End of the Walking Dead

Of all the topics I thought I'd never use from the pulpit (especially on Easter Sunday) zombie would likely top the list... but alas God had other plans.

  A man named Brown was hanged in Philadelphia some time ago. Ten minutes after he was legally dead he was resting on a table in the physiological laboratory. Around the table were three of the most famous physiologists of the scientific world. Could motion and life be restored to that inanimate body? Science waited anxiously for an answer to the question.

 A sharp wire, charged with electricity, was applied to the various nerve centers of the body and brain. A superstitious layman would have been horrified at the result. Brown raised first his right hand and then his left. His head moved. His mouth twitched in a convulsive grin. The cords of his neck swelled and the mouth opened as if he would complete his unfinished sentence on the scaffold. The hands drew up and then extended. Unceasingly the electric wire prodded center after center in the nervous organism. At a fresh touch from the plying needle the body sat upright. There seemed to be breath, for the respiratory organs were agitated. Would he walk? Would he talk?

Science was anxious; another stroke and it had found the secret of life. But placed on the floor, the body fell over limp—dead. Science had demonstrated wonders, but had failed to raise the dead.  As I thought about this idea, initially Frankenstein came to mind, then with all the hype surrounding the finale of The Walking Dead I thought of how our lives before Christ was much like that of a zombie.  Yes, you heard me right, here it is Easter morning and I’m talking about zombies from the pulpit.  But much like Mr. Brown or the zombies in The Waling Dead, every person born into life is dead.  Yes, I know that sounds absurd; but turn with me to Eph. 2:1-10 where we find the End of the Walking Dead.

And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience.  Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. 

But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 

For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.  For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them. 

For the full message shared on 03-31-13 at First Church of God, Racine, WI; go to:
End of the Walking Dead