I don’t remember how old I was the first time that I saw a graveyard on church property, but I remember being struck by the proximity of graves being side-by-side with a church building. There is certainly nothing wrong with it, but it was different than what I had known growing up.
As I’ve gotten older, those graveyards have certainly become more familiar, especially when traveling in certain places. But my mind has sometimes wandered from outside the church building to inside the building and wondered, “Is it possible that some churches might be like a graveyard inside the building and not just outside?”
That’s not designed to be critical. Sharing that thought is intended to stir us up. Jesus told the Christians in Sardis, “…You have a name that you are alive, but you are dead” (Rev. 3:1). Could that be any one of us? God’s children are “dead indeed to sin,” so that we can be “alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 6:11). The question is: Do we live like we are ALIVE TO GOD? Not just in the building! But every day outside of it?
