God Against Death
We just got done with Halloween, so it’s time for all those spooky yard decorations to come down, all the giant inflatable spiders, animatronic zombies, and all the varieties of scary skeletons. There is something special about skeletons. They’ve got a fun spooky song for kids about them. They are fairly familiar to us, we’re all just skeletons with added organs and flesh. Perhaps most importantly, a skeleton, or skeletal figure with a black cloak and a scythe has become our symbol of death.
The Grim Reaper is a great way to personify death. The scythe was a tool for harvesting grain. Similarly, when it is our time to go, death harvests us and takes us away from our mortal life. The dark robe gives the Reaper a sense of sanctity, whether it be genuine or a mockery. It is the reverse of a baptismal robe, a fresh white garment that symbolizes new life. The Reaper’s robe reminds us that we are mortal and that even new life has to face up against death. Even the skeletal nature of the Reaper is fitting. Without facial muscles, the Reaper has no expression. It is neither angry nor sad nor happy nor anything else human. It is cold, somber, and emotionless. Death is objective. There is no pleading or negotiating that will save the Reaper’s quarry. Death comes to all of us in our time, and we cannot escape it. Cold, unfeeling, death.
The ancient Canaanites had a different depiction of death. Their death god, Mot, was poetically described as having an enormous mouth. A massive gaping maw with one lip dragging along the earth and the other in the sky. An endlessly insatiable devouring giant that is unstoppable and inescapable, slowly moving over the earth, taking life as it goes. You can’t climb over it. You can’t dig down enough to escape it. There is no doomsday preparation that will save you.
As much as it would be spooky to open your eyes from a hospital bed to see a skeleton in a black robe standing at your feet, I think Mot might be scarier. Imagine being on your deathbed, opening our weary eyes to look out your bedroom window, and seeing a horrific mouth stretching miles into the sky. Only you can see it, as it moves through fields and forests with a constant speed, coming directly for you. This is a fear beyond comprehension, too great and terrible to imagine.
But as we still linger in the shadow of COVID 19, now with nearly 750,000 deaths in the United States, the otherworldly scope of Mot may be more fitting than the looming presence of the Reaper. As we continue to see our country torn to pieces by fierce political divisions and brought to a standstill by partisan gridlock in Congress and as world leaders meet to once again attempt to make serious promises with regard to curbing what could be an imposing climate disaster, we need something bigger than the Reaper to personify our fear of death. And now, to bring it all to a head, winter is coming to the northern hemisphere. Now is the time when nature dies. Growth stops. The nights grow long. Death is a shroud that is cast over our world.
Isaiah responds with hope.
In Isaiah 25:6-9, the prophet speaks of a great feast that the LORD will prepare at the mountain of God. This will be a feast unlike any other. Not only will there be terrific food and drink, but God will also do something new. God will destroy that shroud that covers the world. The LORD will swallow up death forever.
The image of God swallowing death is interesting. It seems ridiculous to think that Isaiah was not at all familiar with the Canaanite description of Mot as a giant mouth swallowing all the world. Isaiah responds here with God being an even bigger mouth that swallows the all-devouring maw of Mot. While it is certainly true that this portrayal is a way of seeing God as being great on an exponential scale (as much as we fear death, death fears God), I can’t help but notice that death is eaten at a feast. That must mean something.
This is a feast in which the devourer becomes the devoured. The hunter becomes the hunted. Death dies. There is a reversal of what was before. That which oppressed the people now serves. That which ate the world now has become food. I’m not sure I can make sense of this with COVID. I don’t think this pandemic will actually repay the world for those lives it took, but that doesn’t mean that the lessons we’ve learned from it can’t serve God. COVID was allowed to be as bad as it was partially because of misinformation, distrust, and a lack of empathy. Our country and our world in general could benefit from improved medical infrastructure and a better relationship between people and healthcare leaders. We need to make changes in this country with regard to education, religion, healthcare, and everything in between.
God saves us from our sins and the power of death. Looking at God’s Kingdom through faith, we can see that even death is not too powerful for God. The deaths we experience in our world can teach us something. Loss gives us a chance to reevaluate what is truly important to us. Absence helps us to remember why we loved in the first place. Our social challenges can be the same. We can learn from COVID by identifying the underlying problems and seeking to change them. We can learn from political divisions in the same way. Even winter, when the jaws of death snatch the green of spring and summer from our sight, can teach us to look back and remember the new life we saw at the beginning of the year. As the cold kills in the dying of the year, we can look forward with hope, knowing that God is always bringing new life on the other side of the terrifying mouth of death.
