[PhilThreeten] I Hate Death
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PhilThreeten
Jan 18, 2006, 11:35:46 AM1/18/06
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I hate death. I could write that statement a thousand times over, post it, and still it would not communicate the depth of my feelings. I hate death.
This evening I visited a godly woman from our church who is slowly moving towards death. She’s been slowly moving for many years now, but all the medical consensus seems to point to simply a few hours left before she passes on. She’s a saint. Not the type that has an angelic presence and pious smile. No, she was an earthy saint - the type that spoke the truth that came to her mind and obdurately clung to Jesus. In her sickness she has blessed as many people with her grace and humility as she has in her health – maybe even more so. As I looked on her broken body tonight, the feeling came back again. I hate death.
My earliest memory of death was my grandmother on my mother’s side. Her husband had passed away some years earlier, but I was really too young to completely grasp that. But when my grandmother passed away, I was 9 or 10 and old enough to attend all the grieving events associated with a North American death. All I remember is uncontrollably and inconsolably weeping all day long. I remember that it took weeks for me to get back to some semblance of normalcy. I wasn’t that close with this grandmother even though she had lived in our house for the last year of her life while cancer took over more and more of her body. And yet, even at that age, I recognized that something had gone horribly wrong. And to this day, I wonder how much comfort I am to families that I visit during times of death. My own broken voice during readings of Scripture or prayers and barely held back tears as I embrace them communicates too easily what I feel inside – that something is still horribly wrong. I envy the composure that the pastors of our church have during these times. I hate death.
My grandfather on my father’s side had a great influence on my life. He passed away quite suddenly. We knew that he had a blood clot at the beginning of the week, he went in to surgery by the end of the week and died on the operating table. It was a sudden, unexpected death of someone that, at the time, I didn’t realize how much I dearly loved. I remember being at the viewing and looking at his body in the casket. I was overwhelmed with the fact that it was a shell. The body was his and yet it was not him. The soul that made him the fun, faithful, follower of Christ had gone on to be in the presence of his God. It was only a shell – as fragile and useless as the cicada shells that are scattered around our yard throughout the summer. I hate death.
Several years ago, a close relative committed suicide. I was the first person to be called by the family member who found him and, thus, the ‘first responder’ to his place of death. I took it upon myself to make sure that no one else in the family came barging in and saw the vileness of what had been done. It is a picture in my mind that will forever be associated with the heinousness of sin. Though he was a believer and so we have hope of being reunited with him again, that picture in my mind will never be reconciled – at least not in this life. I hate death.
I take comfort that God grieves with us. To know that Jesus wept at the tomb of his best friend as He looked at the brokenness before Him, is a great solace. And then, it hit me. This isn’t even mine! This world isn’t mine. These people are not mine. They are God’s. If I can be so moved by something broken that is not my own, how must it affect God? How it must move Him to mend the brokenness! How it must cause Him to do anything – ANYTHING – to bring about the ‘very good’ that He began with, even if it means His own death. And that is the grand irony of the whole universe – the paradoxes of paradoxes - that the very thing that defines the brokenness is the very thing used by God to bring about wholeness.
I hate death. But it is because of death that I have life both in this life and the life to come. It is because of death that I can rest in assurance that my loved ones who are part of the family of God have gone on to be in the presence of their Lord. They, along with me, look forward with great anticipation to the day when they will have new bodies that have no disease and live in a new creation that is free from death – for ever and ever. Amen. Come Lord Jesus!
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Posted by PhilThreeten to PhilThreeten at 1/18/2006 11:34:00 AM
This evening I visited a godly woman from our church who is slowly moving towards death. She’s been slowly moving for many years now, but all the medical consensus seems to point to simply a few hours left before she passes on. She’s a saint. Not the type that has an angelic presence and pious smile. No, she was an earthy saint - the type that spoke the truth that came to her mind and obdurately clung to Jesus. In her sickness she has blessed as many people with her grace and humility as she has in her health – maybe even more so. As I looked on her broken body tonight, the feeling came back again. I hate death.
My earliest memory of death was my grandmother on my mother’s side. Her husband had passed away some years earlier, but I was really too young to completely grasp that. But when my grandmother passed away, I was 9 or 10 and old enough to attend all the grieving events associated with a North American death. All I remember is uncontrollably and inconsolably weeping all day long. I remember that it took weeks for me to get back to some semblance of normalcy. I wasn’t that close with this grandmother even though she had lived in our house for the last year of her life while cancer took over more and more of her body. And yet, even at that age, I recognized that something had gone horribly wrong. And to this day, I wonder how much comfort I am to families that I visit during times of death. My own broken voice during readings of Scripture or prayers and barely held back tears as I embrace them communicates too easily what I feel inside – that something is still horribly wrong. I envy the composure that the pastors of our church have during these times. I hate death.
My grandfather on my father’s side had a great influence on my life. He passed away quite suddenly. We knew that he had a blood clot at the beginning of the week, he went in to surgery by the end of the week and died on the operating table. It was a sudden, unexpected death of someone that, at the time, I didn’t realize how much I dearly loved. I remember being at the viewing and looking at his body in the casket. I was overwhelmed with the fact that it was a shell. The body was his and yet it was not him. The soul that made him the fun, faithful, follower of Christ had gone on to be in the presence of his God. It was only a shell – as fragile and useless as the cicada shells that are scattered around our yard throughout the summer. I hate death.
Several years ago, a close relative committed suicide. I was the first person to be called by the family member who found him and, thus, the ‘first responder’ to his place of death. I took it upon myself to make sure that no one else in the family came barging in and saw the vileness of what had been done. It is a picture in my mind that will forever be associated with the heinousness of sin. Though he was a believer and so we have hope of being reunited with him again, that picture in my mind will never be reconciled – at least not in this life. I hate death.
I take comfort that God grieves with us. To know that Jesus wept at the tomb of his best friend as He looked at the brokenness before Him, is a great solace. And then, it hit me. This isn’t even mine! This world isn’t mine. These people are not mine. They are God’s. If I can be so moved by something broken that is not my own, how must it affect God? How it must move Him to mend the brokenness! How it must cause Him to do anything – ANYTHING – to bring about the ‘very good’ that He began with, even if it means His own death. And that is the grand irony of the whole universe – the paradoxes of paradoxes - that the very thing that defines the brokenness is the very thing used by God to bring about wholeness.
I hate death. But it is because of death that I have life both in this life and the life to come. It is because of death that I can rest in assurance that my loved ones who are part of the family of God have gone on to be in the presence of their Lord. They, along with me, look forward with great anticipation to the day when they will have new bodies that have no disease and live in a new creation that is free from death – for ever and ever. Amen. Come Lord Jesus!
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Posted by PhilThreeten to PhilThreeten at 1/18/2006 11:34:00 AM
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