Saturday, January 24, 2009

Lesson From Tylenol

When I was about eleven years old, I accidentally took a small overdose of Tylenol. Convinced that I had just inadvertently ended my own life, I fled to my room, slammed the door, flung myself on my purple cushioned rocking chair, and proceeded to sob melodramatically for the next several hours.

I vividly remember when Mom cracked open the door and settled down next to me. (In spite of her obvious concern, it occasionally looked like she was fighting a smile.) For a long time, she attempted to gently reassure me that I was going to be fine, but I only buried my face in the cushions and countered her with vehemence.

Then, in half-exasperation: “One day, Lindsey, you will die. And if you did know that you were going to die soon, I hope you wouldn’t spend your last days sobbing here in your room. I hope you’d be busy loving God and loving other people.” 

That made me stop sniffling instantly, of course— to start glaring.  

Towards the end of the day, when red and puffy eyes were the only thing observably wrong with me, I finally began to believe Mom: maybe I was going to live. Looking back, the story makes me laugh hard. In spite of my glares, however, Mom's simple comment stuck fast with me for months. Under the realization that I could die at any age, how should I act? 

I have an unusual challenge for you this week. Some would call it gruesome or unnecessary, but the Scriptures equate it with wisdom.

Dwell on death.

Not generally or lightly, but specifically and seriously. Envision your own death. The deaths of your family members. The deaths of your friends, co-workers, and acquaintances.

Not just once, or for a couple seconds in passing— once a day isn’t too often to set aside time for these contemplations. The exercise won’t be effective unless we actually dwell on dying long enough for it to radically, deeply penetrate our minds.

C.S. Lewis wryly noted that “100% of the population dies, and the number cannot be increased.” That is the simple, unmitigated truth. And it desperately needs to sink in.

We all know—theoretically—that death is certain, unpredictable, and near. That’s a given. But do we live like people who have embraced its reality?

Or, instead, do our lives reflect the secret mindset that death is still far off—intangible—relatively senseless to dwell on? Isn’t it true that we easily delude ourselves with security, fantasizing that the tragedies we hear of must somehow be the exclusive fates of other people or characters in fiction?

All too often, we willfully gloss over the most essential fact about this life: that it ends, and ends abruptly. And when we do, the proof is scrawled across every page of our lives. If death is laid aside from our day-to-day thoughts, we cannot expect our heavenly mission to remain uncompromised.

Not Morbid, Not Fearful— Fruitful

Jonathan Edwards, one of my greatest personal heroes of the faith, was a man determined to live every day of his life for the delight of God and his own joy.

At the age of nineteen, he began to write his famous Resolutions. The aim of these resolutions was to mold his life into God-exalting patterns of obedience; he re-read all seventy of the resolutions every week in careful self-examination. 

Jonathan’s life was characterized by fullness, passion, devotion, and glad service to the God he adored. Unsurprisingly, death played no small role in his thoughts.

7. Resolved, never to do anything, which I should be afraid to do, if it were the last hour of my life.
9. Resolved, to think much on all occasions of my own dying, and of the common circumstances which attend death.
17. Resolved, that I will live so, as I shall wish I had done when I come to die.
50. Resolved, I will act so as I think I shall judge would have been best, and most prudent, when I come into the future world.
52. I frequently hear persons in old age, say how they would live, if they were to live their lives over again: Resolved, that I will live just so as I can think I shall wish I had done, supposing I live to old age.

Jonathan lived by a radically different rule: in the light of imminent death, and the joy of eternity. God took him at the age of 55 in 1758, after receiving the experimental smallpox vaccination— arguably the most influential theologian America has ever seen.

Jonathan was not the first, however. David and Moses preceded him, with the same cries for wisdom:

“Show me, O Lord, my life’s end and the number of my days; let me know how fleeting is my life. You have made my days a mere handbreadth; the span of my years is as nothing before You. Each man’s life is but a breath” (Psalm 39, “A Psalm of David”).

“You turn men back to dust, saying, “Return to dust, O sons of men.” You sweep men away in the sleep of death; they are like the new grass of the morning—though in the morning it springs up new, by evening it is dry and withered. The length of our days is seventy years—or eighty, if we have the strength; yet their span is but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away. Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom. Satisfy us in the morning with Your unfailing love, that we may sing for joy and be glad all our days” (Psalm 90, “A Prayer of Moses the man of God”).

Note those adjectives—fleeting, nothing, quickly passing. Withering grass. A mere breath. Do we view each day in the same terms?

To those mindful of death, life looks more like this:

Every opportunity to encourage another is grasped at eagerly. Action is a granted; banished is the inclination to languish in apathy, squandering the Master’s time and resources on ourselves. Strife and selfishness are the epitome of 'ridiculous'. Little wounds are instantly forgiven and forgotten. Patience flourishes.  

The world possesses the flavor of “home” less and less— heaven has the greater sense of permanence and solidity. Longing for the joy of seeing Christ face-to-face abounds, and all earthly pleasures pale in comparison with Him. Passionate evangelism is a natural reflex, overflowing from delight in the gospel and deep compassion for those who do not know the living Hope.

In fact, it’s exactly as my mom told me when I was eleven. To the dying Christian—current medical condition or not— two things must be crystallized above everything else in priority:  

And He replied, "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'

There’s no other way to truly live.