Living and dying well

Philip Yancey mentions in his book on Prayer on page 281 about what his wife Janet has learned about spending time with people in hospice care.   Yancey says, “Imminent death offers a chance for old wounds to be healed, grudges forgiven, legacies passesd on.  Sometimes that happens, sometimes it happens.

He then mentions that his wife found that “the obstacles to a good death were the very same obstacles to physical health: anxiety, tension, worry, guilt, fear.”    Not sure exactly the difference between anxiety and worry.  Came up with the following to help me remember this: WAGFiT .  I wonder if another one for the A would be Anger–sure seems to keep people from living well as well as dying well.

Giving Permission to Die

From one of the newsletters I get.  Sorry, can’t remember which one.  This seems to fit after reading updates by our friend David who recently lost his wife to cancer. To read his comments, here is a link to his blog.

One of the greatest gifts we can offer our family and friends is helping them to die well. Sometimes they are ready to go to God but we have a hard time letting them go. But there is a moment in which we need to give those we love the permission to return to God, from whom they came. We have to sit quietly with them and say: “Do not be afraid … I love you, God loves you … it’s time for you to go in peace. … I won’t cling to you any longer … I set you free to go home … go gently, go with my love.” Saying this from our heart is a true gift. It is the greatest gift love can give.

When Jesus died he said: “Father, into your hands I commit my Spirit” (Luke 23:46). It is good to repeat these words often with our dying friends. With these words on their lips or in their hearts, they can make the passage as Jesus did.

A pain-free future

John Piper reflects on what life will be like after death.  He realizes that it is far superior to any kind of comfort or pain-free life that we may be presently experiencing.  I needed to read this today.  Here is the link to the complete post.

In its place, came over me—and this too was fleeting, as much as I wanted it to stay—a conquering and freeing sense of what would be true after death. Its primary effect (as odd as this sounds) was to make me feel free from shame at possible ridicule from unbelievers in moments of personal evangelism. This was all within seconds. It was like a fleeting spiritual taste of heaven and the resurrection.

I saw and felt, as through a clicking camera shutter, everlasting pain-free life. Everlasting warmth. Everlasting guilt-free days. Everlasting friendship with the most interesting and caring Person in the universe. Everlasting expectancy, as on a child’s Christmas morning. Everlasting amazement, as at the first sight of the Himalayas. Everlasting tension-free relationships where everyone knows that everyone will take what is said in the true way. Everlasting calamity-free enjoyment of everything good, without any danger of idolatry, because the Source of all good is loved above all.

Prepared to die so I can be prepared to live

Read Romans 13 by mistake this morning instead of Romans 15 but what powerful verses these are in verses 11 to 12. what an encouragement to wake up from our slumber! Reminds me of what I read in The Imitation of Christ earlier in the week.

Oh, the great dullness and hardness of man’s heart, which thinks only about present things and gives little care to the life to come. book 1:23

a Kempis talks about the need to be prepared for death–a bit of a dark melancholy section but some good thoughts

If you are not ready this day, how will you be ready for tomorrow? Tomorrow is a day uncertain, and you cannot tell whether you will live that long. . . What profit is it to us to live a long life, if in a long life we so little amend our life? Long life does not always bring us to amendment; often, it brings an increase of sin.

If it is fearful to die, perhaps it is more perilous to live long. Blessed are those who have the hour of death ever before their eyes, and who every day prepare themselves to die.

Be always ready, and live in such a manner that death may not find you unprepared.

Learn now to die to the world so that you may then live with Christ.

And the end of all men is death, and the life of man is as a shadow which suddenly glides and passes away.

Keep yourself as a pilgrim and a stranger here in this world, as one to whom the world’s business counts but little. Keep your heart free, and always lift it up to God for you have here no city long abiding.

I don’t know about you but these words are extremely challenging to me. If I am not prepared to die, am I prepared to live?

Why People Die by Suicide

Why People Die by Suicide by Thomas Joiner. After recent suicides within our church and within our family, I remembered two new books on suicide that I had read reviews on. I ordered them and I have finished this one. It is not an easy read but helpful. Joiner gives two main reasons as to why people commit suicide–thwarted effectiveness or the “sense that one is a burden” and thwarted connectedness or the “sense that one does not belong”. The final factor is that a person has acquired the ability for lethal self-injury–”this comes from fearlessness about confronting pain, injury and death”. (92)