Why You Should Think About Death More
Yay.
I’m sitting at lunch with my friend Michael eating quesadillas when he says, “In grad school I wanted to write my dissertation on Harry Potter, Memento Mori, and the Christian view of death.” I lean in. This is my dream conversation.
Two years ago I wrote a book about my brother’s death. It’s a memoir, but also, I don’t know, a treatise? I wrote it to help grieving people, and it’s done that, and I’m glad. But I also wrote it to help people who aren’t grieving confront the reality of impending death—it has been largely ineffective at that. Because who wants to read a book about death if you don’t have to?
We moderns like our death out of sight and out of mind.
During the research for my book about death, I read other people’s books about death—not just grief books, books about cremation and ancient funeral practices and what happens to bodies donated to science. I read a story by Jose Saramago about what would happen if death took a vacation, and I read a book about the American Civil War and what happens when every citizen of a nation is grieving. I learned that looking at death, facing it, makes a person different. As far as I can tell, it usually makes them better, sturdier, braver.
“Memento mori” means “remember that you die” or “remember that you have to die” in Latin, and it’s the ancient practice of reminding yourself (usually via some kind of object) of your own inevitable death. Those who practice memento mori might keep a skull on their dresser or pin a dead butterfly above their desk. Mary, Queen of Scots owned a large watch carved in the form of a silver skull. On it were these lines from Horace: "Pale death knocks with the same tempo upon the huts of the poor and the towers of Kings." It sounds creepy and black magic-y, but memento mori was made popular by Christians, Christians who saw power in confronting the inevitability of death and living fully in light of its approach.
Back to my lunch conversation and that dissertation idea: Michael is talking about how powerful confronting death can be, how exposure to something helps us not be so afraid. He says Christians today are afraid of death. They could learn something from Harry Potter, Harry who can’t run from his almost-death as a baby, the scar on his forehead a constant reminder, Harry who almost dies again three dozen times over the course of seven books, Harry who doesn’t seem too afraid when he realizes it’s time to actually and finally die.
Harry Potter should teach us to live risky lives, to chance death when needed, to stand up to evil and do good even when our lives are on the line.
I’m not sure He does though. We don’t want to be Harry Potter, do we? We just want to watch Harry Potter. From our couch. With snacks.
We do the same thing with Jesus, Jesus who confronts death boldly, Jesus who is born to die, Jesus who tells His followers, Pick up your cross. The Christian symbol, the one above our baptisteries and carved into pulpits, is an ancient instrument of death. I wear one around my neck, a memento mori.
In the book of Romans the apostle Paul mentions death 27 times. Paul says in I Corinthians, “I face death every day.” He’s not exaggerating either. For many, many Christians throughout history (and even now), being a Christian meant a daily confrontation with the threat of death. That confrontation, being forced to reckon with the reality of death, called Christians out. Did they have the faith they said they did? Did they believe death had been defeated?
Do you believe in the resurrection of the saints? Prove it.
And they did.
Christians in America today aren’t being asked to die. And we’re glad about that. It allows us to forget about death, to hide it in our closets behind the Christmas decorations.
That’s tragic.
Because though we aren’t being called to die on a cross or at the stake or in an arena, thrown to the lions, we are being called to die another kind of death. We’re commanded to suffer and sacrifice, to offer our lives for the good of others and the good of the Kingdom of God. We’re called to die in a way every day.
I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice…
Are we capable of it? Not until we’re ready to stand up to death. Not until we truly believe death has been swallowed up by life.
When I encourage my friends or readers or my Bible class at church to consider the ways God might be calling us into full-life sacrifice, I see hands clench into fists, I see eyes wide like a deer’s reflecting headlights.
What would it look like to move into a “bad” neighborhood, next door to a drug dealer maybe, and love your neighbors?
What would it look like to sell your stuff, move into a little apartment, and give all the money you made (and the money you save) to a missionary?
What would it look like to be a missionary? To travel across the world to a place where there aren’t may Christians and join a church and talk to your new friends about Jesus?
What would it look like to send your kids to a school with a failing grade and partner with teachers and administrators to make things better?
What would it look like to work in a prison and read the Bible with inmates?
What would it look like to forgive your abuser?
What would it look like to adopt a teenager addicted to opioids?
These are not crazy ideas. They’re normal things normal Christians do. We Western Christians think they’re crazy, because we Western Christians are terrified of risk.
What if my kid doesn’t get the best education? What if I have to live with my family of four in 1100 square feet, and sometimes we get on on one another’s nerves? What if I get stabbed reading the Bible in prison (or, more likely, what if I feel uncomfortable)? What if someone comes to shoot my drug dealer neighbor and my kids are playing in the yard? What if my abuser abuses me again? What if my adopted teenager steals all my stuff?
These are legitimate possible outcomes. And they are the outcomes we face bravely as children of the One Who’s defeated death.
Am I saying it’s easy? Not at all. Those questions make me sweat, too. But to do it, to live the dying life, we need to be regularly reminded that we’re dying anyway, that we can’t outrun the inevitable (remember that you have to die) and so we may as well live a life worth living.
We can’t save our lives, so let’s lose them for a reason, let’s spend them well. Let’s live risky, as if we truly believe death is overcome, and life is eternal.
This email is called The Goodness, and it comes from Psalm 27, “I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of living.” I believe that, especially when I live in the land of the living as one who knows that one day she’ll die. Knowing my own mortality has a way of opening my eyes to immortality: God’s, mine, the immortality of all things sacred—love, joy, peace, beauty, truth. My mortality lifts my eyes to the horizon.
May you be blessed this week with an awareness of your own impending death. May it teach you to hold fast to everything imperishable. May it empower you to hold everything perishable in wide open hands. May it make you brave.
-JL
More info on our Fall Bible Book Club:
You guys! SO many of you signed up for our Fall Bible Book Club. I’m seriously excited about reading Nehemiah with you and getting to know our Fresh Start, Fresh Strength God. I received a few too many messages to respond to each one individually (awesome), so I’ll be sending an email with more info to everybody who’s expressed interest this Friday. The study officially starts Monday morning at 6am eastern time. If you haven’t yet signed up and want to participate, reply to this message with your email address today!
In addition to daily emails, you can participate via Zoom on Tuesday nights at 8pm central and/or via the Facebook group and Wednesday Facebook Live discussions at 8am central. Join the Facebook group here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1662195707288025
If you’re looking for more info on the Bible Book Club, watch this: https://www.facebook.com/jlgerhardt.fb/videos/823574845054101
See you soon!
A Prayer In Light of Last Night’s Presidential Debate
God, the Way, the Truth, and the Life,
We follow You.
God, sometimes our leaders disappoint us.
They lean into the worst parts of our shared humanity.
They’re impatient and unkind, quarrelsome and misleading.
It hurts our hearts.
God, help us be wise in the midst of foolishness.
Help us make peace when others stir up strife.
Help us not give up when decisions are complicated.
God, bless Donald Trump.
Bless Joe Biden.
Show them the way, the truth, and the life.
Show us, too.
By the power of Jesus we pray,
Amen.
This weekend I’ll be leading an online Ladies Retreat for Clear Creek Church of Christ in Hixson, TN. We’ll be talking about “How to See God,” “How to Talk About God in the Present Tense,” and “How to Help God Write a Better Story.” I’ll report back next email, and tell you what we learned.
Would you pray for us? For me, that I’d be wise and helpful. For these women, that they’d be receptive and eager. Thanks friends!
Side Note: If you’re interested in having me speak (in person or virtually), send me a message! It would be my joy.