Rob Witham

Today, September 21, 2007, should be a day of celebration in my family. Today is my brother’s 30th birthday, but Jonathan David Witham died in my mother’s womb before he was born. Today should be a day of celebration rather than a day of grieving.

Today we mourn, grieve, and wonder what could have been - what should have been. Today we marvel at the passage of time, as sand through a child’s fingers while playing at the beach. “Hard to imagine he would be older now than we were when we buried him,” my father observed this week.

Jonathan’s death marked our family, scarred us each and every one. We didn’t fall apart, by the grace of God, but we were marked by the grief that accompanies a child’s death. For some reason we didn’t visit the cemetery much afterwards, perhaps it was just too hard. My parents could not afford a burial plot for their son so Jonathan David was buried at my grandparent’s plot. My grandparent’s still live and visiting their eventual burial plot forces each of us to also acknowledge their mortality as well. We revisited Jonathan’s grave site several years ago. My brother, Cliff, was but five years old when Jonathan David died. Cliff directed us to the grave site. Despite not having been there since he was a child he could remember every turn of the road in the cemetery. Such is the power of grief.

So today my family grieves and mourns. Yet in the midst of grief we find hope. We know that the best is yet to come. Christians have a blessed hope in the midst of grief. We mourn and grieve - but not as those who have no hope (1 Thessalonians 4:13). Christians have a blessed hope in the resurrection of the dead. We know that death is not the end. Death is but a transition, the exchange of the perishable for the imperishable, the mortal for the immortal (1 Corinthians 15).

Death, viewed from our side of eternity, is a painful separation, a tremendous loss.
Death, viewed from the other side of eternity, looks very different indeed.

“Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his faithful ones.”

Psalm 116:15

Death looks very different indeed from the other side. Death is not the end but the beginning. Death, for those who love God, transitions us from life on earth to life in heaven while we wait for the restoration of all things.

But what about children? What of those who die while they are too young to decide for or against Jesus our Savior? Theologians debate original sin, sin nature, and the age of accountability, attempting to reduce everything to proposition and legal code. The Bible does not. The closest we get to proposition in the Bible is the letter of Paul (perhaps the reason they are the books you hear the most sermons from). God chose to speak to us primarily through narrative, through story. We understand story because our lives are a story, unfolding day by day. And it is in story that we find our hope for children - born and unborn. Proposition is not very helpful during times of grief.

But when David saw that his servants were whispering together, he perceived that the child was dead; and David said to his servants, “Is the child dead?” They said, “He is dead.” Then David rose from the ground, washed, anointed himself, and changed his clothes. He went into the house of the Lord, and worshiped; he then went to his own house; and when he asked, they set food before him and he ate. Then his servants said to him, “What is this thing that you have done? You fasted and wept for the child while it was alive; but when the child died, you rose and ate food.” He said, “While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept; for I said, ‘Who knows? The Lord may be gracious to me, and the child may live.’ But now he is dead; why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he will not return to me.”

2 Samuel 12:19-23

In story we find our answer. In story we find that David drew his hope from the resurrection of the dead. David knew that he would see his infant child again. This hope is what sustained him.

Several years ago my family was rocked by the death of two more children. My sister, Bethany, and her husband, Brian, lost two sons in a short time. Dominick Warren Buell died before he was born. The following year they had another son, Kain Gregory Buell. Kain appeared fine when he was born but quickly became ill due to a rare, mitochondrial genetic disorder. Kain lived several weeks before he also died.

During the weeks that Kain was hospitalized my father fasted and prayed for Kain’s recovery and healing. Dominick’s death the previous year had reopened old wounds from when Jonathan David had died in 1977. As I watched my father struggle during the last days of Kain’s life I was not certain that Kain’s death would not kill my father also. Kain died despite countless people praying and the best medical care that could be found. I will not say that my father picked himself up quite as quickly as David did. But he did pick himself up and he carries on with what God has set before him to do. But the only reason my father is able to carry on is because of our blessed hope in the resurrection of the dead.

But someone will ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?” Fool! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. And as for what you sow, you do not sow the body that is to be, but a bare seed, perhaps of wheat or of some other grain. But God gives it a body as he has chosen, and to each kind of seed its own body. Not all flesh is alike, but there is one flesh for human beings, another for animals, another for birds, and another for fish. There are both heavenly bodies and earthly bodies, but the glory of the heavenly is one thing, and that of the earthly is another. There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; indeed, star differs from star in glory. So it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable. It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. It is sown a physical body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a physical body, there is also a spiritual body. Thus it is written, “The first man, Adam, became a living being”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit. But it is not the spiritual that is first, but the physical, and then the spiritual. The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven. As was the man of dust, so are those who are of the dust; and as is the man of heaven, so are those who are of heaven. Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we will also bear the image of the man of heaven. What I am saying, brothers and sisters, is this: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.

Listen, I will tell you a mystery! We will not all die, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For this perishable body must put on imperishability, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When this perishable body puts on imperishability, and this mortal body puts on immortality, then the saying that is written will be fulfilled: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.” “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

1 Corinthians 15:35-57

Our blessed hope is the resurrection of the dead. This hope is found in Christ Jesus and no other.

Many of you reading this know the pain of grief and heartache all too well. But there is hope. For those who are in Christ Jesus, for those who belong to God, death is but the beginning. Death is the transition from perishable to imperishable, from mortal to immortal.

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