Sunday
Morning Bible Study
April 15, 2001
Easter Sunrise Service
Dead or Alive
Jesus is alive. He is not
dead. The angels said to the women,
(Luke 24:5 KJV) …Why seek ye the living among the dead?
Paul says that as Christians, there is a sense in which we have a personal
connection with the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It not only affects our eternal salvation
because Jesus paid for our sins, but there is a sense in which it affects our
daily lives.
When He died on the cross, somehow there is a sense that my sinful nature
died along with Him. And because of
that, sin doesn’t have to be in control of my life any more.
We often talk about “dying to our selves”.
I think one of the ways that happens is simply learning to say “no” to
our selves. When my sin nature wants to
do something that doesn’t please God, I need to refuse and let that desire
“die”.
But Jesus didn’t stay dead, He rose from the grave. And because I somehow was raised with Him, I
have a new life in Jesus.
Paul writes,
(Rom 6:8-11 KJV) Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe
that we shall also live with him: {9} Knowing that Christ being raised from the
dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him. {10} For in that he
died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. {11}
Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto
God through Jesus Christ our Lord.
If you have come to trust Jesus as your Savior, God has given you a new
life. Whereas before you were pretty
“dead” to the things of God, now you are sensitive to the things of God. God has now given you the ability to live
for Him.
Illustration
THE SMELL OF RAIN!
A cold March wind danced around the dead of night in Dallas as the doctor
walked into the small hospital room of Diana Blessing. Still groggy from surgery, her husband David
held her hand as they braced themselves for the latest news. That afternoon of March 10, 1991,
complications had forced Diana, only 24-weeks pregnant, to undergo an emergency
cesarean to deliver the couple’s new daughter, Danae Lu Blessing. At 12 inches
long and weighing only one pound and nine ounces, they already knew she was
perilously premature.
Still, the doctor’s soft words dropped like bombs. “I don’t think she’s going to make it,” he
said, as kindly as he could. “There’s
only a 10-percent chance she will live through the night, and even then, if by
some slim chance she does make it, her future could be a very cruel one.”
Numb with disbelief, David and Diana listened as the doctor described the
devastating problems Danae would likely face if she survived. She would never
walk; she would never talk; she would probably be blind; she would certainly be
prone to other catastrophic conditions from cerebral palsy to complete mental
retardation; and on and on. “No! No!”
was all Diana could say.
She and David, with their 5-year-old son Dustin, had long dreamed of the
day they would have a daughter to become a family of four. Now, within a matter of hours, that dream
was slipping away.
Through the dark hours of morning as Danae held onto life by the thinnest
thread, Diana slipped in and out of drugged sleep, growing more and more
determined that their tiny daughter would live - and live to be a healthy,
happy young girl. But David, fully
awake and listening to additional dire details of their daughter’s chances of
ever leaving the hospital alive, much less healthy, knew he must confront his
wife with the inevitable.
“David walked in and said that we needed to talk about making funeral
arrangements,” Diana remembers “I felt so bad for him because he was doing
everything, trying to include me in what was going on, but I just wouldn’t
listen, I couldn’t listen. I said, “No,
that is not going to happen, no way! I don’t care what the doctors say Danae is
not going to die! One day she will be
just fine, and she will be coming home with us!”
As if willed to live by Diana’s faith, Danae clung to life hour after hour,
with the help of every medical machine and marvel her miniature body could
endure. But as those first days passed, a new agony set in for David and Diana.
Because Danae’s underdeveloped nervous system was essentially “raw,” the lightest kiss or caress only
intensified her discomfort - so they couldn’t even cradle their tiny baby girl
against their chests to offer the strength of their love. All they could do, as Danae struggled alone
beneath the ultraviolet light in the tangle of tubes and wires, was to
pray that God would stay close to their precious little girl. There was
never a moment when Danae suddenly grew stronger. But as the weeks went by, she did slowly gain an ounce of weight
here and an ounce of strength there.
At last, when Danae turned two months old, her parents were able to hold
her in their arms for the very first time.
And two months later - though doctors continued to gently but grimly
warn that her chances of surviving, much less living any kind of normal life,
were next to zero - Danae went home from the hospital, just as her mother had
predicted.
Today (1996), five years later, Danae is a petite but feisty young girl
with glittering gray eyes and an unquenchable zest for life. She shows no
signs, whatsoever, of any mental or physical impairments. Simply, she is everything a little girl can
be and more - but that happy ending is far from the end of her story.
One blistering afternoon in the summer of 1996 near her home in Irving,
Texas, Danae was sitting in her mother’s lap in the bleachers of a local ball
park where her brother Dustin’s baseball team was practicing. As always, Danae was chattering nonstop with
her mother and several other adults sitting nearby when she suddenly fell
silent.
Hugging her arms across her chest, Danae asked, “Do you smell that?”
Smelling the air and detecting the approach of a thunderstorm, Diana replied,
“Yes, it smells like rain.” Danae closed her eyes and again asked, “Do you
smell that?” Once again, her mother replied, “Yes, I think we’re about to get
wet, it smells like rain.”
Still caught in the moment, Danae shook her head, patted her thin shoulders
with her small hands and loudly announced, “No, it smells like Him. It smells like God when you lay your head on
His chest.”
Tears blurred Diana’s eyes as Danae then happily hopped down to play with
the other children. Before the rains
came, her daughter’s words confirmed what Diana and all the members of the
extended Blessing family had known, at least in their hearts, all along.
During those long days and nights of her first two months of her life, when
her nerves were too sensitive for them to touch her, God was holding Danae on
His chest - and it is His loving scent that she remembers so well.
~ Author Unknown
Dead or alive?
God doesn’t just want you to be “dead to sin”, God wants you to be “alive
unto Him”.
He wants you to be able to know that “smell of rain”. He wants you to learn to put your head on
His chest and find rest in Him.
He wants you to experience intimacy with Him. He wants you to know His loving hand, His purposes, His guidance.
He wants you to live for Him.