Reverend Patrick Erickson
Pastor of Peace Lutheran Church
A Fancy Coffin for a Worn Out Tent!
(2Corinthians 5:1-5; 1Corinthians 15:50-57)
"Mrs. Frances Hiller of Wilmington, Massachusetts, passed away in the spring of 1900. Mrs. Hiller was not known for the substance of her life, but for the dreams of her death.
"She bought a $30,000 carved coffin, placed it in her parlor, and frequently climbed into it to show visitors just how glorious she would appear. After tiring of that in-and-out process, she placed a wax dummy in the ornate box and dressed it in her $20,000 funeral robe. Thirty-five years after her death, the gaudy Hiller mausoleum, which included an identical coffin containing her husband, was seen as an eyesore and destroyed.
"The reason folks are so preoccupied with their burial status is usually due to their lack of belief in God's Word. For Christians, there are these comforting words: 'Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands' (2 Cor. 5:1)", Jim Basset, Spring Reflections 1996.
Isn't it amazing the extremes to which people go to glorify and preserve that which is sown in corruption, namely, their earthly bodies? But to no avail. That which is sown in corruption, because it is corruptible, corrupts. Alas, our earthly tents, as St. Paul refers to our bodies, come crashing down!
And they decay, no matter how gussied up with $30,000 coffins and in $20,000 funeral robes. Like Mrs. Hiller's gaudy mausoleum, which ultimately was seen as an eyesore and taken down, so the earthly tents we live in eventually are brought down--by misfortune, by mischief and mayhem, but mostly by wear and tear and old age--and would become an eyesore if left unburied.
But we have something more glorious to look forward to when we vacate our earthly tents than Mrs. Hiller's $30,000 coffin or $20,000 funeral robe, or her gaudy mausoleum, namely, our heavenly home. Paul speaks of it in his second letter to the Corinthian Christians. "Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands" (2 Cor 5:1).
Like Mrs. Hiller's posh coffin and costly funeral robe, which themselves eventually decay, and her garish mausoleum which is justly torn down because it finally is seen for what it is, an eyesore, the earthly tents we live in, no matter how highly we prize them, will ultimately come down. Some of us are already only too aware of how rickety our fleshly tabernacles are becoming!
We groan, Paul says, not because we wish to put off vacating our fleshly abodes or because we wish we had one of those expensive funeral robes to put on when we do put off our earthly clothes or one of those $30,000 coffins to lay in when we're laid in state and sleep the sleep of death or an outlandish mausoleum to occupy when we vacate our current residence.
No, we groan, the Apostle reminds us, because we long to put off our moth-eaten, torn and tattered birthday suit and to put on our brand spanking new suit, our heavenly dwelling. "Because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life.
"Now it is God who has made us for this very purpose and has given us the Spirit as a Deposit" (vv 3-5). The Holy Spirit is the Down Payment on our home in heaven, guaranteeing what's to come. God will pay off the mortgage (good news in these days of record foreclosures in the face of defaulted mortgages), even as He pays for all moving expenses.
In fact, He already has, not with perishable things like gold or silver, but with imperishable things, things like the holy, precious blood and the innocent suffering and death of the Lamb slain for our offenses and raised for our justification, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, the only-begotten Son of the Father, our Savior Jesus Christ.
Having risen and ascended, He has returned to His Father and His heavenly home and there prepared a place for us, a room with our name on the door and the welcome mat out and our Savior there to welcome us with wide open arms and a heart open wide. "And if I go and prepare a place for you," our Redeemer promises, "I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am" (John 14).
Therefore we groan, knowing that what is sown, that is, our earthly life, is perishable. But we breathe a sigh of relief, too. For we know that what is sown perishable will be raised imperishable through faith in Jesus Christ, who Himself is the Firstborn from the dead who raises us to new life here and now and will raise us to life everlasting when He comes again.
St. Paul testifies to this heartening prospect in store for us all, for all believers in the Lord Jesus Christ and the eternal life that is ours in Him through faith, in his triumphant chapter on the resurrection of the dead. "I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God.
"Nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed--in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.
"For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: 'Death has been swallowed up in victory.'
"'Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?' The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Cor 15:50-57). Amen.
- Pastor Erickson