"Where Is The Hope When Death Knocks On The Door?”

“Where Is The Hope When Death Knocks on the Door?”

“And He shall wipe away every tear from their eyes, and there shall no longer be any death; there shall no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain, the first things have passed away. And He who sits on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” And He said, “Write, for these words are faithful land true…Revelation 21:4-5.”

You and I are created in God’s image. God loves us and knows what worries us the most. He knew in eternity past, we would worry about death, life after death and the death of our love ones. “For He Himself knows our frame; He is mindful that we are but dust. As for man, his days are like grass; as a flower of the field, so he flourishes. When the wind has passed over it, it is no more, and its place acknowledges it no longer. But the lovingkindness of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, And His righteousness to children’s children, to those who keep His covenant. And remember His precepts to do them.” (Psalm 103:14-18)

Death has been called the most democratic experience in life for we all participate in it. As a defense mechanism, we think of death only happening to other people. We don’t like to grow old and we don’t like to think of our own mortality. Yet the Bible tells us life is only a vapor that appears for a moment and then vanishes or is like the grass that withers and the flower that fades. Unless the Lord comes back first, we will physically die. According to Scripture, it is appointed unto man once to die, then the judgment -- every graveyard and every cemetery testify to this no matter if you deny it or remain ignorant of this biblical truth.

When I was growing up, my mother made a distinction between the word “ignorant” and the word “stupid.” If you were uniformed about a subject that meant you were “ignorant” about that subject. But once you were informed usually concerning some area of discipline to which she wanted obedience, you were “stupid” (and sorry) if you repeated the same offense or did not learn from the mistakes you made out of ignorance. For the first infraction you could plead ignorance but for the second you were just plain stupid. What an enemy “ignorance” is of the believer in Jesus Christ! “For a lack of knowledge my people perish saith the Lord.” Ignorance can rob us of the certainty, the confidence and the comfort available in our personal relationship with Jesus Christ when death knocks on the door. This, in turn, weakens our most cherished asset and offering to the world: hope in the face of death.

Say, “Where Is The Hope When Death Knocks on the Door?” Is this not a common cry in the heart of the world today with all its suffering and pain? Yet, as informed Christians, we stand secure and safe in the face of death. We have the answer in Jesus Christ who conquered death for us on the Cross. He is the hope of this dying world. Satan, who is neither ignorant nor stupid, knows this truth about Jesus Christ. That is why he puts up every obstacle when we try to study the Word. He would desire us to remain ignorant of God’s eternal truths. Likewise, this is why the Bible instructs on the importance to, “study to show thyself approved…rightly dividing the Word.”

A believer’s ignorance of God’s Word is a great weapon in the hands of Satan to give him real estate in your mind. So, fight back with truth -- have the mind in you that is in Christ Jesus! Since God doesn’t was us to be ignorant about death or life after death, he uses Paul’s writing to give us three truths to prove that death for the Christian is only a Shadow. Read carefully this passage of Scripture:

“But we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve as do the rest who have no hope. 14. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. 15. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord. 18. Therefore comfort one another with these words.” (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18)