From the moment of our conception, we are dying. Since the garden of Eden’s fiasco, through the darkness of the womb, birth trauma, reckless youth, through the ages of acquisition and vitality, to the “world is my oyster” golden age, to senioritis, we are on a path to death. While early Old Testament characters lived into the hundreds of years, we read that fourscore and ten may now be achieved. My husband and I have almost done it!
But, we also know the despair of mourning others’ deaths. What can we say to the mother who has a stillborn child, after she has projected her love and dreams for that infant about to be born? Or what can we possibly know how difficult it is until we experience it, when a spouse who has shared many years with boatloads of memories, is suddenly whisked away? What were his last words, we wonder, or even the mundane question, “Where did he leave the car keys this time?” or, “I wonder what I do now about. . . the thousand details lost to procrastination now forever?
The teen who never seems to think about death is victim of a car accident, or worse yet, I was supposed to go on that ride and declined and look what happened is stained by “that could have been me!” Or we attend the euphemistic “Celebration of Life” so we don’t use the word funeral which sounds so final.
Well, we Christians know that death is the portal we traverse to eternal life with Jesus, our ultimate joyful reunion, the sure knowledge that it’s our destination for which we were made when God in His grace chose us as one of His own. Here we know the intimacy of finally being where we belonged in the first place, and where there are no more tears, no more unfinished tasks, and a place where we sing “Holy, Holy, Holy” to our God who guided us through our life’s experience, knowing full-well our mortality, and guiding us to those who would school us by words and examples, of the best possible way to life the mortal life in preparation for the eternal one.
This poem, one of my favorite Psalms, is the testament to a life well lived by a dear close friend who championed and exhibited the Christian life. Her life was not an easy one. In her later years she walked through ravages of cancer as she stood by the side of her husband. Shse dedicated her strength to his battle and attended his final servicer dazed, in a wheelchair, following successive strokes, and joined him soon after on her trip to eternity. I still have their photos on my camera. I still hear her voice. I still long to give her yet one more hug.
Yet, since this is “My Father’s World,” I know we will, in God’s good time, fulfill our promises to see each other in heaven, because of the eternal life and promises of Jesus who showed us the way. We can celebrate life when we know that this earthly part leads heavenward. And so, I trust we will keep the eternal perspective in mind, when we too mourn the death of the saint for whom there is sadness in our loss but joy comes in the morning for those who indeed can, in all truth and certainty, celebrate the new life because of the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.
MY PSALM 306 DEATH OF A SAINT
Abba, Father, God of creation, Lover of our souls,
You have known us eternally
And formed us according to Your purpose
To live in this time and place.
Your Psalm 139 tells us
That even as we were being formed in the womb
You knew the time of our death.
Your infinite plan for us even numbers our hairs.
Why then, does mankind long to do as He pleases
When You have created us for Your purposes?
“So teach us to number our days that we may
Get a heart of wisdom.”[1]
From the moment of Adam’s sin
Man has feared death.
But through Christ’s resurrection
Your saints look forward to our homecoming time
To spend eternity in Your Presence
Where “there will be no more tears.”[2]
Your word is clear. I am precious in Your sight.
“You have kept count of my troubles;
Put my tears in your bottle.[3]
Are they not recorded in your book?
Then my enemies will turn back
In the day when I call.
This I know, that God is for me.
In God, whose word I praise,
In God I trust; I shall not be afraid.”[4]
We know You lead us in the valley
Of the shadow of death,
That You shepherd us through this life
And beyond.[5]
What then, is there to fear?
And Your word reveals:
“Precious in the sight of the Lord
Is the death of His saints.” [6]
We thank You Lord
For Your grace and mercy
For the comfort You provide
As we face our own death
And suffer the loss of others to death.
We believe Your promises
And thank You for the atoning work
Of Your Son, Jesus
In showing us life to come. Amen.
[1] Psalm 90: 12
[2] Revelation 21: 4
[3][3] Psalm 56: 8
[4] Psalm 56: 11
[5] Psalm 23
[6] Psalm 116: 15
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