“IF I SHOULD DIE BEFORE I WAKE”
Jim Hance

Now I lay me down to sleep,

I ask Thee, Lord, my soul to keep;

If I should die before I wake,

I pray Thee, Lord, my soul to take.

I wonder how many little children in the land have been trained to repeat these familiar lines as a nightly ritual at bed-time. I wonder too how many of them give much thought to what they’re saying. “If I should die before I wake . . .” Do little children anticipate that possibility? For that matter, how often is it that we who are older think it really might happen tonight?

During 1971 I was asked to participate in 54 funerals. That’s averaging just over one each week. I no longer keep count of such things, but I am sure that during the past ten years I have spoken in memorial services more than 300 times, hoping to help saddened families find comfort as they bury their dead. A brother once asked me whether I had become “hardened enough” to do it without “getting involved.” I told him, “No!” And I hope I never do.

Through these years I’ve observed that most of us don’t want to think about death, unless we have no other choice. Perhaps it’s changing, but very frequently it has been only when forced by circumstances to face up to the fact of death and to respond to it that many of us have given much serious thought to the legitimate question, “How should a Christian view death?” Indeed, how? What about my own death? And how can my faith in Christ influence my behavior when someone I love dies?

For the most part we’ve treated “death” as obscenity, and have sought out euphemisms so we don’t need to use “that word.”

Sigmund Freud questioned whether man has the capacity to be honest about death and dying:

It is indeed impossible to imagine our own death; and whenever we attempt to do so we perceive that we are in fact still present as spectators. Hence. . . no one believes in his own death; or to put the same thing another way, in the unconsciousness every one of us is convinced of his own immortality. When it comes to someone else’s death . . . our habit is to lay stress on the cause of death —accident, disease, infection, advanced age; in this way we betray an effort to reduce death from a necessity to a chance event . . . Toward the actual person who died we adopt a special attitude —something almost like admiration for someone who has accomplished a very difficult task.

We talk with relative ease about most aspects of our being, but we are reluctant to share our inner thoughts and feelings about death. We discuss fond memories of happier days before the untimely death of a relative, the loneliness since the passing of a close friend, or the gratitude we knew when the sleep of death ended the prolonged suffering of someone dear to us. We can be rather matter-of-fact about many things related to death, but tension builds up inside ourselves if we must openly consider the actual fact of death itself. Is this the way it’s supposed to be?

A few minutes ago my sixteen-year old daughter asked me what I’m doing. When I told her I was writing some of my thoughts about death, she asked, “Why did you pick such a depressing subject?” My mumbled response didn’t impress her at all, so I choose not to repeat it in writing at this time!

Is it necessary to have a morbid view concerning life’s apparent ending?

We Christians have a need to know what the holy scriptures teach concerning death. Waiting until death comes to a relative or close friend is hardly the best time to do our study. Under the emotional stress of losing loved ones, we are not able to be very objective in such study. At other, more normal times we are better able to equip ourselves for Christian responsiveness when these special times force us to confront death.

I must describe death as life’s apparent ending. Here is where I believe the primary issue is resolved for the Christian. Living in a world that interprets death as the terminal event to life, the Christian interprets it differently. He views death not as the termination to life but rather as a transition into a larger life. Not wild speculation. Not silly superstition. Instead it’s a reasonable hope validated by the truthfulness of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Various themes at various times are the fashionable ones. Right now death is “in.” Books, articles, sermons, seminars, and even entire publications discuss the issue of death. I see several reasons why. There are the legal problems connected with “organ transplants.” There are scientific concerns as men challenge criteria for determining when death actually occurs. There are the moral difficulties involved in deciding whether “euthanasia” is a merciful alternative to suffering, or whether it is an act of murder. These are some reasons for the current fascination for the subject of death; surely there are others. But ours is a Christian concern. How does a Christian view death?

The Bible portrays death in a variety of ways. I will only mention a few of its characteristics. Death is separation, sleep, and sure. Death is appointed, appropriate, and essential. But to me the greater truth is that the Bible presents death as the prelude to resurrection. The Christian who looks properly at death inevitably looks beyond death.

The Master has declared boldly that, though a man dies, he will live again. Man has this longing. One reason death is such an enemy is because it poses such a threat to what man considers his “important things.” The fear of extinction is overpowering. To have experienced pain too much and pleasure too little, to be forced to leave unfinished some worthwhile works, to contemplate moving out of consciousness without hoping to know the end of dreams we longed to bring into reality —; these are reasons man wants to believe there is more to death than just dying. Human aspiration, of course, is not a reason for hope. But the resurrection of Christ is!

It is no coincidence that Paul’s discussion of resurrection begins with a reminder that Christ died, was buried, and was resurrected the third day according to the scriptures. The fact of the death and resurrection of Christ is the tangible assurance that death precedes resurrection. “Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead? . . . But Christ is risen from the dead, and is the firstfruit of those which are asleep” (1 Cor. 15:1 2, 20). It is because of the resurrection hope that it “shall be brought to pass the saying that is written ‘Death is swallowed up in victory’” (1 Cor. 15:54).

I’ve read of all those wicked and idolatrous things behind the word “Easter.” But our world has come to think of something different when it hears that word now. It speaks of a very special event, —an event that is the basis for the New Testament teaching that the Christian has a completely new and fresh perspective to life. Death and resurrection make it so. Confidence of resurrection redeems the present life, anticipates the future life, and enables the believer to face death as part of the process that leads from the smaller life to the larger life. Suddenly he finds meaning to Paul’s words: “For me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Phil. 1:21).

The resurrection of Jesus is not one of the optional extras of our faith. It is a primary feature of this faith. If Christ has not risen from the dead, our faith is vain. But if He is risen from death as history and Scripture and eyewitness testimony all affirm, then man lives his todays on a higher plane with a solid hope of his own eternal life that death cannot prevent.

You cannot find a nobler promise than this: “I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die” (Jn. 11:25, 26). Because of the death and resurrection of Christ, we are able to live our lives now as a participation in eternity with God and with our Living Lord and Savior, Christ Jesus.

And that childhood prayer can be expanded to say:

If I should die before I wake

I pray Thee, Lord, my soul to take.

But, awakened for another day,

Wilt Thou, Dear Lord, please guide my way.

Jim Hance ministers to the Pearl Street Church of Christ, Pearl and Bolivar streets, Denton, Texas 76201.
 

The body of Benjamin Franklin, Printer (like the cover of an old book, its contents torn out and stripped of its lettering and gilding), lies here, food for worms; but the work shall not be lost, for it will (as he believed) appear once more in a new and more elegant edition, revised and corrected by the Author. —Epitaph on Himself (1728)