We have nothing to fear but........???

Our men's Bible study group met yesterday and the subject was fear. We covered the usual; fear of the Lord, fear for our families and fear that we'll lose our resources. Then a couple guys talked about fear of dying, saying they think about it as they get older. Being the oldest guy in the room I had to jump in.

I'm 71. That's not old, not if you're 75 or 80, but if you take a look at the actuarial tables (is that right?) you'll see that I'm now at the age where I could go at any time. Don't get me wrong. It's truly not a big deal to me - on a couple levels.

First: I'm now a Christian. When I leave this life I'll go to a far better place. Even though, when I think about my life before I became a Christian I'm amazed that the Lord will let me in but I know he will.

Second: Maybe some of you know what I mean. I hurt! The older I get the more I hurt! Sometimes I feel like that old Ford I owned fifty years ago. Parts are wearing out and there's not much I can do about it. I mean, there's no parts stores where I can go to get a new set of fingers, shoulders, elbows. Okay! I'll admit, we can get new knees and hips if our's get too worn but, frankly, I'd rather hurt than go through those long rehabilitations.

So, I told those young whippersnappers in my Bible study group to forget about the fear of dying. I assured them that their fear would be gone by the time they reached my age. There are problems, situations, that come flying our way in the course of our lives that scare the wits out of us. We just can't help it. Hopefully, we can remember we're Christians and get past those perceived crises, and turn them over to the Lord. They're never as bad as we think at the moment.

Most of all, I said to remember that dying is nothing more than a part of living. When our time comes we should rejoice! We're going to the Lord and we're not going to hurt anymore. At 71 I'm happy with that.

arkiedan

"At my age flowers scare me."
George Burns