Alive - by Dave Smith

living life as if there was no eternal life and no resurrection.
Eternity is a hard concept to grasp. If you think of your life duration
as represented by a rope, this current life is like the first metre, while
eternity is the rope going on without end! This brings us to one of the
key questions that we laid out in the introductory chapter: Is there
such a thing as life after death and, if so, what does that look
like? The resurrection of Jesus gives us some wonderful answers,
which we will look at now.
FREED FROM THE FEAR OF DEATH
Death is not something that we like to think about or talk about. But
the reality is that it’s there in the background all the time. One of the
founding fathers of the United States, Benjamin Franklin, allegedly
quipped that there are only two things certain in life, death and
taxes. 13 The problem with death is that it’s not only inevitable but it all
seems so final, which can cast a big shadow over life.
That is…without Easter!
Growing up, I had a definite fear of death. When I became a
Christian all that changed. Feelings of dread were replaced with a
new assurance that death was not something to be afraid of, but
rather was a doorway to a better life. I can now identify with the
words of the world-famous preacher, Billy Graham, who once said,
‘Someday you will read or hear that Billy Graham is dead. Don’t you
believe a word of it. I shall be more alive than I am now. I will just
have changed my address!’ 14
This is not just wishful thinking. Rather, through his physical death,
Jesus Christ took the ‘sting’ out of death. As the New Testament
writer to the Hebrews wonderfully summarises: ‘Since the children
are made of flesh and blood, it’s logical that the Savior took on flesh
and blood in order to rescue them by his death. By embracing death,