Precious Death

These are two words that don’t seem to go together. Take the word death for instance. Death conjures up feelings of heart wrenching sorrow, unbearable grief, unstoppable tears, and loneliness. The word precious on the other hand means valuable, excellent, prized, rare, splendid, glorious, weighty, and noble. So here is the obvious question. How can death be seen as splendid, glorious, prized, rare, and so forth?

The two thoughts do not coincide. I have preached numerous funerals in my twenty-five years of ministry. Since moving to Seminole I have preached or been a part of five funerals in five months. I have watched the heartache of grieving widows and widowers. I will never forget preaching the funeral for a wife who had been married over sixty years. The husband who was in a wheel chair wheeled over to the casket at the end of the service and said, “I will see you baby.” I could not hold back the tears. He told me he had been in love with her since the fourth grade.

I have watched parents have to bury children and visa versa watched brokenhearted children bury elderly parents. I have grieved with families who lost loved ones to cancer, Alzheimer’s, and unexpected tragedy. I don’t think any of those parents, children, husbands or wives would have called the death and sorrow of separation from those they loved precious. In fact, I am pretty sure that would be an offensive statement.

It might be offensive but death is precious depending on what point of view you are looking from. Read Ps 116:15, “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His godly ones.” From God’s perspective when a person is in a right relationship with Him death is a precious thing. For a true child of God death is the ultimate act of His love and protection. God who created us, who lovingly redeemed us, and who has sustained us through various trials and tribulations, cannot wait to be reunited with us physically. Now He relates to us spiritually but when death comes it is only a pathway to everlasting life with Him. This is good and precious. One moment with Him in eternity and the cares, troubles, and even the joys will fade in light of His splendor and the brilliance of His majesty.

The truth is God more than loves us He also longs for us. God Himself says that the death of His godly ones is precious. The phrase “His godly ones” means those who are devout, holy, faithful, and pious. I don’t see anything in this passage about death being precious to God for those who are avowed enemies because in stubbornness they have never come to repentance. Such people will experience the full force of His fury in judgment. I do not see anything in this passage about death being precious to God for those who were lukewarm in their relationship with the Lord. Such people He spews out His mouth. [Rev 3:15-16]

When a person who has loved God supremely and sought to know Him dies, this is a precious thing to God and for that believer. Imagine the scene. You know someone who has loved the Father more than life itself and they die. They step out of the prison of their body that has kept them from knowing and relating to God on a deeper level. Suddenly they are free to experience all of God not just in a temporary service that will come to an end but for life everlasting. There will always be closer encounters and fuller revelations of the Lord Jesus. This is precious, valuable, splendid, and excellent. From God’s perspective He is finally able to rescue His beloved out of a life filled with temptation, heartache, confusion, and distractions. He finally will have us all to Himself for all time. This is precious.

In awestruck wonder we will worship. I do not mean we will sing songs from rote memory and lackluster affection. We will worship. We will willingly ascribe the worth our Lord deserves. Our eyes will be opened to see the wonder and the mystery of all that our God is. We will be so humbled by His greatness and so fulfilled in Him it will be the most euphoric experience that will last forever.

Sadly if we have lived an unfaithful life our death may not be so precious. We will have to endure the testing by fire as all true believers will[I Cor 3:10-15] and we might come up lacking and suffer loss. If we were found unfaithful we barely make it into Heaven while the faithful will be rewarded on the other hand. There will be great dread and regret on that day if we were not devout and faithful.

It is a rare privilege afforded a pastor to preach the funerals of those faithful saints whom Ps 116:15 refers to. I know preachers can spin the truth and make everyone sound like a saint at a funeral but God knows the truth. No matter what is said or not said about our lives God knows the truth about who were faithful.

I have a friend back in Paradise who used to say something to me over and over again. He loves God and walks closely with the Lord. He told me repeatedly, “I want to God to say to me one day, Randy, we are closer to my house than yours why don’t you come home with Me.” I love that.. For all of us we will one day be closer to God’s house than our own in life’s journey. Death in that moment will be a splendid, precious, and excellent thing for God and for us if we have been faithful. That is why I say precious death.

I do not make light of the fact that death can be so tragic it might be less painful to have your heart ripped savagely out of your chest. To have to live with the sorrow is a huge load to bear. If the one who died by natural causes or by tragedy truly loved and walked with the Lord, let us turn our eyes to their perspective. It might ease our grief a bit and cause us to reprioritize our life. Let me end with the words to an old hymn written by William Featherston. “I’ll love Thee in life – I will love Thee in death, And praise Thee as long as Thou lendest me breath; And say when the death dew lies cold on my brow; If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus ‘tis now.”