It’s interesting how sorrow and joy so easily intermingle.

People everywhere just celebrated Easter—the epitome of sorrow leading to the epitome of joy. The tragedy of the cross and the glory of the resurrection. The title of a song by Sixpence None the Richer—“Beautiful Scandalous Night”—paints the picture well.

Recent events bring that theme to mind again and again.

Four Mounties are ambushed and killed in northern Alberta. A nation mourns, but the faith story of the youngest officer, Peter Schiemann, has become a shining beacon to thousands of people, testifying to Jesus’ saving power and awesome love.

A tragic car accident in Manitoba takes the lives of three vibrant Christian young people: a sister and brother and his fiancée. Hundreds mourn, yet those who attended their funerals were witness to a spirit of joy, a time of celebrating lives lived for Jesus.

In B.C. families, friends, and colleagues mourn the sudden passing of Stanley J. Grenz, a preeminent theologian, a prolific writer, an inspiring teacher and a friend to many. His death came as a shock, but the legacy he leaves behind is one richly seasoned with the things of God.

Lutheran Church Canada president Ralph Mayan, speaking to mourners at Schiemann’s funeral, reminded them—and us—that we have “a good and gracious God who is more powerful than the evil that is in us and around us.

“Yes, what happened to Peter and the other [Mounties] was horrific,” Mayan said. “Sin will run rampant, but horror and evil, sin and death did not win the day.”

The apostle Paul said something like that too, in his letter to the Corinthian church. “…the saying that is written will come true: ‘Death has been swallowed up in victory.’ ‘Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death is your sting?’…But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 15: 54-55, 57).

The tragedies are scandalous. The legacies are beautiful. Evil and death have not won the day.