LET US KEEP VIGIL NEAR HIS TOMB TONIGHT
(A biblical refection on HOLY SATURDAY, April 7, 2012)
One of the various readings at the Easter Vigil: Romans 6:3-11
The Scripture Text
Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? We were buried therefore with Him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
For if we have been united with Him in a death like His, we shall certainly be united with Him in a resurrection like His. We know that our old self was crucified with Him so that the sinful body might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin. For he who has died is freed from sin. But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him. For we know that Christ being raised from the dead will never die again; death no longer has dominion over Him. The death He died He died to sin, once for all, but the life He lives He lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. (Rom 6:3-11)
This is a night of vigil, a night of watching, or reflection and oa anticipation. Jesus haad died and has been laid in the tomb. His body has been broken, His blood has been sprinkled, and all our sins have been atoned for. It is also a night of rejoicing and of deeper commitment to Jesus. Why? Because we have died too. “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?” (Rom 6:3). Not only were our sins washed away, but their very principle and source – our olf self, our old fallen nature – was taken in Christ to the cross and was buried. In His tomb in the womb of the earth, we were transformed and born again into a new life, a life available to us by grace and through faith.
Baptism has worked this change in us. Plunged into its waters and lifted out again, we were immersed into Jesus’ death and raised to a new life of freedom from sin. Whether we were baptized as infants or are being baptized tonight as adults, we must realize that it is not enough to confess this doctrine with our lips. God invites us to believe in our hearts the faith which we confess with our lips (Rom 10:9) and express by receiving the sacraments. We truly are a new creation and we are called to be a witness of the resurrection every day by our thoughts, words and actions.
As we await Jesus’ return in glory, God wants to bring us into deeper and deeper conformity to His death so that we can experience more and more of the resurrection life He has already won for us. This conformity has everything to do with sloughing off our self-directed lives and choosing to obey His word and His ways.
As we keep vigil near the tomb tonight, can our hearts joyfully echo Paul’s assurance that “if we have died with Christ, we believe that we also live with Him” (Rom 6:8)? Can we tell Jesus that we want to be conformed to His death so that we can rise with Him – not only at the end of time but every day, as His death at work in us brings us His resurrection as well?
Short Prayer: Lord Jesus, source of my new and everlasting life, help me to die to sin today and every day. May I rise in You to a new life of love and service to God. Amen.