April 2022 Newsletter
Grace, mercy, and peace to you in our Risen Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Dear Family of God at Grace,
Alleluia, Christ is Risen! He is Risen indeed! Alleluia! As I write this letter, I’m preparing the sermon and service for Ramona Daugs. I’m also visiting Harold Ross while he is at home in Hospice care preparing to be with Christ in heaven. The enemy is all around us.
I have heard it said many times, “Death is part of live.” It was never supposed to be this way. Thanks to Disney, we hear that death is part of the circle of life, which is also, not true! Death is the enemy. Death is what we battle against. It is part of the unholy trinity, sin, death, and the devil. Death is not good and not part of life.
When God created the world, death was not part of God’s good creation. Death entered the world by the hand of the Lord as a punishment for the fall and our sinful nature. St. Paul makes this clear, “For the wages of sin is death… and Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned…” (Romans 6:23 & 5:12).
We are at war with death, and it appears that death is winning. Dear friends in Christ, we have Jesus. He is our victory. Its what Easter is all about. We celebrate that victory we have in Jesus. Because of Him, death no longer wins.
Hear the Good News: “Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God” (Romans 6:8-10). “Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall 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 shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: ‘Death is swallowed up in victory.’ ‘O death, where is your victory? O death, where 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 15:51-56).
As we mourn with the Daugs family and with the Ross family and with countless others who have suffered at the hand of the enemy, we mourn with hope that Jesus has won victory this enemy for Ramona, Harold, and all who die in Christ. St. Paul delivers the goods again: “But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep” (1 Thessalonians 4:13-14).
God uses the enemy, death, now for our good in Christ. God sent His Son to take our place under the enemy so that He could conquer death for us. Now, as one of the most comforting hymns states: “Teach me to live that I may dread the grave as little as my bed. Teach me to die that so I may rise glorious at the awe-full day” (All Praise to Thee, My God, This Night 883:3). That “awe-full” day is that last great day when the Lord will return in triumph. St. Paul talks about in 1 Corinthians 15.
Dear beloved of God, may you find comfort in the victory our great God and Lord, Jesus Christ has won for you over the enemy, death, by His death and resurrection! Alleluia, Christ is Risen! He is Risen indeed! Alleluia!
In His Service,
Pastor Lingsch