Bunbury
Sun am
7/11/10
“The art of dying well”
Intro: There is an enormous amount written / said about right living these days..... loads of magazine articles / TV programs / radio interviews that are dedicated to helping people live well.
Today we are beginning to realise that that living well means having a right balance of physical / emotional life, eating right, getting exercise / friends / money etc.
All these things may be valid in one form or another & we shouldn’t just discount them.
But there is precious little written said about dying well!
You never read magazine articles w/ the smiling face of a man & woman in their mid thirties w/ a caption underneath that says .... ‘ 10 tips on dying well”
It’s almost as though that part of life (that’s what dying is, a part of life) is something that people want to shove away & forget.
The underlying thought is ...... I’m too busy w/ living to think about dying!
*** I went to the funeral of a young man only about 30 who was unexpectedly killed in a motorcycle accident. Looking around at the funeral I could see people in shock ..... people, I think, were asking themselves “How could this be happening?” The thing that struck me more than anything is the reality that this young man had given no thought to dying well.
But this is not just the business of the unsaved ..... in fact I think more than anyone else it should be the preoccupation of the saved to dedicate t/s to the art of dying well.
I want to preach t/m on ‘The art of dying well’.
Text: Genesis 25:7-8 (NKJV) 7This is the sum of the years of Abraham’s life which he lived: one hundred and seventy-five years. 8Then Abraham breathed his last and died in a good old age, an old man and full of years, and was gathered to his people.
# 1. The thing that no one wants to think about.
A. Death is the one thing that no one wants to think about.
a. Everybody is too busy w/ life!
i. And this is the way that it’s always been ...... men have always been too busy w/ life to think about death.
ii. Jesus points this out in speaking about the days Noah ...... their problem was that they were too busy to give time to thinking about death.
Luke 17:26-29 (NKJV) 26And as it was in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man: 27They ate, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all.
28Likewise as it was also in the days of Lot: They ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; 29but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all.
iii. Here are two different generations of man who were doing the very same thing!
iv. And has it really changed ...... is it very different today ..... people are too busy w/ life to think about death!
v. Not only are they too busy w/ life to think about death but they are too busy w/ life to think about the One who gave them life.
b. But think about the brevity of life.
i. We often don’t u/s things until we they are put into perspective ..... or in other words until they are place alongside of something else that we can compare them w/.
*** In 2002 I was in Essex, England in a little town I had never seen b/4....... as we walked through the streets of the town I came to an old pub. It was one of those old oak beam pubs. My friend told me it was over 550 years old. As I stood there I realised that this pub had stood here 5 centuries b/4 I came along & if Jesus should tarry it will be here 5 centuries after I’m gone! I was suddenly struck by the reality of my own passing / brief life.
ii. So what I’m getting at here is the fact that your life is going to over in a flash!
James 4:14 (NKJV) whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.
iii. Listen to the warnings sounded out in the Scriptures again & again ....
(Job 9:25-26 NKJV) "Now my days are swifter than a runner; They flee away, they see no good. {26} They pass by like swift ships, Like an eagle swooping on its prey.
iv. Job is saying this is what death is like ...... one day it just swoops down on you & it’s over!
Job 14:1 - 2 (NKJV) 1 “Man who is born of woman Is of few days and full of trouble. 2 He comes forth like a flower and fades away; He flees like a shadow and does not continue.
v. Why don’t we like thinking about death? ......... how many of you woke up this morning thinking you could die today???
B. Sometimes we need to be bought back to the reality that we don’t live forever.
a. We are going to have to face death one day – whether we like it or not!
i. No one wants to think about this .... even Christians don’t like to dwell on the thought of the temporary nature of life.
ii. But ...... if we fail to live w/ eternity in view we b/co just like the man whom Jesus condemned in the gospel.
iii. The mistake this man made was that he didn’t have eternity in view as he lived his life.
Luke 12:19-21 (NKJV) 19And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years; take your ease; eat, drink, and be merry.”’ 20But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul will be required of you; then whose will those things be which you have provided?’ 21“So is he who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.”
iv. This is why we don’t like to think about death ..... b/c we learn how to b/co rich in life / possessions but ignore the need to be rich toward God!
v. The man who is rich toward God has no problem thinking about death!
*** I read a little rhyme a number of years ago in a book somewhere that grabbed my attention b/c it the rhyme was accompanied by a photo of the place where it was written. But I also had the rare experience of seeing the very place where that rhyme was inscribed – on a tombstone!
I was in Norwich Cathedral in England a few years back ..... it’s a 900 year old cathedral. It was built in stages until it eventually b/ca the considerable structure it is today. As you walk through it one of the notable points is that there are several tombstones inside the church building i/s. Tombs built into the floor & the walls. Maybe the preaching was particularly bad & bored some of the congregation to death???
But one tombstone that you just can’t miss is in the wall of the building & on the front of the tombstone is the engraving of a skeleton. Underneath the skeleton is an inscription that reads:
Remember now as you pass by,
As you are so once was I.
As I am now so you must be,
So prepare yourself to follow me.
b. The reality is that we all ought to be preparing ourselves to follow the man who left that pertinent message on his tombstone.
*** Someone once said to me the only thing you have to do in life is die!
i. And this is exactly what the Bible tells us to when it says .....
Hebrews 9:27 (NKJV) 27And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment,
*** I was in Scotland on another occasion & we visited an old church yard & the ruins of a large cathedral. Again the cathedral was many hundred years old. Around & in the church were a number of graves & one of the things that stood out is the many graves that again had engravings of skeletons.
This was a common practice in those times, not b/c the people were morbid but b/c they believed that as people would walk by the graves & see the skeleton engraved on the tombstone or on top of the grave it would remind men / women of their own mortality & make them think about eternity.
c. And maybe that’s a good question to ask right now – how much do we think about eternity?
i. B/c unless you have given some serious thought to eternity & your own preparation for it then you are not ready to die!
*** In the book ‘Beyond Death’s Door’ ...... Dr. Maurice Rawlings who had interviewed 300 people who had flat lined & been resuscitated says these words, “Just listening to these patients has changed my whole life. There’s a life after death, and if I don’t know where I’m going, it’s not safe to die.”
ii. If you don’t know beyond any doubt where you’re going when you die – it’s not safe for you to die!
# 2. What have you done w/ the dash?
*** I wonder if you’ve ever taken a stroll through a graveyard? It’s not a bad way of spending a few hours. It can be at one time the most discouraging thing you can do & yet the most inspiring thing you can do. It can be discouraging in the sense that as you walk through the rows of tombstones & read the epitaphs the reality of life’s brevity comes forcefully home. Some people are only seeing out a few brief years breathing, their last & then stepping into eternity. Others, even though they may have lived out what we might rate as a long life have nonetheless eventually succumbing to the inevitable end. I’ve always found myself thinking whenever I’ve read the gravestones in a cemetery – “You’ve got to make it count, life is only short!”
But on the other hand I’ve found myself in a strange way being thrilled as I think about how short life is & how long eternity is! I’ve found myself thinking that I am as near as a heartbeat away.
Bu the final analysis is that I’ve got to make life count!!! I can’t afford to waste days .... weeks / months or years of this short interlude called life. B/c all that we do in life is summed up on our gravestone as a ‘dash’- John Perry 1957 - ? So what have you done w/ the dash? That’s the big question!!!
A. This is going to be the all impt question that will be asked when life ends – what have you done w/ the dash?
a. But life hasn’t ended for us just yet!
i. Of course we are still living / drawing breath / functioning / working a job / paying bills / being a father / mother / husband / wife / disciple of Jesus.
ii. Unlike Paul, we are not (as far as we know) on the threshold of eternity ...... for most of us we wouldn’t be able to say ....
2 Tim 4:6 (NKJV) 6For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure is at hand.
iii. So let’s put the question in context ...... b/c the end hasn’t come yet, we are still in the ‘doing’ stage of life.
b. So ....... what are you ‘doing’ w/ the dash?
i. In other words what will be said of the dash of your life ...... that portion of your life that will be represented between your birth & your death by a simple – ‘dash’?
ii. You see each & every one of us are writing a book & the book we are writing is the story of our lives ..... what we valued / what we lived for / what we gave our lives to.
iii. More imptly – what our lives achieved .... literally what the ‘dash’ of our lives was made up of.
iv. Listen to the story of Paul’s life .....
2 Tim 4:7 (NKJV) 7I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.
v. But what’s the story of your life going to be?
c. Getting back to our text ..... Abraham’s life; what we see here is a man who has done something w/ the dash.
i. In one sense the text about Abraham’s life tells us nothing but at the same time it tells us everything.
Vs 8. 8Then Abraham breathed his last and died in a good old age, an old man and full of years, .....
ii. The thought here is that Abraham drank up life / he lived it out to the full – he went for broke & won the race of life.
Gen 25:8 (AMP) 8Then Abraham’s spirit was released, and he died at a good (ample, full) old age, an old man, satisfied and satiated .......
Genesis 25:8 (GWT) 8Then he took his last breath, and died at a very old age. After a long and full life, he joined his ancestors in death.
iii. What our text tells us ..... & this is backed up by the story of his life ...... is that Abraham did something w/ the dash.
B. Our text is about the dash of Abraham’s life!
a. Nothing much is being said about Abraham here except that he lived – it’s the dash on his tombstone.
i. Our text in reality is the inscription on his grave & nothing much is recorded about his life .....
ii. It’s the silent dash that we so often see a life summed up w/...... & one day unless the Lord takes us all home first your life is going to be summed up the same way – a dash!
*** In 2005 we took a team of people w/ us to Port Moresby, PNG. While we were there Ps Mike Butler took us out to visit the Australian military cemetery just a little way out of town. When you’ve never seen it b/4 the sight is overwhelming – acres of land covered in rows of white stone crosses. Most of the crosses are the similar ..... they have the name of a young soldier, usually not more than 21 years old, the year that he was born – ‘dash’ – the year that he died w/ the occasional exception where the cross might have the rank of an officer or in even less cases the cross will sport the honour for the soldier’s bravery w/ the initials ‘VC’ – Victoria Cross.
Hundreds / thousands of lives represented w/ a mere dash!
iii. But somewhere there are records of these men / what they did, their bravery ..... the fact that they laid down their lives for their nation.
iv. Military records that speak about how they battled / fought / were valiant / gave th/s for the cause.
b. The few verses we’ve read about Abraham t/m are the ‘dash’ of his life ....
i. But his life fills 14 chapters in the book of Genesis beginning at Gen 11 through to Gen 25.
ii. His name appears in one form or another no less than 263 X – even Paul falls about 100 X short of that!
iii. His life established the powerful truth that God responds to faith .....
Romans 4:3 (NKJV) 3For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.”
iv. What I’m saying to is ...... we have the record of a life well lived!
c. And although your life may one day be represented by a simple ‘dash’ on a slab of stone in a graveyard somewhere, there is going to be a record.
i. In Revelation we read about the Great White Throne & the Bible says .......
Revelation 20:12 (NKJV) 12And I saw the dead, small and great, standing before God, and books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to their works, by the things which were written in the books.
ii. What this tells us is one powerful truth ...... God remembers your life as more than just a ‘dash’.
iii. So getting back to the theme of this message – what is the secret, how do we learn the art of dying well?
# 3. We die well by living right!
A. The art of dying well is mastered by living right!
a. If you want to die well – you need to live right – that is the only hope you have of dying well.
*** During our impact team to Fiji this year a man named Wm came along to one of our services. William used to be a Bible study leader in our church. His wife Ed***a has been faithful over the years since we left. But unfortunately this is not the case for Wm. He backslid & his life has gone steadily downhill. While we were back in Suva I met Wm one day downtown & he joined us for lunch. We chatted but there was no great conviction on him about the way his was living.
I asked him to come along to the revival services & he finally did on the last night we were there. I discovered that Wm’s dad had suddenly & unexpectedly died about 3 months earlier. He was seriously shaken by this but nothing had changed in the way he lived.
On the last night as Wm sat in service w/ his head bowed during the altar call, unmoved by anything that had been said ....... I asked a question that I knew would further shake him up. During that altar call I said “What are you going to do when your heart stops beating, how are you going to deal w/ that moment if you don’t know Jesus?”
That was the very thing he needed to jolt him back to reality. Having just seen his own father die a few months earlier Wm now found h/s facing the reality of his own inevitable end.
He was bought face to face w/ the fact that you can only die right by living right!
i. If dying is the one thing that none of us can avoid then we’d be foolish not to give due diligence to living right.
** An old preacher E Stanley Jones once said “The art of living is the least learned of all arts.”
ii. You can only hope to die well if you live right ..... But how do we live right?
b. Fortunately God doesn’t leave us guessing here.
i. The apostle Paul lays down for a us a pattern for living right when he writes his own Epitaph ...... the words he h/s inscribed for his own tombstone when he said ......
2 Tim 4:7 (NKJV) 7I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.
ii. Living right is about ‘fighting a fight’ ..... you’re going to have to fight to live right .... the devil wants to put you out of the fight.
*** Danny Green has recently been cleared of fight fixing allegations. He was accused of not having fought a good fight. But the records show that he fought a good fight. And there’s coming a day when the fight of your life is going to be reviewed to see if you fought a good fight!
iii. Living right means there is a race to be run & a finish line to be reached ...... the race is not over until you reach the end!
1 Corinthians 9:26 (NKJV) 26Therefore I run thus: not with uncertainty. Thus I fight: not as one who beats the air.
iv. Living requires us to be keeping the faith ...... you are going to have to live a life of faith to live right – you’re going to have to keep believing / trusting God.
c. Living right is not about doing what you want but it’s about living the way God wants you to live.
i. In this mad world of pleasing our/s Christians need to remember the forgotten call to do our duty.
Luke 17:10 (NKJV) 10So likewise you, when you have done all those things which you are commanded, say, ‘We are unprofitable servants. We have done what was our duty to do.’”
** Horatio Nelson who was killed in the battle of Trafalgar shortly b/4 he died said “Thank God I have done my duty.”
B. The sole purpose of this life is preparing for the next life.
a. Think about it!
i. What is death to the believer? .... what does it mean? What does it hold for us?
ii. The Bible says that death far from being the end ...... is the beginning – death is promotion to the beginning of everlasting, never ending, infinite living!
iii. The death of a believer doesn’t sadden God but thrills His heart – listen to what the Bible has to say here.
Psalms 116:15 (NKJV) 15 Precious in the sight of the LORD Is the death of His saints.
iv. Reading about heaven we could hardly think of death as anything other than God’s greatest blessing to the faithful Christian.
Revelation 21:4-5 (NKJV) 4And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.” 5Then He who sat on the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.” .......
v. You’ve been waiting for a new house / car / knees / hip / ears / eyes ....... Heaven is the place where God is going to make everything new!
1 Corinthians 15:51-54 (NKJV) 51Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed— 52in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.
53For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.
54So when this corruptible has put on incorruption, and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.”
vi. Death is either going to be your greatest promotion or it’s going to be your greatest loss.
