It Can Take Time to Connect the Dots

Did you ever play “connect the dots” as a child? Maybe you had an activities book with pages for coloring, word-finds, tic-tac-toe and other games. You’d turn to a page with an incomplete illustration; to determine what the object was, you’d draw lines to link the numbered dots. It might turn out to be a duck, a donkey, the Eiffel Tower, or an ice cream cone. You didn’t know what it was until you’d connected all the dots.

 

Life can be like that. As we’re going through it, it might seem like a random assortment of twists and turns, exits and on-ramps, with some unknown destination. It seems confusing as we plod through life’s circumstances one day at a time, but through the beauty of hindsight we can glance backward and find order in the chaos.

 

Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple Computers, once observed about the course life takes, "You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backward. So, you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future." 

 

Have you ever felt that way? I know I have. A description for much of my life, particularly my working career, could be, “You can’t get there from here. You have to go someplace else first.” I was born in Germany, where my father was stationed in the U.S. Army. We traveled to the United States by ship and eventually settled in New Jersey. After high school I attended college in Texas, then transferred to a university in Ohio to study journalism. 

 

My 10-year career as a newspaper editor took me from a community newspaper in Ohio to a suburban newspaper in Pennsylvania, back to the Ohio newspaper, and finally to Texas. Next, I moved my family to Chattanooga, where I joined the staff of a Christian ministry, and 17 years later, a sister ministry with an international focus. After three years I became part of the team for a non-profit based in Atlanta. Can you see the convoluted path my career has taken?

 

All I can say in summary is that God has done “immeasurably more than all [I could] ask or imagine…” (Ephesians 3:20). During this journey of more than 50 years, some of the changes I made didn’t make a lot of sense. However, as Jobs said, even though I couldn’t connect the dots looking forward, I now can connect them looking backward.

 

As Christians all around the world prepare for the annual observances of Good Friday and Easter, we might apply the same “connecting the dots” principle to what we now know about Jesus Christ. The Bible’s Old Testament contains numerous prophecies about the birth, life, death and resurrection of Christ, all made hundreds, even thousands of years before God took on flesh and invaded this world. Here’s a handful of examples:

 

From the prophet Micah we read, “But as for you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you One will go forth from Me to be ruler in Israel. His goings forth are from long ago, from the days of eternity” (Micah 5:2). Jesus, of course, was born in Bethlehem.

 

The prophet Isaiah prophesied, “Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call Him Immanuel” (Isaiah 7:14). In Matthew 1:18-23 and Luke 1:26-35 we read about a virgin, Mary, who was pledged to marry Joseph. The angel Gabriel tells her that God has chosen her to be mother to the Son of God, and the passage states, “…they will call Him ‘Immanuel’ – which means, ‘God with us’” (Matthew 1:23).

 

Isaiah 9:1-7 is one of the longest prophecies in the Old Testament, describing Jesus’ ministry centered in Galilee. “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned…. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on His shoulders. And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. There will be no end to His government or of peace, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will accomplish this.”

 

Jesus’ crucifixion was prophesied in Psalm 22:14-16, “I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart has turned to wax; it has melted away within me…. Dogs have surrounded me, a band of evildoers has encircled me; they have pierced my hands and my feet…. They divide my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots.” Zechariah 12:10 says, “…They look on me, the one they have pierced….”

 

The crucifixion accounts are included in each of the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. What’s especially interesting about the Old Testament crucifixion prophecies is they were made hundreds of years before the Romans invented that heinous, excruciating form of execution.

 

And Christ’s resurrection from the dead – also reported in each of the gospels – was prophesied in Psalm 16:9-10, “Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices…because You will not abandon me to the grave, nor will You let Your Holy One see decay.”

I wonder, as these prophecies were being made, if the prophets had any idea of how they would be fulfilled by Jesus in such spectacular fashion. Those men of old might have struggled to “connect the dots,” but we can today as we look backward with 20:20 vision through the pages of history. 

Raising the Dead, Physically and Spiritually

We’ve recently celebrated the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the singular most important event in all of Christianity – and if we believe the Bible, the most important event in the history of all mankind. Jesus being raised from the dead stands alone in eternal magnitude and significance, beyond comparison. However, it’s not the only example in the Scriptures of people coming back from death. 

For instance, in the Old Testament we read compelling stories about two prophets, Elijah (1 Kings 17:17-24) and his protégé, Elisha (2 Kings 4:6-37). In different circumstances, both prayed and pleaded with the Lord to bring back to life sons of two women who had extended kindnesses to them. And their prayers were answered.

Many of us are familiar with the New Testament story of Lazarus (John 11:1-44), a friend of Jesus and brother of Mary and Martha, who lived in the village of Bethany, a small town in Judea not far from Jerusalem. When Jesus learned Lazarus was very ill and his sisters had sent for Him to come and heal him, He informed His disciples, “This sickness will not end in death.” 

 

After waiting two more days, Jesus said, “Let us go back to Judea.” He gathered up His disciples and announced, “‘Lazarus is dead, and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him’….” 

 

When they heard Jesus was approaching, Lazarus’s sisters Martha and Mary went to Him separately and said, “Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died.” Martha added, revealing her faith, “But I know that even now God will give You whatever You ask….” By that time, Lazarus had been in his tomb for four days. Nevertheless, Jesus replied, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11:25-26).

 

He proceeded to the tomb, ordered the stone to be removed, prayed to the Father, and then “called out in a loud voice, ‘Lazarus, come out!’ The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them, ‘Take off the grave clothes and let him go’” (John 11:43-44). Understandably, this caught the attention of many people – including the religious opposition.

 

Other examples of Jesus raising the dead included: the daughter of Jairus, a synagogue ruler (Mark 5:22-43); the servant of a God-fearing Roman centurion, recounted in Luke 7:1-10; and the son of a widow in a town called Nain (Luke 7:11-17). Even though each of these accounts is stirring, the greater narrative in the Scriptures is not God’s power to resurrect people from physical death, but His desire to raise up those who are dead spiritually.

 

The Old Testament provides the intriguing example of the prophet Ezekiel, who received a vision by God of a valley filled with dry bones (Ezekiel 37:1-14). The Lord asked him, “Son of man, can these bones live?” to which Ezekiel responded, “O Sovereign Lord, You alone know.” Then as instructed, the prophet spoke to the bones, which came together, along with tendons, flesh and skin, and finally became alive: “…I prophesied as He commanded me, and breath entered them; they came to life and stood up on their feet – a vast army.” 

 

The boneyard that came to life, God said, represented backslidden and rebellious Israel. Ezekiel had been given the challenging commission to call the Israelites to repentance – along with proclaiming God’s promise to Israel that He would “put My Spirit in you and you will live….” 

 

We find a powerful description of the spiritually dead in Ephesians 2:14, where the apostle Paul writes to believers in the city of Ephesus, “As for you, you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world…gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts… But because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive in Christ…it is by grace you have been saved.”

 

Even though these words were penned nearly 2,000 years ago, they have a familiar ring for today.

 

During His earthly ministry, Jesus uttered many profound teachings and performed countless miracles, but most important was the message of repentance, forgiveness, redemption, and the assurance of eternal life. At the conclusion of what is commonly known as the parable of the prodigal son, the Lord described the joy of a father whose estranged son had returned home. Speaking to his other son, the father declares, “But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found” (Luke 15:32).

 

All around us we see people who look perfectly fine physically but spiritually belong in a morgue. Kind of reminiscent of the little boy in the movie, “The Sixth Sense,” who hauntingly stated, “I see dead people.” Our Lord’s primary concern is not how we appear outwardly, but the condition of our hearts. 

 

As Jesus told religious leaders who had confronted Him after He had healed an invalid on the Sabbath, “I tell you the truth, whoever hears My word and believe Him who sent Me has eternal life and will not be condemned; He has crossed over from death to life. I tell you the truth, a time is coming and has now come when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear will live” (John 5:24-25).

 

Regardless of the quality of our earthly life, Jesus’ desire for us is to experience every day the assurance of having eternal life, as well as the peace and joy that come with that, regardless of our temporal circumstances.