TEXT: Luke 7:11-17

SUBJECT: Luke #23: Master of Death

Some people can tell a good story and others can’t. Bad story tellers always leave something out that needs to be in the story—or, more often—put things in that are better left out. A good story teller, on the other hand, has a knack for getting it just right. And Luke is a very good story teller!

Thus far in His Gospel, Luke has told many fine stories about the Lord—about who He is and what He has come to do. But no story he’s yet told can match this one for its power and beauty and its hope.

It’s about the most real thing in the world: death. It’s the one thing you can’t get away from. You cannot ignore it, you cannot deny it, you cannot explain it away. The talking heads on TV cannot put a positive spin on death. And all the fantasizing about its unreality only proves how real it is.

Here, for the first time in His life, Jesus Christ goes eyeball-to-eyeball with death. And death blinks first! What a Savior we have! The disciples once said,

Winds and waves? They’re nothing! What manner of Man is this—that even death surrenders to Him?

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s go to the story first, and then, back to His mastery of death.

As usual, Luke sets his story in time and space. Although the miracle is fantastic, it’s not a fairy tale he’s telling. There’s nothing like "once upon a time" in the Luke’s story.

It occurred "the next day", that is, the day after our Lord healed the Centurion’s servant. The place is s Nain, a village several miles east of Capernaum.

As for witnesses? There were plenty—

When Luke wrote his Gospel, many of these people were no doubt alive. You would have told you what they saw that day. Remember, the people in the Bible are not characters in a work of fiction. You can’t ask Frodo what Gollum looked like.

Whether the Lord knew anyone there, we don’t know and why he went there, we can’t say. But remember, Peter tells us that Christ "Went about doing good". What the bumper stickers tell us to do, He did,

As He passed through town, He met a funeral procession. A young man had died that day, leaving his widowed mother bereaved and without a penny to care for her in her old age.

When He saw the mother’s grief, He too was "moved with compassion". He knew what loss was and what it meant to have "No place to lay His head". He tells the weeping mother to dry her tears. Her loss is not final—that the Lord Himself is going to do something about it!

He goes to the open casket and orders the young man to get up! Which he does without hesitation. He doesn’t have to clear his head or loosen up the muscles made tight by death. The man is not just alive; he’s well! The Lord takes him to his mother and

The people respond in the same way you would: they were seized with fear. A dead man brought back to life would make you happy after you thought about it awhile. But, when you first saw him, it would make you lose your mind with fear.

What kind of power does the Carpenter wield? Any man can say, "I kill", but only the LORD can say,

That’s what He did that day. He took a dead man—really, fully, hopelessly dead—and put life back into him.

The people are struck with a sense of awe—there’s a Divine Majesty in this Man who raised the dead.

Once the shock wore off, the people began to praise God for His act of Almighty Grace.

The word gets out fast.

In the blink of an eye, everyone was talking about the news—and why not? They knew the stories about God’s great work in the past—about Elijah and Elisha raising the dead back to life, for example. But that was a long time ago—800 years! The stories must have seemed like legends to the people. But here’s a new story and it happened the day before yesterday!

That’s the story.

It’s meaning is plain: Jesus Christ is the Master of Death.

This was hinted at from the beginning of time. In the first chapter of Genesis, we find the Lord making all things. They start off—it seems—as a confusion of elements—earth and sky, seas and dry land, plants, animals, fish and fowl, cattle and men are all of the same stuff—dark, cold, dead matter. But the Almighty starts working and before you know it the once dead lump is now a place teeming with life. The deadness of matter is brought to life by the Word of Life, our Lord Jesus Christ.

In the next chapter, we have the beginning of human life. The world is full of plants and animals, but there’s no one there to name them or care for them. So the Lord reaches down to the mud and forms a body—a perfect statue it was. But then He breathes life into him, and

Later, we have a genealogy of…death. Men lived long lives back then: Adam lived to 950, Seth made it to 912, Jared reached 962 and Methuselah 969. But in that middle of that list of death, we have verse that doesn’t quite fit,

The Lord breaks into the world of death and pulls one man out alive.

The theme is picked up on later in Genesis as the Lord takes a old couple—whose reproductive organs are dead—and gives them a son. Hebrews 11:12 says,

Four hundred years later, Abraham’s children, now slaves in Egypt, are revived. The waters of the Red Sea stand for death—as the People pass through it, they enter life.

Centuries later a prophet is taken into a valley full of dead, dry, and bleached bones. The Lord asks him, "Son of man, can these bones live?" The man gives a fine answer: "O, Lord, you know". He’s commanded to preach to the bones and to tell the wind to enter them. He does it, and the bones come together, flesh grows over them, and a great army comes to life.

The bones are symbolic, of course—or prophetic. The People of God are as dead and scattered and hopeless as those bones were. But when the Prince of Life breathes on them, they live.

Even then, the life-giving power of God was so sure that a prophet—as mortal as we are—could taunt death,

What’s shadowy in the Old Testament, comes into the light with the arrival of Christ.

First, in the raising of the young man of Nain. Later, a little girl is restored to life, then the Lord’s good friend, Lazarus. When the Lord gave up His life on the cross, a strange thing happened—tombs were unsealed. Three days later, the open tombs gave up to dead who were now alive!

Don’t think horror movies here. These were not ghosts, mummies, vampires, or zombies. They were real men as alive as they were before they died—only more so!

All these indicate that Jesus Christ is the Master of Death. But that’s all they do—indicate, suggest, make it probable. It’s o,y proven by His own resurrection. Unlike other dead men who were raised by a force outside of themselves, Jesus Christ rose from the dead on His own power.

Also, the others regained life only to lose it again. But when the Lord rose from the dead, He "entered into life", that is, He passed beyond the reach of death into a life that cannot be lost. There’s a word for that kind of life: eternal.

This is the life He gives us. Everyone who believes in Christ receives life—real life, life that never wears out, life in fellowship with God forever. When the angel broke Peter and John out of jail, he told them to,

What life? The life Christ entered into and offers us in the Gospel. Though the Apostles are all dead now—and we don’t hear much from angels anymore—we still have the Gospel. And by that Gospel Jesus Christ invites you—just as you are, even if you’re a rotten sinner and feel lousy about yourself to join Him in life.

The life is first given to the believer’s soul. But, one day, the whole person will share in it. The Christian’s hope is not to die and go to heaven, but to rise in the Resurrection of the Dead and to have eternal life in body and soul.

As we get older and heavier and slower and grayer and balder and the sicknesses start piling up, we wish we had the bodies we used to have—young, fit, limber, strong, and quick to recuperate. That’s a dream of millions.

But it’s a puny dream! Believers don’t hope for the body they used to have, but for the body they will have! That’s a body just like the Lord’s—perfect, sinless, not above sickness and only getting better with time.

Believers already have this life in part. One day, we’ll have it in full. Because Jesus Christ has it in full now—and we’re in union with Him.

If your life is no life at all, you can have the real thing. You can have it now, but on God’s terms. If I offered you a million dollars on the condition that you walked up here and took it off the pulpit, you shouldn’t say, Throw it to me instead. No, you take the money on my terms—or not at all.

The terms God sets for your salvation are two: repentance and faith. To repent means to feel sorry for your sins and to do your best to give them up. To believe means to trust Jesus Christ alone—not Christ and His Mother, Christ and the church, Christ and your good works. But Christ Alone.

These are the conditions for salvation. Take it or leave it.

If you take it, you have life—whether you feel anything or not. The Lord gives life to everyone who repents and believes. And the life He gives He will never take away: it’s eternal life. The old preacher said,

To believers, today’s story provides great encouragement. First of all, the life that you now have in Christ is real life, a life that cannot be lost, and a life that will one day blossom into the fullness of life.

It also promotes obedience. It is hard to obey God and to withstand the pressure Satan and the world put on you. But you can do both—because you’re alive.

It takes away the terror of death. When the believer quits breathing, it’s not something worse he goes to, but something better. Not less life then, but more life.

If today’s story means anything at all, it means we’re alive. Alive to serve Him and alive to bring others to life through the Gospel. Now, go become what you are. And God bless you, everyone. For Christ’s sake. Amen.