During the past two years, the subject of death has confronted us in a powerful way. Over 4.5 million people worldwide have died from Covid19; indeed, in all probability, some joining us in our meditation today, will have experienced the reality of death within their own families. Our hearts and prayers embrace you in sincere sympathy today for your loss and trust that you will feel the healing presence of ‘the Father of mercies and God of all comfort’, 2 Corinthians chapter 1 verse 3.

It is thought-provoking to consider some of the expressions used to describe ‘death’ by various characters in the Bible. When king David spoke of it to his son, Solomon, who was about to succeed him as king of Israel, instead of simply saying that he was about to die, he said, ‘I GO THE WAY OF ALL THE EARTH; be thou strong, therefore, and prove yourself a man’, 1 Kings chapter 2 verse 2. We often think of death as something that happens to everyone else but not to me. The truth is that, since sin invaded God’s world, it has become a reality for us ALL, without exception! Satan, in the form of the serpent, said to Eve, ‘You will NOT surely die’, Genesis chapter 3 verse 4. How deceitful and wrong he was!

God had made it clear to Adam, ‘But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it, YOU SHALL SURELY DIE’, Genesis chapter 2 verse 17. Have you faced up to the reality that one day you, like all those before and after you, will leave this world by way of death? The Bible says that ‘it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment’, Hebrews chapter 9 verse 27.