My mom and dad are buried on a little sandy knoll south of Englewood, FL. Dad’s gravestone proclaims that he was a faithful preacher of the gospel. What a cruel mockery if there is no resurrection of the dead; someday they will simply wash away into the sea and be no more.
If there is no resurrection, none of us will see those who have gone before us. If someone you know is in a cemetery, they will remain there. If there is no resurrection, Paul says “we are of all men most miserable.” We have waited for a reunion that will not come. We have made sacrifices we did not need to make. We are sinners still.
For centuries Christians have put little cemeteries by their little churches and on the outskirts of their little towns, waiting for that blessed hope, the glorious appearing of our great God and savior Jesus Christ.
We have longed for his return, and for our ultimate transformation, knowing with certainty that the resurrection is the sign of both the promise and the power that delivers us.
It delivers us from vanity, from sin, and from death, and so we celebrate the hope, and the glory, and the life to come.
Because He is risen, just as He said.
the daysman 