“He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”
Revelation 21:4
“And the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.”
Ecclesiastes 12:7
“A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;”
Ecclesiastes 3:2
Every man approaches death with every day that he lives. We have been physically dying from the start of life. At some point we truly realize the reality of our approaching death and we are forced to come to grips with it. Whether or not we actually do get a grip on the truth of it is up to us.
Most people never get a grip, so they ignore death, treating it as something afar off and never preparing for the day when they must die. Every day, we as men have to prepare for the reality of our death. There is nothing we can do to avoid this engagement. We have a few years to gain mastery over our mind, to command our thoughts towards life and death and then to live a noble life. It is difficult to act rightly if we are constantly overwhelmed by fear of death.
Old people say that young people do not consider death.
I consider mine every day, multiple times per day, and you should as well. You must consider your death every day without fail and try to understand how limited your time is. This will keep you focused because you know there is only so much life to live, after which you must give an account of how you used your time. In reality the old are the ones who do not consider death and spend much of their remaining life fighting to delay the inevitable end. Also, many people live as if they were already dead. Their lives are in a state of death. The robotic lifestyle of most religious individuals is a representation of this fact.
We decay as we live by the process of aging, and we spend a fortune trying to delay this aging. Every kind of skin product and every “special” diet are tools people try to use to preserve their youth. No man accepts how he ages, he always wishes to stop it or slow it down. Every attempt to slow aging is just action taken because of the fear of death. We fear death because we do not know what lies beyond it.
As Christians we hope there is an afterlife, but do not be confused, no one has died and then come back to tell us what is really on the other side.
This is why it still requires an element of faith to be a Christian and have a hope for the promise of life beyond death. Christians do not want to hear this, they think you can know for sure what lies beyond the doors of death. If that is true and you can know what happens after death, why are we still afraid of dying?
We want to think that we have been told exactly what will happen upon death, but really, we still do not know, and this is why we are afraid. This explains why we have “hope” regarding the afterlife and not “knowledge”. If we knew what was coming, there would be no need for faith.
We believe that the Word of God has been revealed to us and in it are descriptions of a paradisiacal afterlife. This not only gives us hope beyond this present life, but lessens the fear of death for some men.
Death can spring out of any place at any time and snatch us from this life.
Often we make the mistake of assuming we have time on our side. We never think that we will be a casualty in a car accident, or that we will die in some ridiculous event that had a 0.1% chance of happening. We always think we will live to a ripe old age and pass away in our sleep. This is not the case, our time could be over today. This could be your very last day on the earth. As you put down this book and get ready to head to work, you could be T-boned by a semi that ran a red light and be killed instantly.
That is a dark idea to meditate on, but it is a possibility. A car wreck that kills you is a small possibility, but still something that happens to random individuals every day. They only had a “small possibility” of being killed in a wreck too. And how many of them planned on and prepared for their death that day?
We must also meditate on the fact that our loved ones will die, this is an even darker thought.
The thought of the death of our wives or parents is very dark and brings tears to the eyes, but that is a day that is coming and we must prepare for it. Even if they live to a ripe old age, they will likely die before you, and you must be ready to handle that sorrow. Your wife may die before you. Your partner for life may be snatched from you before you are prepared.
This is one of the highest points of human suffering, to lose those we love to the abyss of death, not knowing where they are or if they are okay because “God Judges the heart” (1 Samuel 16:7). We as Christians believe they are in paradise, but we still fear because we do not know exactly where they are in space and time. This is a natural fear, it does not project lack of faith.
We must be mentally ready to handle a funeral and final goodbyes to our family members.
We must be equipped to handle the sorrow while still conducting ourselves like men on that day. The most masculine men I have ever known have been ones who lose their wife and yet are still at the worship service the very next Sunday. They do not take time off from their highest responsibility to grieve or be sorrowful, there is plenty of time for that. They mourn publicly, grieve at home, and maintain their faith to the highest caliber.
Death is more real than anything we experience. Death is the only thing we cannot avoid. We can cancel meetings and appointments. We can delay, postpone and procrastinate about everything else in life, but we cannot delay death. It is coming for us all, and we must be ready mentally and spiritually for that day.
Mantra
Death comes to all men.
Application
Conquering the fear of death is a Long War. To begin with, you must think about death every day. Just bring it into your consciousness and accept the reality that this flesh is temporary. Eventually you will start to ask yourself questions about the nature of death and about what is beyond death, this is where you build your faith. You can either fear death and stop thinking about it, or you can use the reality of death as a way to motivate yourself into righteousness.
Accepting the reality that we do not have that much time left to live helps to keep us accountable to ourselves and to God.
When we get to this point in our thinking, death becomes a tool and is useful to us rather than something that promotes fear and dread. The only people who dread death are the people who do know what is coming after death, and that is all of us, regardless of what you hear in the religious world.
By meditating on your death, you bring yourself closer to the acceptance of it. We believe that death is not the end. Death should be the most perfect thing in the world to a Christian, because it means that man has put aside his flesh and has gone to a perfect world the likes of which could never be described through language. Paradise is on the horizon for the faithful follower of God.
After you come to grips with your own death, you must immediately turn your mind to the deaths of those you love, and conquer that fear.
For some people, the death of others is easy to accept while their own death is extremely difficult, and for others it is the reverse. Wherever you fall on the spectrum, you must follow the same pattern you used when fighting to accept your own death. You must meditate on the death of your family, because at any time they could be taken from you. How are you going to react if that happens? Will you be a man or will you die?
These applications are not dark and depressing. For some Christians they are sorrowful, but meditating on death gives you the ability and perspective necessary to be extremely thankful for your family while you still have them. Thinking about death makes it less likely that you are going to waste a saturday watching football for ten hours and will instead spend at least a small amount of time with your family, because you are acutely aware of the fact that your time with them could be over at any second.
The stoics used the thoughts of death to keep them grounded in reality and to help them live a good life.
“Memento mori” – a reminder of death.
Death is a tool to help men live a good life, as long as we as men are thinking about it properly.
Gain strength of the mind.
Remember that you will die.
Be a virtuous and righteous man.
Behave with honor and integrity.
Conduct yourselves like Men.
