Death and Dying

Last week, Sophia asked me if it hurt to die. I told her that to the best of my understanding, sometimes it did and sometimes it didn’t. For example, our friend died recently in a head-on collision with a semi-truck. I believe that one moment Kirk was alive and the next moment, he was in glory. His injuries were so catastrophic that I simply cannot imagine that he felt any physical pain.

But we also have two friends who have valiantly fought cancer for years and who just recently shared with us that they are entering into hospice. So unless the Lord chooses to work a medical miracle, they will soon be Home. In the coming days and weeks I will continue to beg God for sufficient palliative care for both of these dear souls! For I have been close to a friend who was slowly and painfully dying from cancer and even just the memory of her suffering (which she bore up under without complaint and with her heart fixed firmly on the joy set before her) makes me slightly nauseous even decades after the fact. And so I pray for pain management for the physical pain for my two friends.

Yet. Of course. The deepest pain is not the physical (as horrific as it might be at times), but the PIERCING ACHE of knowing that their husbands and children and grandchildren will miss them every single day once they are gone.

Oh oh oh. Death is an enemy! And Christ has triumphed over death—but it is still a dark and foreboding foe, even for the Believer.

This morning as I was thinking of them and praying for them and trying to process it all, my mind immediately went to two pieces of literature. The first, my favorite John Donne Sonnet (best to be read out loud!):

“Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou are not so;
For those whom thou think’st thou dost overthrow
Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.

From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,
Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee do go,
Rest of their bones, and soul’s delivery.

Thou’art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,
And poppy’or charms can make us sleep as well
 And better than thy stroke; why swell’st thou then?

One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.”

The second, the end of Pilgrim’s Progress. (In our discussions, I actually used this example with Sophia because we had read the Children’s Version and many of the illustrations have been extremely helpful in daily life.)

“So I saw that when they awoke, they addressed themselves to go up to the city. But, as I said, the reflection of the sun upon the city (for the city was pure gold, Rev. 21:18,) was so extremely glorious, that they could not as yet with open face behold it, but through an instrument made for that purpose …

So I saw in my dream, that they went on together till they came in sight of the gate. Now I further saw, that betwixt them and the gate was a river; but there was no bridge to go over, and the river was very deep. At the sight, therefore, of this river the pilgrims were much stunned; but the men that went with them said, You must go through, or you cannot come at the gate …

The pilgrims then, especially Christian, began to despond in their mind, and looked this way and that, but no way could be found by them by which they might escape the river. Then they asked the men if the waters were all of a depth. They said, No; yet they could not help them in that case; for, said they, you shall find it deeper or shallower as you believe in the King of the place.

Then they addressed themselves to the water, and entering, Christian began to sink, and crying out to his good friend Hopeful, he said, I sink in deep waters; the billows go over my head; all his waves go over me. Selah.

Then said the other, Be of good cheer, my brother: I feel the bottom, and it is good. Then said Christian, Ah! my friend, the sorrows of death have compassed me about, I shall not see the land that flows with milk and honey. And with that a great darkness and horror fell upon Christian, so that he could not see before him …

Hopeful therefore here had much ado to keep his brother’s head above water; yea, sometimes he would be quite gone down … Then said Hopeful, Be of good cheer, Jesus Christ maketh thee whole. And with that Christian brake out with a loud voice, Oh, I see him again; and he tells me, ‘When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee.’ Isa. 43:2. Then they both took courage, and the enemy was after that as still as a stone, until they were gone over. Christian, therefore, presently found ground to stand upon, and so it followed that the rest of the river was but shallow. Thus they got over.”

Deep waters. Frightening waters. But Jesus makes us whole! And we do get over to the Celestial City. To our Home.

Praise God and Praise God.

Your (sad but hopeful) sister in Christ,
Tara B.