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Pull the Plug

Lazarus did not have a near-death experience. Even Miracle Max from The Princess Bride would have realized that he was not simply “only mostly dead.” He was completely, undeniably dead. First, he was miserably sick, and then he passed away. He expired. He kicked the bucket. He bought the farm. He bit the dust. However you want to say it, make no mistake about it: Lazarus died. His sisters washed his body and wrapped it in linen. Weeping, they laid his corpse in a cave-tomb and leaned a flat stone across the opening.

We like to read this story because it ends so well, with Jesus arriving apparently too late—four days later—only to dramatically raise Lazarus from the dead and give him back to his family.

I wonder, though, if we devote enough time to thinking about the implications for our own lives. In our excitement about the resurrection part, do we forget that you can’t raise a person from the dead unless he or she is actually dead? Do we really get it—that we need to be dead people ourselves before Jesus can infuse us with his life?

Second Corinthians 5:17 says, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” Colossians 3:3 says it even more clearly: “For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.” The expectation is obvious: When Jesus invites us to follow him, it’s an invitation to die. Only when we die to ourselves can we truly live for him. That kind of surrender goes against every instinct we have. We want to hang on. We can’t seem to let go. We refuse to pull the plug. But it is only when we die to ourselves that we can finally experience the resurrection power of Christ.