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SCRIPTURE READING
JOB 19:23-27
2 THESSALONIANS 2:1-5
LUKE 20:27-38

SUNDAY REFLECTION

The theme for our reflection is “God of the Living” God of the living means that those who are in the Lord do not die but have everlasting life. We shall discuss the following facts:

1. He is the God of the living because of His power of resurrection
2. He is the God of the living because He intervenes in the affairs of the living

Firstly, we worship the God of the living because of His power of resurrection. The Sadducees were a Jewish sect that did not believe in the resurrection therefore they asked Jesus the status of a woman who married seven men while she was in the world, who will be her rightful husband at the resurrection? Jesus answered ““The people of this age marry and are given in marriage. But those who are considered worthy of taking part in the age to come and in the resurrection from the dead will neither marry nor be given in marriage, and they can no longer die; for they are like the angels. They are God’s children, since they are children of the resurrection. But in the account of the burning bush, even Moses showed that the dead rise, for he calls the Lord ‘the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ He is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive.” (Luke 20:34-38). In other words, God is the God of the living, at resurrection our nature is transformed and death has no power over us again, we become like angels. Again, Jesus demonstrated that God is the God of the living when resurrected on the third day after His death, ascended to Heaven and Shall come to judge us and grant the faithfuls everlasting life. It was for this reason, Paul cautioned the Thessalonian Christians to disregard the false teaching about the fact that the coming of Jesus had already happened. The Thessalonian Christian were worried and terrified that Jesus had already come and they had been left out. Paul assured them that “Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him, we ask you, brothers and sisters, not to become easily unsettled or alarmed by the teaching allegedly from us—whether by a prophecy or by word of mouth or by letter —asserting that the day of the Lord has already come. Don’t let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction. He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple, proclaiming himself to be God.” (2 Thessalonians 2:1-4). In other words, Paul gives us an assurance that before the second coming of the Christ, the antichrist will come proclaiming himself to be God but those who stand firm in the Lord will be gathered with Christ at the Judgement day. There are two categories of those who will be gathered to the Lord when He comes, these are faithful believers who will overcome the great tribulation, their old nature will be transformed into the new heavenly nature and those experienced physical death will be resurrected with the new and heavenly nature. We are further assured in 1 Corinthians 6:14 that “By his power God raised the Lord from the dead, and he will raise us also.”To make the point clearer and to again prove that God is the God of the living Jesus said in Matthew 16:24-28 that “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul? For the Son of Man is going to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay each person according to what he has done. Truly, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in his Kingdom” We are further emboldened in Revelation 21:6-8 that God is the God of the living when He revealed to John that “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To the thirsty I will give water without cost from the spring of the water of life. Those who are victorious will inherit all this, and I will be their God and they will be my children. But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars —they will be consigned to the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.” In the same manner the second life is the etenal life for those who are saved and believe in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Secondly, apart from the ressurection, God is the God of the living because He intervenes in the lives of those who have faith in Him even in times of adversity. Job was broken with calamities but did not despair, He trusted the God of the living and assured himself that “For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another.” (Job 19:25-27). Dear friend, God hears our prayer of distress and help because He is the God of the living, He will not forsake us. The Psalmist further assures us that “I sought the LORD, and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears. Those who look to him are radiant, and their faces shall never be ashamed. This poor man cried, and the LORD heard him and saved him out of all his troubles. The angel of the LORD encamps around those who fear him, and delivers them. Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him!” (Psalm 34:4-8). In time of economic hardship, sickness, rejection from family and friends, unemployment and uncertainties we are called upon like Job, to look up to the deliverance of the Lord because He is God of the living!

In summary beloved in Lord, the theme for our reflection is “God of the living” in our reflection we have discovered that He is the God of the living because of His power of resurrection and also, He is the God of the living because He intervenes in the affairs of the living. May the Holy Spirit strengthen us to put our hope and trust in the God of the living. Amen.