Death, Denial, Escape
Updated: Oct 1, 2022
“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit” (John 12:24).
Because of our death-denial and escapism, we try our best to circumvent all the little daily deaths and big deaths of life. In an article for Psychology Today, Stephen Diamond writes, “In some ways, addiction is an extreme example of an existential challenge we all wrestle with every day: accepting reality as it is.” Even if you’ve never attended Alcoholics Anonymous or drug rehab, we can all relate to the struggle to accept reality as it is. losing ourselves in shopping, alcohol, drugs, sex, pornography, social media, sports, and much more. We’re obsessed with resurrection, but avoid death at all costs. God reshapes death into a gateway to life. Spiritual death-to-self is now the only way back to God, and physical death is the way back to paradise.
But God redeems death. Death is a curse brought into our world through the sin of Adam (Genesis 2:17), but God brings good out of the bad — he brings resurrection. And resurrection does not depend on circumstances changing. It’s a work of the Spirit in our hearts giving us peace and joy regardless of our circumstances.