Death is a hard thing. Anyone who tells you differently may have never experienced it up close, or they may be either a psychopath. The feeling of loss in your own life is immense. If Jesus, the Son of God, mourns the loss of his friend Lazarus when he hears he has died, it tells me that it is not supposed to be easy when death happens. It does not, however, mean that all hope should be lost.
I watched a movie today that dealt with a small girl who’s mom was deathly ill. The whole movie, this girl makes up a pretend world fighting giants to forget about the fact that her mom is sick. She never spends any time with her mom because she refuses to believe that her mom is actually sick. That death is on the doorstep.
It’s a hard movie as you see this small girl struggling to deal with the fact that her mom, whom she clearly loves, is going to leave this earth when her daughter is so young. How could this happen?
The truth is, as I think toward death as a Christian, it is truly one of the most sobering things. Not for myself, but thinking the finality of it. Once you have died, I believe you face judgment. On that day of judgment, you’re not going to be asked how many good things you did, or if you’ve outdone your bad with good. You’re not going to have to prove something of yourself. There will be one simple test. Do you know Jesus? Did you give Him your entire life? If that answer is no, you may have been a saint in the eyes of the world, but God will say that he never knew you, and say “away from me you evildoers.”
Death for those who do not know Jesus Christ should be terrifying. You don’t go into the dirt and do nothing. You don’t simply cease to exist. You are eternal. Once you are born, you will never cease to exist. This life will determine where you will exist for the rest of your life.
Death is painful, even as Christians it’s painful. But for Christians, it’s not pain of knowing that person is suffering or done with their life, it’s more of a selfish pain of missing them and wanting them back in your life….but in that realizing that they are living the best life that they could possibly be living in a land that you can’t even imagine the wonders.
Death is painful, but I pray to God, that whoever is reading this understands the severity of death if you do not know Jesus.