Thursday, April 18
Unless we are alive at the Second Coming, one change that we can all expect is the biggest change of all: from life to death. Along with marriage and birth, what change has a greater impact on family than the death of an immediate family member?
Read 1 Corinthians 15:24-26. What do these verses teach us about death?
Many times, of course, death comes unexpectedly and tragically. How many men, women, even children, woke up one morning only, before the sunset, to close their eyes not in sleep but in death? Or woke up one morning and before the sun set had lost a family member?
Other than making sure you are connected by faith with the Lord and covered in His righteousness moment by moment (see Romans 3:22), you can’t prepare for a death that you don’t see coming, either for yourself or your loved one.
On the other hand, what would you do if you knew you only had a few months to live? We may not know for certain when death will overcome us, but we certainly may know when we are nearing the end of our life. Thus, how crucial it is to prepare ourselves and our family for the inevitable.
Read 1 Kings 2:1-4, some of the last words David spoke to his son Solomon. What lessons can we take from this about preparing for death, both for ourselves and for family members?
At first glance, one could argue, That’s rich! David, who murdered Uriah after impregnating his wife in an adulterous affair (see 2 Samuel 11), tells his son to walk in the way of the Lord. On the other hand, it was perhaps precisely because of this sin and the horrible consequences that followed that David’s words were so powerful. He was, no doubt, in his own way trying to warn his son away from the folly that caused him so much grief. David learned, the hard way, some difficult lessons about the cost of sin, and no doubt he had hoped to spare his son some of the grief that he himself had experienced.
