Bible Church of Owasso has had the joy and privilege of supporting Christ Seminary since, I think, May of 2009. And we've had the joy of watching what God has been doing through that seminary, and especially in the life of this young man who is with us this morning. You were here for our Sunday school class. You gave us an update on the ministry there. And it was an encouragement to know that we have a privilege of being a part of what's going on over there. I think we recorded that. We recorded that. So if you want to get a copy of that, it would be worth listening to. It would be a great encouragement. Joseph is a pastor at Christ Baptist Church in Polokwane, South Africa. He's also a professor at Christ Seminary. He's also a preacher. We've asked Joseph if he would come this morning and bring the word of God to us. Joseph, will you come? Thank you for welcoming me to your church and God's church. Also such a privilege to finally get to meet some of the old faces that I have seen a number of years ago when some of you came to Africa. I had the privilege of leading your team to Mozambique and we had a wonderful time of fellowship, of breaking God's Word together and evangelizing the village of Mbeti together. Before I go to God's Word, let me bring greetings from Christ Baptist Church and Christ Seminary, Samaria Mission. They've all asked me to bring greetings to the Church of God and to just appreciate again the partnership we have with you in the Gospel. I'm always reminded of Paul's words in the book of Philippians when he talks to the church in Philippi. And he just thanks God for the church. In chapter 1 he begins by sharing how they have been his partners in the gospel throughout. Thanking God that they continually pray for him. And chapter 4 outlines actually the main reason why he's talking to them or writing to them just to thank them for sending Epaphroditus with financial help that he brought to them. And I think you all feed in all of those three aspects of partnership. And thank you for coming alongside us, South Africa. Just one thing about me is that I am married. One of the students asked me at SBTS, he said to me, are you married? And I said, I need to make it clear because I'm thinking like an African. I'm married to one wife. I'm married to Valemina, and the Lord has blessed us with two children. First born, his name is Tikva, he's seven, and Phoebe, she's five. Once I'm done here preaching today, I'm switching my mind. I need to go home. It's been a long 19 days. I need to get back to them. I miss them and I know that they miss me, but it's been a great privilege to be here. Well, without a waste of time, let us just pray and commit our time, let's wait to the Lord. Father in heaven, you are so magnificent. You are so wonderful. You are lifted on high. You are El, Elion, El Shaddai. You are Sabaoth, God who is also with us, all powerful, all present, all knowing. Words cannot even begin to describe your greatness, your holiness, your righteousness, even more so, your relationship with sinful man. He prostrated before your holy throne this morning. And I do so a lot with fear and trembling as I have to stand not only before souls bought with the precious blood of the Lamb, but also having to stand in the presence of God the Father and Jesus Christ who will one day judge both the living and the dead. Paul says to Timothy, preach the word. It is Lord with this context of God being present in the audience. Oh, how can a fallen human being begin to speak for God and even before God? Pray Lord that you would care me and that you would protect me and I will speak your word and nothing else. Bless us this morning through the preaching and the proclamation of your word. Pray as I commit this time to you. In Jesus' name, Amen. I have a test for you. Let me find out about your eschatological understanding. What do you know about God's calendar revealed in His Word? If I were to ask you a question, in the eschatological calendar, what is the next imminent event that should occur? What is the next event that is coming in the eschatological calendar? Rapture. Return. And you have flunked the test. Because that's not the next thing to happen in God's eschatological calendar. Yes, the rapture is still coming. The tribulation is coming. The second coming as well will occur in God's timing as well. But I would like to say this to you, that the very next event in God's eschatological calendar is your death. Death is the next event. And it is important for us to think about that. We don't think about death as something that should actually follow immediately. When the Lord tarries, as long as He is not here, You will see and you will experience week after week death either of a beloved one, of a fellow believer, or of someone in the community. you hear about death every day. And I think the reason we are not thinking so closely about death as being the next thing to happen is because we are really not thinking about life and the reality of death. Brothers and sisters, this morning I am here to tell you that you are going to die and I fly to Africa. And that's the reality. Each one of us seated here, we are going to die one day. We don't know when that's going to happen. We don't know how that is going to happen. And we don't know where that is going to happen. But we know for certain that as long as the Lord carries, we are going to die. Solomon, the preacher, in the book of Ecclesiastes basically set out to remind human beings of the reality of death. And as he writes the book of Ecclesiastes, his main goal is to remind us of the impending death, living life in light of that impending or that nearness or that imminent death that will befall every human being on this world. Both believers and unbelievers, the small and great, all are going to have to face death. In Ecclesiastes chapter 1 verse 12, you can just stand there. Our passage this morning will be chapter 7 verse 1 to 4. But just to set a context for you of this book of Ecclesiastes, the preacher Solomon, he writes, as a wise man, more of a research that he is basically setting out to prove and to bring out some things that human beings tend not to think about. He is going to apply his mind, as he would say there in chapter 1 verse 12, to seek and to explore what's done under heaven. That's his purpose statement. That's why he is writing this book. He is going to rigorously research, if I am to use that word, some things about life under the heaven, life on this earth, this transitory fleeting life of the sons of man. And Solomon said, I have set my mind to seek and explore all these things. Now one thing repeats itself in this book of Ecclesiastes, which seems to be his main findings after his long research. His conclusion is one, and he found that all is vanity. All is vanity. Vanity of vanities. All is vanity. Those are the words that Solomon continues to repeat in this. Now we ask the question, Solomon, what do you mean by all? When you say that all is vanity, what are you talking about? And Solomon would hit hard on the things that so much preoccupy us that we forget the reality of death. There are a lot of things that we use to try and numb our conscious not to think about death. And Solomon says some of those things are these. Enjoyment is one of those. Chapter 2, Solomon says, let me give you a testimony of these things that I also said to myself. I spoke to myself. And I said to myself, come, I will test you with pleasure. Enjoy the things of this world. Enjoy what's at their disposal. And that's what he set out to do. And he said, I did that. I drank wine. I had a pleasure of building so many other things, the works of my hands. I had a pleasure as well of owning silver and gold. And I even had a pleasure, as you would call it there in verse 8, it says, I provided for myself male and female singers and the pleasures of men, many concubines. All the things that people seem to be enjoying on this earth. Solomon says, I have tested death and I found enjoyment to be vanity. pleasure to be vanity. But not only that, Solomon says, I've also tested education. something that we are striving for. I always have to ask myself with a degree after a degree, like why am I still doing this? Is my heart right? If I'm going to pursue a doctoral degree, is my heart right? What is my motivation? Why do I want to accumulate all this knowledge and education? The book of Ecclesiastes will help you to understand that education and in Solomon's words he would use the word wisdom in chapter 2 verse 12 says, So I tend to consider wisdom madness and folly. For what will the man do who will come after the king except what has already been done? And I saw that wisdom excels folly, as light excels darkness. The wise men's eyes are in his head, but the fool, and he continues there. But at the end, he says, well, there is one thing that I have noticed in verse 16, the last part of verse 16, and how the wise men and the fool alike die. Education becomes vain, vanity. in light of the impending death. You are going to die and leave your education behind. How about employment as well? Another thing that we spend our lives and our energies and many countless hours doing, laboring with our hands. We get up early in the morning, we come up late, we come back late, working ourselves to death without taking a break or without even having to rest and just ponder the beauty and the glory of God. When we have to commit to the things of God and saving Him, be it in His church locally, be it on a mission field somewhere, be it in meeting with other believers for fellowship, what do we normally do? I am too busy. I've got this work to complete. I've got that task to complete. But Solomon says, I've got bad news for those who spend their lives in employment. It is vanity. Vanity of vanities. Solomon has all his vanities. One of the things that he has proven to be vain, to be fleeting, to be like chasing after a wind, is success. He tried success as well. And there is one thing so disturbing about Solomon's findings in chapter 5 verse 10. Look at that. The pursuit of success. This is what you're going to get. Ecclesiastes 5 verse 10. Solomon says, He who loves money will not be satisfied with money. Is that not true? Isn't that what we're seeing around? That even on the rich man on his deathbed, the last and the only thing he could ask when he was asked what he would wish for, one more dollar in my account. That's the problem with success and pursuing it. Solomon says all these things are bad. Now, we ask ourselves a question with all this. We need to stand back and ask ourselves. Perhaps that's the question you're asking right now. Pastor, are you saying that I should not be enjoying life? Are you saying that I should not be pursuing education? I should not be working? Or I should not be wanting to be successful? Well, that's not what I'm saying. Because that will be a contradiction to other passages of scriptures. But why is Solomon writing this? What is Solomon's main purpose of writing this, the overall purpose of this? Well, let me set context for you and we'll go to chapter 7 and deal with that. Solomon writes this. Because he has come to a point in his life where he has tried all these things. And when he did all these things, you need to go and get context from 1 Kings chapter 11, with Solomon's demise. When he fell, when he chose a different path, instead of worshipping and being wholeheartedly committed to God, Solomon took a different path. And he started pursuing these things to find life, and meaning in them. And what did he come up with? One statement. Life without God is empty. Life without God is empty. You can have all the fun the pleasures, the enjoyment of this world. You can have it all. You can have all the education. You can have all the great employment. You can have success or have all loads of money in your bank account. But without God, those things mean nothing. Because you are going to die and leave them behind. But that's not everything there is. It's not just about death terminating or severing you from these things. But here's the next thing that you need to think about when you think about death. That when you die, you're going to face the eternal God. You're going to stand before God and give a reckoning. And that's what Solomon says when he closes this book in chapter 12. There will come a time where everyone will stand before God and we will have to give an account for what we have done. Whether good or bad, we will have to stand before God and give an account of what we have done with our lives. Have we feared God? Have we pursued God? Did we enjoy God? Or did we substitute God with education, enjoyment, success, and employment? Death is coming. And when you die, you're going to stand before God and you will have to answer. We will all give an answer. Somehow Solomon wanted us to live in light of impending death. Death is coming and judgment will follow. Therefore, chapter 7 is very important for us this morning to take to heart. So with the remaining time, let me take you to that chapter. Chapter 7, verse 1 to 4. Living with the reality of death in mind is what we need to find here. Living life in light of that impending death. Eusebius chapter 7, A good name is better than a good ointment, and the day of one's death is better than the day of one's birth. It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, because that is the end of every man, and the living takes it to heart. Sorrow is better than laughter, for when a face is sad, a heart may be happy. The mind of the wise is in the house of mourning, while the mind of fools is in the house of pleasure. That is the reading of God's Word. I believe that in reading these few verses, you can but notice the running theme of death, the house of mourning, death, the house of mourning, sadness and sorrow. Solomon brings that out. And as he seeks to bring out this, he is answering a question that he has actually asked in chapter 6, in verse 12. Solomon has asked this question actually in verse 11 and to verse 12, chapter 6. For there are many words which increase futility. What then is the advantage to a man? That is the question he is asking in chapter 6, verse 11. And in verse 12, it says, for who knows what is good for a man during his lifetime, during the few years of his futile life? The answer is, nobody knows. No one knows. There are things that God has deliberately hidden from human beings. And that frustrates us as human beings. That's what God does. We don't know what is going to happen next. Bible says, He will spend them like a shadow, for who can tell a man what will be after him under the sun? We don't know all the details of our lives, but there is one thing that we know for sure, is that with death, death is We are going to die and we need to be ready. When Solomon asked what is good for man while he lives the few days of his vain life which he passes like a shadow, the answer lies in the great reversal. Many theologians would call a Christian or a Believer's life a great reversal. live life different from the world. It's what Solomon is saying before us. Now we ask, what does a life lived different from the world look like? Here it is, the great reversal. In light of death, number one, this life prioritizes godliness over pleasure. A life that is lived different from the way the world lives life is the life that prioritizes Godliness over pleasure. Look at verse 1 again. A good name is better than a good ointment. Let's stop there and ask ourselves, what's in the name Solomon? Why a good name is better than an expensive and luxurious perfume? I mean there are so many things they could do with this ointment or this oil that Solomon is talking about here. This was one of the precious commodities they had in that they could use it as medicine, they could use this perhaps for burial, they could use this to soothe their bodies and everything else that they could do with this expensive oil. Why is Solomon now comparing this and saying it is better to have a good name than to have this perfume? Well, here's the truth. Is that when you are born into this world, you are not only given a name, but you are making a name for yourself. You are busy writing history. You are busy painting a reputation that will be left behind when you are gone. Now my question is, what will you be remembered of? What will be your identity when you are gone? Your wife? Or your husband? Your children? Your relatives? your community and your church fellowship, or your colleagues at work, what will they remember about you when you are gone, terminated by death? How will you be remembered? Will they remember you as a man who glitched so many deals for their company? Will they remember you as a man perhaps in the community who never cared about people? Will you be remembered as a father who has never been at home? Will you be remembered as a husband? who loved his job more than his wife? Will you be remembered as a wife who never cared about children and the family but cared about just pleasing yourself and your own desires? There are so many things we can pile that you can be so sure that you will be remembered of. I don't know what kind of a reputation or an identity you have right now. But Solomon says, once you are born, it is better to have a better name, a better reputation, a better identity, so that when you are gone, you would have left not only a legacy, but you would have left a model and an example for others to follow. I want you to remember that this is in the context, not only living life in light of death, but also in light of living life, in living life in light of eternity that is coming. That's how God is going to judge us. Yes, people will talk about all the bad things you have done and they might say, well, he is gone or she is gone now, but that's not over. We have moved on from this world, but there is a great judge standing on the other side who will ask those very questions. What did you do with the life that I gave you? What did you do with the resources that I gave you? What did you do with the family that I gave you? What did you do with the marriage that I gave you? And all other things that we will have to give an account of before God. Brothers and sisters, Solomon says then, it is better to have a good name than to have the pleasures of this world. It is better to be remembered as a godly man and a godly woman, a godly young man and a godly young lady, than to be remembered as someone who had pleasure. You were in every party that is in your community. Is that how you want to be remembered? May the Lord help us to not only make a good name, but to make a name for ourself that is in a context with our salvation. We will be remembered as men and women who served God so dearly. We will be remembered as men and women who basically gave our lives in all that we found to do, gave our lives to the cause of Christ. May we be remembered in the language of the New Testament to be people who are Christ-like. Prioritize godliness over pleasure. And we do that because the day of death, again Solomon says, it's better than the day of one's birth. That's a great reversal. We celebrate birth and we mourn when someone dies. But why does Solomon say it is the day of death is better than the day of birth? I would say this quickly to us and I think the Apostle Paul would help us with this especially when you think of this in light of being a believer. Paul in Philippians 1.21 says that for me to live is Christ and to die is gain. Now which one is better as a believer there? being born and continuing to live, or dying and being with the Lord. Paul says it is better, he continues in that passage, I am wrestling with this within me, whether I should die and go and be with the Lord, which it is much better, or to continue here with you which is necessary. Compare that, the necessity and the much better. It is much better to die and be with the Lord. And a Christian understands chapter 7 verse 1b of Ecclesiastes in that note, in that line. That when the troubles of this world come, we should want to be with the Lord. Believers are not scared of death. They are actually waiting for it. We should be asking for it. We should long to die and be with the Lord. I say that a lot back home. And I know you may not be voicing it out, but that's something that you wish for as well. When love mounts pressure after pressure, you want to die. I feel like I can just go home and be with the Lord. And that's Solomon. When he looked at the situation of life and what people are just getting into doing and day after day trying to pursue the wind. Solomon says, I think it is better to die. He actually somewhere again in Ecclesiastes says, better off if you're still born than someone who has been born into this world and faced the oppression of this world. Death is not a negative thing for a believer. For me to die is Christ. It says there, to live is Christ, to die is gain. Death is a gain, it's not a loss. But may I submit this to you. You can never say, for me to live, is Christ. To die is gain. You can never say to die is gain if you have never lived for Christ. We should first be able to clear that first part. I am living for Christ. Christ is my life. before you could be excited about dying. Perhaps you are scared of death right now, and right now you just don't like the idea that I'm busy talking to you about death. Let me ask you, why are you scared of dying? I don't think your main reasoning is because you're going to leave your children and your wife behind. It is good to think like that. That's being unselfish. I think your main reason is this, and that's what Solomon talks about. God has set eternity in our hearts. You like it or not, you deny it to do whatever you care. People who are opposing the Bible and whether there is life after death, it's because they are trying to suppress that consciousness. But God has placed it in our hearts, that eternity. We know that eternity is there. The main fear is you are not perhaps sure of your life with God after death. That could be resolved because there has been a greatest death ever of God who took upon himself flesh, came into this world, lived like us, eventually the Bible says He went to the cross to die a very excruciating, painful death for sinful human beings. Why? So that when we believe in Him and place our trust in Him, we can speak now like Paul. Take me home Lord. for me to live, yes, it's Christ, but now I am ready for the gain to be with the Lord forever. That should be exciting to a believer and that should be the hope we need to give to believers who are dying or are facing the grieving moment. When a believer dies, yes, it's a loss. because this person is no longer here. But it is also a joy to know that the believer is with the Lord. Let us have a right view of death. It begins with living. We need to know Him and understand that He has defeated death. Secondly, in light of death, We are to live our lives different from the world and in doing that we are to prioritize, and this again is a great reversal, to prioritize funerals over parties. We need to prioritize the house of mourning over going to the house of feasting. We need to go to the funeral to where death is than to go to the party Why Solomon? I mean, after all, it is nice, it is cool, right? To be with peers, perhaps wedding celebrations, celebrating birthdays, all other sorts of accomplishments in this world. But Solomon says you need to change that world view. You need to change and start focusing on prioritizing going to the funeral. What's there at the funeral? Is there anything we can learn from the funeral? Why is it better to go to a house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting? Well, here's why. Romans says, because that is the end of every man and the living takes it to heart. When you are partying, you're not thinking of death. All you could be thinking is, man, life on this world is just... In South Africa, we would say lacquer. That's the best expression you can ever get of how something is so beautiful beyond. But that's exactly what people who go to the parties do. They don't think about death. All they're thinking is that life ends here. They live as though life ends on this world. They live as though this is home. But those who prioritize a house of mourning, they would go there and they would sit there and they would see that casket or that coffin and they will be reminded, I can be next. Reminded that your life is passing away. Death is the end of all mankind, Solomon says. The living will take it to heart. face reality and death actually at that particular moment becomes your teacher. Moses prayed to God in Psalm 90 verse 12, O Lord, teach me to number the days of my life so that I may attain to the heart of understanding. Teach me to number the days of my life That's the prayer we should all be praying. Because wisdom comes from understanding that I am going to die. Now another question is what do we take to heart when we are at the funerals? When we see our beloved brothers and sisters pass away and we take them to the grave. What do we take to heart? Here's what we take to heart. Genesis chapter 3 is so serious and the impact of it is so vast and so grave. The fall should not be minimized. The reason you see someone going underground six feet and we cover with soil, that's because man has fallen. That's how serious and how painful and how severe and how damaging sin can be. It has brought us death. We die because we are sinners. But we also realize the brevity of life which should cause us to seek the Lord while we can still find Him. It also affects how we live our lives. When you go to the funeral and you see someone going underground, it should cause you to think, how am I going to live my life? This particular person right now is God and is already going to face God. The Bible says it is appointed for a man to live once and then follows judgment. It is appointed for us to live once. You are not a cat, you are not going to have nine lives. You will live once and you will face God and His wrath. Unless you have been shielded by the cross of Jesus Christ, who took upon himself the wrath of God, When you die, you will experience the full weight of God's wrath. Brothers and sisters, you don't want to go there. That's why the gospel is so urgent, and that's also why we should always be thinking about death in light of it. Because it will cause us to think about life as something that passes. In verse 4, Solomon said, the mind or the heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, while the mind or heart of fools is in the house of pleasure. You can make that contrast there, and that is true. The wise would go to funerals. Fools would go to the parties. Where do you spend your time in contrast to those two? In South Africa and in Africa at large, we are a very communal people. We are a community people. We don't choose. When someone dies in the community, whether I have a strong or a friendly or a rival relationship with them, I would still attend that funeral. We are a community. That's what we do. So you can spend your life week after week going to a funeral in Africa. I know that it's different with the West, that you can only go to the close relative there. And here is one thing that shocked me about your culture. We had one missionary who came to South Africa and in God's sovereignty they were there I think for six months and his wife died. And we had to bury her in South Africa. And I was there and we went to the gravesite and I'm waiting there at the gravesite and all of a sudden I see the family living and the casket is just still there, not underground yet and the family left. That struck me. I've never seen that before. In South Africa we don't leave until the hole is covered and we are ready and now we can go. But when I saw that I'm like, I think we are missing something here. I'm not trying to change the culture, I'm just trying to paint a picture and illustrate it. You should stay there and experience the pain of seeing that body go into the ground and cover it. And you will understand that this person is indeed God. That's how close you can come. And you see the body going down. And that's what it's saying here. We need to go there, see that, spend time there, and this will help us to think well. And the reason we don't take time to go to the funerals is because we don't have the right theology of death. Now I'm tempted to call this death theology, right, deathology. Perhaps we need that. We need a doctrine of death in our church. Not only to die well, but also to know how to cancel with those who experience it. I think that's one thing believers are facing. I often ask believers, why do you fear to go to a house of mourning? I don't think they fear because someone is dead, but we fear that we don't know how to speak to them. How do you counsel with a brother or sister who has just lost a child, or a mother, or a brother? We need to prepare ourselves for that. And we can only do that if we will apply our mind to the reality of death. Let us live with death in mind. Let us prioritize the funerals over the parties. Just shy away from feasting and get into thinking hard about life and death. Because death is coming. My question for you is, are you ready for it? Are you ready to die? Yes, we never get ready to die. We should be prepared to die. The readiness I'm talking about When it's over and done and you face God, will you be ready? Have you been transferred from God's judgment into the eternal life? Or are you still living under God's judgment? It is revealed. Romans 1.18, God's wrath is revealed. It can be reversed. You could be shielded from it in Christ. Are you ready? Have you trusted Him? Is He your joy and your salvation? Well, right now I'm quite sure that you are very depressed. Perhaps your heart is very heavy. And I think that's right because that's where Solomon wanted your heart to be. Solomon wanted it to take place in your heart. Hence he said in verse 3, let's close with that. Look at verse 3. This will be our final point. Look at that puzzling statement of verse 3. And we can call this point or just title it, Life that is different from the world. prioritizes sorrow over laughter. Prioritizes sorrow over laughter. Instead of wanting to be laughing everything off, you need to seed and absorb the pain. and go through all that pain, because it is at that moment of pain where your heart will be sharpened. Look at verse 3. Solomon says, Sorrow is better than laughter, for when a face is set, the heart may be at I think with that little verse there we need to deal with the translation. The word happy or glad here does not really make sense. When a face is sad, a heart may be happy. How does that happen? It helps a little for us to understand that the word happy that Solomon has been using here repeatedly and it means good, good or healthy. So what Solomon means there by the word happy there, I think it should be translated either better or good or healthy. A sad face will actually produce a healthy heart. That's what Solomon is bringing out here. Sorrow is better than laughter because when the face is sad, that's where the healthy heart comes out. And it comes out because we start thinking about the reality of death in light of eternity and what God does and how Genesis chapter 3 has affected everything. That's where the counseling of believers comes. That's where you start sharpening people. We should not minimize the pain of death. I think as counselors, as believers, we need to talk about the pain of death. When people are going through pain, please let us not just settle for God is sovereign. I think that's what we often do as believers. You know, my brother, God will heal you. My sister, God will heal you. Because God is sovereign. God knows why your brother or your sister or your mother died. Yes, I know that, but you're not helping me right now. I am in sorrow. I think what we need to do as believers and counselors is allow people sorrow, grief, go through that pain. Let them take it in. And once they've taken that in, let us confront them with the reality of death. As we sympathize and bring compassion, we become compassionate and bring comfort, we should also be able to say, what are you learning? We should not miss that point. What is God teaching you through this painful experience of death? That's where sorrow could be used for our good. Because there our hearts are sharpened. It is there where we can pray like Moses. Teach us to number the days of our lives so that we can attain the heart of God. And the Lord teaches. May the Lord help us with that. Let us not try and brush off sorrow by hypocritical laughter. And believers, let us just stop saying, ah, it's fine, I'm okay. We are not immune to the grief that comes with death. We are not okay when a loved one dies. We should sorrow and grieve. We should think should affect the mind and hearts. So that when we get out of it, the Lord heals us from that, we'll be able to say, how am I going to live my life in light of death? Because I know that I am next. I am going to die. But I want to close with these words. Answer to all this and why we should prioritize basically death or house of mourning over parties. Why we should prioritize our good reputation over a fume or luxurious or enjoyment or pleasure? Why we should prioritize sorrow over laughter? Because, you know, When we die, we face with God and we have to answer before Him. The only answer and the only hope that we have of spending eternity with God. If we could say before God, we understand the pain that Jesus Christ went through. and we understand that His pain and His death on the cross brought us salvation. And in light of that, I understand as well that when I die, there is a hope of resurrection. If Christ dies and we are one with Him, the Bible says we will be raised with Him. I understand that when life, this life is gone and it's over, I will rise on the other side. I will be on the other side, and I will sing those glorious songs. We just thank you. So may we live not only in light of death, but also in light of eternity. Eternity is coming, and destinies are two. Either you're going to spend your eternity in hell, or you're going to spend your eternity with Christ in heaven. The only way to go to heaven through the death of Jesus Christ. Therefore death for believers is but a shadow. Christ took all the way. May the Lord help us and may this sharpen our hearts to live our lives wisely and not to indulge or to pursue the vanities of this Lord I thank you this morning, this afternoon already for your truth and word. I have just touched the surface, I can't get even, Lord, to the depth of that place because the experience of death is so vast and deep that we human beings cannot totally comprehend. I pray that this reminder today urges not only, Lord, to live life in light of death, but also to live life for Christ, knowing that things of this world that we tend to pursue, will not only be taken from us, but we will be separated from them by death. Eternity begins. God, I pray that as we wait for the coming of Christ, or we wait for death, help us to die well, to die in Christ. That will be gain. I pray that you help each one of us to think through this truth. In Jesus' name.