by Timothy Keller, 2020
Short, little book on death by Tim Keller, based on a sermon he preached at Kathy’s sister’s funeral, Terry Hall, on 1/6/2018. First he talks about how we fear death. One reason we fear it is because we don’t see it any longer. Our medical establishment has made it so we live longer and when we die, we’re away from family in hospitals or nursing homes. “Medicine and science have relieved us of many causes of early death, and today the vast majority of people decline and die in hospitals and hospices, away from the eyes of others.”
“If people three thousand years ago had a problem with the denial of death, as Psalm 90 attests, then we have an infinitely greater one. Medical progress supports the illusion that death can be put off indefinitely. It is more rare than ever to find people who are, as the ancients were, reconciled to their own mortality.”
“A second reason that we today struggle so much with death is the secular age’s requirement of this-world meaning and fulfillment.”
“The human race as a whole can’t not fear and hate death. It is a unique and profound problem. Religion gave people tools to help in facing our most formidable foe, and modern secularism has not come up with anything to compensate for its loss.”
In the chapter, A Fear of Judgment, “Many have pointed out that today our society is as moralistic and judgmental as it ever has been. We live in a “call-out culture” in which people are categorized reductionistically to good or evil and then are publicly shamed until they lose jobs and community.”
“As McClay points out, human beings cannot abandon their moral reflexes–a belief in moral absolutes, in sin and judgment, and in the imposition of guilt and shame.”
“As a pastor I’ve spent many hours in the presence of dying people. As death approaches, people look back on their life and feel tremendous regret. The unbehagen, or deep dissatisfaction with oneself, comes to the fore. There may be guilt for things not said or done for loved ones, for apologies not made or received, for kindnesses refused or unkindnesses done and now beyond forgiveness, for wasted opportunities or even a wasted life.”
Under Our Champion, “Rather than living in fear of death, we should see it as spiritual smelling salts that will awaken us out of our false belief that we will live forever. When you are at a funeral, especially one for a friend or a loved one, listen to God speaking to you, telling you that everything in life is temporary except for His love. This is reality.”
“It’s in death that God says, “If I’m not your security, then you’ve got no security, because I’m the only thing that can’t be taken away from you. I will hold you in my everlasting arms. Every other set of arms will fail you, but I will never fail you.””
Right before Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, he wept. Jesus was grieved and angered by death. It goes against Him. “How could the Creator of the world be angry at something in his world? Only if death is an intruder. Death was not in God’s original design for the world and human life. Look at the first three chapters of Genesis. We were not meant to die; we were meant to last. We were meant to get more and more beautiful as time goes on, not more and more enfeebled. We were meant to get stronger, not to weaken and die. Paul explains elsewhere, in Romans 8:18-23, that when we turned from God to be our own Lords and Saviors, everything broke. Our bodies, the natural order, our hearts, our relationships–nothing works the way it was originally designed. It is all marred, distorted, broken, and death is part of that (Genesis 3:7-19). So Jesus weeps and is angry at the monstrosity of death. It is a deep distortion of the creation he loves.”
Regarding the belief that we all become a drop in a big ocean, ‘part of the All Soul,’ he quotes 1 Thessalonians 4:16-18, Paul: “For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage each other with these words.”
“Notice all the references that we will be with one another. You will be with people you’ve lost. And do you see the word “together”? We will be with the Lord together forever. These are words that mean personal relationships–perfect relationships of love that go on forever.
“Jonathan Edward’s famous sermon “Heaven Is a World of Love” begins by arguing that the greatest happiness we can know is to be loved by another person, and yet, he adds, on earth the greatest love relationships are like a pipe so clogged that only a little water (or love) actually gets through. In heaven, however, all these “clogs” are removed and the love we will experience will be infinitely, inexpressibly greater than anything we have known here. On earth we hide behind facades for fear of being rejected, but that means we never experience the transforming power of being fully known yet truly loved at the same time. In addition, we love selfishly and enviously, which disrupts, weakens, and even ends love relationships. Finally, our love relationships are darkened by the fear of losing the other person, which can make us so controlling that we often drive people away, or in other cases become fearful of making any commitments at all.
“Edwards concludes by declaring that all of these things that reduce love in this world to a trickle at the bottom of a riverbed are removed when we get to heaven, where love is an endless deluge and fountain of delight and bliss flowing in an out of us infinitely and eternally.
“The Christian hope is for a personal future of love relationships.”
Under the section, Material Hope, he talks about how the risen Jesus was flesh and bones. “He taught them that, unlike all other major religions, Christianity promises not a spirit-only future, but a renewed heavens and earth, a perfected material world from which all suffering and tears, disease, evil, injustice, and death have been eliminated.”
“You see, there’s a real you, a true self down inside you, but then there are all the flaws and weaknesses that bury and mar and hide it. But the Christian hope is that the love and holiness of God will burn it all away. On that day, we’re going to see each other, and say, “I always knew you could be like this. I saw glimpses of it. I saw flashes of it. Now look at you.”
“Paul, knowing something about the other cultures and religions of the world, says our future is not an impersonal, immaterial world of abstract spirituality, but a personal future of love relationships and the restoration of all things.
“If the knowledge of this future was always present in our minds, would we become as downcast as we do? Why ever think of payback for people who have wronged you when you know you’re going to get not just all you’ve ever wanted, but more than you dare ask or think? Why envy anyone? This hope is transforming.”
In Beatific Hope, part of The Rupture of Death, he writes: “Along with personal hope and material hope, there is beatific hope. Paul does not say we will simply be together with others. Nor does he talk so much about how lovely the world will be when it’s healed. That’s not the main thing in his mind. Here’s the final note, the biggest emphasis–that we will be “with the Lord forever” (1 Thessalonians 4:17). It means we will be in perfect communion with him, we will see the Lord face-to-face.”
“Paul talks about it in 1 Corinthians 13:12 when he says, “For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.””
“When we look into the face of Christ it will completely transform us because, as Paul says, we will finally be fully known yet fully loved.”
“Sinful human beings cannot come into the presence of a holy God and live. But Moses certainly knew the danger. Why did he seek this direct sight of God’s glory anyway? Because he intuitively knew that we were originally created to know and love God supremely, to commune with his love and see his beauty. Moses knew at some level that our human restlessness and drive–for approval, comfort, aesthetic experience, love, power accomplishment–are all ways of filling what Saint Augustine famously called the “God-shaped hole” in us. In every set of arms we are seeking God’s arms, in every loving face we are seeking God’s face, in every accomplishment we are looking for God’s approval.”
“In the Old Testament we see God’s glory residing in the tabernacle’s Holy of Holies, present among his people but largely inaccessible.
“But when Jesus comes, John announces that in Christ “we beheld his glory” (John 1:14), and Paul adds that because of Jesus’s death and work on our behalf, those of us who believe in him get a foretaste, by faith, of that future transforming vision. He writes:
“For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ. (2 Corinthians 4:6)”
“This is not the direct, face-to-face encounter that Moses asked for and that Paul and John say is still in the future. Rather it is a “faith-sight” that we can have now. We cannot see God’s glory yet with our physical eyes, but through faith, the Word and the Spirit can give us a powerful sense of his presence and reality in our lives and hearts.”
“Anything wonderful or great in this world is only an echo or foretaste of what is present in the Vision of God and in the New Heaven and New Earth, the world of love.
“When at last you see the God of the universe looking at you with love, all of the potentialities of your world will be released and you will experience the glorious freedom of the children of God.”
Under the section, Assured Hope, he writes: “When a prisoner has fully paid his debt he is released; the law no longer has any claim on him. So when Jesus fully paid the debt of sin with his death, he was resurrected. The law and death had no more claim on him. Nor does it have any claim on us if we believe in him. “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). When we put our faith in him we are as free from condemnation as if we had paid the penalty ourselves–as if we had died.”
“In Mark, chapter 5, Jesus is brought into a room with a little dead girl…And with a little tug of his hand, he lifts her right up through it! It’s his way of saying, “If I have you by the hand, if you know me through faith in grace, nothing can hurt you. Even death itself, when it comes to you, will just be like waking from a nice night’s sleep. If I have you by the hand, even death, when it comes upon you, will only make you something greater. Nothing can hurt you. Be at peace.”
“Hit me with your best shot. The lower you lay me, the higher you will raise me. The harder you hit me, the more brilliant and glorious I’ll be.” Elsewhere George Herbert says, “Death used to be an executioner, but the Gospel makes him just a gardener.” Death used to be able to crush us, but now all death can do is plant us in God’s soil so we become something extraordinary.”
In A Prayer: “Our Father, you are the strength of your people, and we ask now that you would heal the brokenhearted among us and bind up their wounds. We ask that you would grant to them and to all else the vision of that life in which all tears are wiped away and all shadows have fled away.
“Raise us up in your Spirit’s power now to follow you in hope and trust, and give us your loving power to protect us, your wise power to nurture us, your beauty to enrapture us, your peace to fulfill us, and lift up our hearts in the light and love of your presence. And we ask in the name of the one who is the Resurrection and the Life, Jesus Christ. Amen.”
In the Appendix, “If you are facing your own possible death:” Monday – Philippians 1:20-23, “While the Bible tells us that death is a tragic monstrosity, yet for Christians with assurance of their relationship with God, it is a win-win.” Tuesday, Isaiah 43:1-3: “God is saying plainly that, if we are his, he will never let us go…Consider this hymn, based on Isaiah 43. “That soul that on Jesus has leaned for repose I will not, I will not desert to its foes. That soul though all hell should endeavor to shake I’ll never, no never, no never forsake. [How Firm a Foundation]” Wednesday, 2 Corinthians 4:16-18. “If we live to old age we can feel our bodies (and our beauty) fading, yet if we are growing in God’s grace, our souls, as it were, are becoming stronger and more beautiful. At death this reversal becomes complete. Our bodies disintegrate and we become blindingly glorious. Comfort yourself with these words.” Thursday, 2 Corinthians 5:1, 4, 8-9, “It is reported that an army chaplain, comforting a frightened soldier before a battle, told him: “If you live, Jesus will be with you, but if you die, you will be with him. Either way he has you.” Friday, John 14:1-3, 27, “The world can only give us peace that says, “It probably won’t get that bad.” Jesus’s peace is different. It says, “Even the worst that can happen–your death–is ultimately the best thing that can happen. We all long for a “place” that is truly home. Jesus says that it awaits you.” Saturday, 1 John 1:8-2:1. “If we refuse to admit and try to cover up our sin, God will uncover it. If we will without excuse repent and uncover it. then God will have it covered in the most astonishing way. Believers know that Christ, as it were, stands before the divine bar of justice and is our “advocate” or defense attorney. That is, when God the judge sees us, he sees us “in Christ” and our sins cannot condemn us. Christians have nothing to fear from death or judgment.”
Also in the appendix, If you are facing the death of a loved one, he says to “just take it one day at a time, “doing the next thing,” not spending too much time with people or too little.”
“Be honest about your thoughts and feelings, whether to others, to God, or even to yourself. Don’t feel it is “unspiritual” to question and cry out. Remember Jesus weeping and angry at the death of his friend Lazarus. Remember Job crying out to the Lord. Job complained loudly–but he complained to God. He never stopped praying or meeting with God, even though he was not getting much out of it at the time.”
“Don’t expect your prayer life to feel very good now. It will have the same air of unreality that everything else does. But eventually, there is comfort and peace available beyond your wildest imagination. When we have other things–spouse, family, friends, health, home, security–we are not driven to really plumb the depths of what is available in communion and prayer. But there are infinite stores of grace. More than enough to get you through the rest of your life.”
He give some verses to meditate on throughout the week: Monday, Job 14:5-6 and Psalm 88:18, “What does it say that God not only allows, even includes, such thoughts in His Word? He knows how we feel and speak when we are desperate.”
“Tuesday. “The righteous perish, and no one takes it to heart; the devout are taken away, and no one understands that the righteous are taken away to be spared from evil. Those who walk uprightly enter into peace; they find rest as they lie in death” (Isaiah 57:1, 2). From our perspective, death–especially for the young–is nothing but a great evil. Yet we don’t know the future, and what if death is God’s way of taking people to himself, giving them peace, and saving them from evil. Why is this so counterintuitive for human beings?”
Wednesday, John 11:17-44. “Jesus shows that he sees death from both the perspective of God and from the viewpoint of the bereaved human beings. He weeps with Mary and Martha, yet is moved with anger (verse 38) toward death, even knowing that he will immediately raise Lazarus to life. Even if God is bringing His people home to Himself, He knows the sorrow and devastation death creates, and grieves with us. Does knowing that God hates death help you in any way? “Jesus said to her, ‘I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?'” (John 11:25-26). Do you believe this? If you do, how should that affect how you grieve?“
Thursday, 1 Corinthians 15:17-22, “Paul is staking the credibility of all of Christianity on whether Jesus was raised from the dead or not. If Christian belief is merely a comfort in this life, then we are to be pitied, and those who have died hoping in Christ are gone forever. So before any other of the teaching or claims of Christianity are considered, this is the primary question: Was Jesus raised from the dead? If the answer is yes, then the way forward, though painful, leads to hope. If no, then life is meaningless. Which is it?”
Friday, 2 Corinthians 5:1-5, “Paul is specifically rejecting the idea that when we die we become disembodied spirits; instead, we are further clothed, with immortality. This was a theme he had also treated in 1 Corinthians 15, when he talked about the resurrection of the body (verses 42-54). So passing through death is not entering a nebulous, ghostly afterlife, but a life of unimaginable fullness and joy. Our loved ones do not leave us and go into the dark. They leave us and go into the Light.”
Saturday, Psalm 23. “Here is a whole set of comforts for those who grieve. Remember that when you walk into the valley of the shadow of death, it is Jesus, the Shepherd, who has led you there. He has comfort to give you and ways to strengthen, deepen, and grow you that would be otherwise impossible. So give thanks for his presence, refuse self-pity, and seek him in prayer even when you don’t feel him present (because he is). Jesus himself walked into death, solitary and rejected by everyone (Matthew 27:46), so when we face the death of loved ones or even our own death, we will never be alone.”
Sunday, Romans 8:1-2, “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death” (Romans 8:1-2). Many people are unaware of the condemnation that has been pronounced over them, or else they are unacquainted with its magnitude, except perhaps for a nagging sense of unease. When facing death, however, our enemy allows us to see the full scope of our cosmic treason, and what answer do we have then? Only this–that Jesus has taken our punishment and set us free, and there is now no condemnation left for us. Rejoice!”
Thank you, God, for Tim Keller! Again and again, he communicates You so purely and truthfully. He is in heaven with You and living the joyful, eternal life he writes about in this book.
For my further reading, C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory, and Jonathan Edwards, “Sermon 15: Heaven Is a World of Love,” in The Works of Jonathan Edwards.
From Tim Keller’s further reading:
- Joseph Bayly, The View from a Hearse
- Elisabeth Elliot, Facing the Death of Someone You Love
- Timothy Keller, Walking with God Through Pain and Suffering
- Timothy Keller, Making Sense of God: Finding God in the Modern World