GOING HOME

Pt. 1

My wife and I were watching an English movie on NetFlix the other night. I forget the name of it, but it involved an elderly husband and wife, and the latter of the two was contending with a diagnosis of Stage 4 inoperable cancer. And although “Marge” was given the option of additional radiation treatments, she was told that this would only prolong “the evitable.”

And as you might expect, as the movie progresses, the disease does the same, and Marge finds herself walking the only sure and certain pathway common to every man, woman and child who has ever, and will ever live on this tiny blue marble.

In one poignant scene “Harry” and Marge are lying together in bed. By now Marge is in the last throes of the little time still remaining to her. And as she leans her head into the crook of Harry’s neck and shoulder, my wife says exactly the same thing I find myself thinking at the moment.

“You know, that will be us one day.”

Uhhhh! What a thunderously poignant consideration!

I stood by the gurney upon which my father lay after he had been transported, unresponsive, to the hospital, and I heard my mother say, “Henry, you can finally meet the mother you never knew.” I was at my mother’s bedside when she passed away a few years later. I will spare you the details, but I vividly recall that day long experience.


Pt. 2

Of course, over the course of the last couple of decades, as my parents and parent’s in law “shuffled off this mortar coil,” I have been all too aware that one generation precedes another, and, in turn, one generation follows another. And given that dynamic, I have often thought about the questions and subsequent answers which we find in scripture.

In Job 14:14 we read, “If a man die, will he live again?”

(The answer)?

“It is appointed unto man once to die, and after that the judgement.” (Hebrews 9:27)

Obviously, the implication of the last four words of the previous verse is that we will all be alive on the other side of this life, and we will all, in turn, stand before our Maker.

And as a believer, I have absolutely no fear of death, and what comes afterwards, since I have entrusted my soul to a faithful Savior, and I am convinced that He has a wonderful home for me in which I will dwell, and where I will be privileged to look into His lovely face forever.

However, I think it’s the “getting there” which is, as they say, “the rub.” I never thought about the process of dying when I was a child, or adolescent or young adult. I just didn’t. Sure, a couple of my classmates died during high school, and several during my young adult years. But I was too busy living to spend much time contemplating the brevity of life.

However, at this stage of my life, I am looking into a proverbial sunset. And not unlike a literal one, it is though the western horizon is lit with the oranges and reds, and gradually deepening shadows so reminiscent of that portion of the day.


Pt. 3

My wife served as a visiting hospice nurse for several years, and has, as you might imagine, been in the presence of death numerous times, and watched many of her patients take their last breath, and go on to their eternal reward; (or the lack thereof).

As her husband, only one of her patients is truly memorable, since, of course, I never accompanied her when she did home visits.

However, “as I was going about my business” one day, I received a call from Jean, and she asked if I would mind singing a song to one of her patients. “Jonathan” was apparently a Christian, and, no doubt, my wife had told him that her husband would be glad to sing to him.

Of course, I acquiesced. How could I do otherwise? And, while I don’t recall greeting the man, nor telling him, “goodbye,” when I was done, I held the phone close to my lips, and proceeded to sing, “Amazing Grace” to this deserving soul.

“Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound

That saved a wretch like me

I once was lost, but now I’m found

Was blind, but now I see”

My wife told me later that as I sang this ageless hymn, “Mr. Johnson’s” feeble little arms gradually lifted from the bed on which he lay, and it seemed he mouthed the words along with me.

When it comes to this subject, I have often made the statement,

“We all get our turn.”

And, indeed, we will. But when it comes to those months, or weeks, or days or moments in which we will find ourselves in the real-life roles of Harry and Marge, the movie characters of whom I previously wrote, I think we can trust our risen Lord to help us, as we navigate the final pathway of life.

I recently tended a sparrow with a broken wing which had fallen from its nest. And I could not help but think of the statement of our Lord in Mathew Chapter 10. And it comforts me that if God is aware of the falling of some of the smallest of His creations, He is all too aware of the passing of His noblest creation.

I believe, and I am sure that He will give His angels charge over you and me, as we bid ‘farewell” to this life, and we say ‘hello’ to the next.

by William McDonald, PhD. Copyright pending

If you would like to copy, share or 'save' please include the credit line, above