An Outlet and an Inlet
It is incredibly sobering to realize how much can change in a week. I am thinking particularly of the passing of two mothers of the faith from our community since last Friday. Antoinette Bom and Sharon Denk both went to their eternal homes, passing from the arms of their earthly loved ones, into the arms of their Savior.
It is good to pause and reflect on death for a moment. I say this mindful that we are in the season of Lent when we remember the death of our Savior. Death is real. Death is a robber. Death is a reminder that sin has entered our world and that we need rescue. Sharing the grief with these families this week over the earthly loss of their loved ones is real; is raw. Even for Christians, with full confidence that their loved ones are in heaven and that they will one day be reunited in glory, the pain of earthly tearing feels wrong, feels final.
But while we grieve, we do not grieve as those that have no hope. (I Thess. 4:13). For we know that the death of Christ has served to conquer the finality of this earthly death. We still face death, but death has lost its sting. There is a parting but it is not final. There is an end but it is not the end. In fact, death for the believer is not a wall, but rather a door into a new reality, a new way of being in this universe that God has created. In this sense death is a release, a victory even, over the infirmities of this life and all of their attendant sorrows. Death puts an end to our daily battle with temptation and sets the believer free into an eternity with no sin. At Antoinette's committal service we read from Thomas Brooks, an English Puritan, who puts it this way: The assured soul knows that death shall be the funeral of all (her) sins and sorrows, of all afflictions and temptations, of all desertions and oppositions. (She) knows that death shall be the resurrection of (her) joys; (she) knows that death is both an outlet and an inlet; an outlet to sin, and an inlet to the soul’s clear, full, and constant enjoyment of God; and this makes the assured soul to sing it sweetly out, ‘O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?’ (1 Cor. 15:55–57) ‘I desire to be dissolved.’ (Phil. 1:23) ‘Make haste, my beloved.’ (Cant. 8:14) ‘Come, Lord Jesus, come quickly.’ (Rev. 22:20)”
Amen! Come quickly Lord Jesus! As we wait, may we become ever more mindful about the people and tasks that fill our lives by pausing for moment to remember that earthly death is a reality for us all.
Photo by Blake Sherman on Unsplash