Two octogenarian ladies recently confided their fear of dying to family members. When I heard about that, I felt surprised. These women have loved and served Jesus for over half a century. I could not imagine that they would question their relationship with God or their heavenly destination. For decades, I have witnessed how they lived and loved others in Jesus’ name. How they could be fearful of death confused me.
Deathly Fears
For those who fear death, does the decline from health to the last heartbeat scare them? For example, the potential of a long illness, terminal diagnosis, or painful suffering might provoke anxiety. The idea of facing death alone may seem overwhelming and uncontrollable. Fears of death also relate to what is left behind: met goals, unreconciled relationships, or an unfulfilled legacy. There may be unfinished tasks, like a house full of stuff left to children who don’t want anything. Although looking forward to being with Jesus, do they fear that interval between their last heartbeat and heaven?
Although I didn’t speak with these lades about it, I thought about my own attitudes toward death. Some of those fearful aspects could happen at any time. My current healthy life could stop instantly in a car accident. My father died in a plane crash at age thirty-six. A sudden pain may result in a terminal diagnosis or sudden death. The oncologist told my seemingly-healthy seventy-six year-old mother that she had the body of a sixty year-old. Pancreatic cancer took her life less than five months later. My first husband dropped dead of a heart attack at forty-five, without cardiovascular symptoms or risk factors. From my family history, I have learned that death’s timing is unpredictable—for humans. But not for God.
Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. Psalm 139:16 NIV
In Second Corinthians, Paul pictures our body as an the earthly tent that we live in. When that tent/body is destroyed by death, we go to the eternal house in heaven that God built:
For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. 2 Corinthians 5:1
Jesus also described His Father’s house as a real place where we would go to be with Jesus:
My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. John 14:1-2
Paul describes our desire to leave this earthly tent for our heavenly home. Expanding the metaphor of tents to clothing, Paul pictures heavenly life overcoming our mortality:
For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. 1 Corinthians 5:4
No matter what my own death will look and feel like, I can trust the one who conquered death. First Corinthians 15 quotes Hosea 13:14 in the proclamation of Christ’s victory over death. I pray that any anxieties about death, that I or these two precious ladies have, be reassured by God’s promises. As believers who are forgiven because of Jesus Christ’s death on the cross, our destination after death is heaven.
“Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Corinthians 15:55-57
