Time to understand death with the eyes of faith

What you need to know:

  • The survivors will eventually have to prepare themselves to die from other causes.
  • Despite seeing all that God did to free the Israelites from slavery and help them escape from Egypt, they hardened their hearts against God in the desert.

Do you want some good news? If coronavirus is the worst thing that happens this year, the vast majority of people in the world will be alive and healthy a year from now. Truly, the vast majority.

Even so, the survivors will eventually have to prepare themselves to die from other causes. We all die. Sooner or later.

A hundred years from now, billions of people will have died. You and I will be among them. You do not have to be a spiritual person with deep religious beliefs to figure this out. It’s a plain fact.
Even so, we tend to live as if death does not exist. But often, despite believing in Jesus, we may find it hard to deal with death. As long as death seems abstract, we don’t mind.

Once tragedy strikes, fear sets in, and panic is not far behind. Believing in death takes zero faith. Believing that God loves us and that his Son is preparing a place for us in the next world takes a lot of faith.

HORRIBLE EVENTS

Oddly enough, this is one of the reasons our Father in heaven allows such horrible events as the pandemic to occur. It forces us to stop playing the game of postponing the day of our conversion.

This is why the Letter to the Hebrews repeats God’s warning from the Old Testament (4:7): “If only you would listen to him today, harden not your hearts.” Despite seeing all that God did to free the Israelites from slavery and help them escape from Egypt, they hardened their hearts against God in the desert. They were hungry and thirsty. They could not see the promised land.

They were tired of listening to Moses talk about rivers flowing with milk and honey. The Book of Numbers says they gave up on God (14:4): “They said to one another, ‘Let us appoint a leader and go back to Egypt.”

ANXIETY

Do not let your heart grow hard. Just because you are filled with anxiety and find it hard to believe that God is preparing a kingdom for you, do not let your faith grow weak. Cling to Jesus. Request him as the apostles once requested: “Increase our faith.”

Death is painful for us. It was painful for Jesus. But it’s not the end of the story. Learn to look at death with eyes of faith. Death is just a desert we have to cross if we want to reach the promised land. Let me conclude with a quote from a saint: “Don’t say, ‘The time has come for me to die.’ Instead say, ‘The time has come for me to Live!’