2 Chronicles 34:27-28 “Because your heart was responsive and you humbled yourself before God when you heard what he spoke against this place and its people, and because you humbled yourself before me and tore your robes and wept in my presence, I have heard you, declares the Lord. Now I will gather you to your fathers, and you will be buried in peace. Your eyes will not see all the disaster I am going to bring on this place and on those who live here.”

As verse 28 indicates, this is one of several places in the Bible where people are rewarded for their faithfulness with death. We have a lot of trouble with that! We forget that, as Paul said, “I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far.” (Philippians 1:23) Our focus is almost exclusively temporal, and so we see death as entirely negative. I am no advocate for suicide or euthanasia, but we need to realize that this life is no more than a prelude to eternity. It is an opportunity to experience God’s grace and love and commit ourselves to Him in faith, but even a hundred-year lifespan is no more than an instant compared to eternity. Paul wrote about this a good bit, and as he said, “We do not want you to be ignorant about those who fall asleep, or to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope.” (1 Thessalonians 4:13) When we understand that Jesus didn’t die and then rise again just for himself, but so as to conquer death itself for all who believe, then death loses its terror completely. Those who are left behind do suffer loneliness, at least to a degree, and grief itself is real and not to be put down, but there many times when, for the one dying, death is a huge victory. We act and pray as though we don’t believe that, because all too often that’s the case! Our goal should be, not to live a long time necessarily, but however long we live, to hear our Lord say, “’Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!” (Matthew 25:21, 23) When that is the case, then physical death is a glorious celebration indeed!

My strong shift to this way of thinking happened when my father went to the Lord after heart surgery at 64, and my first, honest reaction was, “He won’t have to retire.” I was terribly lonely about it, having had about 2½ months of genuine fellowship with him as adult to adult, but I knew that it was glory indeed for him. Since then I have lost count of how many people I have “seen off,” and I have seen a wide variety of responses to death. Faith makes all the difference in the world! At 75, this is a far more immediate anticipation for me than it was at 26 when my father graduated, but it is not a sad one at all. My wife has quite a list of physical issues, and there have been specific prophecies that she would go first. That is certainly not anything I look forward to, but I know that when it happens, she will be liberated from all those physical issues, and I am not to begrudge her that. I have no doubt whatsoever as to her destination, or mine. She had a foretaste of heaven when her heart stopped at 27, but the Lord had mercy on me and our daughters and sent her back. That wasn’t the easy course for her, though! I am certainly grateful to have been able to live with her all the years since, and she has touched countless people with the love of God. For her and for me, the question is simply when the Lord will say, “That’s enough. Come on home.” Like for Josiah in today’s passage, that will be a reward.

Father, thank You for this reminder. Thank You for the privilege of being able to walk with You all these years, in spite of my many failures. I pray that I would be faithful indeed, making full use of all the time You give me in this body, so that Your purposes for me may be accomplished on Your schedule for Your glory. Thank You. Praise God!