Zombies and the Art of Negotiation

Halloween is nigh, and American culture turns to the macabre with its multiple fictional creatures including the zombie.  Watch B movies with a "living dead" plot, and you notice a recurring theme: be gone or be lunch.  There is no reasoning with zombies because they no longer have the capacity.  Driven entirely by instinct, they are dead and walk around with a single, voracious, insatiable purpose—self-satisfaction.  So as I was pondering the advertisements being displayed during this time of year, it struck me like an old Norm Crosby line:  I resemble that remark!

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.  (Eph 2:1-3)

That's right: people come into this world as zombies—spiritual zombies.  We are dead and do not realize it.  (Bruce Willis was not the only one who had to figure this out.)  Everything we do in this world is for our own appetites being guided by depraved thoughts.  For the majority, the only difference between real people and movie zombies is that the former dress better, but inside both are dead men's bones.

Jesus told one particular story about a father with two sons that described how dead men acted.  The younger son demanded his share of the estate and squandered it all on reckless living and ended up slopping hogs and going hungry (Luke 15:11-16).  Why did the son act so foolishly?  Because he was dead: the father said as much (Luke 15:32).  This sad state of affairs finally brought the younger son to his senses, and he said to himself:

But when he came to himself, he said, "How many of my father’s hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger!  I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you.'"  (Luke 15:17-18)

The son is absolutely correct in everything he stated.  He recognized the sin and against whom it had been perpetrated, then made a definite plan to make a confession.  But then he tried to concoct a plan:

I am no longer worthy to be called your son.  Treat me as one of your hired servants.  (Luke 15:19)

The son sounds very humble and pious, but what is really happening?  He is trying to concoct a bargain.  He wants to negotiate a deal.  The problem is that he is dead.  There is nothing to bargain with.  This is exactly how the walking dead negotiate with the living, but the very attempt is ludicrous.  For instance, how could someone present his righteous thoughts and deeds before the living God, when they are in actuality polluted items being presented by the unclean (Is 64:6)?  Zombies are terrible negotiators, but they try anyway.  They just don't know any better.

You may not realize that there is another zombie that is less prominent in the story Jesus told.  He is called the older brother.  He does not appear to be as bad off as the younger, but he is.  The only difference is that his self-satisfaction was derived from the long-term prospect of a future inheritance rather than short-term wonton living.  But he was still dead as evident by the reaction to his father and the brother he refuses to acknowledge.

Is there a cure for the zombie condition?  Yes, it is life.  The younger son had planned to proffer a deal.  After he confessed his son, the father refuses to allow him the chance to deal.  Instead, he bestows extravagant grace on his son.  The one who was dead is now declared alive and welcomed into the family (Luke 15:32).  No amount of bargaining can gain this.  It must be freely given by the One who alone has the authority to give it.

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.  For by grace you have been saved through faith.  And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.  (Eph 2:4-10)

Life was made available by virtue of Christ, the only living one, coming into this world and dying on the cross for those who were dead in sin in order to make them alive.  Believe it.