Posted on 02/18/2015 6:48:34 AM PST by Gamecock
Death for the Christian and the non-Christian alike is the terrible fall-out from the Fall. While Christians should grieve with hope (1Thess. 4:13), even we still grieve. When your non-Christian neighbor experiences a death, you can sympathize with the real horror of a life ended and a relationship severed. What’s more, in a culture where death is either downplayed and ignored or set in the realm of dignified personal choices, you may be the only one willing to acknowledge its awful and inevitable impact.
When a loved-one of a friend dies, words come hard. In the emotionally-charged aftermath of death, it’s tricky to know how to extend comfort without sounding stupid or, worse, hurting our neighbor more than she already is. We want to be lovingly proactive, emotionally sensitive, personally sympathetic, and theologically correct.
All in the space of a hug and a sentence.
It’s a tall order, and the complexity compounds when we are comforting a non-Christian who is grieving the death of another non-Christian. With no understanding of the soul, no hope of eternity, and no trust in Christ’s return, our co-workers and neighbors can’t receive the same comfort we’d offer a believing brother or sister.
What do we say to the pagan co-worker who is mourning the death of her Hindu best friend? How do we approach our nice, secular neighbor whose even nicer, secular wife just died? What words can we offer the agnostic friend who just watched her atheist mom succumb to cancer?
Recently I read an article by Stanley Gale, “How Do We Comfort the Non-Christian in Grief?” (H/TThe Aquila Report) There, Dr. Gale helpfully lays out the theological landscape of death. Standing on his foundation, then, I want to build a bit further and make three practical suggestions. Let’s call it:How (Exactly) We Can Comfort the Non-Christian in Grief.
1. Acknowledge That Death Is Very, Very Bad
Death for the Christian and the non-Christian alike is the terrible fall-out from the Fall. While Christians should grieve with hope (1Thess. 4:13), even we still grieve. When your non-Christian neighbor experiences a death, you can sympathize with the real horror of a life ended and a relationship severed. What’s more, in a culture where death is either downplayed and ignored or set in the realm of dignified personal choices, you may be the only one willing to acknowledge its awful and inevitable impact. You can say:
I’m sorry. This is really hard.
This is so sad. I know you will miss her.
It’s okay to cry. Death is terrible.
If you openly lament death, you may have opportunity later to walk your friend backwards to sin—whose wages death is—and forward to Christ, whose gift is eternal life (Rom. 6:23).
2. Affirm That Human Beings Are Precious
Just as only Christians truly appreciate the sadness of death, only Christians can fully affirm the amazing privilege and value of life. We understand that human beings are more than a collection of cells but are actually image-bearers of the most-high God, knit together by him in the secret places, and given unique abilities, interests, and experiences. Though your non-Christian neighbor doesn’t understand all of this, you do. And in contrast to a culture where human life is cheap, you can testify to its value. You can say:
She was an amazing violinist.
He was so cheerful—he always brought a smile to my morning!
Her work with those school kids was remarkable.
Your valuing of life may one day lead to an introduction to the Lord and giver of life, “in whom we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28).
3. Commend the Loving Actions of Your Grieving Neighbor
Knowing that all good things come from the Lord, Christians can affirm common grace when we see it. The deeds of your grieving non-Christian neighbor have no saving merit (just as your own deeds have none), but Jesus says that even ungodly people can and do love others (Luke 6:32). We know that it is God who enables non-Christians to be kind and generous and faithful. And you can affirm these things by saying:
You took such good care of your mom at the end. I know you loved her.
He often told me how much your friendship meant to him.
I always liked seeing you out shooting baskets with your son after work.
And maybe someday these kind deeds will be the beginning of a conversation about the kindness of our God—revealed in the giving of his Son to die in our place.
All I know is that I’m going to be in Heaven with God, because of Christ, and not because of me.
I’m unworthy of Heaven. Without Christ, I wouldn’t be allowed anywhere near it.
As for suffering eternally, I don’t know about that. I want to be with the God who made me.
Being outside of that, perhaps, could be eternally tortuous.
It is said that our inability to see angels and demons is a gift, not a handicap.
We are like sheep, but we aren’t exactly sheep either. Ignorance is only bliss until the knife crosses your throat.
I don’t know about Hell, but I believe there’s a Satan. My understanding is that Satan is the prince of the air, and the king of this world.
I think that in Matthew 6, there’s a verse of the Lord’s prayer that goes
‘Thy Kingdom come, they will be done
On Earth as it is in Heaven.’
To me, that’s terrifying, because we are being specifically instructed to pray for something that prevails against the assumed norm: While God’s will is the norm in Heaven, it’s the apparent opposite here on Earth, unless we pray for that direct intervention.
Makes even more sense given that we are instructed to ask for ‘our daily bread’.
It suggests we have to continually, unceasingly pray for that intervention.
The archangels, it is said, still carry swords - even in Heaven.
Hell may be a real-time experience. We’re perhaps going through it now. When we die, perhaps some go live with God in Heaven and the others just cease - their names erased from the Book of Life.
I confess that I don’t know. I also confess that I don’t have enough information to found my belief in the nature of Hell, Satan, and eternal damnation in any terms other than being outside of the eternal presence of God.
For the sake of those I’ve known that did not accept Christ, and it was apparent in many cases that their early experiences did more than lead them from God, I pray for mercy on them, just as I pray God have mercy on me.
In the case of me, and the case of those whom I’ve known that did not accept Christ, I know that I’m no better than them.
God sent enough people to drill it into my head that Christ wanted me as I was, and I chose to believe that. All of the rest is beyond the choice is grace.
I wish I could answer your question with more certitude. I certainly wish I could answer, ‘yes, they just died - perhaps as unlucky fools - but they are beyond pain.’
I didn’t make us, and we have very little information to go on. Christ himself recognized this, and marveled when Thomas demanded to put his hand in Christ’s wounds.
He knew people like us would believe without the benefit of having actually seen Christ crucified. Even hardened Roman guards believed after seeing. What fool wouldn’t?
Christ knew there would be those that believed because His Word had reached us through broken people over thousands of years, and we’d believe anyway.
No advertiser would bet their brand on that strategy, I can tell you from hard experience.
Anyway, I hope they aren’t in pain, except maybe guys like Stalin and Hitler and Pol Pot and Mao - Pinochet, etc.
I don’t have a strong belief in that regard. Just a little hope for otherwise earnest folks that never got it through their skulls for one reason or another.
Not the answer you were probably looking for. I don’t think your salvation depends upon what you believe happens to the souls of the damned anyway. Amazing how folks get wrapped around the axel on what seems like small points.
For one that professes to be in touch with feelings you seem to have a way of showing kind words to others. There was no malice in the words that I wrote. Grieving is a human emotion which happens to be inwardly focused. It is all about the personal feeling of loss. Hence, selfish. One can choose what do human emotions. Personally, I rejoice in their going to heaven. In the case of a non-Christian, the heaven part doesn’t apply. Sucks to be them. So, they need to get over it. There is nothing sociopathic about that.
On the contrary. You gave me 2 different answers to choose from regarding eternal suffering, so I picked the one in post #36!
The thing about post 36 is that atheism is really secular humanism, and a religion all its own.
The gap between atheism and agnosticism is humility. Even the Greeks understood that hubris was probably the least forgivable of all the sins. To too many people, that gap is as wide as the one between galaxies.
Admission of ignorance is a pretty tall step for a lot of folks.
Your ‘pretty close to what I was thinking’ agreement with Ancient Man’s (ping) statement seemed to indicate a bit less humanity than would be called for in a situation like this, at least from where I sit.
The loss does have a personal impact, it is totally appropriate to grieve. It is not appropriate to wallow in self pity, but that is way different from grieving.
If ‘get over it, they’re dead’ is one’s way of (thinking that they are) appropriately expressing sympathy/empathy, I think they need to re-evaluate.
Don’t know if you’ve lost your parents yet (or a spouse, or a child), but I have little doubt that if anyone stated ‘get over it, they’re dead’, your response would NOT be ‘gosh, thanks for those kind words’.
JMO.
And yes, in retrospect, I would have favored writing ‘if one is a sociopath’, so it did not appear that I was referring to you that way. That was not intended.
Having never wanted to lie, I do think *I’m sorry for your loss* for someone who died an atheist, would be a pretty accurate statement.
I AM sorry that someone died without knowing Christ.
(Disclaimer: Still trying to work up those thoughts for ISIS and other jihadist butchers)
I find comfort on that issue when I contemplate what is revealed to us in Revelation 21:4.
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