The power of death

A British crematorium wants to install turbines in two of its burners which would use the heat generated during cremation to provide enough electricity to power 1500 televisions. A third burner is to be used to heat the site's chapel and offices.

Some have already fitted systems which use the heat from the burners to heat their buildings, nearby offices and, in one instance, a swimming pool.

Alan Jose, a crematorium's superintendent and registrar, said: "We will have far more electricity than we can possibly need, so we would be feeding a reasonable amount into the grid. If there is genuine spare capacity to generate electricity, then we are certainly interested in investigating that.

What is striking about this story is that we don’t normally associate death or dead people with power or energy or usefulness. Dead normally means... dead.

That is, unless you are a Christian. For Christians know that the death of Jesus is incredibly powerful, eternally energetic and wonderfully useful.

The death of Jesus has the power to:

• Justify sinners like you and me (Romans 3:25a)
• Demonstrate God’s justice (Romans 3:25b)
• Demonstrates God’s love for us (Romans 5:8)
• Motivate (2 Corinthians 5:14-15)
• Rescue (Galatians 1:3-4)
• Ransom (Mark 10:45)
• Forgive (Ephesians 1:7)
• Unify believers (Ephesians 2:13-15)
• Make peace (Colossians 1:20)
• Reconcile you to God (Colossians 1:24a)
• Present you holy and blameless before God (Colossians 1:24b)
• Destroy the Devil (Hebrews 2:14)
• Free us from the fear of death (Hebrews 2:15)
• Cleanse our conscience (Hebrews 9:14)
• Take away the sins of many (Hebrews 9:27)
• Give us confidence to approach God (Hebrews 10:19)
• Heal (1Peter 2:24)
• Purify us of all our sins (1 John 1:7)
• Turn away God’s anger (1 John 2:1-2)

That’s an impressive list. And there are more.

The death of Jesus is incredibly powerful, eternally energetic and wonderfully useful.

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