I Hate Death

I hate death beyond words to describe. It fosters fear, sadness, hopelessness, loneliness, grief, and suffering. It's brutal. It's ugly. It smells. It hurts. It tears at the heart like a ravenous beast. It has no regrets and no mercy. It's a thief who robs you of those you love with no remorse. It is the final hurrah of the enemy – his greatest victory against God's most magnificent creation - yet it was never intended for human beings.

I've had many different animal family members over the years and each time they came to the end of their life, its finality hurt my heart and stirred up the culmination of sorrow and anguish experienced over the years at the moment a loved one died.

I attended my first funeral as a young boy. It was for my best friend's Dad and was an open casket, which shook me to my core. It was there that my deep hatred for death began. There have been too many other relatives who have died over the years. I was given up for adoption when I was a baby and my next funeral was for my adopted Mom, who died of cancer when I was 11 years old. It is still painful to this day. My adoptive Dad died due to a tragic accident when I was in my forties, and the pain of his departure tore a hole in my heart. My Step-Mom died suddenly a very short time ago at the ripe old age of 91. She lived a long and productive life. Knowing that has been somewhat consoling and offsetting much of the pain. My birth mother recently graduated from this life and is now with Love Himself. The continuing sadness of loss is what provoked this message within me.

I was by the side of my wife during the final days and moments of her life after a decades-long fight against the effects of a ravenous disease. Watching her die was far beyond words to describe the anguish, and it was the hardest thing I have ever done. I will NEVER get over it.

Her life was plagued by chronic illness and debilitating pain that ended only a couple of hours before taking her last breath. I have tried in vain to understand and reconcile the love of God in contrast to her suffering over the years. I have found NO legitimate answers. I have been consoled by others, who I am sure were well-intentioned but could offer only hollow spiritual platitudes – which I think were said more out of their fear of facing the very issues I have had to confront for decades – than from a deeply personal and experiential emotional understanding.

My wife lived to share the love of God with others. She prayed with many to receive the gift of salvation – and she continued up to the final days of her life. I was hoping that she would pass over at 3:16 pm as a kind of prophetic soul-winning climax to her life. However, precisely at 4:44 pm, February 24, she finally graduated from this world into the next. February 24 was the day of Purim on the Jewish calendar, a joyous celebration of deliverance from destruction. The number 4 in the Bible represents the earth. It is where we were made from, where we live, and where we will return.

"By the sweat of your brow will you have food to eat until you return to the ground from which you were made. For you were made from dust, and to dust you will return." (Genesis 3:19 NLT)

I did a lot of contemplation in those final days and hours spent with her. I wish I could say that her death had the glow of glory shining in the room as the sound of Angels singing could be heard in the background while doves flew in to carry her away to her heavenly home. But, that was not the case - it was quite to the contrary.

Once again, I found myself being forced to confront another one of the many paradoxical mysteries of Christianity. Amid all this agony, gut-wrenching grief and despair rolling over me like a Tsunami as I watched the pain and suffering this world offers brutally inflict itself upon the one who I loved explicitly for nearly four decades, I simultaneously experienced Love Himself – holding, comforting - and as He has always done - filling me with the wondrous peaceful beauty of His limitless love that is beyond comprehension and understanding.

I am forever amazed by Jesus, and I am now even more desperately in love with Him than yesterday. I will forever be fascinated with His beauty. I don't know what the future holds for me, but I do know that Jesus will keep me in His everlasting arms of love, and I have nothing to worry about and absolutely nothing to fear.