The Story: Solomon’s catalog of aging, cast in verse, continues: unfounded fears, graying hair, tired legs, and the diminishment of sexual desire. All these come with getting old. But they don’t have to be an occasion for regret – unless, of course, merely indulging our flesh has been our way of life. When Rehoboam is staring down the well of eternity, on what will he rely to carry him into a peaceful and blissful eternity? His strength? His fleshly pleasures? His sexual potency? By the time he gets old, Rehoboam will have come to see that all the ways of the flesh decay, decline, and disappoint; thus, we are not wise to make these the source of our pleasure and purpose in life. Look to your Creator! He’ll put all these things in a proper perspective so that, when they begin to fail, you’ll still have a real and unfading Source of joy to remember.

The Structure: Talking about death is difficult for people these days. Indeed, the writer of Hebrews explains that the fear of death looms over every unbelieving soul, spoiling life for the present (Heb. 2.15). Unbelievers try to euphemize death – “passing away,” “crossing over,” “going to the Great Beyond.” This is whistling one’s way through the graveyard. One day one of those stones will have our name on it, too. Are our contemporaries ready to die? More than that, are ready for what waits beyond death and the grave? They may not like to talk about it, but we do them no favors by acceding to their fears. Rather, like Solomon, we need to hold those fears out and remind our friends that even death has no victory over the one who lives “under the heavens.”

Do you ever talk with friends about death and dying? What fears would you expect to hear from them? What is the promise of the Christian faith concerning death?

Each week’s studies in our Scriptorium column are available in a free PDF form, suitable for personal or group use. For this week’s study, “Remember to Fear the Lord: Ecclesiastes 12,” simply click here.

T. M. Moore

Scripture taken from the New King James Version. © Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved