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[no audio] Existence has four common ventures. They are birth, work, marriage, and death. Each of these is marked with a rite of passage.

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We celebrate the time when a newborn babe enters the world. We celebrate the entrance into the labor market. We celebrate the time of retirement. We celebrate the marriage event.

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and we celebrate the last rite of passage in the celebration of death. Death is a subject we like to push aside. We'd rather not discuss it. It's a rather sad subject in the eyes of most of us. We consider it as kind of morbid discussion and we prefer to deal with death only when we have to. Did we dismiss it as quickly as possible, yet on with the business of living?

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I pondered for some time when I was in the course of arranging these messages, dealing with the life of Joseph. We dealt with the last will and testament in the previous message and after Jacob blessed his sons, after he declared his last will, testament, the next thing comes is death. And it would be quite easy to omit that

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and I thought about it, prayed about it. I would be remiss if I did not deal with the whole story because every one of us not only do we live but we also die and the Bible presents the stark reality in popular piety and theological scholarship has been a distortion of the biblical understanding of death. But what

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the gospel reveals is that God has a word for us in every condition and circumstance, in every one of these common ventures of life, God has a good word for us in birth, in work, in marriage, and in death. So we are propelled from day to day, week to week, and from year to year by the will to survive. All of us want to

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live as long as we can. There's one good friend of mine said, you know, that he recognized that he was on this train and the older he became the slower he wanted this train to move. So we we try to stay here as long as we can and we ought to do that. The truth of the matter is that we are living longer.

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About a hundred years ago the ordinary person who survived infancy died before he or she was 50. And today the average is about 70 higher for women than for men in the West. And people today

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are not as concerned about heaven as they once were. Many people have said that

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in years gone by that we were sort of being lulled into a state of complacency by the promise of pie and in the sky

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by and by Not only do we have people who are concerned about pie We want to get some of the pie now into hearing now as well as in the by and by So we depend upon medical science the doctors

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to keep us in this world as long as possible. And yet, every one of us is haunted by the certainty of death. We know we've got to go. And it works on us like a psychological cancer. We say to each other, "Well, let's not talk about it." And so we ignore it. We push it under the rug. We try to forget it and

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We think that because we live longer we do not need to reflect on death You said that there are two things that are certain and they are Death and taxes And and we started get a a sense of it when we're quite young I can remember when I was the age of

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Some of the members of the children's choir here and I went out to a school Function it was not a school function. It was a function to which school Children were invited on a Saturday and they were giving away candy and things of that nature No, there were hundreds of us there standing in line get the candy thing the gifts that they had

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And we started pushing, at least they did, I was just there, we were so jammed together. And then we started falling on top of each other. And I thought that was the end of me.

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That's the first time I thought I was about gone from this world, and that's a strange feeling. But we get an understanding of it quite young. Jacob here is related to the fact

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to the whole community. That's the biblical understanding. In other words, all year today we seek to privatize it and take it off and sort of have it concealed as much as possible. But the biblical understanding of it was that they were part of the community. That all of these people were the people of God

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and that not only those who were alive in the here and now, but those that had gone on were all a part of that community. And so Jacob, as he comes to the end of the journey here in this world and he talks to his children, he is gathered up to his father's. he goes to join the members of the group who have preceded him. So he comes to the end, and he faces it

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in a rather courageous manner. And that's what I think is a good lesson for us today, is how Jacob leaves this world. It's one of complete realism.

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There's nobody around the bed saying, Daddy, let's not talk about it. You're gonna get well. They're not trying to push it away

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as if this is not gonna happen. There's no attempt to evade the issue. Jacob calls all of his children together, and as they are around his bedside,

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he says to them in so many words, "I'm going home now." And he exemplifies courage in facing the inevitable. He does not attempt to hide, but he shows courage in facing death.

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Courage, courage. Some time ago, I received a call from a family telling me that they would like for me to go and tell the mother that she was going to die. Well, that's quite an undertaking.

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So, the doctor had suggested to have the preacher to tell her, and the children were calling, saying, "You go and tell her." So as I rode over, I fought and I prayed as to what I should say. And when I walked into the room I saw this lady who was frail who was wasting away because of cancer but

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as I walked in her voice was strong she said come right in Reverend and I went And she said, "Have a seat." And I sat down. Her voice was not only radiant, but it was strong.

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And so we sat there and we talked and we talked. She was in touch with herself. She was in touch with what was happening to her. But she chose to be courageous and she was triumphant

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as the conversation went. When I left, I felt that I had been lifted up. (audience laughing) And she said, "Come back again."

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And so I went back again. I went back several times before she passed away. But she was strong and confident, even to the end. She didn't want to talk about and cry

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about leaving the world. She wanted to talk about how good God had been to her in the world, and she was glorifying God as she came to what was really the climax of her life.

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Now that's the biblical understanding of death. That's the way we see Jacob. He's 147 years old. And as he comes, he talks to his children

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and then he just has his feet placed in the bed and he gathers himself to his father's. Before he does that, he talks about the funeral arrangements. You know, that's realism.

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Here's a man about to pass away He talks about the funeral arrangements. He said, "I've got the burial plot. "It's all worked out.

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"I've arranged for that. "Everything is in order and I want you to do this. "I want you to do that." And so he goes on.

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That's the kind of realism that this patriarch exemplifies as he faces the worst thing that can happen to us in this life. That's the lesson, brothers and sisters,

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for us who believe in Jesus Christ. Because what he does, I think it's exemplified in what William Cullen Bryant has to say as he describes the end of the way.

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He said, "So live that when thy summons come to join "that innumerable caravan which moves "to that mysterious realm where each shall take his chamber in the silent halls of death, thou go not like the quarry slave at night scourged to

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his dungeon, but sustained and soothed by an unfaltering trust, approaches grave like one who wraps the drapery of his couch about him and lies down to pleasant dreams. That's what Jacob does here. the culmination of his life and that's what is the kind of realism, the kind of

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courage, and the kind of courage I'm talking about isn't something that just happens. It's not a kind of stoic courage, it's a kind of faith, it's a kind of commitment, it's a kind of trust in God that we see in Jacob. John Quincy Adams was 80 years of age and he was walking down the street in Boston and one of his

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comrades said, "How is John Quincy Adams today?" And he said, "John Quincy Adams is quite well, thank you, but the house he lives in is dilapidated. It is tottering on its foundations. The roof is worn and the walls are shattered and it trembles with every wind and I feel that someday soon that I will have to move out but

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John Quincy Adams himself is quite well and with a wave of the hand the old man moved on down the street. Well that's the kind of courage, that's the kind of faith that we are called upon to manifest as we come to the end of the way. That's what Jacob does and it is the kind of faith that is described in the life of

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the early Christians because here we are face to face with one of the great mysteries, it's one of the great mysteries of life. Life itself is a mystery and death is a mystery but what is really involved here is the commitment of the great mysteries of life. Lord I don't understand, I don't

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really understand how I came into the world, what I did, the way I did, I don't understand all that. I really don't understand how I am to leave the world and all of the ramifications as to what will happen. You know I hear a lot of lot of people talk about you know they talk about how everything is going to be

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they have it all lined up they know God's timetable they know exactly what he's going to do 1,000 years 2,000 years and all of that well I'm really not caught up with all of that what I'm really caught up with is being in tune with God and if we're really in tune with God whatever he does if you are

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rightly related to him then you are right in the program. And so this is the great mystery I think Paul expresses it for us when he says, "Behold I show you a great mystery." That is the miracle of miracles we shall be changed in a moment in the last trump. When the trumpet shall sound we shall be changed. The dead shall

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raised, we shall be changed. And you see when you trust God, I'm talking about the kind of faith that the God who has been with us in the past, we know that, we know what he's done in the past, and we really know what God's doing right now in our lives, we know about that. Well if we can trust God for the past and we can

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trust him for the present, then why not trust him for the future? For that same God who was with us in our past and in our present, the same God is able to care for us and to keep us in our future. So we shall be changed, Paul says. This corruptible shall put on incorruption, this mortality shall put on immortality.

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We shall be changed and that's the miracle of it all, that we will have victory over death. That when we come to the end of the way, that that's really not the end, that's the end down here, but there is life beyond death. That's the story of the resurrection, that's the foundation of our faith

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brothers and sisters. The belief in the resurrection. Jesus Christ says, "He that believeth in me though he were dead yet shall he live." Do you believe this? This is the foundation of our faith and so it's the courage to believe, to trust God, the courage to face death. So this is the faith by which we live now, it's the

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faith by which we are to live in the world to come. Prostitute Leon was searching for the fountain of youth. He wanted to live forever. He got to Florida he thought he had found it. Well he really hadn't. People continued to die just as they always had died in this life. But there

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is a fountain. There is a fountain that promises not only life here but there is a fountain that promises life beyond this veil of wrath and guilt. There is a fountain. There is a fountain of grace. It's a fountain of God's forgiveness. It's It's the fountain of God's love.

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It's the fountain of hope that goes on and on and on. That love that endures, there is a fountain filled with blood, drawn from Emmanuel's veins, and sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains. It's that fountain that gives us life here and life hereafter.

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the dying thief about whether there is victory over death and the dying thief rejoiced to see that fountain in his day and there may I go vow as he wash all my sins away. What to worry about death? Dear dying lamb, thy precious blood shall never lose its power till all the ransomed Church of God be saved to sin

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no more. There's salvation from death, there is victory over death. E'er since by faith I saw the stream, thy flowing wound supply, redeeming love has been my theme and shall be till I die. But then after death, the writer goes on to say, when we have death in this world that there is life beyond

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because he says, "When this poor lip-spring, stammering tongue lies silent in the grave, still in a nobler, sweeter song, I'll sing thy power to save." Thanks be to God who gives us the victory over death, and because he gives us victory over death, By faith we are given the courage to face it and to face it triumphantly.

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We don't understand it. There's so much we don't understand here, but we commit the mysteries of life to him and in his safekeeping knowing that we'll understand it better by and by. [MUSIC]

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Lord, the church is open. Time is commitment of kind of Christian discipleship to accept Jesus Christ as Lord of your life. [MUSIC]

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I invite you to come. [MUSIC] ♪ On the restless sea of times ♪ ♪ Somber skies and the howling tempests ♪

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♪ Of succeed of bright sunshine ♪ ♪ In that land of perfect day ♪ ♪ When the mists have rolled away ♪ ♪ We will understand it better by and by ♪

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I am not with or without. All the saints of God gathering up will tell the story how we all began. And we'll understand it better by and by.

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We are all fond as the two of the things that life demands. One of food and one of shelter, thirst to his and barren lands. We are trusting in the Lord and according to his word. We'll understand it better by and by.

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Oh, by and by, with morning light, all the saints of God gather in, hear you tell the story of your God, ♪ The wheel of destiny will find us ♪

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♪ Trial's dark on every hand ♪ ♪ We cannot understand ♪ ♪ All the ways that God would lead us ♪ ♪ To that blessed promised land ♪

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♪ But he guides us with his eye ♪ ♪ And we'll follow 'til we die ♪ And we'll understand it better by and by. Oh, by and by.

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In the morning comes. In the morning comes. All the strange things. That's when it comes on.

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On and on. Oh, we'll tell. Tell the story. How we all were bound.

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♪ And we'll understand it better by and by ♪ ♪ Oh, by and by ♪ ♪ We'll be in the morning light ♪ ♪ We'll go where the saints go ♪

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♪ Oh, we will tell the story of the old man ♪ ♪ And we'll undress any man I love ♪ ♪ Oh, I am lovely in the morning glow ♪ ♪ And the weather's safe and warm ♪

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♪ Oh, we'll tell the story of the old MacLeod ♪ ♪ And we'll undress When we're better by and by ♪ [Music] [BLANK_AUDIO]