I Hate Death!

The older I get, the more I experience death. Most are people who die are like me, older, though the death of someone younger does surprise us from time to time.

As you have heard, our best friend and long term colleague, Kevin Popely, died suddenly of a heart attack a few weeks ago. Kevin was 63. You may not have heard that Leeba Curlin’s mother died about three weeks ago. She was 96.

It never gets easy to hear of another good friend or colleague who has died. The more I experience it, the more I hate it.

These, and others, remind me that grandma and I will die. Unless, Jesus returns again. As you think about us on that day, we would be pleased for you to think about the following thoughts.

Death reminds me of the poison of Satan which has been spilt out upon all of us. He is the originator of death. The promise of death comes from God who has designed us not to die. But, the promise was clear to Adam and Eve. In the day in which you eat of the tree of good and evil, you will die. Satan, the tempter who had already died to the designs of God for Him, obedient relationship to God, and condemned to a hellish separation from God, was the propagator of death. He knew the consequences of Adam and Eve’s disobedience.

Death reminds me of our incomplete world. God did not create us for the world we now live in. We chose it. With that choice comes the consequence: death. We die and return to dust because nothing in our present body is fit to inherit the righteousness that God designed in the beginning.

Death reminds me of the separation that comes to those of us left behind, for now! Even when we know that those who die belong to Jesus, and upon their death have gone into His presence, we still experience the pain of relational separation. The pain is even more acute when we know that they have not responded to God’s offer of reconciliation in Jesus. We will not see them again

Despite the repulsiveness of death it reminds me that this world is not my home. Every time another friend dies, I am reinforced in the promise that to be absent from this body is to be present with the Lord! I inherit in Jesus, the world that God intended in the beginning!!!