The final in the series by Michael Godfrey, journeying through the Nicene Creed.

WE LOOK FOR THE RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD AND THE LIFE OF THE WORLD TO COME

Here the rubber of belief hits the road one final time. Paul (as ever!) put it well: “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile” (1 Cor. 15.17a). If Christ is not raised, then death has defeated Christ. If Jesus is just a misguided fool, and his resurrection a paltry drama dreamed up by grieving goofs, then, says Paul, “we are of all people most to be pitied.”

Dismantle resurrection-hope, and we should go home. I have better things to do on a Sunday than worship a god smaller than Death. I have other things I could do with my life, more fun than wearing a collar back-to-front and rabbitting on for hours each week about a misguided Palestinian from long, long ago. Come to think about it, I reckon there’s many Christians who have made far greater sacrifice than I could dream of in their service of the gospel. Silly Peter. Silly Paul. Fancy dying for nothing: misguided twits who should have known better.

Except … the hope of God won’t let me go. Personally I can testify to the good the invasion of God’s grace has worked in my own life. I hear it, too, from those who share my faith. And in the bulk of lives that are lived in stubborn dis-acknowledgement of the possibilities of God I am unconvinced I see anything better.

Bob Dylan put it well:

You can laugh at salvation,
you can play Olympic games
You think that when you rest at last
you'll go back from where you came?
But you're picked up quite a story
and you've changed since the womb
What happened to the real you,
you've been captured but by whom?

(Bob Dylan, “Property of Jesus”, from the 1980 album Shot of Love)

Link to the entire The Creed and Crossed Fingers? series (Tip: click on the subject you want to read again on the contents page)