TITLE: “Life from Death”

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Our text for today is the raising of the widow of Nain’s son, with focus on the words, He came and touched the open coffin, and those who carried him stood still. And He said, “Young man, I say to you, arise.”

I don’t think you and I can truly appreciate the situation this woman finds herself in. Her husband is dead, so her status in the community is already at risk. For to be a widow in those days meant that you really were at the mercy of your family and your community. If you had sons who would care for you, well, then you were okay. But without a son to take care of you and provide for you, you were as good as dead.

So when her son dies, it is as if she died with him. Her whole life has no flashed before her. All of her hopes and dreams, her very life itself hangs in the balance. The crowds recognize this, and so their cries and wailing over this young man’s death are great. It is almost as if they are not burying one person, but two.

This is you and I, dear friends. This is what sin does in our lives. The wages of sin is death, as St. Paul rightly reminds us. We earned it. By our sinful lives and actions. By our selfish thoughts, words and deeds. Indeed, our very being as sinners from birth all point to this stark and painful reality: the wages of sin is death. A wage is your payment for what you earned. And you, oh sinner, have earned it well. Just as this young man who lays dead on the funeral bier, so too you are receiving the wage for your work of sin. You can see it in your body which does not work as well as it used to work. You can see it in broken lives, messed up marriages, and families torn apart by pain either real or contrived. And then there is the sin. You know your sin. It lurks within you, it eats away at you. You know of your gossip and slander, you know how you despise your parents, how you covet other people’s stuff, other people’s spouses. You know your sin. It is there. Do not deny it. For the wage is before you. You are dead in trespasses and sin.

Into this mess our Lord walks up. We did not invite Him. We did not ask Him to come and fix our problems. You and I are so sick that we don’t even know enough to ask for help! But He comes nonetheless. Jesus meets the funeral procession as they are leaving the city. He walks up to them unbidden and unasked. The Lord of Life meets death itself. What can He do? Who will win in this dreadful strife?

The Lord, Jesus Christ, walks up to them and has compassion on them. Now that word in English sounds so civilized, so nice and polite. You know what compassion means. It means to be moved to help another person because you recognize their need. Now that is certainly true, but it doesn’t really catch the flavor of this word. For this word is more than that. The word literally means that His gut is churning to help her. Notice where Jesus directs His compassion, on the widowed woman. He longs to help her. His very gut and being demands that He help her. It is as if He cannot help Himself but walk up to her. He has compassion on her, and says to her, do not weep.

Now we say those words sometimes at funerals. Maybe you’ve been there. Don’t cry, honey. Don’t cry. We say those words because we want someone else to feel better. Or maybe we say those words because we don’t want to deal with the pain of loss, the heartache that always accompanies death. But Jesus says it a little differently. Don’t weep, he says. Now when Jesus says it, He says it because He can do something about the problem. He does not simply offer sympathy to her plight, as though patting her on the arm will solve her problems. No, when Jesus says to her, do not weep, He does so because He is the only one who can dry our tears bringing life out of death and turning our tears of sorrow to tears of joy.

So our Lord goes up to the funeral procession and touches the coffin. They are so shocked at this that they stand still. No one touches a coffin. No one. You would be unclean. The stench of death would be upon you. Why would He do this? You can almost see their astonishment. Jesus then says the words which bring life: Young man, I say to you, arise. Then, at the Word of the Lord, the one who was dead stood up and began to speak.

We don’t have this problem yet in our household, but I’ve heard that when children get a little older, it can sometimes be, well, a little bit of work to get them up and moving in the morning. GET UP, you may call up the stairs. You may even say it right in their ears, but somehow, when you or I say these words to arouse one even from sleep, they don’t always do much.

But not so with the Lord of life. When He says to you, get up, you get up. Even if you are dead, you get up. For our Lord’s words carry power and authority beyond anything we can even imagine. Get up, He says to you. He says it to this young man as if he were simply taking a nap. Get up!

But you see, dear friends in Christ, this is how it is with our Lord. The insurmountable problems of this life, even death itself, they are as nothing to the Creator of heaven and earth. Well, not exactly nothing. He paid the price of death itself so that He can say the words to you which bring life. I forgive you. I forgive you all your sins. In Greek the word for forgive is the same word as the word to let go or to arise. It is as if He reaches out His hand to you and says to you as you are weighed down with the struggles and things of this life, come, get up. I pick you up out of your sins. They are no longer yours, but mine. Get up! I give you your life back.

Jesus gave life back to this young man of Nain, and in doing so, He gave the widow her life back as well. That is the power of forgiveness, dear friends. It does not just affect you, but everyone around you. Jesus forgives your sins in His Word of absolution. He touches you with His very Body and Blood in His Holy Sacrament. His Word gives life and peace and hope where there is only death. This is why we can pray with the Psalmist: I will praise You, O Lord my God, with / all my heart,* and I will glorify Your name for- / evermore. For great is Your mer- / cy toward me,* and You have delivered my soul from the / depths of Hell (Introit for Trinity 16). Amen.

The peace of God, which passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in true faith, unto life everlasting. Amen.