I say this with images of yesterdays horror still sharp and bright-edged in my mind’s eye—and maybe that places me—places us—closer to Paul and his hearers than we might otherwise be. Because it’s a shocking image he’s using here to catch an inkling of what it means to have a new life in Christ—it is like death.
Let that sink in—with all its images of falling bodies, crumbling buildings, fire and smoke and dust—being a Christian is like dying—“you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God”—and that’s not just died and risen—living a fourth-week life—the revelation of that glory has to await the time when “Christ our life is revealed”.
Being saved, living as a Christian, is for Paul so damned radical it is best compared to the absolute and irreversible change brought to us by death.
And since we have all been changed so dramatically—since we are all dead—what difference does it make if we were once Jew or Greek, Arab or Israeli or American, catholic or protestant, female or male. Put Paul and Luke together and we might hear it—“happy are you dead—life and peace should be yours!”
But I don’t believe that—death is not my cup of tea—be it slow or sudden, peaceful or violent, untimely or timely … I want my consolation now, my satisfaction now, my laughter now, my reputation and friends now.
Alas for me …