THINKING ABOUT DYING?
Do you ever think about dying ?? You may say what a macabre question. When you are young, dying does not normally come into your thinking, and if it does you quickly push it away, for even as a young Christian, there can be the fear of the unknown. But when you get to my age (77+) it can often be in your thoughts because you see others around you passing away. It has been said that one sign of aging, is that we start becoming regular pall bearers and friends funerals.
I am now at an age when I honestly think often about going to heaven and living for eternity with our God and Saviour. With aging comes aches and pains and our bodies slowly wearing out, I am looking forward to that day that John speaks of in Revelation 21:4 NKJV And God will wipe away every TEAR from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more PAIN, for the former things have passed away.” We will then spend eternity around the throne of God, looking at the “lamb slain before the foundation of the world:, ever reminding us Jesus DID IT ALL FOR US, and bowing down and worshipping with all our hearts
There is also the saying, IF YOU ARE BORN TWICE YOU WILL DIE ONCE, BUT IF YOU HAVE ONLY BEEN BORN ONCE YOU WILL DIE TWICE. Paul describes the Rapture of the Church this way in 1 Cor. 15: 51-54 NKJ Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed— in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible has put on incorruption, and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.”
Whether we have already died when Jesus comes for His Church, or are still alive (His return is ever so close) the graves will be opened , the dead will rise and replace their corrupt bodies with an incorruptible one, and those who are still alive replace their mortal bodies with an immortal one, and we are all caught up in the air to be with the Lord FOREVER. What a TRIUMPHANT DAY that will be, I trust the Holy Spirit is not saying you as Jesus had to say in Luke 21:28 NKJV look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near.”
The Apostle must have thought a lot about heaven, as he declares he would love to be with the Lord,(Phil.1.23) but it was necessary for him to remain. I feel like that too, I would love to “be ever with the Lord” but I don’t believe my time is finished down here yet, there are still things God has put into my heart that I have not yet fulfilled. I sure don’t want to die, feeling I have not completed all that the Lord wanted me to accomplish, by His grace I want to die without any regrets for any reason.
Selfishly, in the past I would joke that Margaret had to predecease me, but with the Lord’s help I would love to be able in my own bumbling way care for Margaret and see her off to glory.
We of course must work hard as Paul expresses it in Phi. 2:12-13 NKJV Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure. In other words, we cannot afford to relax, we have been chosen and have received an inheritance now, and we need to watch that we do not get slack and lazy,
As I have written before I am looking (His grace helping me) for the Uppertaker, but it may be the undertaker (only God knows), as this unworthy man knows more and more thatWITHOUT HIM I CAN DO NOTHING.
