A Wise Hope

Days of Trouble Come.

(Ecclesiastes 12:1)

That’s how Solomon describes old age: “Days of trouble”. That’s the way the wise talk. They describe life the way it is—the way they find it. Yet, for wisdom to be wisdom, such observation must be told artfully—in poetry and song and parable. Otherwise, it’s not wise. You can’t just blurt things out.

Tradition has it that Solomon wrote Song of Songs in his youth; and, Proverbs at the height of his kingly power; and, Ecclesiastes as an old man reflecting back on life. We need all three books to grasp something of Solomon’s wisdom. For now, let’s assume we know something of the greatest love song ever sung; and, that we know something of Solomon’s courtly wisdom—the way the King’s Kids behave and live life. That leaves us with Ecclesiastes. Notice the artful way Solomon describes the reality of old age (Ecc 12):

Remember your Creator in the days of your youth, before the days of trouble come, and the years draw near when you say, “I have no pleasure in them”: …In the day when strong men are bent down…

                        When the almond tree blossoms

                        And the grasshopper drags along,

                        And desire fails…

                So, remember your Creator before the silver cord is snapped,

                        Or the golden bowl is broken,

                        Or the pitcher shattered at the fountain,

                        Or the wheel broken at the well.

It’s all imagery and poetry. Maybe that’s the best way to say what’s so hard to say. We can’t pretend Gary’s last days were not troubled. We lost him bit by bit.  The wheel to lower the bucket into the water, broke. Seems Scripture wants us to spend time with Solomon before we get to Easter Morning. We can’t just leap frog to Easter as if we were never troubled—as if there were no Cross. The Apostle speaks of a wise hope (Ro 8):

We ourselves groan as we wait for the redemption of our bodies. For we were saved in this hope, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one still hope for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance. Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.

“Hope”… perhaps we were hoping for a bigger word than “hope”. Any other word wouldn’t be truthful. It wouldn’t be wise. The “redemption of our bodies” is a humble hope precisely because we can’t pull it off of ourselves. It’s not our doing. It lies totally and absolutely in God’s hands. It has to do with Jesus, young and vital, who died and rose again on our account. So it is that “faith, hope and love abide.”

Officer Kinser

The Dead in Christ Shall Rise.

(First Thessalonians 4:16)

The Press Democrat ran a major article on Gary: “Acclaimed Santa Rosa Police Officer Gary Kinser dies of pneumonia” the heading goes with a picture of the young officer in all his vigor—full head of hair, slight smile, with a cool mustache. What a guy! It’s a story about his police days when he worked undercover narcotics and served as “one of the finest street cops ever”, as a colleague says of him. The photo of him, in uniform and all, looks like that kind of guy—like the finest street cop ever.

The article tells of Gary’s award as the state’s “Law Office of the Year.”  The award brought a crew out from channel seven news to do a piece on him. I remember queuing up to make sure we caught it. “Hey, that’s Gary on T.V.” He looked good—young, vital, alert. What a guy!

When the deal goes down, and the last trumpet sounds, and “the dead in Christ rise… to be together with the Lord forever” (1Thess 4); I’m guessing Gary’s resurrected body will look like that picture: young, vigorous, and full of life.

Eternity:

We ourselves groan.

(Romans 8:23)

Funny how though we can speak of God’s mercy in Gary’s death—though we rejoice in Easter Morning and life everlasting; we still groan. Or, maybe I should speak for myself, or ourselves—our household. We keep moping around, and bemoaning how it can be that Gary is no longer with us. Even with Alzheimer’s, there was something about him still being there even when he wasn’t all there.

Gary was 73 years old when he “breathed his last.” Abraham was 175. Doesn’t seem fair. Those Patriarchs got an extra hundred years or so on us. The Psalmist laments that God has set our mortality clock back:

The length of our days is seventy years,

      maybe eighty, if we have the strength;

We finish our years with a moan.

      our days quickly pass… (Ps 90:9-10).

So it is to this day. Our life expectancy has been whittled down to our 70s or 80s. As things go, Gary did all right. He got his three-score and ten plus a few. He out lived King David who died at 70. Yet, we sorrow—too young.

Death always comes too soon. We were hoping for more days on God’s beautiful green earth—days to take a few more leisurely drives together on Eastside road winding our way through the vineyards. “God has placed eternity into our hearts,” observes King Solomon; “yet so,” he goes on, “we cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end” (Ecc 3). That’s our predicament. We long for eternity; yet, we, of ourselves, can’t get there. Only the One who “placed eternity into our hearts,” can get us to eternity. We need, as our Lord says, “someone greater than Solomon” to get us to life everlasting.

A Precious Death:

Precious in the sight of the Lord

is the death of his faithful ones.

(Psalm 116:15)

Gary died: “At 10:36 my dad took his last breath with mom, his girls, 6 of his grandkids, and Ken and Cheryl around him.” That’s how Amy let us know. That’s the whole text. One sentence. Though Amy, along with all those gathered, believe Gary is now in the arms of Jesus; she left that part out for now. She simply writes “took his last breath”. It’s okay. We don’t always have to tell the whole of it. That’s how the Bible tells it (Gn 25:8):

Abraham breathed his last                                                          

      and died in a good old age;

An old man and full of years,

      and was gathered to his people.

It’s good to linger for a spell on that last breath. That’s why we gathered—to be by his side as he “breathed his last.” It turned out to be a lengthy vigil. The hospital, gracious and caring, found a room on the third floor down the end of the hall clearing space for us to gather. That’s another thing I like about how the Bible puts it: “gathered to his people.” Gary went from our third floor gathering to his eternal gathering. Glory wouldn’t be glorious if we were not gathered to our community of worshipers singing our songs of praise: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty…” (Rv 4:8). Gary liked to sing. We sang hymns at his bedside. Maybe he just slides from our third floor singing into the heavenly chorus singing “Worthy is the Lamb…” (Rv 5:12).

There’s something precious about the death of such a faithful one as Gary. He’s been my faithful, dearest friend since Hebert Slater Junior High. We played football together—he played, I mostly sat on the bench. We married our high school sweet hearts. Our children enjoyed growing up together with many summer vacations at their cabin at Lake Tahoe. All such precious memories. So it’s okay to weep just like Jesus did when we lost his dear friend Lazarus.

 “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his faithful ones” (Ps 116:15). There was something remarkably precious about our third floor gathering. There’s sorrow and tears. We’ve lost a dear friend, a husband, a dad, a grandpa, a brother. But we sorrow in hope that, because of Easter Morning, the worst thing—even this thing, is not the last thing.