Last week I attended four funerals. Yes, four. The lives being celebrated ranged in age from early thirties to late eighties. Some of the deaths were expected, while others were shockingly unexpected. All brought grief, mixed with hope, to families left behind.
I watched a thirty-something father try to comfort his young sons in the midst of his own grief over losing his wife. I saw the relief of two separate families who had watched their loved ones battle cancer for several years, knowing their struggles were past. I had the privilege of looking into the eyes of a beautiful eighty-something lady who had lost her husband of sixty-five plus years, and seeing grief, steadfast love and faith, swirled together in her heart. The common denominator in every situation is that each life left behind will never be the same. There is a gaping hole in the heart of a loved one left to journey on without the one now gone.
Having walked this same path with my Mother in recent months, I have an overwhelming urge to scream, “This is not the way it is supposed to be!” God created us to be eternal beings; to live with Him, surrounded by His unceasing love. When He created Adam and Eve, He did so with the intent of unbroken fellowship with His prized creation. Death was never supposed to be part of the equation.
Man’s exercising of his free will changed all of that. The moment Adam and Eve decided to slip outside the boundaries set for them by God, the specter of death loomed large (Genesis 2:16-17). Satan, God’s enemy, was in the shadows cheering Adam and Eve on. Satan’s free-will choice had resulted in broken fellowship with his Creator (Isaiah 14:12-15), and he wanted nothing less than suffering and misery for the centerpiece of God’s creation. You and I are God’s centerpiece.
Every time death claims a human life, Satan cheers as though he had won the lottery.
BUT, for the man or woman who has turned to Jesus, asking Him to forgive their sin and live in their heart, Satan’s cheers turn to groans of defeat. Why? Because he knows that person stepped from this life into an eternal life of unbroken fellowship with God the moment they took their final gulp of earth’s air.
Jesus’ death on the cross, and resurrection from the grave offered, once again, the possibility of unhindered relationship between God and man. Friends, the sweetest moment of human interaction here on earth is only a whisper, a tempting taste, of what awaits us in heaven, if we have made Jesus our Lord and Savior. If you, like me, have made a deposit or two in heaven, your heart longs a bit more for that reunion in the sky, doesn’t it?
No, death is not the way it was supposed to be. Praise Jesus, death does not have the final word over the life of a believer in Jesus! One day there will be no more death, tears, partings, or pain. One day we will live forever in unbroken fellowship with our Lord and our loved ones who trusted in Jesus and have gone ahead.
I’m reminded of this old hymn. Will you be there?
Linking up today at Grace & Truth.
