Posted on 02/07/2007 5:52:25 PM PST by Lee N. Field
Americans know in their heart of hearts they're going to die but they don't like to admit it. It's a mark of our post-Christianity that this culture is so obsessed with youth and beauty. Most folk don't die at home anymore. Many folk have never seen a dead person. We go away to antiseptic hospital rooms to die and are boxed up and delivered to the funeral home and, in many cases, (even the "open casket" seems to be disappearing) never seen again.
It wasn't so in the 16th century. Death as a routine part of life. Life expectancy was rather shorter than it is today. One of the things that tipped me to this fact was a 16th-century sketch of Olevianus as an old man, except at the time of the sketch he wasn't "old." He was 30 years old.
(Excerpt) Read more at dannyhyde.squarespace.com ...
On what or whom can you trust?
That I, with body and soul, both in life and in death, am not my own, but belong to my faithful Savior Jesus Christ, who with His precious blood has fully satisfied for all my sins, and redeemed me from all the power of the devil; and so preserves me that without the will of my Father in heaven not a hair can fall from my head; indeed, that all things must work together for my salvation. Wherefore, by His Holy Spirit, He also assures me of eternal life, and makes me heartily willing and ready from now on to live unto Him.
Only Jesus never let anyone down. Only Jesus is a faithful Savior. Lot's of people and things promise help, but, at some point they all become liars. Jesus never did. He told his disciples why he came up to Jerusalem. He told them what was going to happen and why. They tried to talk him out of it and even started a gang fight, but Jesus would not be stopped. He knew what had to be done and he did it --every day of his life. God's justice is relentless and had to be satisfied (just ask the folk of Noah's generation!) and Jesus did it. Jesus knew that without his life and death we would always be in the power of death. Because he was faithful, however, we, for whom Jesus has earned the ground of our comfort and and to whom the Spirit has given faith, are free from the tyranny of death.
Whatever the advertisers tell you -- unless Jesus returns first -- you are going to die. If, however, you trust in Jesus it's just a temporary thing. Death can't hold you because it couldn't hold him and you are united to him and the power of his life by faith and by the same Spirit who raised him. As surely as Jesus lives, so will you.
Now that's comfort.
So good it needed to be shared. Part of a continuing series this guy is doing on his blog. --"lnf"
Very timely and necessary for me to read, Lee. Thank you for posting it.
Jer 17:5 Thus saith the LORD; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm...
By the way, for anyone reading this who's not familiar with the Heidelberg Catechism, the first question (the answer of which this blog posting was all about) is "What is thy only comfort in life and death?"
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