Back from the dead

How ironic that, on the rare occassion that the media uses the phrase “back from the dead”, it is to describe a scam.

The missing canoeist John Darwin sought to pull off a not-very elaborate scam, seemingly to enable his wife to claim on his life assurance, and as this week’s story unravels it has turned both tragic and comical.

During this season of Advent we do more than prepare for Christmas and the celebratation Jesus Christ’s birth.  Advent looks forward to his future appearing.  We remember that the one who truly did come back from the dead will one day return.  That will be a day of great reckoning for us.  There is “life assurance” in the here and now for those who put their confidence in his death, and a tragic day of reckoning ahead, for those who spurn his offer of forgiveness and new life.

Maybe John Darwin and his wife will come to put their confidence in that plan for the future?