July 31, 2009
Too Young to Die
As I see it, the only thing all obituaries have in common is the fact that someone has died. Beyond that, our emotional reaction to each obituary is decidedly different. For instance our sympathy level may be much higher for a twenty-something than for an octogenarian. We’re likely to have more empathy for a mother with a young family than for a grandfather. I think most of us mentally use our own age as a gage to determine when we think someone is too young to die. At 33 years of age Jesus was crucified…not too young to die?
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Gail;
-----Nothing is too young to die. Technically, any living thing conceived is old enough to die. In fact, millions die shortly after conception, and millions more have been put to death before birth by a heartless society which almost raises to sainthood a child deceased after its birth. It is not age by which we apply our standards to the timeliness of death as much as it is by our own attachments, emotions, and perceptions. We walk around in this life overrating its significance because we over involve ourselves in the sensations of its physical nature and in our struggles to stay alive and in the company of those who are close to us. We only perceive death to be more appropriate for older folks because their approach to their allotted number of years gives us forewarning to begin our emotional preparation to detach.
-----But in its non-technical meaning, truly, “too young to die” is any death before rebirth. Those of us who are born again understand that the overwhelming majority of life exists in that spiritual dimension where God dwells with His perfect creatures. We can not experience it by taste, touch, sight, etc., but we can sense it by observing the effects of applying His holy principles to the events and situations of this minuscule, physical, dying dimension. And the more we ponder upon its timelessness, perfection, bliss, and presence of God, the more comfortable we become in stepping out of this life and into it. But only those who have been reborn will step into it.
-----Everyone else will remain locked in the trap of death. And if there is any such concept as too old not to have died, it would be Satan and his system of separation from God. For we live in the realm of separation from God that belongs to him. In as much as separation from God is death, we can understand that the very life we are living now, no matter how full it may seem, no matter that we might be reborn, is partial death. For we do not have the pleasure of God’s physical presence. And it is getting old.
-----I would completely envy those who have died out of this death at any age having been reborn, but for the fact that this life of death is an unique time in all eternity. For while we live in its flow toward utter destruction, we have the once in an eternity chance to stand up straight and speak what is true and right and to live it against the currents of wrong, being messages for Jesus and His Father, effecting any around us we can however we are able, and advancing in spirit more than in age. A struggle it is! And the hardships of swimming upstream are continuous. But the chance to do it in this short allotment of time is precious. By that standard I view “too young to die”.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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