fear death.”
When Jesus arrived Martha was at that wall. There was no hope left in her. Jesus comforts her by declaring “I AM the resurrection. I alone have the authority to waken him from his sleep. I AM the sustainer of life. I alone have the ability to allow him to continue living.”
The Apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 15:54-55
“Then, when our dying bodies have been transformed into bodies that will never die, this Scripture will be fulfilled:
“Death is swallowed up in victory.
O death, where is your victory?
O death, where is your sting?”
Have you ever seen someone swatting at a bee as it flies around their head? They are bobbing and dodging. Why? It is because they do not want to get stung. But the bee cannot sting you unless it lands on you first. Jesus said “I am the resurrection and the life. Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die.” Jesus insures that the bee called death, when it lands on us, will not have a stinger. He took the stinger into himself so that death would not have victory over us. So that death would be stinger less.
I do not know about you but a bee without a stinger is still not something I desire to have crawling on me. So it is with death. We do not embrace it. We do not desire it for ourselves or our loved ones. However, we should not fear it. Because we believe in Jesus we will never die. We will only appear to be asleep while actually being in his presence.
So, what is it like to be asleep and in his presence? It means to be fully awake.
1 Corinthians 13:12 tells us “Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.”
We will have complete knowledge. We will understand all of the mysteries of God. We will see his plans clearly and our lives will make complete sense.
2 Corinthians 5: 1-9 “For we know that when this earthly tent we live in is taken down (that is, when we die and leave this earthly body), we will have a house in heaven, an eternal body made for us by God himself and not by human hands. (Jesus said “I go to prepare a place for you) We grow weary in our present bodies, and we long to put on our heavenly bodies like new clothing. For we will put on heavenly bodies; we will not be spirits without bodies. While we live in these earthly bodies, we groan and sigh, but it’s not that we want to die and get rid of these bodies that clothe us. Rather, we want to put on our new bodies so that these dying bodies will be swallowed up by life. (Jesus said “I am the resurrection and the life. Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die.”) God himself has prepared us for this, (death had plans to destroy us but Jesus took away its sting and left it defeated. God used death as a passage way to give us eternal life. He made preparations for that day) and as a guarantee he has given us his Holy Spirit. (we have the conformation of the Holy Spirit guaranteeing that our home has been made ready)
So we are always confident, even though we know that as long as we live in these bodies we are not at home with the Lord. For we live by believing and not by seeing. (our eye tells us that someone is dead but our beliefs assure us that they are only sleeping) Yes, we are fully confident, and we would rather be away from these earthly bodies, for then we will be at home with the Lord. So whether we are here in this body or away from this body, our goal is to please him.”
Our goal in life is to please Jesus. Remember he said “I am the resurrection and the life. Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die.” We are required to live in him. That means to please him. We are required to believe in him. That means to obey him. Only those who please him and obey him have his promise of never dying. But you cannot put it off.
Isaiah 38:18-19 “For the dead cannot praise you;
they cannot raise their voices in praise.
Those who go down to the grave
can no longer hope in your faithfulness.
Only the living can praise you as I do today.”
If you suffer mortal death apart from having Jesus as your Lord, then you cannot hold on to his promise of being the resurrection and the life. You cannot praise him or ask for forgiveness. All bets are off.
Proverbs 27:1 “Don’t brag about tomorrow, since you don’t know what the day will bring.” Everyday people leave their homes expecting to return. And everyday they meet some tragedy that takes their life. Just last week a car filled with teenagers who had been shopping for Christmas all night was involved in a terrible wreck when the driver fell asleep behind the wheel. He lost his life. He never expected those results.
2 Corinthians 6:2 “For God says,“At just the right time, I heard you.
On the day of salvation, I helped you.” Indeed, the “right time” is now. Today is the day of salvation.” If you do not have your guarantee, do not leave here without it.
