Tracked down to a site called www.demotivation.us, this terrific cartoon recently appeared in my inbox. Wish I knew the artist, because he or she gets it in a way that few Americans do.
 
The truth is, many of us living in Row 4 or this cartoon act like we’re still in Row 2, doing all we can to maintain our youthful vigor, looks and attitude. We diet routinely and work out at costly gyms; have our hair dyed and highlighted to banish the gray; invest in expensive face creams and even undergo injections or surgeries to stamp out the wrinkles; shop expansively for clothing that’s flattering and at least a little hip; read all the latest best-sellers on both the fiction and non-fiction sides of the aisle; and keep ourselves constantly busy, ideally with cultural events or cutting-edge entertainment or exotic hobbies to sharpen our conversational repertoire.
 
The trouble is, preoccupied as we are with all this frenetic activity, we fail to think deeply about the future captured so perfectly in this cartoon – especially about that last frame.
 
But Death Comes as the End, as Agatha Christie so famously titled her lone historical whodunit.  And we may be headed towards eternal tragedy if we fail to plan for it by seeking out, and responding to, the truth about eternity.
 
The good news is that, as long as we have breath, it’s not too late to do precisely that. And the resources needed to streamline our search have never been more plentiful or more readily accessible.
 
So if you aren’t sure of your ultimate destiny, why put it off another day? Set aside the best-sellers and Must See TV shows for a few weeks or months and educate yourself about eternity. You will be forever grateful that you took the time to do so. 

I’ve been an avid student of death notices since my mother died in May of 2000 – a habit that’s one of just two reasons that we still get the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel twice a week (the other being the hilarious comic strip Get Fuzzy). 

I read these notices for several reasons. Natch, I want to see if anyone I know has died. But I also want to see if there’s any hint about whether each departed soul will be spending a Christ-filled or Christ-free eternity. 

There are no guarantees, of course, especially considering that few of the people featured here have written their own obituaries. In my mother’s case, for example, my oldest sister let me direct its writing by our funeral home rep. Being unsaved, I selected the ubiquitous phrase “born to eternal life” only as a nod to wishful thinking; and it never occurred to me to mention that she had considered herself a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ. I suspect that’s often the case these days, especially with the elderly who no longer have a church home to keep the connection fresh in the minds of unbelieving survivors. 

Still, many obituaries provide some clues about the dead person’s current location. Certainly explicit language about the individual going home to his Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is a good sign, as is active membership in a solid Christian church. But of course only the Lord knows an individual’s heart, and whether he or she is His child. 

Which brings me to the other major reason I am such a faithful reader of our local death notices: The only real tragedy in this life is spending the next – which is to say all eternity – separated from the Lord, in what He described as “outer darkness” where “there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 8:12). 

Reading the death notices reminds me of how many people are apparently headed towards this end, because they refused the Lord’s gift of eternal life – a gift requiring only that we repent of what He has said is sin, and trust in Him to have paid our sin debt on the cross. It reminds me to pray for the lost, to ask for the Lord to use today’s sorrow to produce tomorrow’s new believers, and to redouble my personal efforts to reach those who have yet to make Christ their own.

It's easy to become discouraged about what's happening in this country, to mourn the passing of what was once a very special nation rooted in the word of God and the gospel of Jesus Christ. 

It helps to put things into the perspective of what was truly the most blessed nation of all time, ancient Israel. Anyone who has ever read through the Old Testament has no doubt seen the parallels between then and now. Consider just a few:

Then: They burned their sons and daughters as sacrifices to their gods (Deuteronomy 12:31, for instance)

Now: We sacrifice our children to the god of this world, and the god of convenience, in federally funded abortion mills across the land

Then: They worshipped useless idols. As Isaiah said (46:7), "They lift it to their shoulders, they carry it, they set it in its place, and it stands there; it cannot move from its place. If one cries to it, it does not answer or save him from his trouble."
 
Now: Instead of the living God, we worship our own useless idols. Whether that means celebrities or money, work or education, friends or family, patriotism or religious ritual, none of it is of any help in times of trouble. 

Then: They entered into ungodly alliances, trusting in other nations rather than the Lord God. Isaiah 31 says, "Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, And rely on horses, Who trust in chariots because they are many, And in horsemen because they are very strong, but who do not look to the Holy One of Israel, Nor seek the Lord!"

Now: Trust in unholy alliances is rampant, starting with the UN. Check out the headlines of the day; really, only the names and the weapons of war have changed.

Then: They pursued sexual abominations. "Though they know God's decree that those who practice such things deserve to die," says Romans 1, a New Testament book commenting on practices almost as old as man himself, "they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them." 

Now: Where to begin? How about we just say that the day is coming when biblical Christianity will be forced into the closet; the wheels are already in motion in Massachusetts.  

And that's just a peek into a few of the parallels. If you think what's happening today is sad beyond words, take comfort in the fact that God gave His chosen people the freedom to destroy their land. Fortunately, we know the ending and the news is good for those who repent and trust in Him!

Updated from a 9/13 post

A darling great-niece just sent me this amazing poem by Corrie Ten Boom – the Dutch Christian who famously hid Jews from the Nazis, suffered for her “crimes” in the Ravensbruck concentration camp new Berlin, and lived to tell her story in The Hiding Place.
 
The Tapestry

​My life is but a weaving
between my Lord and me;
I cannot choose the colors,
He worketh steadily.
Oft times he weaveth sorrow,
and I, in foolish pride,
forget he sees the upper
and I the underside.
 
Not ‘til the loom is silent
and the shuttles cease to fly,
shall God unroll the canvas
and explain the reason why.
The dark threads are as needful
in the Weaver’s skillful hands,
as the threads of gold and silver
in the pattern He has planned.
 
I’ve often tried to express this thought, even using the tapestry analogy, but never as clearly as Corrie did in just 84 simple words.
 
Nor have I ever come close to explaining this idea as concisely as the apostle Paul did in Romans 8:28: “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.”
 
In 1 Timothy 2:3b-4, Paul added that “God our Savior … desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” And maybe that’s the larger point: The undersides of our tapestries may look dull or even hideous to us in this life, particularly as we approach its end – but the Lord is creating the precisely the image needed to bring each of us into His heavenly kingdom, safe and joy-filled forevermore.