How often do we hear it said, of someone making a questionable choice, "it's his funeral"? The general inference is not that someone is going to die because of a bad choice, but rather that we face the consequences of our decisions. The choice to die is not generally associated with a stable emotional state. Since Genesis 2:7 when, "the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being." we have had an innate drive for self preservation. We can face incredible odds and prevail because of our refusal to roll over and die.
Against this backdrop of refusing to die, we encounter several New Testament Scriptures which seem entirely counter-intuitive. Luke 9:23-25, for example, reads, "And he said to all, "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow him. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it." Luke tells me that if I act intuitively and try to save my life, I'm going to lose it. The only way to preserve my life is to lose it for Christ's sake. Dying doesn't come easy for most of us, even when life hardly seems worth living. Yet Luke says that is the only way I can survive.
Dying seems to be very difficult for me. Perhaps I'm typical, having never lived in another's mind I can't really say. I remember late this spring / early summer when God told me to die. I was taking a walk, early one morning, at the church family camp. I was walking along railing at God. Railing about circumstances in my life which He "needed" to fix. I was railing at Him about lackluster Christianity and the infrequency with which we see signs and wonders following those who profess His name. I remember walking past a wooded area and looking in at some dead fall in the woods. I called out to God and said, "if this is all it is, then I might as well be one of those dead trees rotting away into compost on the bed of the forest! If this is all Christianity is, then let me die now." "That's exactly what I want you to do", is what He told me. It was not the response I was expecting and to say the least, I was a bit shocked. I expected Him to assure me that He wanted me to live, instead He encouraged me to become compost.
As I pondered my shocking revelation, I came to realize that only as "I" died was there going to be room for the "new me", the regenerate man. I may be a twin, but there can only be one of me and so God was saying, it's time for the old man to die. The faster his body decomposes, the less likely I would be to try to resurrect it. God reminded me of this again today. I was feeling dead and wondering if I would ever feel alive again and He said, "good, isn't it about time?" Time for the old man to be dead and gone. Time for the carcass to be decomposed so that there is no motivation to try resurrecting it.
It's amazing, horrifyingly so, how often I have tried to pull that stinking, decomposing carcass from the compost pit in the past several months and tried to live in it. To convince myself that it was comfortable and presentable. It is encouraging, however, to realize that I can see myself being different when I climb back into the old man. To see how many areas of my life it affects, negatively, and not like it.
Romans 12:2 reads, "Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is - his good, pleasing and perfect will." The pattern of this world, that certainly was / is the old man. One thing about the "old man", he always had someone in his corner - himself. It was all about me! Everything! Amazingly, even when I was praying for people it was about me. "Lord, bless my boys with peace, make them content and happy." Not a bad prayer, IF it had been out of concern for them instead of making my life easier. The pattern of this world is ego-centric and my "old man" certainly fit that bill. "Let him rot in the forest," God says, "but be transformed by the renewing of your mind". That's one of the cool things about our Father. He doesn't just take things from us - even when the things He's taking are not good for us. He gives us an alternate and His alternates are a major up-sell. He didn't just ask me to die, He offers me new life, the transformational renewing of my mind.
And it changes things. It changes things so that I can weep for someone and pray for them because I care for them and want the Lord's best for them. Yes, I said for them - no longer for me. Do I still take trips out to the compost pit? Unfortunately. Are the trips becoming less frequent and the stays shorter in duration? I pray, so. Deuteronomy 30:19, "This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live." I chose life, I keep choosing life, daily, hourly. I choose life so that I may live but also for my boys. My choosing life gives them a heritage of life and it's the least I can do for them.
2 Timothy 2:11, "Here is a trustworthy saying: If we died with him, we will also live with him;"
I choose my funeral ...
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