The Angel Convoy
Not surprisingly, given the events of the past year in our community, I've heard more questions and more answers about matters of life and death than usual. Some of the answers I've heard have generated additional questions in my mind. I have become a little suspicious of absolute certainty in the face of death--certainty both about the sovereignty of God and the role of Satan in death, and yet, I acknowledge the truth of both matters. I sometimes feel like scenes from my own life 17-25 years ago are being played back to me now, with slight variations. Then, I was a mother, trying to explain death to my young children. Now, I am the child, and my Heavenly Parent is explaining things to me.
"God was right there," I remember saying to Joel primarily, because Shane and Grant were still very young. "I think Daniel saw Jesus right away, out there on the highway. He was ready to take Daniel to heaven as soon as he died." Joel was about six years old, and Daniel, the father of our children's playmates, had died instantly in a traffic accident.
Sometime later, when our children were probably about 8, 10, and 13, I felt compelled one day to make sure my children don't blame God for death. I wanted them to see God as a loving Father, and not to be angry with God when a person dies. "Death was Satan's idea," I said, "not God's." I went on to say again that God is always "right there" when one of his children dies, and He carries that person straight to heaven. God is more powerful than Satan, and when Satan tries to do something bad, God can actually turn it into something good. Taking someone to heaven is one of the good things that happens when a child or a Christian dies." It was only a little later when Shane's dearest friend, Andrew, died instantly in an accident. I have always believed that God was preparing us for Andrew's death before it happened.
I remember asking Shane within the first few minutes of his hearing of Andrew's death, "Who caused Andrew's death?" and "What happened as soon as Andrew died?" Shane was crying brokenheartedly, but he remembered what I had told him, and verbalized the "right" answers.
What is my Heavenly Parent telling me now? Basically, I think He's saying to me what I've been saying to my children: Satan causes death, but God is always "right there" and carries his children straight to heaven, and God can make something good out of the bad things Satan does.
I'm hearing something beyond that, however. Overwhelmingly, I sense the need for humility. Much about death remains a mystery. In a private note to one of my students--who is also the writer's great-niece, Paul W. Nisly (author of Sweeping Up the Heart), said he prefers to concentrate on caring for those who suffer when a death occurs, rather than to presume to explain things in terms of the sovereignty of God, or presumably, any other one-size-fits-all answer. He believes there is much that we simply cannot know. When a retired career Mennonite professor and pastor and former Kansas Beachy man says he doesn't understand all these things, I feel OK about saying I don't understand either. What I still want to learn to do better is to care for those who are hurting. That is a safe place to concentrate my drive for "more" in this matter of coping with and formulating a response to death.
Wesley, the principal at our school, often speaks of death in kinder terms than I usually hear elsewhere. He references verses like this: "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints." Psalm 115:16. He reads out loud to the students "Go Down Death" by James Weldon Johnson, which ends with
"Weep not--weep not,
She is not dead;
She's resting in the bosom of Jesus."
In short, Wesley sees much of God's benevolence in death, and is troubled by too much attention being given to Satan when a death occurs. I see some wisdom in this stance, since it is God we must go on walking with if we are ever to come to terms with grief and tragedy, and a predisposition to seeing God's kindness and mercy can help us turn quickly to our source of healing and help. Rehearsing the role of Satan in death has no such redemptive potential that I can see.
One of the questions I've been plagued with in recent months is how one ever comes to peace about a death if there is preoccupation with doing things "just so" in faith that a prompt bodily resurrection will take place. If I had an inclination to ask such a thing of God, I can imagine myself endlessly second-guessing what happened, if a resurrection failed to materialize before my eyes. Was there a lack of faith? Was there a glitch in the technique? Was this person of no further use on earth? Or--dangerous questions here--is God not as powerful as we've believed him to be, or is Satan more powerful than we've believed him to be? Here's where the humility needs to kick in, and all hubris needs to be laid aside, before the questions degenerate into silliness or downright heresy and unbelief. For me, a settledness about the sovereignty of God provides rest--no matter if I can explain every detail of it or not. Faith in Who God is suffices. Perhaps expecting death to be as final a separation from earth dwellers as we usually experience it to be is actually a greater blessing than alternative expectations, at least if finding rest is important.
I believe that the physical death of a believer is promptly followed by a spiritual resurrection and is, in some sense I don't claim to fully understand, followed eventually by a physical resurrection. I do know personally, however, of what can only be termed a prompt physical resurrection. It happened to my aunt by marriage--Uncle Mahlon's wife, Fannie. She was stricken several years ago with Guillian-Barre Syndrome, and deteriorated extremely fast before they figured out what the problem was. After she reached the hospital, and while her physician son was there, her heart stopped beating. Since there was no "Do not resuscitate" (DNR) order in place, the usual "Code Blue" procedures kicked in and she was revived. In that interval, however, between "death" and resuscitation, ten or 15 minutes of time elapsed. She recovered her physical health very slowly, and the doctor in the family often lamented the absence of a DNR, believing that having allowed her to die might have been a kindness. Eventually, however, she recovered almost completely. At 81, she appears to be in reasonably good health.
To my knowledge, no one anywhere has used Aunt Fannie's experience as a launching pad for claiming knowledge of revolutionary truths or techniques--old or new--that must now be studied and discussed and embraced. What seems obvious to me is that God chose to grant Fannie life again, and standard medical procedures provided the vehicle. That explanation works for me, and I have no reservations about celebrating the goodness of God in the matter, and no particular convictions about whether "technique" mattered in the outcome.
I couple this understanding with something we heard in church last Sunday from several people who spoke publicly--Matthew, on the tragedy when there is a paucity of wonder at Bible truth that is familiar and timely, Oren, on substituting this (a sense of wonder at the familiar) for a preoccupation with what is novel and exciting, and Nathan, in a testimony of healing after a health crisis last year. He requested anointing, and has subsequently been delivered from fear of further health crises, while enjoying good health during the past year. The gist of what I'm seeing is that when our "wonder antennae" are functional, what is already present right under our noses is immensely satisfying, and even exciting, and we need not dash about, looking for something better. I'll let my nephew, Hans Mast, elaborate on such matters, as he did in a Facebook post several days ago:
"For there will be a time when people will not tolerate sound teaching. Instead, following their own desires, they will accumulate teachers for themselves, because they have an insatiable curiosity to hear new things."
--2 Timothy 4:3, NET
I used to think that this verse was talking about liberal heretics. Then the devotional and sermon last Sunday were about it and I read it in the NET and for the first time realized what "itching ears" meant. Now I realize it's talking about me.
As conservative Mennonites, we've at many times been not curious enough about what the Bible says. We have accepted traditions as a sufficient interpreter of Scripture.
I've rejected that view and swung to the opposite extreme, wanting to dig deeply into Scripture and understand it thoroughly. Many others have done the same. I am grateful for that viewpoint and still consider it basically right.
However, I've seen the malady of this verse afflict us. We're so ADD for new, shiny, exciting things. Learning new things can quickly become the point instead of retaining and living truth. We learn more and more about increasingly inane, relatively worthless bits of trivia about the Bible. In fact, in our eagerness to find shiny new theological concepts, we end up manufacturing patterns and connections and ideas that are not present in the Bible. And we actually end up with error. Because truth is no longer our objective, but rather our objective is scratching the discovery itch.
Thanks MatthewAndrea Nisly and Oren Yoder for expressing some of these thoughts and sparking the rest."
I honor teachers and love to learn, but I do not feel a need for "accumulating teachers for [myself]" to satisfy "an insatiable curiosity to hear new things" that "come around" or "go around" while the Word of God stands unchanged and unassailable. I am content to leave some things in the category of mystery, and, for the rest, I'm satisfied with what I already know, and with what God will teach me in the process of turning to Him and to my church brothers and sisters with my questions. In the event of facing my own death, I hope to remember the sentiments in the words of the hymn that has been coursing through my mind all day:
Death shall not destroy my comfort,
Christ shall guide me through the gloom;
Down He'll send some angel convoy
To convey my spirit home.
Soon with angels I'll be marching
With bright glory on my brow;
Who will share my blissful portion,
Who will love my Savior now?
"God was right there," I remember saying to Joel primarily, because Shane and Grant were still very young. "I think Daniel saw Jesus right away, out there on the highway. He was ready to take Daniel to heaven as soon as he died." Joel was about six years old, and Daniel, the father of our children's playmates, had died instantly in a traffic accident.
Sometime later, when our children were probably about 8, 10, and 13, I felt compelled one day to make sure my children don't blame God for death. I wanted them to see God as a loving Father, and not to be angry with God when a person dies. "Death was Satan's idea," I said, "not God's." I went on to say again that God is always "right there" when one of his children dies, and He carries that person straight to heaven. God is more powerful than Satan, and when Satan tries to do something bad, God can actually turn it into something good. Taking someone to heaven is one of the good things that happens when a child or a Christian dies." It was only a little later when Shane's dearest friend, Andrew, died instantly in an accident. I have always believed that God was preparing us for Andrew's death before it happened.
I remember asking Shane within the first few minutes of his hearing of Andrew's death, "Who caused Andrew's death?" and "What happened as soon as Andrew died?" Shane was crying brokenheartedly, but he remembered what I had told him, and verbalized the "right" answers.
What is my Heavenly Parent telling me now? Basically, I think He's saying to me what I've been saying to my children: Satan causes death, but God is always "right there" and carries his children straight to heaven, and God can make something good out of the bad things Satan does.
I'm hearing something beyond that, however. Overwhelmingly, I sense the need for humility. Much about death remains a mystery. In a private note to one of my students--who is also the writer's great-niece, Paul W. Nisly (author of Sweeping Up the Heart), said he prefers to concentrate on caring for those who suffer when a death occurs, rather than to presume to explain things in terms of the sovereignty of God, or presumably, any other one-size-fits-all answer. He believes there is much that we simply cannot know. When a retired career Mennonite professor and pastor and former Kansas Beachy man says he doesn't understand all these things, I feel OK about saying I don't understand either. What I still want to learn to do better is to care for those who are hurting. That is a safe place to concentrate my drive for "more" in this matter of coping with and formulating a response to death.
Wesley, the principal at our school, often speaks of death in kinder terms than I usually hear elsewhere. He references verses like this: "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints." Psalm 115:16. He reads out loud to the students "Go Down Death" by James Weldon Johnson, which ends with
"Weep not--weep not,
She is not dead;
She's resting in the bosom of Jesus."
In short, Wesley sees much of God's benevolence in death, and is troubled by too much attention being given to Satan when a death occurs. I see some wisdom in this stance, since it is God we must go on walking with if we are ever to come to terms with grief and tragedy, and a predisposition to seeing God's kindness and mercy can help us turn quickly to our source of healing and help. Rehearsing the role of Satan in death has no such redemptive potential that I can see.
One of the questions I've been plagued with in recent months is how one ever comes to peace about a death if there is preoccupation with doing things "just so" in faith that a prompt bodily resurrection will take place. If I had an inclination to ask such a thing of God, I can imagine myself endlessly second-guessing what happened, if a resurrection failed to materialize before my eyes. Was there a lack of faith? Was there a glitch in the technique? Was this person of no further use on earth? Or--dangerous questions here--is God not as powerful as we've believed him to be, or is Satan more powerful than we've believed him to be? Here's where the humility needs to kick in, and all hubris needs to be laid aside, before the questions degenerate into silliness or downright heresy and unbelief. For me, a settledness about the sovereignty of God provides rest--no matter if I can explain every detail of it or not. Faith in Who God is suffices. Perhaps expecting death to be as final a separation from earth dwellers as we usually experience it to be is actually a greater blessing than alternative expectations, at least if finding rest is important.
I believe that the physical death of a believer is promptly followed by a spiritual resurrection and is, in some sense I don't claim to fully understand, followed eventually by a physical resurrection. I do know personally, however, of what can only be termed a prompt physical resurrection. It happened to my aunt by marriage--Uncle Mahlon's wife, Fannie. She was stricken several years ago with Guillian-Barre Syndrome, and deteriorated extremely fast before they figured out what the problem was. After she reached the hospital, and while her physician son was there, her heart stopped beating. Since there was no "Do not resuscitate" (DNR) order in place, the usual "Code Blue" procedures kicked in and she was revived. In that interval, however, between "death" and resuscitation, ten or 15 minutes of time elapsed. She recovered her physical health very slowly, and the doctor in the family often lamented the absence of a DNR, believing that having allowed her to die might have been a kindness. Eventually, however, she recovered almost completely. At 81, she appears to be in reasonably good health.
To my knowledge, no one anywhere has used Aunt Fannie's experience as a launching pad for claiming knowledge of revolutionary truths or techniques--old or new--that must now be studied and discussed and embraced. What seems obvious to me is that God chose to grant Fannie life again, and standard medical procedures provided the vehicle. That explanation works for me, and I have no reservations about celebrating the goodness of God in the matter, and no particular convictions about whether "technique" mattered in the outcome.
I couple this understanding with something we heard in church last Sunday from several people who spoke publicly--Matthew, on the tragedy when there is a paucity of wonder at Bible truth that is familiar and timely, Oren, on substituting this (a sense of wonder at the familiar) for a preoccupation with what is novel and exciting, and Nathan, in a testimony of healing after a health crisis last year. He requested anointing, and has subsequently been delivered from fear of further health crises, while enjoying good health during the past year. The gist of what I'm seeing is that when our "wonder antennae" are functional, what is already present right under our noses is immensely satisfying, and even exciting, and we need not dash about, looking for something better. I'll let my nephew, Hans Mast, elaborate on such matters, as he did in a Facebook post several days ago:
"For there will be a time when people will not tolerate sound teaching. Instead, following their own desires, they will accumulate teachers for themselves, because they have an insatiable curiosity to hear new things."
--2 Timothy 4:3, NET
I used to think that this verse was talking about liberal heretics. Then the devotional and sermon last Sunday were about it and I read it in the NET and for the first time realized what "itching ears" meant. Now I realize it's talking about me.
As conservative Mennonites, we've at many times been not curious enough about what the Bible says. We have accepted traditions as a sufficient interpreter of Scripture.
I've rejected that view and swung to the opposite extreme, wanting to dig deeply into Scripture and understand it thoroughly. Many others have done the same. I am grateful for that viewpoint and still consider it basically right.
However, I've seen the malady of this verse afflict us. We're so ADD for new, shiny, exciting things. Learning new things can quickly become the point instead of retaining and living truth. We learn more and more about increasingly inane, relatively worthless bits of trivia about the Bible. In fact, in our eagerness to find shiny new theological concepts, we end up manufacturing patterns and connections and ideas that are not present in the Bible. And we actually end up with error. Because truth is no longer our objective, but rather our objective is scratching the discovery itch.
Thanks MatthewAndrea Nisly and Oren Yoder for expressing some of these thoughts and sparking the rest."
I honor teachers and love to learn, but I do not feel a need for "accumulating teachers for [myself]" to satisfy "an insatiable curiosity to hear new things" that "come around" or "go around" while the Word of God stands unchanged and unassailable. I am content to leave some things in the category of mystery, and, for the rest, I'm satisfied with what I already know, and with what God will teach me in the process of turning to Him and to my church brothers and sisters with my questions. In the event of facing my own death, I hope to remember the sentiments in the words of the hymn that has been coursing through my mind all day:
Death shall not destroy my comfort,
Christ shall guide me through the gloom;
Down He'll send some angel convoy
To convey my spirit home.
Soon with angels I'll be marching
With bright glory on my brow;
Who will share my blissful portion,
Who will love my Savior now?
posted by Mrs. I (Miriam Iwashige) at
11:47 AM
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