Death, where is thy sting?

I don't want to break anyone's heart, but I hope you all know you're probably going to die someday.

I recently heard a Christian friend of mine say, "I just don't understand how God can allow so-and-so to get cancer." I wanted to say, do you really think certain people should be immune from the normal frailties of the flesh? Or that being a believer should mean not getting cancer, heart disease, MS, etc.? The real question is, why shouldn't he or she get cancer? Or you? Or me? Or anyone else?

Where did we get this idea that it should be disturbing when a wonderful Christian believer gets sick or dies like everyone else in the history of the human race (with a couple of Biblical exceptions)?

I think I know where we get it. Three kinds of teaching in the church: Poor teaching. Lousy teaching. And downright creepy teaching.

Here's an example. In certain Christian circles it's very common to hear talk about the Christian life as if it were a battlefield between God and the devil. Good things happen, and that's obviously attributable to God, the author of all good. Bad things happen, like serious illness, and clearly the devil is trying to get to us. The universe, in this view, is pretty clearly a dualistic place. Good vs. evil in a fight to the finish. Mankind in the middle, choosing sides.

But much trouble comes of this dualistic cosmology. For one thing, the devil is given way too much credit for the world's evil. It's as if the greatest problem we face is "the enemy." It's the devil makes us sick, causes us to lose our jobs, messes up our relationships, causes automobile accidents . . . I've heard it all. But this view makes us out to be more or less innocent victims. We wind up crying out to God (who apparently should have been protecting us better), "How could you let this happen!"

Let me go at the problem from a different angle. If the sickness and death is from an enemy who means us harm, then the greatest problem we face is that enemy. We need God to stop him in his tracks. We have a powerful assailant, so we need an even more powerful protector (God). And we call it faith when we firmly believe that it is surely that protector's will to protect us from every harm.

Therefore, whenever someone gets sick and dies, it seems a kind of failure of God's. "How could you let this happen?"

But what if our greatest problem is not "the enemy"? Or, what if, like Pogo, we have met the enemy, and he is us? What if death is really directly related to sin (Rom 6:16)? Billions of people, throughout history, sinning. You. Me. Everybody. Ever since Adam.

If the devil is our main problem, repentance is not really necessary. We're victims, that's all. The solution is to get on God's side, because He's the more powerful one, and He will protect us. To put it another way, our most pressing need, in that case, is not grace, but power. Superior Spiritual power for vigorous devil-rebuking. If only we had more power! And here good old fashioned legalism has a chance to rear its hoary head, as we study how to coax this needed thing, power over sickness and death, from an apparently somewhat uncooperative deity.

But of course our most pressing problem is not the devil, but sin. And therefore that which we most need is not superior power for fighting the devil, but grace. Again and again grace. Again and again the knowledge of Jesus and his cross, and its victory over every enemy, including death.

I want to insert here Ray Ortlund's brilliant metaphor for the process of sanctification. Read this carefully:

I think of my inner self as a globe, a world, with many dark continents still unexplored, uncivilized, vast jungles of primitive impulses. But Jesus the Liberator steps ashore on the coast of one of those continents, plants the flag of his kingdom in my consciousness and declares peace. That is justification.

Then sanctification begins. For example, it doesn't take long for a half-naked savage to run out onto the beach with spear in hand to attack Jesus. This is some selfish desire in me rising up against the King. But he declares peace all over again and subdues that aspect of me by the force of his grace. "Clothed and in his right mind" (Mark 4:15) is the picture.

The King starts moving steadily inland, planting his flag in ever new regions of my being. He brings one dark thing after another into my awareness, declares peace again and again and again, and thereby establishes civilization.

Here's my point in inserting this passage. One of the darkest regions of our interior continent is that place where we harbor our thoughts about death. Our selfish feeling that death is just not fair, and our childish fear of it, which only reveals the shallowness of our faith. We just don't want to give up this cherished complaint. We don't want to let Jesus plant his flag of grace here, for then we'd have to admit that death for us was justice after all. But Jesus will plant his flag, nevertheless. See, the wages of sin is death, but when Christ took care of sin on the cross, he took care of death. The crosswork of Christ took care of both sin and death.

I know a fellow whose ministry it is to "walk with the dying." He befriends and advocates for dying people, and he's often at their side when they pass from this world. He told me once, "Bob, there's no way to predict how someone is going to die. I've seen atheists die peacefully in their beds and lifelong Christians die in abject terror. You can never tell."

I am not foolish enough to claim to know in what way I will face my end, whether in terror or in peace. But I know how God would have me go. Giving him the glory right to the end! I hope I go out whooping and hollering like a rodeo cowboy riding Elijah's whirlwind heavenward. I pray that before my last day comes, whenever that shall be, I will have so feasted on the grace of God, day in and day out, that in the end it will be clear to all who knew me that for me, as for Paul, to die was truly gain (Phil 1:21).