Not too long ago a co-worker of mine informed me that her mother was taken off life support and her family was waiting for her to pass. Because she knows that I am a Christian she turned to me for a word of comfort. I could see the impending grief was weighing on her.
At the time I wasn’t sure what to
say other than to offer my sympathies and to share with her Psalm 139, the scripture
passage that my mother had shared with me after the death of my cousin Eric. It has always held a dear place in my heart as
I have grieved over the deaths of loved ones, brothers in arms, and friends.
One specific section really speaks to me in
these types of situations:
“Where shall I go from your
Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your
presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are
there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you
are there! If I take the wings of the
morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall
lead me. If I say, ‘Surely the darkness
shall cover me, and the light about me be night,’ even the darkness is not dark
to you; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you.”
Here in this passage, we see the
unrelenting love of God in action. No
matter where we may go, God follows.
Even in Sheol, Hebrew for the place of the dead, God is with us, relentlessly
pursuing our redemption. Ultimately this
Psalm is fulfilled in Christ.
In Christ, we see the Son, who
created all things, and through whom all things have their being, came down to
us and became incarnate by the virgin Mary.
He lived among us in our very presence.
And when the time was right, he subjected himself to death, even death on
a cross, as the atoning sacrifice for our sins.
The Son even made his bed with us in Sheol, when he died, and was buried
for three days, in total darkness, in accordance with the scriptures.
And yet, even the darkness is not
dark to Him. On the third day Christ
rose bodily from the dead breaking the darkness and the hold it has on us. It is in Him and in the resurrection that we
take hope. For Christ has promised that
we too shall rise from the dead and dwell with Him.
Paul, in his First Letter to the Church
in Corinth, describes the hope of the resurrection so well.
“But in fact Christ has been raised
from the dead, the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come
also the resurrection of the dead. For
as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order. Christ the first-fruits, then at his coming
those who belong to Christ. Then comes
the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every
rule and every authority and power. For
he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death.”
Even though we grieve for the
loss of a loved one, we know that through Christ we have hope in the
resurrection of the dead. We are not to
be permanently parted one from another.
We shall be made alive with Him.
I have the certain hope that just
as Christ rose from the dead, and we have the empty tomb that we can point toward
giving us tangible evidence of this fact, we too shall rise at His command and
death will be no more. The one who has
demonstrated his power over death has made this promise and we can trust
it.
Even though I know that someday
all my relatives will die, and that I too shall pass away, I have Christ as my
hope.
My hope is that one day as I lay
in bed, hopefully surrounded by my wife and children, with my last breath I
will be able to impart to them one last word of comfort, “See you at the
resurrection.”
May you experience the peace of Christ and the certain hope of the resurrection of the dead. Amen.
