We Westerners avoid death.
When was the last time you walked through a cemetery? When was the last funeral you went to? Our churches no longer have cemeteries; those who are older head to retirement communities and then head to long-term care or assisted care facilities. The number of funerals held in churches has diminished. Death has become professionalized, antisepticised, and remote.
I give thanks to God for modern medicine and for medical workers, but we ought to pause before we place death in a vacuum-sealed container only accessible to the professionals of death and dying.
Biblical wisdom urges us to consider death and walk with those who do. We ought to go to more funerals.
In the book of Ecclesiastes our squeamishness of death is questioned:
A good name is better than precious ointment,
and the day of death than the day of birth.
2 It is better to go to the house of mourning
than to go to the house of feasting,
for this is the end of all mankind,
and the living will lay it to heart.
3 Sorrow is better than laughter,
for by sadness of face the heart is made glad.
4 The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning,
but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth. (Eccl. 7:1-4)
If we want to live an intentional life, we should consider death and walk with those who are in their last days. If we want wisdom, we ought to step into the house of mourning. Paul exhorts us to, “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep” (Rms. 12:15).
The presence of those who are facing death enriches our lives. Our perspective shifts, our wisdom deepens. My wife has daily notifications pop up in her phone. The first of those is: “Remember, you are going to die.” Some might consider that initial daily reflection to be morbid. But I think Moses would consider it wise. In his only Psalm, Moses prays to God, “So teach us to number our days that we might get a heart of wisdom” (Ps. 90:12).
When I was a young pastor, I received a call from a congregant. Her husband was in hospice and dying. Would I come and pray with him? I had never met him before, but I was happy to do so. I stood at his bedside, singing hymns and then reading scripture over him. I opened my Bible up to David’s most famous Psalm,
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
2 He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside still waters.
3 He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness
for his name's sake.
4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.
5 You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies;
you anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
6 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
all the days of my life,
and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord
forever. (Ps. 23)
He breathed his last breath and went still. His wife came up to the other side of his bed and held his other hand. We prayed.
What a gift to be able to be with this man in his final moments. As a late twenty-something, I reflected: what would my final moments look like? Who would stand next to me? There have been a lot of parties over my forty-five years I have forgotten. I will never forget that moment. “The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning.” Truly—and so, may we place ourselves at the intersection of death that we may truly live.
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Photo by Michael Starkie on Unsplash