Death, such an ominous title. I remember once reading an entire chapter on death in a Charles Dickens book. I don’t remember what it said, I just remember being terribly confused about the chapter and getting to the end and realizing it was about death. I decided it was too confusing to bother trying to read again now that I knew what it was about – which is probably why I don’t remember a word of the chapter.
Charles Dickens isn’t the topic though. Actually, I was watching an episode or two of Torchwood the other day and I was struck by their approach to death. I noticed the same opinion repeated through at least 3 different episodes (I’m still working on season one so I haven’t seen that many episodes, so I find it interesting that the topic has been discussed so much already) If you’re not familiar with the show it’s a SciFi. I love SciFi. I’ve seen all the Stargates, all the original Star Trek and most of Star Trek Next Generation. I’m pretty much up to date on my Dr. Who and one of these days I’ll try the Big Bang Theory. Right now though, I’m working on Torchwood.
So, if you don’t like SciFi just stick with me here and it’ll all makes sense. In Torchwood the main character Jack can’t die (why is complicated so I won’t try to explain that). Basically, he’s going to live forever. Yet, oddly, he’s terrified of death. He died once and it terrified him. Basically, the belief in Torchwood is that after death there is nothing, just darkness, and you’re aware of this darkness, it’s terrifying and it goes on forever. In one episode one of the characters come back to life and she’s so terrified of dying again that she’ll do anything – including killing her friends – to stay alive for as long as she can.
So, what struck me as interesting was the way the characters approach life because of their belief in what happens after death. Basically, they believe nothing happens after death, yet they are somehow aware of this nothing and it’s unbearable, so you never want to die.
Contrast that to my faith in Christ and living forever with God after death. I actually have a bright outlook on death.
Your belief about death greatly impacts your approach to life.
If there’s nothing after death and it’s the worst thing of all then you live your life for yourself because this is all you get and when people die you mourn your loss AND their loss. And you do everything you can to avoid death. Jack is cursed because he has to live, he has to see all his friends die, make more friends, watch them die, etc. Yet he’s afraid to die, because death is worse than living forever. Really, who wants the pain of loosing that many friends. Living forever would be terrible!
With heaven after death I still work to achieve whatever I can in this life but I don’t do it at the expense of my soul because my soul lives on after my body dies so I have to think about the affect things I do have on those around me and what affect they have on my morality. Because when I die, I want to leave those behind me blessed by me and I want to go to heaven having lived well. Death isn’t a thing to be feared. I fear it because it’s unknown but not because it’s terrible. I want to see my children grow up, meet my grandchildren, and live a nice long life, and at the end I want to look forward to meeting my savior.