Chuck Berry died on March 18th of this year, 2017. But just recently, he was “made alive” again by having his very first music video of a song that appears on his forthcoming album, CHUCK. Watch it and read the story here. 
There is something about listening to the music of a recently dead artist. This year it was Leonard Cohen and Sharon Jones. The year before that? Merle Haggard and Mike D of the Beastie Boys. Next year? Who knows? When you put on their music, there is something hauntingly alive about them – something that didn’t even seem quite so alive before they died.
This past week we confessed the 3rd and last part of Luther’s explanation of the 3rd article:
What does this mean? (Part 3)
I believe that . . . on the last day [the Holy Spirit] will raise me and all the dead, and give eternal life to me and all believers in Christ. This is most certainly true.
When the Holy Spirit raises all people, I think there is going to be something that feels natural about it. God’s plan for humanity wasn’t a plan where death has the last word. Hearing Chuck Berry “sing from the grave” or reading a letter from a long lost loved one – there is something that feels right about it. We SHOULD be able to hear their words, sing their tunes, laugh at their jokes. But we can’t. Those things are on pause, stuck inextricably except for the work of the Holy Spirit.
So when the Holy Spirit raises us and all of the dead, I think it’s going to feel like the gear finally caught and we go speeding ahead with life at the speed it was meant to go at. I think it’s going to feel like the needle finally caught the groove of the record. I think it’s going to feel like this should have been the case all along. We should have never had to stop hearing Chuck Berry.
But for those of us in Christ, it is like we have that experience of listening to Chuck even though he’s dead. Even in the midst of a world of death around us, we still hear the music. The empty tomb is a subwoofer that is playing out a bass line that rattles our fragile mortal bones and lets us know that there is something more – and what is more feels right. What feels right is eternity. What feels right is Christ. What feels right is God’s plan.
Have the faith to hear the music streaming from beyond the grave, and wait, just wait . . . because there is more music yet to be played.