Decay Does not have the Last Word

We (Paul and Barnabas) tell you the good news: What God promised our fathers he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second Psalm: ‘You are my Son; today I have become your Father.’ The fact that God raised him from the dead, never to decay, is stated in these words: ‘I will give you the holy and sure blessings promised to David.’ So it is stated elsewhere: ‘You will not let your Holy One see decay.’ For when David had served God’s purpose in his own generation, he fell asleep; he was buried with his fathers and his body decayed. But the one whom God raised from the dead did not see decay. Therefore, my brothers, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. Through him everyone who believes is justified from everything you could not be justified from by the law of Moses. (Acts 13:32-39, NIV) 

I have a picture and a card from a dear former member on my wall where I pastored for twenty years. The picture showed her smiling face with a short hairstyle. The background of the picture showed her knitting, using her fingers to make gestures of love through yarn. There were butterflies scattered across the card. She was dying of cancer. Nevertheless, her words captured her relationship with the enemy of this world and the fulfillment of her life with Christ. At her funeral, I read her words. She wrote, “if I had my way I would leave behind the good times. I would want them to know that I am with Jesus now. No more pain, no more sickness. I will see them all someday. Be happy for me. Don’t mourn my death too long for I have won my battle.” 

We are too familiar with this dying world.  

Deb felt the decay of her body every time her chemo treatments tore down her body. She saw the decay of health when her hair fell out. She experienced the decay of this life even when she knitted her creations of love. I witnessed the brokenness and decay of life from babies dying too soon, young disciples who lost their way, children who walked away from God, young people taken by gun violence in my neighborhood, broken schools in a broken world decaying because of sin. We are too familiar with this dying world.  

David, in Paul’s sermon, was exhibit A of a decaying world. David pleased God with his obedience by killing a giant blasphemer, writing most of the Psalms, and ruling king for many years. Paul observed David could not stop death, which began a process of decaying that signaled his human limitations. The good news, for Paul, iss found in verse 33, which stated, “he [Jesus] fulfilled for us”.  The whole purpose of Jesus was that he was God’s answer to a world where we experience the decay of life almost every day. All our material blessings will decay. We cannot stop it no matter how hard we try. Paul did not back down in his sermon that, “the fact that God raised him from the dead, never to decay. “For when David had served God’s purpose in his own generation, he fell asleep; he was buried with his fathers and his body decayed. 37 But the one whom God raised from the dead did not see decay” (v.33-37). 

 My dear church member believed that the brokenness and decay of this world was a known fact and inescapable. But the gospel of hope can only be found in a fully alive Jesus. One day we will join a world where decay and brokenness can keep on knocking but they can’t come in. In the final analysis, we have a Jesus who does not decay to things in this world. We will not back down from this fact no matter what the world says.  

Forgiveness of sins and being human became a game he knew he would never win by his own strength. 

A few years ago, I chatted with a massage therapist who attended my church many years ago. She told me about her father’s childhood experience in Christian Reformed Church. Back then, he was well dressed and made his way to church. As he approached the door, he felt an overwhelming sense of guilt that paralyzed him. He began to shake and sweat. He ran home and never went back to church again. She told me his father suffered from a severe case of “not-enough-ness”. He felt the guilt that was too deep of a hole to climb out. He felt the pressure to perform the role of a Christian and he knew he did not measure up. The dear man knew he could never do or be enough to earn God’s love and acceptance. Therefore, he stopped trying. Fear of never doing enough was the thing that drove him away. I could see his daughter’s deep pain for her father. Forgiveness of sins and being human became a game he knew he would never win by his own strength. 

 Paul knew the game of “not-enough-ness” well. He played it all his life and was more skilled in keeping the Mosaic Law almost faultless. The law was the only to justify one’s rightful access to God’s grace.   The text read, “Therefore, my brothers, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. Through him everyone who believes is justified from everything you could not be justified from by the Law of Moses” (v. 38-39). Paul was a recovering zealot who tried to earn forgiveness rather than to receive it through the death and resurrection in Jesus who fulfilled the Law perfectly. Why did he work so hard, for what God gave to him for free? Paul had to choose to receive forgiveness by faith in Christ alone. 

The Heidelberg Catechism, has a lovely description of grace. Answer 60 stated, “even though my conscience accuses me of having grievously sinned against all God’s commandments and never having kept any of them and even though I am inclined towards all evil, nevertheless, without my deserving it at all, out of sheer grace…All I have to do is to accept this gift of God with a believing heart (A. 60). Paul made the same statement in his sermon to a people who used the law to earn their salvation. Paul advanced the gospel of grace and he did not back down from it. We do not back down that we are saved by grace alone. It is just that good! That is all we got in this world, because decay does not get the last word.  

Photo by Mathias Reding