Death Destroyed: Christ's Victory, Our Confidence
Daily Scripture
2 Timothy 1:9-14
9 God is the one who saved and called us with a holy calling. This wasn’t based on what we have done, but it was based on his own purpose and grace that he gave us in Christ Jesus before time began. 10 Now his grace is revealed through the appearance of our savior, Christ Jesus. He destroyed death and brought life and immortality into clear focus through the good news. 11 I was appointed a messenger, apostle, and teacher of this good news. 12 This is also why I’m suffering the way I do, but I’m not ashamed. I know the one in whom I’ve placed my trust. I’m convinced that God is powerful enough to protect what he has placed in my trust until that day. 13 Hold on to the pattern of sound teaching that you heard from me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. 14 Protect this good thing that has been placed in your trust through the Holy Spirit who lives in us.
Daily Reflection & Prayer
The apostle Paul applied the good news of Jesus’ resurrection to his own life—and his own death. He was in prison, awaiting execution by the Romans (2 Timothy 4:6-7). In that death-haunted setting, he wrote that Jesus “destroyed death and brought life and immortality into clear focus through the good news.” He trustingly said, “The champion’s wreath that is awarded for righteousness is waiting for me. The Lord, who is the righteous judge, is going to give it to me” (2 Timothy 4:8).
- Pastor Gary Demarest wrote, “It is a well-established fact that ours is a death-denying culture. * We live under the power of death until we have confronted the reality of our own death in the light of Jesus’ victory over death…. To the Christian, the “sting” of death has been removed (1 Corinthians 15:54-55)…. It is a positive trust in Jesus Himself as conqueror of death.” ** How can you strengthen that “positive trust” in your own heart and mind?
- “Death, the final weapon of Caesar and all tyrants, has been defeated…. something had been brought to light… far superior to the kind the great pagan philosophers imagined. Some of them (e.g. Plato) believed that each human being possessed an immortal soul which would survive bodily death. The kind of immortality the gospel offered is a new bodily life which will not be subject to pain, sickness or death.” *** How was Paul “freer” than the Romans who executed him?
Prayer
O Lord, help me live into the strong words of Mary Peters’ hymn: “On our Father’s love relying, Jesus every need supplying, in our living, in our dying, all will be well.” **** Amen.
GPS Insights
Leah Swank-Miller
Leah Swank-Miller serves as Pastor of Care and Director of Student Ministries at Resurrection Overland Park. A Kansas native, she has been a professional actress for nearly two decades, and she loves to see the vastness of God’s creation through theatre and the arts. Leah graduated with an M. Div. from Saint Paul School of Theology. Leah, Brian, and their two children love to play tennis, golf, soccer, and board games.
There was a moment in my life when death felt overwhelmingly real. I came to visit my aunt in hospice, and while conversing with her–though she was neither awake nor lucid–I witnessed her take her last breath. Her body shook, and then she entered eternal rest. As I heard the weeping of family around me and the rush of nurses into the room, I vividly realized the thin veil between life and death. I had never experienced death so closely before. The finality weighed heavily on my heart, and I wrestled with questions about what comes next. Even as I began praying in that heavy moment, I thought, “Lord, are you here?“ But in the midst of that sorrow, I was reminded of Jesus’ words in John 11:25—“I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die.”
In my pain, I found comfort in the truth that death is not the end. Christ’s victory over the grave means that we can have the assurance of eternal life. I began to realize that, while we grieve loss, we do not grieve without hope (1 Thessalonians 4:13-14). The sting of death is real, but it does not have the final word—Jesus does.
This personal experience has stayed with me, especially now as I care for those in need, praying for those undergoing surgery or saying goodbye to loved ones. It has deepened my faith, transforming my understanding of what it means to live in the freedom of God’s love. Instead of fear, I now hold onto the confidence that I will see my loved ones again, that Jesus has prepared a place beyond this life where sorrow and pain will cease. I imagine this was the truth Paul carried with him while shackled in a prison cell awaiting his death. Because He lives, we can face each day with hope, knowing that His victory is my victory, and that nothing—not even death—can separate us from His love.
I grew up singing a song that still comes to mind in moments like these: “Because He Lives,” written in 1969 by Bill and Gloria Gaither. The lyrics are: “Because He lives, I can face tomorrow; Because He lives, all fear is gone. Because I know He holds the future, and life is worth the living just because He lives!” Dear friends, in a world of chaos and confusion, I assure you that life is worth living because Jesus lives. He lives in me, in you, and in the promise that inspired Paul’s words we read today. Wake up today and every day, knowing that life is worth living because HE lives, and because of that promise, we CAN face tomorrow.
© 2024 Resurrection: A United Methodist Church. All Rights Reserved.
Scripture quotations are taken from The Common English Bible ©2011. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
References
* Note that unlike our death-denying culture, Jesus did not rebuke or scold those who grieve but offered them God’s promise (cf. Matthew 5:4).
** Gary Demarest, The Preacher’s Commentary Series, Volume 32: 1, 2 Thessalonians /1, 2 Timothy /Titus. Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, p, 251.
*** Wright, N. T., Paul for Everyone: The Pastoral Letters: 1 and 2 Timothy, and Titus (p. 89). Westminster John Knox Press. Kindle Edition.
**** Click here to hear the entire hymn.
