Eternal life...for Vampires

John 6:35-40

Human beings have always been scared of death.

It’s the great unknown, and it leads to some of the most important questions, philosophical and practical, we ask ourselves and each other.

That’s why all cultures through the centuries have developed mythical characters

who have the gift of eternal life, who are able to cheat death,

and keep going on going on for ever.

Think of Vampires.

Death-cheaters “par excellence”,

they die to the world only to come back overnight to eternal life…

or least until someone stakes them, shoot a silver bullet in their heart,

or decapitates them…it depends on whom you ask.

The interesting thing about Vampires is that

as they receive the amazing gift of life eternal,

they find themselves paying a very steep price for it:

the price of alienation.

Vampires, who cheat death, lose life as we know it in the process.

We are communal beings, defined by our relationships

(sons, daughters, siblings, spouses, friends…)

Vampires are alienated from the community of the living

because the living

[to paraphrase the sharks in Finding Nemo]

have become food, not friends.

Also, human beings are creatures of the daylight:

the sun is good for us, for our crops,

for our interactions, for our emotional well-being.

And the sun destroys Vampires.

Finally, they are alienated from their own self.

Vampires are unable to see their own reflection.

In spite of the fact that once they are “reborn” they never grow old,

they never change,

they progressively forget what they look like,

symbolically losing their identity, their self.

Living forever is not without problems, is it?

Eternal life comes with a price tag.

But this is not the kind of “eternal life” Jesus is talking about.

When Christ tells us that

all who see the Son and believe in him may have eternal life,

he is not talking about quantity of life, but quality of life.

Jesus is not talking about the life we know,

our current, often broken, definitely temporary life extended to infinity,

but of a life renewed, transformed, free

that begins in the present, continues beyond death,

and will take the form of the resurrected life on what we call the last day.

We don’t need to die

to receive the kind of “eternal life” 

that Jesus is talking about.

We need to embrace Christ and everything he stands for

to receive the gift of rebirth that God promises.

This new life begins here and now,

when we meet the risen Lord and accept his gift of Grace and Forgiveness.

It is not a perfect life, it is not a life outside of this world,

outside of our community, and it is not a life without evil and pain.

But it is a life filled with Hope.

Whoever comes to me will never be hungry;

whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.

Jesus presents us with a life of plenty, a life of joy even in the darkness,

the ability to hope even when the going get rough,

because no matter what happens we have seen the Lord

and we know that he is risen and present to us at all times.

He has not simply cheated but destroyed death [as our collect says]

Sin, evil, desperation have no more power over us

and the moment we embrace this and believe in him,

we begin a new life, an imperishable life, in Christ.

We are not Vampires, 

we are brothers and sisters o

f Jesus Christ: 

the Son of God, the source of our hope,

the giver of the true eternal life.

Amen