Graveyards and Shopping Malls

Once a month, on a Friday, the youth pastors on our district that live in the city gather for lunch.  We try to meet at a central location for some good eats.  This month we met at Five Guys Burger and Fries just east of the West County Mall.  If you haven’t had Five Guys, I would recommend it.  I had never been to this particular Five Guys so I looked it up on Google maps. 

After I had located the restaurant, I began to look the map over.  I’m a big fan of maps.  I always have loved maps.  I’ve found them very useful as I have navigated myself all over the country.  One of the things I noticed was a small graveyard tucked away in a little corner surrounded by the West County Mall on one side and some strip malls on the other.  How ironic?  A place that houses the dead surrounded by establishments dedicated solely to things we can only use while we are alive. 

I imagine that most of the people shopping inside the mall, or eating at Five Guys or the Elephant Bar, have never noticed this graveyard.  I never would have.  The reality is, while this life is extremely important, we spend an inordinate amount of time scratching and clawing for things that will simply not matter.  We work really hard so that we can buy cool things.  All the while we forget the fact that we’re gonna die.    

This reality of death should move us to do more than work hard to enjoy life now.  It should, if we are truly followers of Christ, move us toward alleviating the kinds of death we are confronted with on a daily basis.  Jesus knew that death was coming for him.  But he also knew that it ultimately had no power over him.  Jesus used the time he had on our world to work for life, offering redemption, sight, forgiveness, the ability to walk, freedom and love.  We know that death is coming for us.  But we know that if we have been made alive in Christ, death will ultimately not hold us.  As Jesus used his time on this earth to chase away death, so should we.

Death is coming.  How will you spend your life, at the mall or spreading the light and life of Christ?