My class this morning was moved to a classroom containing a real human skeleton. While waiting for all my students to arrive I tried to remember the names of all the bones. I haven’t done that since high school biology class. I need to bone up a bit to get all of them. While lecturing he was looking over my shoulder. I wanted to turn around and say, “Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio; a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy; . .” Hamlet Act 3. And I wanted to add from Act 5, “To be or not to be: that is the question: Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing end them? To die: . . . ’tis a consummation devoutly to be wish’d. To die, to sleep; to sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub; for in that sleep of death what dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, must give us pause.”
If only Hamlet really had known Jesus his fear would been stilled. But then we would be missing one of the world’s greatest soliloquies, which should give all of us pause to reflect on the wonder of the promises we have received from Jesus, the Resurrection and the Life. Surely Satan cringed with contempt when he heard Jesus say in front of a tomb of a man who had been dead four days, “Lazarus, come forth.” It was a hallmark moment in the history of mankind. If you are a friend of Jesus, death is temporary. A fleeting moment of nothingness and then the trump of God blares across the universe. Please refresh yourself by rereading the close of I Corinthians 15.
Written by Roger Bothwell on March 31, 2017
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