Thoughts for the Day

Hear this, all you peoples;
give ear, all inhabitants of the world,
both low and high,
rich and poor together....

When we look at the wise, they die;
fool and dolt perish together
and leave their wealth to others.

Their graves are their homes for ever,
their dwelling-places to all generations,
though they named lands their own....

But God will ransom my soul from the power of Sheol,*
for he will receive me.

(New Revised Standard Version)

*The place of the dead in the Hebrew scriptures.

Sunday 21st June, follow up thoughts

Thoughts

Some years ago I helped an undertaker slide the top of a low chest tomb open, in order to put in a new casket of ashes in the family tomb. Inside there were quite a few caskets. The original grave, which would have been dug into the ground below the chest, had an inscription to that person dated to the early 19th century. However, the family had continued to add successive caskets, and I felt rather sad at the time that these were not mentioned on the tomb.

The incident came to mind when I was thinking about today's psalm concerning what we leave behind when we die. The Psalm could have been written as early as 1,400 BCE* or as late as 550 BCE. The psalmist is writing to "all peoples", both "rich and poor", reminding them that no-one can take what they own with them. All their wealth is useless - their dwelling place will be the grave for all generations!

Amazingly the psalmist, who was writing between 1,400 or 550 years before the birth of Christ confidently states that God will ransom his soul from the power of the grave, (as though he was being bought from an owner in the slave market) and will set him free. The confidence of the writer that God will intervene at his death is astonishing. Today, with the example of Jesus Christ, we too should be confident that the grave is not the end of a Christian's life, but the beginning of a new one with our Heavenly Father.

*BCE = Before Common Era.

Almighty God,
give us the confidence to believe
that all who die are in Your hands,
and that the grave is not the end of life,
but the beginning of a new one.
We pray for all nearing the end of their life
that they may know that Jesus
gave His life for them.
Amen.