Death – A Melancholy And Bittersweet Celebration of Life

Even though a hexagenarian, I find myself facing a new experience; the death of a sibling.  As the youngest of five, I experienced that inevitable, awkward and painful telephone call from my nephew yesterday, to inform me that my brother (his dad) had passed away.  On the surface, one might surmize this is not an earth-shattering event, it eventually happens to all of us, and it happens every day, in every city, of every country on the planet.

Let me assure you, however, death is anything but routine, ordinary or insignificant.  As a Christian, death is the debt we pay as the entry fee to cross the portal from human reality to spiritual eternity.  It is a process, a portal and many times, painful.  Make no mistake, though, death is also a celebration, albeit a melancholy and bittersweet one.

Death is as the Yang to the Ying, as it permeates Life.  It can be construed as an ending, however, the Christian’s reality is that death is another beginning; a rebirth of our spirit/soul.  Death can certainly be viewed as routine, ordinary and perhaps even normal, that is, until it directly impacts YOUR life.

When you witness death in the first person of someone you intimately know, love and share history, it is exponentially more significant, impactful and forever changes your essence as a human being.

“In a peculiar sense, death morphs your sense of reality, self-image, mortality and perspective of the world around you.  Ironically, viewed as a polar region, death coexists and even defines the boundaries of life as do the poles on a planet.  Profoundly, death has its own life.”

As you experience death at a very personal and familiar level, every emotion in the library of your mind is touched, jolted, carressed and exposed.  In that context, death can be defined, understood, acknowledged and bounded by each of our realities of life.  Death is the wild stallion being broken, it is the uncontrollable child morphing from adolescence via puberty into an adult; psychologically, emotionally and spiritually.

Without question, witnessing death up close and personal is an experience you simply Never forget.  The bittersweet nature of life is that positively, it ends all aspects of human suffering, be it physical, emotional, or psychological.  Death, as a metaphysical event, takes away the undesirable aspects of life, and to that end, can be looked upon as something good.  The rest of that story, however, is that death also creates an ending or sense of finality (absent faith), for those remaining alive.  It is the proberbial locked door, separating the past, the present and the future.

In a comforting light, however, faith and Christianity offer us the key to unlock that seemingly impenetrable barrier.  All we must do is use the key, without fear of the unknown, to master our own mortality, prepare for our own passage and comfort those standing on the mortal side of eternity.

Importantly, death is not to be feared, but to be understood, prepared for and anticipated… and the way we accomplish those goals is through our personal relationship with Jesus Christ.   Death serves as that little voice in the back of our minds coaxing, whispering and urging us to take stock of the life we have, leaving no stones unturned, to demonstrate gratitude for it, to reconcile our differences with others, remind those close to us just how much we love them and how much they mean to us.  In a terse and succinct context, now, go do it!  Be well.

Dedicated to the eternal spirit of David L Cerkas (1947-2016)