Death…….. and then?

It can happen at any moment to anyone in a thousand different ways. We can choke on a fish-bone; we can fall down the stairs; we can be run over by a bus or be destroyed by a cancer.

It’s called “death” and it is coming to someone near you today. One day it will come for you. That day has already been decided on. You can’t change it, delay it or postpone it.

It’s ugly, horrible, tragic and final. So much so that most of us refuse to call it by its name. We talk instead about “kicking the bucket”, “pushing up the daisies” or “being 6 feet under”. We spend all our lives trying to avoid it, yet the grim fact is that the moment we are born, we begin to die.

What then is death,
where does it take us,
and how on earth
can we learn how to cope with it?

In the 1st place, death is definitely not the end. That’s a psychological fact as well as a God-given truth. What do I mean? I mean that we all find it impossible to imagine not being around, to think of a world without me. Why? Because God “has put eternity in our hearts”. We’ve been made to live for ever, and when we die, it’s unnatural – even though we all do. Death is a separation, a removal of my soul from my body. It’s an enemy!

Two things – the first one’s obvious. For the other we need God to tell us. The obvious bit is that our bodies rot until the day Jesus returns and raises them from the dead, re-uniting them with our souls. The soul, (God tells us), on the other hand, is at the moment of death, summoned before God’s crown court. On that day I will either be welcomed into heaven, or cast into hell.

Well, here’s the good news. In fact it’s terrific news….. Jesus has defeated death, public enemy number 1. When He died, He died the death of everyone who puts all their trust in Him to save them. He died death dead. The Bible says that when Jesus died, He drew death’s sting. In other words, He sucked all the poison that makes death, death, into His own body and soul. He was sentenced to our hell, so that when we die (if we’re really united to Him), there’s no punishment left to fear. It’s all been emptied out on Jesus on the cross. So that Jesus can now say to every Christian exactly what He said to the criminal who died next to Him on the cross, but who asked Jesus for mercy – “Today,… you will be with me in paradise”