He's In A Better Place

Why am I so alarmed at all these various reactions of people when  sharing my pain and sorrow, this past week, following the death of David?  Do I need to look any further than reading Blaise Pascal in Pensees, as he penned: "Being unable to cure death, wretchedness, and ignorance men have decided, in order to be happy, not to think about such things."

The more and more I think about it; when facing the reality of suffering and the specter of death, most folks, I've experienced, are most likely to actively seek for a distraction. One of the most common distractive comments has been, "he's in a better place, now." Then we're off to: "do you think we're going to get anything out of this storm?" And I can remember it’s only been a few of generations ago that it didn’t seem to be that way.  I have to be careful here of hypocrisy and admit that, at times, I have found the fear of death as an underlying, albeit unconscious, motivation;  nevertheless recognize that my life is filled with distractions. Whether it is in the juggling of priorities, the relentless busyness of this age, or perpetual media noise, most people’s lives are so full that they rarely give themselves space or time to reflect. Isn’t this been more noticeable, particularly with my own family and friends, for some time now?  It’s alarming and I pull myself back from what I have come to name ‘mindless consumption’ that I’ve found numbs me to the eventuality of corrosion on my mortal condition and finitude. Not excluding my darkened heart, at all, but I know over these seventy five years I’ve had the propensity of being sucked into the consumptive destruction of the advertising world.

The figure is staggering of the what marketers spent in billions of dollars in total media advertising this last month. I now think of how the progressive church has been seduced and inextricably bound up into the same vein of lights, smoke, and football jerseys but I’m not going down that rabbit hole today. Just convicted. . . . . . . ‘what is that to you, Bill.’  

As I think further, it is easy to understand how one’s fear of death and suffering would compel him to live a life of distraction. Yet, I know how costly that distraction is in pervasive and deadening apathy—apathy not simply as the inability to care about anything deeply, but the diminishment for engagement that comes from caring about the wrong things.  I have been struck again when rereading Kathleen Norris lament in my copy of Acedia and Me: A Marriage, Monks, and A Writer's Life : "It is indeed apathy's world when we have so many choices that we grow indifferent to them even as we hunger for still more novelty. We discard real relationships in favor of virtual ones and scarcely notice that being overly concerned with the how many threads are in cotton sheets and the exotic ingredients of gourmet meals can render us less able to care about those who scrounge for food and have no bed but the streets." I hope it continues to sadden me, to no end, to think that my inability to recognize my own mortality and to live my life in light of the fact that I will die leading to the diminishment of my ability to genuinely care for others—because my care, by its very nature, will demand my willingness to suffer, and to lose my life for someone else. The more I love, the more I open myself up to vulnerability and the possibility of pain. And yet, if I choose against loving engagements, I will be only left with a diminished and distracted last sentence of life.

I love what the ancient Hebrew poets, while meditating on the brevity of life, prayed in Psalms, "So teach us to number our days that we may present to you a heart of wisdom." It was the inevitability of death that motivated this prayer for wisdom for living. This was a wisdom that didn't try to hide from the realities of life—be they joys or sorrows—but rather sought to keep finitude ever before it. I find the poem ending with a cry for God to "confirm the work of my hands." I haven't given it a great deal of thought but I do recognize that for some time now, my day's seem to led to more meaningful engagement—and if there is truth in what the poets write is the mark of wisdom. 

Father, God, I thank You for Jesus, Himself, facing His own death with intention and purpose, walking the way of the cross, not only up the hill to Golgotha, but also offering His life in loving service to those around him. May I always remember Hi words: "I am the Good Shepherd...and I lay down my life for the sheep....No one has taken it away from me, but I lay it down on my own initiative." Thank You for my friend David and through these last few days, allowing me to realize the way of wisdom demonstrated by the life of Jesus calling me to engage my mortality as a catalyst for purposeful living. Thank You for demonstrating through reading, prayer, meditation and listening to others closely that while following Jesus insists on my laying down my life in Your service, it can be done in the hope that abundant life is truly possible even in these dark day of David's passing. For the One who laid His life down is the One who was raised. He is the one who declared, "I am the resurrection and the life; the one who believes in me will live even though he dies."  Amen