Tag Archives: Death

Devotional, Series

Sacred Signs of Subversion, Part 10: The Skull

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Read Mark 15:22–39

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“Better to spend your time at funerals than at parties. After all, everyone dies—so the living should take this to heart.” (Ecclesiastes 7:2 NLT)

Symbols carry memory and meaning far beyond words. The Church has always leaned on them—sometimes hidden in plain sight, sometimes dismissed or distorted. Yet the most powerful symbols are those that subvert the world’s expectations and draw us back to the radical heart of the Gospel. In this series, we’ll look closer at the sacred signs that shock, unsettle, and ultimately call us deeper into Christ.

Image: AI-generated using DALL·E and customized by the author. Used with the devotional “The Skull” at Life-Giving Water Devotions.

Part 10: The Skull. October is full of skulls—on shelves, shirts, and front lawns. Some wear them as rebellion; others treat them as decoration. But long before they became Halloween props, the Church used the skull as a reminder: memento mori—“remember you will die.” For centuries, believers looked at the skull not to glorify death but to confront denial. Yet there’s another truth here. Death may be the great leveller, but it’s also the great thief—robbing the world of breath, joy, and love. And yet, in Christ, even that thief meets its match.

I write poetry, and much of it is dark—haunted by death, decay, and the ache of being human. Some have judged that darkness as morbid, even un-Christian. But I’ve always believed art should speak the truth we’re taught to avoid. We treat death like a taboo, pretending it’s impolite to mention or too heavy to hold—as if silence could protect us from it. But denying death doesn’t sanctify life; it cheapens it. Faith, like poetry, must face what’s real if it’s to mean anything at all.

Golgotha—“the place of the skull”—stood just outside Jerusalem’s walls, a place of spectacle and shame. Rome staged executions there to remind everyone who ruled life and death. The hill itself became a billboard for fear. But in God’s strange reversal, that place of horror became the stage of salvation. The skull, symbol of mortality and defeat, became the site where Death itself was unmasked. What empire used for terror, God turned into triumph.

Early Christians didn’t shy away from this imagery. In the catacombs, they carved skulls and bones beneath the sign of the cross—art that confessed resurrection in the midst of decay. The skull became both confession and comfort: we die, yes, but Christ has been here first.

Memento mori was never meant to breed despair but to strip illusion. Power, wealth, fame—all return to dust. To remember death is to remember our limits, to live humbly before the God who alone gives breath. But Christ goes further: He doesn’t just remind us of death; He redeems it. The cross planted on the skull of Golgotha declares that the grave has lost its grip.

Death once ruled as thief and tyrant—robbing equally, yes, but still robbing. Jesus entered its house, broke its locks, and walked out carrying life itself. Death is no longer the end. It’s the beginning of something eternally beautiful.

We live in a culture that denies death. We hide it in hospitals, numb it with distraction, and disguise it with filters and slogans of “forever young.” But memento mori still whispers truth: you will die—and because of Christ, you will live again.

To remember death is not to surrender to fear but to wake up to grace. Every breath is borrowed; every heartbeat is holy. The skull that once marked loss now preaches resurrection: the grave has been plundered, and love has the last word.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
Death may be the great thief, but Christ has broken its hold and turned the tomb into a doorway of glory.

PRAYER
God of life and victory, remind me that death does not define me—you do. Teach me to live awake to every sacred breath, unafraid of the shadows, certain of the dawn. Through Christ who conquered the grave, I give you thanks. Amen.

Devotion written by Rev. Todd R. Lattig with the assistance of ChatGPT (OpenAI).

Devotional, Series

Sacred Signs of Subversion, Part 6: The Seashell

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Read Romans 6:3–4

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“And now why do you wait? Rise and be baptized and wash away your sins, calling on his name.” (Acts 22:16 NLT)

Symbols carry memory and meaning far beyond words. The Church has always leaned on them—sometimes hidden in plain sight, sometimes dismissed or distorted. Yet the most powerful symbols are those that subvert the world’s expectations and draw us back to the radical heart of the Gospel. In this series, we’ll look closer at the sacred signs that shock, unsettle, and ultimately call us deeper into Christ.

Image: AI-generated using DALL-E and customized by the author. Used with the devotional “The Seashell” at Life-Giving Water Devotions.

Part 6: The Seashell. Today seashells are everywhere. They decorate bathroom walls and beach houses. They hang from necklaces and sit in souvenir shops as reminders of vacation days and ocean breezes. Harmless, pretty, sentimental. But in the early church, the seashell was no trinket. It became a vessel of death and life — a sign not of leisure, but of dangerous allegiance.

Why? Because baptism itself was subversive. To step into the water was not just to make a personal choice, but to renounce everything Rome held sacred. Baptism meant dying to this world and rising in loyalty to Jesus — the one Rome had executed as a traitor. It was not merely symbolic. Families could disown you. Inheritance could be stripped away. Neighbors would brand you disloyal, suspicious, immoral. To be baptized was to be cut off from your household gods, from your family name and protection, and to join a subterranean movement with a terrible reputation.

To grasp the shock, imagine the reversal today: a Christian family’s child announcing they were now an atheist—or even a Satanist. The backlash wouldn’t just be private disappointment. It would ripple socially, touching reputation, relationships, even employment in some communities. That’s the kind of upheaval baptism triggered in the first century.

That reputation was fueled by rumors: that Christians held secret “love feasts” filled with sexual immorality, that they practiced cannibalism when they spoke of eating Christ’s body and drinking his blood, that they upended the household order by welcoming women and slaves as equals. To go under the water was to step into that reputation. You were no longer respectable. You were part of a sect Rome saw as both treasonous and depraved. Baptism was treason, and the seashell — often used to scoop and pour the water — became bound up in that act of rebellion.

The shell carried other echoes too. In Greco-Roman culture, shells were tied to fertility and birth. Venus was often pictured rising from the sea on a scallop shell. Christians didn’t directly borrow that imagery, but they reframed it. The shell whispered of a different kind of fertility — one that required spiritual death to this world and rebirth into a new humanity brought forth from the waters of baptism.

As time went on, the seashell became a pilgrim’s badge. Those who traveled to holy sites, like Santiago de Compostela, carried a scallop shell as a mark of their journey. It was practical — used to drink from streams — but also deeply symbolic. To wear the shell was to announce: I am not traveling for leisure, but for transformation. My life is a road of discipleship.

Put together, baptism and pilgrimage gave the seashell a dangerous beauty. It was never just decoration. It was a summons. The seashell told the world that you had died to Rome and risen into Christ. That your loyalty no longer lay with emperor, household, or inheritance, but with the crucified and risen Lord. That you were willing to walk the long road of discipleship, even when it meant being despised.

Today, we’ve tamed the shell into a souvenir. Pretty, harmless, something to match the curtains. But the shell still asks its ancient question: what does your baptism mean? Do you remember that in those waters you died — not just to sin, but to empire, to family idols, to all lesser loyalties?

And as the band Demon Hunter reminds us, the world is crowded with lesser gods — idols demanding our loyalty, false saviors promising security, belonging, or power. Baptism drowns them. It puts them to a watery grave. To rise from the water is to declare that none of those idols rule us anymore.

Because Rome still has its names today. Sometimes it waves the flag and baptizes nationalism as faith. Sometimes it hides in markets that tell us our worth is what we consume. Sometimes it creeps into families that demand loyalty to prejudice instead of love. Sometimes it sits in churches that bless power instead of bearing the cross.

To carry the shell is to reject those false lords. It is to live as if your life is a pilgrimage — marked not by comfort, but by costly transformation. To say with your whole being: my baptism was treason to the powers of this world, and my life is now hidden with Christ in God.

The seashell is not a trinket. It is Christ’s rebellious mission in your hand.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
The seashell is not a souvenir. It is a summons.

PRAYER
God of new birth and long journeys, remind us of our baptism. Remind us that we have died to old loyalties and risen to follow Christ. Give us courage to walk the pilgrim’s road, to bear reproach, to seek justice, to love mercy, and to trust that you go before us. May every step of our lives echo the vows we made in the water. Amen.

Devotion written by Rev. Todd R. Lattig with the assistance of ChatGPT (OpenAI).

Devotional, Holy Week Series, Previous Post

REVISITED: SON OF GOD: Holy Saturday

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Read Matthew 27:62-66

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“’Go out and stand before Me on the mountain,’ the LORD told him. And as Elijah stood there, the LORD passed by, and a mighty windstorm hit the mountain. It was such a terrible blast that the rocks were torn loose, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake there was a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire there was the sound of a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave.” (1 Kings 19:11-13a NLT)

Image: AI-generated using Adobe Firefly and customized by the author in Photoshop. Used with the devotional “SON OF GOD: Holy Saturday” at Life-Giving Water Devotions.

Today is Holy Saturday, which is the day in between Jesus’ death and his resurrection. It is on this day that his disciples sat in hiding. It is on this day that the uncertainty of death hung over them like a shroud, clouding them with the fear of the unknown and paralyzing them in that fear. They had followed Jesus for three long years and had invested all of their hopes and expectations in him. Now he was dead, gone, and the silence of the tomb echoed in their psyche about as loudly as a shrill scream in the night.

On the flip side, the powers that be that opposed Jesus were scrambling to keep the silence from becoming to uncertain. Caiaphas and other religious leaders were holding a meeting with the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate, regarding what they were going to do with this dead trouble maker named Jesus. The religious leaders were claiming that his disciples might come and snatch the body in order to make false claims about some sort of bodily resurrection. Out of fear that the body might disappear, they all decided that it would be best if guards were posted at the tomb to ensure that nothing happened to the body.” These men, too, were disturbed by the silence of the tomb, for they were afraid it might remain silent. So they did everything they could to ensure that it would.

The silence of death and the tomb affects each of us in many different ways. It seems so final, yet so uncertain, and we are left feeling not only loss by a sense of hopelessness. And I need not be talking about the physical death of any one person, but death in the broader sense. Throughout life, aspects of our lives die off. We come to identify ourselves one way, or another, and for a season that identification endures; however, there comes a point when that identity, that aspect, that part of us dies off and we are with a tremendous sense of loss and of fear. Who are we? How do we respond to this particular loss? Do we, like the disciples, hide in the shadows afraid of what lies next? Or do we, like the religious and political leaders of Jesus’ day, place guard over the tomb to make sure nothing is out of our control?

Both of the above questions are pathways that we can take? Both seek to hang onto whatever control we have left. Paralysis and overreaction are on the opposite side of the same coin of control. However, there is a third option. We need not hide in the shadows or overreact in some outlandish way or through some sort of crazy power grab; rather, we have the option of letting go. We have the option of allowing the silence of the tomb to speak for itself. We have the option of letting go of control and allowing God to work resurrection in our lives. The reality is that no matter what we do, whether we hide in the shadows or stand guard over the tomb, that stone will be bursting forth with or without us. The question is not “if”, but “when.” When the Son of God sparks resurrection in your life, will be open to it or will you let it pass you by? The silence of the tomb gives you ample time to reflect on that very question. May that reflection be rich in the darkness and the silence of the tomb.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
“No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new.” – Steve Jobs

PRAYER
Lord, prepare me for the death in life, and for the death of life, for I know that all ends are the beginnings of something new. Amen.

Devotional, Holy Week Series, Previous Post

REVISITED: SON OF GOD: Good Friday

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Read John 19

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
When the Roman officer who stood facing Him [heard His cry and] saw how He had died, he exclaimed, “This man truly was the Son of God!” (Mark 15:39 NLT)

Image: AI-generated using Adobe Firefly and customized by the author. Used with the devotional “SON OF GOD: Good Friday” at Life-Giving Water Devotions.

Up until now, it might not be clear why I entitled this series of Holy Week devotions, “Son of God.” I mean, sure, I am writing about Jesus of Nazareth who is known by billions of Christians to be the “Son of God.” That much is self-evident; and sure, I am writing about the activities, suffering and death of “the Son of God” because it is Holy Week and that is when billions of Christians celebrate the last days of Christ. But, other than that, why entitle this SON OF GOD?

What most people don’t realize is that the title, “Son of God”, was not held exclusively by Jesus during his lifetime. There was another person who was known to the world at the time as son of god and his name was Tiberius Caesar, just as Augustus Caesar was before him. Because Julius Caesar was divinized following his assassination, Augustus (whose birth name was Octavian) took on the title divi filius, aka son of the divine one, aka son of god. When Tiberius succeeded Augustus, he took on the same title, as did the Caesars that followed him. And, honestly, who was going to argue with them. They were truly the most powerful men in the known world and to argue their divinity with them was to order your own death.

When Jesus’ followers, and later the Gospel writers, started hailing the peasant carpenter from Nazareth as “the Son of God,” this instantly put him in immediate competition with Caesar, who did not take kindly to such competition. What’s more, Jesus wasn’t being called the equivalent of divi filius; rather, he was being called the equivalent of Dei Filius, which put him above the son of a deified mortal and made him the Son of the immortal God. Also, this Jesus claimed that being the Son of God meant conquering people with love and truth, as opposed to Caesar’s way of conquering people with fear and force. It was on this day, nearly 2,000 years ago, that this peasant Nazarene came face to face with the Roman Empire. It was on this day, nearly 2,000 years ago, that the Son of God challenged another son of god. It was on this day, nearly 2,000 years ago, that LOVE and brute force crossed paths in such a dramatic way that the world would never forget it. While brute force may have won the battle, three days later it totally lost the war!

On this Good Friday, we are being called by the Son of God to reflect on the ways we oppose walking the path of LOVE. How often have we tried to force our way on others? How often have we put ourselves above the Son of God through our thoughts and through our actions? Christ is calling us to search our hearts and our souls. The Son of God is calling us to acknowledge his Sonship, his divinity, and his Lordship over our lives. The Son of God is calling us to abandon our ways for his ways, and he is calling us, at all costs, to return to the pathway of LOVE. While this is not always easy, it is what the Son of God calls us to do and his death on the cross is a reminder to us all of the extent to which he was willing to go in order to see that pathway through. The Christ on the cross is waiting for us to join him in his mission.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
“For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give His life as a ransom for many.” – Jesus of Nazareth (Mark 10:45 NLT)

PRAYER
Lord, precious Son of God, thank you for your sacrifice. Stir up in me a sacrificial love that reaches far and wide to those in need around me. Amen.

Devotional

Death the Deceiver

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Read 1 Corinthians 15:54–57

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“I am the living one. I died, but look—I am alive forever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and the grave.” —Revelation 1:18 (NLT)

Image: AI-generated using Adobe Firefly and customized by the author. Used with the devotional “Death the Deceiver” at Life-Giving Water Devotions.

Have you ever stood in a cemetery long after the funeral has ended? The chairs are folded, the people have gone home, and it’s just you and the stone. Maybe it bears the name of someone you loved, someone you still talk to. And so, you speak. You ask questions. You share regrets. You cry. You laugh. You wait for something—anything—in return.

But all you get is silence.

Death doesn’t talk back. It doesn’t comfort. It doesn’t explain itself. It simply takes… and leaves us with the ache of unanswered questions. And yet, in that silence, we do something very human—we start to imagine death as something we can reason with, something we can bargain with, something we can understand. We try to make it feel fair. Even noble. But what if we’ve got it all wrong?

The world often says, “Death is the great equalizer.” But is it? Some die peacefully in their sleep, others in excruciating pain. Some go surrounded by loved ones; others go alone. Some have time to prepare; others are taken in an instant. If this is a level playing field, it sure doesn’t look that way. The truth is, death is not a friend or a philosopher. It’s not even a conversation partner. Death takes. Indiscriminately. Without fairness, without explanation, without moral compass.

As Christians, we do not romanticize death. We face it. Even Jesus did. The Son of God, the Word made flesh, was not spared death’s reach. He succumbed to it fully, painfully, publicly. But here’s the truth death doesn’t want you to know: Jesus walked out of the grave. Not because death let Him go, but because it couldn’t keep Him. He didn’t escape death—He conquered it.

And that changes everything.

In Jesus, death is not the end. It is not the last word. It is not something to fear, bargain with, or exalt. It is temporary. And if that’s true—if death really has lost its sting—then how should we live? We live by anchoring our hope not in comfort or avoidance, but in Christ. In the One who is the way, the truth, and the life.

We follow Him not by mere belief, but by devotion—loving God, loving neighbor, pouring ourselves into communities of faith that worship, learn, grow, disciple, steward, and serve. This is not a faith of convenience. It’s a faith of commitment. A faith that looks death square in the face and says, “You don’t get to win.”

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
Death is not a friend or a philosopher. It is a deceiver. But Jesus, who conquered death, is the truth that sets us free.

PRAYER
God of life and light, remind us that our hope is not in this world alone, and certainly not in death’s illusion of finality. When grief tempts us to make peace with death’s lies, turn our hearts back to the truth of the Resurrection. Help us to live boldly in the freedom Christ has secured, to love deeply, serve faithfully, and reflect Your glory in all we do. Amen.

Devotion written by Rev. Todd R. Lattig with the assistance of ChatGPT (OpenAI).

Devotional, Previous Post

REVISITED: Spider Web

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Read Joshua 1:1-9

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE 
“Fear betrays our ability to help ourselves by thinking clearly. Expecting the worst, people prefer to remain ignorant of the cause of their torment.” (Wisdom of Solomon‬ ‭17:12-13‬ ‭CEB)‬‬‬‬‬‬

I was just recently in a conversation with someone about the difference between the world I remember when I was growing up, and the world we are living in today. The conversation started around the fact that so many children, youth and young adults are suffering from levels of anxiety that I don’t remember existing when I was growing up. I remember dealing with depression as a teen, and I remember the anxiety that can well up due to bullying and things like that, but that kind of anxiety is different than the kind I find in today’s generations.

When I was growing up I knew that I needed to be aware of my surroundings and not talk to strangers. Still, even though I knew that, it was not like I ever came into an encounter with creepy, stalker-like strangers. One would hear of kids getting kidnapped, but it wasn’t on the news every day, nor did it really happen (to my knowledge) in my area while I was growing up. I never, EVER, had to worry about someone blowing the mall up, or someone coming into store and blowing everyone away with semi-automatic weapons. It just never crossed my mind.

In school, all we ever had to do was prepare for potential fires. Every now and again, the fire alarm would go off, which usually meant that we were having a “fire drill.” If it wasn’t a fire drill, it was a dopey prankster pulling the fire alarm. We never, EVER, had to have “active shooter”, “lock-down” kinds of drills. We never, prior to the Columbine High shooting, worried that high school wasn’t a safe place. Sure there where bullies, and high school didn’t always feel safe in terms of my social life. But the most I had to worry about was being bullied and beaten up, not blown away! When there were bomb scares, it was pretty much always because another one of those dopey pranksters were attempting to get a day off from school.

Yet, that is not the world my daughters are growing up in. In this post-Columbine, post-9/11, post Newtown, CT, post-Paris/San Bernardino/Brussells world, we cannot help but fear for our lives. Every nght the news is on, the world is exploding, people are being massacred, martyred, and tortured at alarming rates. And the level of fear and anxiety is at an all-time high! That fear and anxiety is also causing people to go into “self-preservation mode”, where it is literally everyone for themselves.

Fear does that, it is like a huge spider web. There are so many webby threads for us to get caught up in and, if the truth be told, we are often caught up in many more than one. Once the fear web has us in its grip, we cannot escape! We are stuck in the web of fear until the spider comes down and consumes us. As we pass through the bowels of the spider, we become defined by the fear that has killed us. What’s more, we become the very thing we fear. Instead of working toward building a sanctuary, we build up walls that further divide us. Rather than building up community, we become a part of it’s destruction.

Christ is calling us away from the spider web that is fear. The Bible is consistent in its call to the faithful to “fear not”, for we trust that God is, indeed, with us, that God will never abandon us or fail us. We trust that God will be with us always, even to the end of our lives and to the end of the age. While it is hard in this world to maintain this kind of faith, I pray that you surround yourself in a loving, faith community; I pray that you immerse yourself in the Scripture and in God’s promises, and that you turn from fear to faith.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY

“I sought the Lord and he answered me. He delivered me from all my fears.” – King David (Psalms ‭34:4‬ ‭CEB)‬‬ ‬‬‬‬‬‬

PRAYER

Lord, deliver me from my fears and lead me to the promised land of faith. Amen.

Devotional, Holy Week Series, Previous Post

SON OF GOD: Holy Saturday

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Read Matthew 27:62-66

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“’Go out and stand before Me on the mountain,’ the LORD told him. And as Elijah stood there, the LORD passed by, and a mighty windstorm hit the mountain. It was such a terrible blast that the rocks were torn loose, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake there was a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire there was the sound of a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave.” (1 Kings 19:11-13a NLT)

Today is Holy Saturday, which is the day in between Jesus’ death and his resurrection. It is on this day that his disciples sat in hiding. It is on this day that the uncertainty of death hung over them like a shroud, clouding them with the fear of the unknown and paralyzing them in that fear. They had followed Jesus for three long years and had invested all of their hopes and expectations in him. Now he was dead, gone, and the silence of the tomb echoed in their psyche about as loudly as a shrill scream in the night.

On the flip side, the powers that be that opposed Jesus were scrambling to keep the silence from becoming to uncertain. Caiaphas and other religious leaders were holding a meeting with the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate, regarding what they were going to do with this dead trouble maker named Jesus. The religious leaders were claiming that his disciples might come and snatch the body in order to make false claims about some sort of bodily resurrection. Out of fear that the body might disappear, they all decided that it would be best if guards were posted at the tomb to ensure that nothing happened to the body.” These men, too, were disturbed by the silence of the tomb, for they were afraid it might remain silent. So they did everything they could to ensure that it would.

The silence of death and the tomb affects each of us in many different ways. It seems so final, yet so uncertain, and we are left feeling not only loss by a sense of hopelessness. And I need not be talking about the physical death of any one person, but death in the broader sense. Throughout life, aspects of our lives die off. We come to identify ourselves one way, or another, and for a season that identification endures; however, there comes a point when that identity, that aspect, that part of us dies off and we are with a tremendous sense of loss and of fear. Who are we? How do we respond to this particular loss? Do we, like the disciples, hide in the shadows afraid of what lies next? Or do we, like the religious and political leaders of Jesus’ day, place guard over the tomb to make sure nothing is out of our control?

Both of the above questions are pathways that we can take? Both seek to hang onto whatever control we have left. Paralysis and overreaction are on the opposite side of the same coin of control. However, there is a third option. We need not hide in the shadows or overreact in some outlandish way or through some sort of crazy power grab; rather, we have the option of letting go. We have the option of allowing the silence of the tomb to speak for itself. We have the option of letting go of control and allowing God to work resurrection in our lives. The reality is that no matter what we do, whether we hide in the shadows or stand guard over the tomb, that stone will be bursting forth with or without us. The question is not “if”, but “when.” When the Son of God sparks resurrection in your life, will be open to it or will you let it pass you by? The silence of the tomb gives you ample time to reflect on that very question. May that reflection be rich in the darkness and the silence of the tomb.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
“No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new.” – Steve Jobs

PRAYER
Lord, prepare me for the death in life, and for the death of life, for I know that all ends are the beginnings of something new. Amen.

Devotional, Previous Post

A LOOK BACK: God’s People, part 1: Eve

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Read Genesis 2:4-25; 3:1-24

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“Then the man—Adam—named his wife Eve, because she would be the mother of all who live.” (Genesis 3:20 NLT)

When we think of God’s people, we tend to think one of two things. We might think of the Israelites who were God’s “chosen people”, or we might think of specific characters in the Bible. Either way, we tend to idealize the people we are thinking about. For instance, we may think that God’s people are super faithful, holy, perform miracles and live wholly devout and righteous lives. Unfortunately, this idealism enables us to distance ourselves from being God’s people, because we feel that we fall short of those ideals. As such, I have decided to write a devotion series on specific characters in the Bible in order to show you how much these Biblical people are truly are like us, and how much we are truly called to be God’s people.

Part 1: Eve. When we think of Eve, we tend to think in negative and sexual terms. That last one may make you uncomfortable to read, but it is true. Eve is commonly known as the mother of us all, but only because she chose to disobey God and lured Adam to do the same. Her sin, as it is commonly understood, led women into having labor pains and to the establishment of patriarchy (aka women being under the dominion of men). Sadly, our common way of understanding things does an injustice to Eve herself, and it has been damning for women throughout the millennia.

I also think that our tradition, in this regard, does an injustice to the Scriptures themselv es, as I think we tend to lay more blame on Eve than we do on Adam. My reading and interpretation of Scriptures leads me to a different place. By focusing on the sin of Eve, we also miss the beauty of her inherent goodness that is a reflection of the divine image of God. While the story has Eve coming from man, it is only because God realized that man was incomplete without woman. The story is kind of comical in how it is structred because God sets out to create a partner for Adam and has to give it a couple of attempts before getting it right.

The first time round God gave Adam animals, but ended up finding out that humans and animals don’t make a good match. Then God tries again and this time puts Adam asleep and forms woman from Adam’s rib. In other words, Eve was not a sheep or a donkey or a horse or any other animal. Eve was another human being like Adam, made from the same flesh and blood. The important thing to note is that Eve completed Adam.

Yes, Eve did sin, but it is important to realize that it was Adam who God told not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. That was a direct command from God to Adam before Eve was even created. Presumably, as the story never specifies, Adam told Eve; however, it’s no wonder that Eve was the vulnerable target for the shrewd and crafty serpent. She had less of an understanding  as to why they could not eat from that tree, and so the serpent lured her in. Despite that, Adam is still culpable because he was the one who truly knew better.

Yet, that still misses the ultimate point being made here. Eve did not let her sin weigh her down. She became the mother of all despite many painful and tragic circumstances. Also, while sin may have entered the world through the first people, so did true LOVE. Why, you might ask? Because, through Adam and Eve’s choice came God’s plan of redemption through Jesus Christ, who is the ultimate embodiment of God’s faithful, unconditional love. Christ is the clear choice God has given us in regard to away out of our sin and back into a relationship with our Creator.

We all make choices and those choices all bear consequences. But that does not make us any less God’s people. The story of Eve drives that point home. Eve did not let sin have the final word and, as such, she became a part of God’s redemption plan as God would choose to become one of her descendents and redeem the world. God does not want you mired by your choices or their consequences, but wants you to move forward from them, like Eve did, and allow God to guide you toward being who you were created to be.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
“Grace is a much more accurate word to use when dealing with the state of human existence. God gives us unmerited favor through Jesus Christ, and since Adam and Eve, our lives have depended on it.” – Monica Johnson

PRAYER
Lord, I acknowledge that I am a sinner. Still, despite my sin, give me the perseverance of Eve who moved beyond her sin, was fruitful and multiplied. Because of Eve’s faithful perseverance, your Son Jesus Christ came into the world and conquered sin and death. Amen.

Devotional

A LOOK BACK: Just Who Do You Think I Am?

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Read Romans 7:7-25

ALSO IN SCRIPTURE
“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:23 NLT)

If you were to ask any of the students I have had over the years for confirmation class, they would tell you that one of the major projects I have them do is write a theological essay on who people say Jesus Christ is, and to also write about who they believe Jesus Christ to be. This essay is based off of the two questions Jesus asked his disciples, “Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, ‘Who do people say that the Son of Man is? Who do you say that I am’” (Matthew 16:13, 15b)?

There were no wrong answers, and it wasn’t anything they were graded on. The purpose of the required exercise was two-fold: 1) To help them develop the skill of critical theological thinking and the ability to articulate the Christian faith as they have been taught it. 2) To promote critical thinking around their own experiences with Jesus Christ, as well as to give them the opportunity to express those experiences and their own understanding of who Christ is in writing to themselves. Later in life, they can look back on those answers and see how their understanding has grown over the years.

Recently, while driving, I was listening to the Christian metal band Demon Hunter’s album, “Extremist.” The first song on that album is “Death”. This song, to me, is the opposite exercise. Unlike the exercise I have my confirmation students (aka confirmands) go through, this song is not asking the listener who they think Christ is, but rather it is asking that same question in regard to all of the other influences in their lives.

Actually, the song is a reflection, in part, on the tendency to idolize people like him, as if they are some sort of paragon of perfection. With that said, I also think that this song works beyond just Ryan Clark, but other people and/or influences in our lives that we turn to in order to be “saved” from ourselves and our circumstances. In the song, Ryan Clark screams, “I’m not your gateway. I’m not your prodigal son. I’m the vile lesser-than. Just who do you think I am? I’m not your standard. I’m not your vision divine. I am not sacrificial lamb. Just who do you think I am? I am death.”

Ryan is not stating that he is literally Death, as in the Grim Reaper. Nor is he stating that he is evil or that he has no part to play in helping others. That is not what he is saying at all; rather, he is stating that ONLY CHRIST is the savior. We all, including Ryan, are sinners and we are all in need of being saved. How do I know that’s what Ryan actually meant when writing the song? Here’s what Ryan has to say about it:

‘By our very nature, we are a sinful people. It doesn’t matter which side of the fence you stand on, that will always be the case. If you don’t see it, you’re not paying attention. There is no pretending to be impervious to it. The answer is revealed in the realization of its existence, and the understanding that you are in need of forgiveness. The wages of sin is death. Eternal death. My desire is to be an instrument for this revelation, but my words alone can only point the way. I am no savior.’

Amen. We are all in need of being saved and, for those who recognize that need, salvation rests in Jesus Christ who literally HELD NO BARS in ensuring that  salvation for us, should we desire and ask for it. Our way, apart from the eternal love that is GOD in Jesus Christ, leads to death. This need not merely be in some other-worldly sense either. Just look at the wisdom and “saving plans” of human beings running amok in the world. Look at the broken relationships, the drug addiction, the abject poverty, the abuse and oppression, the genocide and the governing for SELF-INTEREST. It is clear, we humans are not saviors, but lesser-than (to use the lyrics).

We are, apart from Christ, death. Yet, as Ryan rightly points out, those of us who are saved are called to point the way to Christ, who is the revelation of God’s unconditional, saving love. We may not be the savior, but we intimately know the savior and can introduce people to our Lord and Savior. If you feel lost in your life, if you feel surrounded by dead ends and hopelessness, there is a way out of such despair. There is a way to abundant and joyful life. That way is Jesus Christ and I pray that you two get in touch. Find a pastor or someone grounded in faith who can support you in that. If you are a person of faith, be willing to be the vessel that points the least, the last and the lost to the One who LOVES and SAVES THEM beyond all measures!

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
“He that falls into sin is a [human]; that grieves at it, is a saint; that boasteth of it, is a devil.” – Thomas Fuller

PRAYER
Lord, have mercy on me a sinner. May I always point to your saving grace. Amen.