Regional Synod of Canada - Reformed Church in America

Pioneer Christian Monthly

Date - Mar/71

Contributor - R. Katerberg

Title - He Was Really Dead

Topic - Meditation

Question: Why was he "buried"?

Answer: To confirm the fact that he was really dead.

In this season of Lent, we are mindful of the fact that our Lord Jesus suffered severely, which led in the end to his death on the cross. This cruel execution of our Lord is meant to be good news to us. The day of his death we celebrate as good Friday. How can anyone's death be good? How can anyone's death be gospel?

We don't like death. We don't even like to think about dying. We know that we all have to face death sometime, but we refuse to think about this. We block it out of our thinking. If we refuse to face the fact of our own death, we cannot accept Christ's death as good news. The catechism suggests that the word "buried" is included in the creed to make it clear to us that our Lord was really dead. How easy it is for us to think that his death was not real, in hope that ours won't be that bad either. Are we willing to accept that Christ was really dead? It is difficult for us to accept that anyone should die. We like to live, and therefore we don't like anyone to die. Even when people have died, we often deny it for some time. In the case of our Lord, we join Peter and the others in protest, when our Lord speaks of his impending death. "God forbid it Lord! This must never happen to you." We won't allow our Lord to die, because we have difficulty in accepting our own death.

How do we respond if we accept his real death? We don't like death. It is our enemy. But we have to face this enemy from time to time around us, and at least once for ourselves. In our religious experience of Lent we now have to face Christ's real death. We hope to respond to the fact that he really died. When Jesus confronted his disciples for a second time with the fact that he was to die, they did no longer deny what he was saying. They expressed a feeling. "The disciples became very sad." If we want to experience the joy of the gospel, we too have to face the reality of his death. Why, we ask. Why did he have to die? Do you know why he had to die? Doesn't the answer to this question make you sad too?

Can we respond at all to Christ's death? When someone dies we are speechless. We don't understand the why's of dying. We like to say something, but there is nothing to be said. Every person sometime has to die. That means you too will die. Our Lord became one like us in facing this enemy of death. When he speaks a third time about his impending death, no response of the disciples is recorded. After their denial, and after their expression of sadness, there was now nothing more to be said. When we today face the cross of Christ, we too are speechless.

"By our baptism, then, we were buried with him and shared his death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from death by the glorious power of the Father, so also we might live a new life. For if we became one with him in dying as he did, in the same way we shall be one with him by being raised to life as he was. For we know this: our old being has been put to death with Christ on his cross, in order that the power of the sinful self might be destroyed, so that we should no longer be slaves of sin. For when a person dies he is set free from the power of sin. If we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him."

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