Robert T. Young - "Living beyond Death" (November 2, 1975)

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	♪ Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Hallelujah ♪	0:04
	♪ Hallelujah, Hallelujah ♪	0:08
-	Most merciful and loving God.	0:30
	All we have is from you, our life and our death.	0:34
	Accept this offering from your people	0:40
	and so follow it and us with your blessing that	0:42
	we may bring life and hope	0:47
	and peace to your people who are suffering.	0:49
	Amen.	0:54
	(trumpet gospel music)	1:03
	♪ Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord ♪	2:03
	♪ He is trampling out the vintage ♪	2:06
	♪ where the grapes of wrath are stored ♪	2:08
	♪ He hath loosed the fateful lightning ♪	2:10
	♪ Of His terrible swift sword ♪	2:14
	♪ His truth is marching on ♪	2:15
	♪ Glory, Glory Hallelujah ♪	2:21
	♪ Glory, Glory Hallelujah ♪	2:26
	♪ Glory, Glory Hallelujah ♪	2:30
	♪ And his truth is marching on ♪	2:34
	♪ I have seen Him in the watch-fires ♪	2:39
	♪ of a hundred circling camps ♪	2:42
	♪ They had builded Him an altar ♪	2:44
	♪ in the evening dews and damps ♪	2:47
	♪ I can read His righteous sentence ♪	2:49
	♪ By the dim and flaring lamps ♪	2:52
	♪ His day is marching on ♪	2:54
	♪ Glory, Glory Hallelujah ♪	3:00
	♪Glory, Glory Hallelujah ♪	3:05
	♪ Glory, Glory Hallelujah ♪	3:10
	♪ His truth is marching on ♪	3:15
	(instrumental gospel music)	3:20
	(trumpet gospel music)	4:02
	(instrumental gospel music)	4:36
	Go now in the assurance of God's love	5:36
	and may the almighty and merciful and faithful God	5:41
	who raised Jesus from the dead, bless us.	5:44
	And may we be kept this day and forever more,	5:48
	in the knowledge of God's love and truth.	5:53
	Amen.	5:57
	♪ His truth is marching on ♪	5:59
	(instrumental gospel music)	6:15
	(instrumental gospel music)	6:30
	(instrumental gospel music)	6:45
	(instrumental gospel music)	7:00
	(instrumental gospel music)	7:15
	(instrumental gospel music)	7:30
	(instrumental gospel music)	7:45
	(instrumental gospel music)	8:00
	(instrumental gospel music)	8:15
	(instrumental gospel music)	8:30
	(instrumental gospel music)	8:45
	(instrumental gospel music)	9:00
	(instrumental gospel music)	9:15
	(instrumental gospel music)	9:30
	(instrumental gospel music)	9:45
	(instrumental gospel music)	10:00
	(instrumental gospel music)	10:15
	(instrumental gospel music)	10:30
	(clapping)	10:50

	(soft ambient music)	0:07
	(soft ambient music)	2:50
	(bright upbeat music)	3:53
	(soft ambient music)	5:51
	♪ When the trumpet of the Lord shall sound ♪	12:35
	♪ And time shall be no more ♪	12:38
	♪ And the morning breaks, eternal, bright and fair ♪	12:41
	♪ When the saved of earth shall gather ♪	12:46
	♪ Over on the other shore ♪	12:49
	♪ And the roll is called up yonder, I'll be there ♪	12:51
	♪ When the roll is called up yonder ♪	12:57
	♪ When the roll is called up yonder ♪	13:02
	♪ When the roll is called up yonder ♪	13:08
	♪ When the roll is called up yonder, I'll be there ♪	13:17
	(soft ambient music)	13:25
	(bright upbeat music)	14:37
	(bright upbeat music)	15:46
	(bright orchestral music)	16:02
-	Let us acknowledge and confess our sins,	17:47
	before Almighty God, and in the presence of our neighbors.	17:51
	Oh God, our creator from whom we come	17:58
	and into whom our spirits return.	18:03
	We confess to you our slowness to accept death	18:07
	as a part of your plan for our life.	18:11
	We confess our reluctance to commit to you,	18:15
	those who we love.	18:19
	Oh God,	18:22
	we know that there may be situations	18:24
	which are worse than death.	18:26
	Forgive us,	18:30
	when we hurt and destroy our brothers and sisters	18:31
	and the world you have given us,	18:35
	our thought misdeeds,	18:38
	our careless actions and our lack of love.	18:40
	And give us grace in the presence of death that pain	18:45
	to worship you and to trust you with confidence	18:50
	through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.	18:56
	Oh Lord, hear us as we make our personal confession to you.	19:00
	Amen.	19:19
	Hear the good news,	19:22
	nothing can separate us from the love of God,	19:24
	not our sin, no tribulation, no distress or persecution,	19:28
	neither death nor life, no anything,	19:35
	and all of creation will be able to separate us	19:39
	from the love of God,	19:43
	which we know in Christ Jesus, our Lord.	19:45
	For this, we give thanks and sing hallelujah.	19:49
	(bright classical music)	20:00
	♪ Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	20:07
	♪ Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	20:11
	♪ Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	20:16
	♪ Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	20:20
	♪ For the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth ♪	20:25
	♪ Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	20:31
	♪ For the Lord God omnipotent reigneth ♪	20:35
	♪ Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	20:41
	♪ Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	20:47
	♪ Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	20:51
	♪ Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	20:58
	♪ Hallelujah ♪	21:07
	♪ The kingdom of this world ♪	21:11
	♪ Is become the kingdom of our Lord ♪	21:17
	♪ And of His Christ, and of His Christ ♪	21:23
	♪ And He shall reign for ever and ever ♪	21:27
	♪ And He shall reign for ever and ever ♪	21:32
	♪ And He shall reign for ever and ever ♪	21:38
	♪ For ever and ever, forever and ever ♪	21:45
	♪ King of kings Forever and ever Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	21:49
	♪ And Lord of lords Forever and ever Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	21:54
	♪ King of kings Forever and ever Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	22:01
	♪ And Lord of lords Forever and ever Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	22:07
	♪ King of kings Forever and ever Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	22:13
	♪ And Lord of lords King of kings and Lord of lords ♪	22:19
	♪ And He shall reign ♪	22:25
	♪ And He shall reign ♪	22:27
	♪ And He shall reign forever and ever ♪	22:30
	♪ King of kings Forever and ever ♪	22:35
	♪ And Lord of Lords Hallelujah, Hallelujah ♪	22:39
	♪ And He shall reign forever and ever ♪	22:43
	♪ King of kings! and Lord of lords ♪	22:50
	♪ King of kings! and Lord of lords ♪	22:54
	♪ And He shall reign forever and ever ♪	22:58
	♪ Forever and ever ♪	23:04
	♪ Forever and ever ♪	23:06
	♪ Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	23:08
	♪ Hallelujah! Hallelujah ♪	23:10
	♪ Hallelujah ♪	23:14
-	The epistle lesson for this morning,	23:50
	is from First Corinthians 15:35	23:53
	through 44 and 51 through 57.	23:56
	"But some will ask how are the dead raised?	24:03
	"With what kind of body do they come?	24:07
	"You foolish, man,	24:11
	"what you sow does not come to life unless it dies.	24:13
	"And what you sow is not the body, which has to be,	24:18
	"but a bare kernel perhaps of wheat or of some other grain.	24:22
	"But God gives it a body as he has chosen	24:28
	"and to each kind of seed its own body	24:32
	"for not all flesh is alike,	24:36
	"but there is one kind for men, another for animals,	24:39
	"another for birds and another for fish,	24:44
	"there are celestial bodies and there are terrestrial bodies	24:48
	"but the glory of the celestial one	24:53
	"and the glory of the terrestrial one is another.	24:56
	"There is one glory of the sun	25:00
	"and another glory of the moon.	25:03
	"And another glory of the stars,	25:05
	"for star differs from star in glory.	25:08
	"So is it with a resurrection of the dead.	25:12
	"What is sown is perishable?	25:16
	"What is raised is imperishable.	25:19
	"It is sown in dishonor,	25:22
	"it is raised in glory.	25:24
	"It is sown in weakness,	25:27
	"it is raised in power.	25:29
	"It is sown a physical body,	25:32
	"it is raised a spiritual body.	25:35
	"If there is a physical body,	25:38
	"there is also a spiritual body.	25:41
	"Lo I tell you a mystery.	25:44
	"We shall not all sleep,	25:48
	"but we shall all be changed in a moment	25:50
	"in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet.	25:54
	"For the trumpet will sound	25:58
	"and the dead will be raised imperishable	25:59
	"and we shall be changed.	26:02
	"For this perishable nature must put on imperishable	26:04
	"and this mortal nature must put on immortality.	26:08
	"When the perishable puts on the imperishable	26:12
	"and the mortal puts on immortality,	26:15
	"then shall come to pass the saying that is written,	26:19
	"Death is swallowed up in victory.	26:23
	"Oh death, where is thy victory?	26:26
	"Oh, death, where is thy sting?	26:30
	"The sting of death is sin and the power of sin the law.	26:33
	"But thanks be to God who gives us the victory	26:39
	"through our Lord Jesus Christ."	26:43
	The gospel reading is from John 14, one through six,	26:47
	15 through nine.	26:51
	"Let not your hearts be troubled,	27:03
	"believe in God, believe also in me.	27:05
	"In my father's house are many mansions,	27:09
	"if it were not so, would I have told you	27:12
	"that I go to prepare a place for you.	27:15
	"And when I go and prepare a place for you,	27:18
	"I will come again and will take you to myself.	27:21
	"That where I am, you may be also.	27:26
	"And you know the way where I am going.	27:29
	"Thomas said to him, Lord,	27:32
	"We do not know where you are going,	27:35
	"how can we know the way?	27:37
	"Jesus said to him,	27:39
	"I am the way and the truth and the life,	27:41
	"no one comes to the father but by me."	27:46
	"If you love me, you will keep my commandments.	27:51
	"And I will pray the father.	27:55
	"And he will give you another counselor,	27:57
	"to be with you forever.	27:59
	"Even the spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive	28:01
	"because it neither sees him nor knows him.	28:06
	"You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.	28:10
	"I will not leave you desolate, I will come to you.	28:15
	"Yet a little while and the world will see me no more,	28:19
	"but you will see me, because I live, you will live also."	28:23
	That's the end of the reading of the gospel.	28:29
	(bright orchestral music)	28:32
-	Let us with one voice affirm our faith.	29:15
	We are not alone.	29:20
	We live in God's word.	29:22
	We believe in God, who has created and is creating,	29:24
	who has come in the truly human Jesus	29:30
	to reconcile and make new.	29:33
	Who works in us and others by the spirit.	29:36
	We trust God who calls us to be the church	29:40
	to celebrate life at its fullest, to love and serve others,	29:45
	to seek justice and resist the evil,	29:51
	to proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen,	29:54
	our judge and our hope,	29:58
	in life, in death and life beyond death,	30:01
	God is with us, we are not alone,	30:06
	thanks be to God.	30:10
	The Lord be with you.	30:13
	Let us pray.	30:17
	Eternal God, Almighty creator,	30:29
	maker of heaven and earth, we worship you.	30:34
	Your wisdom is beyond our understanding.	30:40
	Your power is greater than we can measure.	30:45
	Give us grace to apprehend this power and wisdom,	30:50
	which lie beyond our understanding	30:56
	and in our worship to feel that which we do not know,	31:00
	and to praise that which we do not completely understand	31:05
	and to rejoice in the presence of your glory,	31:10
	which we feel in this our worship.	31:13
	We thank you Holy God	31:19
	that you have made us creators together with you,	31:21
	that you have given us this ability to make beautiful music,	31:27
	to proclaim your love,	31:34
	to use this earth and its wonder for your glory	31:36
	and the nurture of your children.	31:41
	Help us to be responsible to you in our creativity.	31:45
	Look with pity and love, oh God,	31:52
	upon this your world in its sorrow	31:54
	with the sighing of your children,	31:57
	for we are engulfed by the evil of our own contriving.	32:01
	May those who suffer because they are guilty,	32:07
	learn the godless sorrow of true repentance.	32:11
	May those who suffer innocently	32:16
	have a vision of the suffering of Christ	32:19
	and know that there can be redemption in their pain.	32:22
	Help us, oh God, to be instruments of your mercy,	32:28
	servants of your love, to all who suffer,	32:33
	binding up their wounds,	32:37
	stealing their hunger and restoring them	32:40
	to a loving community.	32:45
	We give you thanks for all persons	32:48
	who have as their vocation to bringing a fullness	32:51
	and wholeness of life, to all your children,	32:53
	the doctors, the nurses, the teachers, the researchers,	32:56
	the ministers and all who work	33:01
	that we may have life.	33:04
	We give thanks for all who have gone before us	33:08
	and have preceded us into death	33:10
	for the love and continued remnants of those we know	33:13
	who've have died during this past year.	33:17
	We pause now, oh God, to lift these people silently to you,	33:21
	Bless their memory.	33:40
	We lift you, oh God,	33:43
	those persons who know no grief and pain and sorrow.	33:45
	Those for whom life holds no meaning,	33:50
	those persons who are critically ill	33:53
	and those who grieve because persons they love,	33:57
	are near death.	34:01
	Comfort and support and sustain us in our time of grief.	34:03
	Oh Lord, you are not a God of the dead,	34:12
	but of living people.	34:16
	We ask you who have made us to bless us and keep us alive.	34:19
	Receive us when we die,	34:25
	renew us when we grow old or tired or discouraged	34:27
	and make us open if we become close to you,	34:33
	we pray in the spirit of Jesus, the Christ	34:37
	who taught us all to pray,	34:41
	our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name,	34:44
	thy kingdom come,	34:51
	thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.	34:53
	Give us this day, our daily bread	34:58
	and forgive us our trespasses	35:01
	as we forgive those who trespass against us	35:04
	and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil,	35:08
	for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory,	35:13
	forever and ever, Amen.	35:19
-	In the name of God who creates, sustains	35:39
	and offers us the promise of life eternal, Amen.	35:44
	Dr. Paul Tillich in a sermon of his entitled,	35:52
	"The Eternal Now", writes,	35:55
	"It is our destiny and the destiny of everyone in our world	35:59
	"that we must come to an end.	36:06
	"You will also come to an end."	36:11
	Or as Carl Reiner puts it,	36:17
	it is not a question of whether, but of how.	36:19
	And so each of us lives his or her three score years and 10	36:25
	or 26,000 days or more or less years and days and so what.	36:29
	Death is still not a question of whether, but of how.	36:37
	Everything must come to an end.	36:44
	And so recent news stories tell us again and again of death,	36:50
	the threat of death, and for some, even the hope of death.	36:54
	Two different assassination attempts have been made	37:00
	on the life of the president of the United States.	37:02
	And the wife of the president says,	37:05
	simply we know that this is a part of the risk of the office	37:07
	and we accept it.	37:11
	General Francisco Franco of Spain	37:14
	lies four days near the point of death	37:17
	and all of Spain waits and the entire world watches	37:19
	as an aged leader approaches death.	37:23
	We all have been reading recently of Karen Ann Quinlan,	37:27
	a 21 year old young adult who has been lying in her bed	37:32
	for six months in Denville, New Jersey	37:37
	kept alive only by means of an artificial respirator.	37:41
	Her parents with the advice and the support of her church	37:46
	have asked the doctors to let her die	37:50
	and to use her father's words, "with grace and dignity."	37:53
	Recently, Dr. Henry P Van Dusen and his wife,	37:58
	took their own lives at the same time.	38:01
	For those of you who know who Dr. Van Dusen is,	38:06
	you know that this was a shock and a surprise	38:09
	because for a number of years,	38:13
	this man had been president of union theological seminary	38:14
	in New York city and a leader in the theological world.	38:17
	He and his wife had reached their eighties.	38:23
	They wrote letters to their children	38:26
	and to their grandchildren saying	38:28
	simply we do not want to be a burden on you	38:29
	or on anyone else or on society.	38:33
	And then they said, we are not afraid to die.	38:36
	Norman Cousins in the Saturday Review editorial	38:42
	commenting on the Van Dusen death,	38:45
	said, "Death is not the greatest loss in life.	38:47
	"The greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live.	38:52
	"The unbearable tragedy is to live without dignity."	38:56
	Dr. Elizazeth Kubler Ross, noted psychiatrist and author,	39:03
	who is well known for her extensive work with the dying	39:09
	and for her book entitled "On Death and Dying"	39:13
	has been in the news recently	39:16
	with some of her views on life after death.	39:18
	And she writes,	39:23
	"I have never been religious in the conventional	39:25
	"church going since, but in the last years,	39:29
	"my ideas about death have begun to change.	39:33
	"I used to think that death was the end of everything.	39:37
	"Now I'm certain it is not.	39:43
	"From the bottom of my heart.	39:47
	"I can say, I believe there is no death.	39:50
	"Only the body dies.	39:55
	"I now do believe in a life after death,	39:58
	"beyond a shadow of a doubt,	40:01
	"I have come to believe that death may be a very beautiful	40:04
	"experience and not something to fear."	40:07
	And so this morning, my friends in Christ	40:12
	with news stories and experiences	40:14
	of the famous and of the not so famous	40:17
	is introduction and background,	40:19
	what of a Christian word on death and living beyond death	40:22
	as on this Sunday and thanks to the choir	40:25
	and to John Harding and the jazz lab band	40:28
	for the magnificent moving hallelujah chorus.	40:31
	As we celebrate this morning,	40:36
	the Sunday after all the saints day.	40:37
	Randolph Crump Miller says that whimsy and humor	40:40
	are to be combined with a serious faith	40:44
	in the meaning of life and death.	40:47
	And then I remember the child's letter	40:51
	in the little book of simple, but very profound insight,	40:52
	a little book entitled "Children's Letters to God."	40:57
	And this one particular letter reads,	41:00
	"dear God, what is it like when you die?	41:02
	"Nobody will tell me.	41:06
	"I just want to know, I don't want to do it.	41:09
	"Your friend Mark."	41:12
	Well, most of us are like God's little friend, Mark.	41:15
	We want to know what life is like when we die.	41:19
	We don't want to do it yet,	41:22
	though God, we just want to know.	41:23
	When I think of living beyond death,	41:29
	one verse of scripture comes readily to mind,	41:31
	and that is in Paul's writing to the church at Corinth	41:33
	in First Corinthians 2:9, where he says,	41:36
	"Eye has not seen nor ear heard.	41:38
	"Neither has it entered into the mind of anyone,	41:41
	"those glorious things,	41:44
	"which God has prepared for those who love him."	41:46
	No, no eye has seen, no ear has heard	41:50
	neither has it entered into the mind of any person.	41:53
	We do not know, we only believe.	41:57
	So keep that verse in mind this morning.	42:04
	And perhaps you may want to keep it in mind	42:06
	beyond this morning, because when all is said and done,	42:09
	and when all is written and even when all is understood	42:13
	about living beyond death, this word does remain true.	42:16
	We do not know,	42:21
	we only believe.	42:23
	And so talk of life and death and living beyond death	42:27
	brings all kinds of fears to the surface	42:34
	for many of us in ham.	42:37
	It seems to me that there are basically three aspects	42:41
	of living and dying and death and the presence of fear,	42:44
	the very presence of fear which may be considered.	42:49
	And the first place some people say	42:53
	that they do not fear death,	42:55
	they fear only the suffering that they may have to endure	42:56
	before they actually die.	42:59
	The late great preacher at city temple in London,	43:02
	Dr. Leslie Weatherhead is, or was one of these.	43:05
	He said once, "I am not afraid to die,	43:08
	"I am afraid of the suffering,	43:11
	"which may lie between my present healthy state and death."	43:12
	But the idea of dying he says, "is attractive to me	43:16
	"to wake up amongst old friends,	43:20
	"with a new body that doesn't hurt anymore	43:22
	"and is not worn out is most attractive.	43:25
	"I am not afraid to die, I am afraid of suffering."	43:29
	In the second place,	43:34
	some people simply say they do fear death.	43:35
	The mystery of it, the unknown of it, the finality of it,	43:37
	the apparent futility of it.	43:41
	Psychiatrist, Margaretta K. Bowers	43:44
	writes the great bulk of normal people,	43:46
	who face death are terrified.	43:50
	And they have all sorts of different ways	43:52
	of controlling this.	43:54
	Not always successfully,	43:56
	but all have some kind of coping technique.	43:58
	And Dr. Joel Posner of Philadelphia is quoted	44:02
	in this week's Newsweek feature article entitled	44:04
	"A right to die."	44:07
	And he says,	44:08
	"I have seldom seen anybody die with peace and dignity.	44:09
	"They all have tubes and pain and they're scared."	44:14
	Then in the third place,	44:22
	some people say they fear what lies beyond death,	44:23
	or fear that nothing is beyond death	44:26
	or fear that this life is it	44:28
	at death it's all finished, the end	44:30
	or they are afraid because they just do not know	44:32
	if I really knew they would say,	44:35
	or if I could just be sure they say,	44:37
	or if only I knew or had some glimpse	44:40
	or some idea of what it would be like,	44:42
	it is the unseen, the unknown,	44:44
	the uncertain, the unforeseeable,	44:46
	the unknowable that is fearful to some persons.	44:48
	A Blackfoot Indian named Crowfoot described this feeling,	44:52
	as he wrote "From nowhere, we came and into nowhere we go,	44:57
	"what is life?	45:05
	"It is the flash of a Firefly in the night.	45:07
	"It is the breadth of a Buffalo in winter time.	45:11
	"It is the little shadow	45:17
	"that runs across the grass	45:18
	"and loses itself in the sunset.	45:22
	"From nowhere we come and then to know where we go."	45:26
	And this thought is fearful to some.	45:31
	When I think of these three fear feeling	45:35
	dimensions of life and death,	45:38
	I'm reminded of the response you often hear	45:40
	when someone asks you after dinner,	45:43
	what would you like to have for dessert,	45:46
	ice cream or pie or cake?	45:48
	And you say yes, all three.	45:50
	And if you were to ask me, Bob,	45:56
	what are you afraid of suffering before death,	45:57
	death itself or that which lies beyond death?	46:02
	I would say yes, all three.	46:06
	So as I talk with you this morning	46:13
	about living beyond death,	46:14
	I feel some need to tell you some of my own feelings	46:15
	about life and death and thus about some of my fears.	46:18
	Ever since I was a little boy, I've been afraid of death,	46:25
	to think about it scared me,	46:31
	to hear about it frightened me,	46:35
	to talk about it made me upset.	46:38
	So we didn't, not at my house.	46:41
	I was 16 years old before I went to my first funeral	46:44
	or saw someone who was dead.	46:47
	I really didn't know what it was that I feared or why.	46:49
	And no one talked with me or gave me a chance	46:52
	to talk about my feelings.	46:56
	And as I entered the ministry	47:00
	and came to the Divinity School here at Duke,	47:01
	these feelings continued with me even at the age of 22.	47:03
	I was scared to death	47:07
	at the thought of being around the dying.	47:08
	As a matter of fact, I only took one course in pastoral care	47:13
	in the Divinity School because I was afraid	47:16
	that if I took another one,	47:18
	I'd have to be on call in the hospital here.	47:19
	And that would mean being around death and dying.	47:22
	The one thing about the ministry that I dreaded most	47:26
	was having to make hospital calls	47:28
	and being near those who were dying,	47:31
	but God took care of that.	47:33
	On my first parish,	47:35
	one of the first telephone calls I received was from a woman	47:37
	who said, my husband is dying of cancer.	47:40
	I'd like for you to be our pastor,	47:43
	God has a way of taking care of us	47:47
	and some of our deeper fears and feelings.	47:52
	And so for six weeks,	47:56
	I visited with him as he slowly lay dying.	47:57
	My friends, may I tell you that my fear of death	48:03
	has given me a heightened awareness of some of those things	48:06
	that have been going on around me and within me.	48:13
	And two insights have become powerfully real to me.	48:18
	One of these insights and one of these awarenesses	48:24
	that has come to me is the feeling of awe and reverence	48:27
	that I have known as I have stood beside the bed	48:33
	of a dying man or woman and have shared.	48:37
	And I remember particularly the first time	48:41
	as I stood beside the bed of a man	48:43
	and shared for the first time,	48:46
	my experience of seeing him breathing and here in one moment	48:48
	and not breathing and not here in the next.	48:55
	Now you talk about awe and reverence	48:59
	and mystery and being overcome,	49:04
	all of these feelings and many more,	49:08
	were very, very pressing.	49:11
	Here he was, and then he wasn't.	49:15
	Strange as it may seem, I can still recall,	49:20
	and even sense the numinous presence of God,	49:23
	which I felt in that very, very moment,	49:28
	in that twinkling of an eye, which Barbara read to us.	49:33
	The mystery and the majesty,	49:38
	the awfulness and the awesomeness.	49:41
	And here's some words of Charles Dickens come to my mind	49:46
	as he once wrote.	49:49
	"It is a disturbing thing to do anything for the last time."	49:49
	And so it is, my fear of death has helped me	49:58
	to know the majesty of the moment of death.	50:02
	My fear of death also has taught me the value,	50:09
	the real value of life.	50:14
	I have a very, very, very dear friend	50:17
	who does not believe in the resurrection.	50:21
	He does not believe in life beyond it.	50:24
	He thinks that when death comes that there is no more.	50:28
	And I said to him, one time, Ed,	50:30
	I don't really see how you get along now	50:34
	with no hope of life after death.	50:38
	It seems to me that that that would ruin life for you now.	50:41
	And he replied not at all, Bob, as a matter of fact,	50:47
	that awareness in me makes this life	50:52
	all that much more important.	50:54
	If this is all,	50:57
	then I want to get the most out of this life	50:58
	that I possibly can.	51:00
	I'm going to live it to its very fullest.	51:02
	And this man does in a caring, healing helpful way.	51:06
	And so, as I have stood by and with the dying	51:11
	and with their families, I have indeed become convinced	51:15
	that the inevitability for death of death for each of us,	51:18
	should cause us to place the greatest of value on life,	51:21
	as we are privileged to live.	51:29
	Maybe, just maybe,	51:34
	that's what death is intended to do after all,	51:38
	to teach us the value of life,	51:43
	how important it is, how valuable it is,	51:47
	how filled with possibilities	51:51
	or when one faces the reality of death.	51:55
	The reality of one's own death,	51:57
	life does take on a newer and deeper meaning.	52:00
	You know the name of Abraham Maslow, a noted psychologist,	52:08
	after having had a heart attack,	52:15
	Maslow wrote about his, what he calls his post mortem life.	52:19
	"My attitude toward life changed,	52:26
	"the word I use for it now is the post-mortem life.	52:30
	"I could just as easily have died	52:34
	"so that my living now constitutes a kind of extra a bonus.	52:37
	"It's all gravy."	52:41
	Hmm, interesting how psychologists talk at times, isn't it?.	52:43
	Therefore I might just as well live	52:47
	as if I had already died.	52:49
	One very important aspect of the post-mortem life is that	52:53
	everything gets doubly precious, gets piercingly important.	52:56
	You get stabbed by things by flowers	53:01
	and by babies and by beautiful things,	53:05
	just the very act of living of walking and breathing	53:08
	and eating and having friends and chatting.	53:11
	Everything seems to look more beautiful.	53:15
	And Brian Kirkland in his book "Home Before Dark"	53:21
	tells of this same insight, as he says,	53:23
	"a certain majesty enters the lives of men and women	53:29
	"who have brushed the wings of death	53:35
	"and have returned to their daily toil."	53:38
	A new meaning enters into the commonplace.	53:41
	A new tenderness encompasses the family circle	53:44
	when a man has confronted death,	53:48
	though, others may not see it.	53:50
	The fact that he comes home more directly from work,	53:52
	may escape his wife's notice,	53:55
	but for him who has been granted to stay	53:57
	from perhaps never returning home again,	54:00
	it makes a new perspective of love and devotion.	54:04
	Perhaps, just perhaps,	54:11
	facing the reality of death	54:16
	is intended to help us to see	54:20
	the real value of life every moment, perhaps.	54:23
	But then what do we say of living beyond death?	54:33
	After we have said, as we did at the beginning,	54:38
	eye has not seen nor ear heard,	54:40
	neither has it entered into the mind of anyone,	54:42
	those things, which God has prepared for those who love him.	54:46
	What do we say then of living beyond death?	54:50
	Emerson Harris has an intriguing little poem,	54:54
	entitled "Strawberry Shortcake."	54:58
	I heard a good man say he writes at the funeral of a friend	55:02
	that unless he believed in the immortality of the soul,	55:08
	there was nothing to live for,	55:11
	nothing to hope for.	55:13
	It was the hope of their mortality that gave his life	55:15
	what a meaning and riches he knew he had found.	55:18
	I could not agree with him.	55:22
	Immortality, is like a maraschino cherry	55:26
	on a strawberry shortcake.	55:30
	The cherry adds color and taste to the delicacy.	55:33
	But if it were not there,	55:38
	I would find the cake and the berries	55:39
	and the whipped cream to be quite delicious.	55:41
	And this would be sufficient.	55:44
	And I would say, God, thanks for the strawberries	55:46
	and the cake and the whipped cream.	55:49
	Put the cherry on if you wish,	55:52
	but without the cherry, the rest is enough.	55:54
	Thanks God for life.	55:58
	Living beyond death, the resurrection,	56:03
	the maraschino cherry added to the strawberry	56:08
	shortcake of life.	56:10
	What can we say of living beyond death?	56:11
	After eye has not seen nor ear heard,	56:15
	we do not know, we only believe,	56:21
	but we believe based on promise.	56:26
	The promise found in God's word.	56:30
	We live with promise and we die with promise,	56:32
	the promise of our Lord and our God.	56:36
	Surely we are, as Paul says,	56:40
	surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses	56:43
	or as Paul writes, I am persuaded that nothing,	56:47
	there is absolutely nothing which shall separate us	56:54
	from the love of God in Christ Jesus, our Lord,	56:58
	or as Jesus said, let not your hearts be troubled.	57:03
	He who believes in me shall never die.	57:11
	And whoever lives and believes in me	57:13
	shall have life everlasting.	57:15
	Those who come to me, I will in no wise cast out.	57:20
	Today, he said to the thief dying at the same time he died,	57:24
	today, you shall be with me in paradise.	57:29
	A promise, yes.	57:33
	Living beyond death is a matter of living	57:38
	with the promises of God.	57:40
	But my friends, that's nothing new.	57:45
	We live by promises all the time,	57:50
	as in life, so in death.	57:55
	We live by promises from those persons whom we trust.	57:59
	We listen and we hear a word and we trust.	58:04
	To a husband or a wife, the promise is, I will love you.	58:12
	To a child, the promise is I will care for you.	58:22
	To a class, the promise of the professor is,	58:29
	I will help you to learn.	58:33
	To a person facing surgery,	58:37
	the promise is, I will watch over you.	58:40
	To a friend going away, the promise is, I will wait for you.	58:45
	And to those who are here,	58:54
	the promise is I go to prepare a place for you.	58:57
	And if I go and prepare a place for you,	59:03
	then I will come again and will take you to myself	59:05
	that where I am there, you may be also.	59:09
	Robert Ox, in a little book of his,	59:15
	just recently published, writes,	59:18
	"To be a person means to count forever"	59:22
	And God, in Christ says to you, and to me, you are a person	59:31
	and you count forever.	59:38
	In life we say, we said a moment ago	59:42
	in our affirmation of faith in life, in death,	59:44
	in life beyond death, God is with us.	59:48
	Amen,	59:54
	and amen.	59:56
	(bright upbeat music)	1:00:25
	♪ Amazing grace ♪	1:00:59
	♪ How sweet the sound ♪	1:01:03
	♪ That saved a wretch like me ♪	1:01:07
	♪ I once was lost, but now I'm found ♪	1:01:15
	♪ Was blind, but now I see ♪	1:01:22
	♪ 'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear ♪	1:01:30
	♪ And grace my fears relieved ♪	1:01:38
	♪ How precious did that grace appear ♪	1:01:46
	♪ The hour I first believed ♪	1:01:54
	(bright orchestral music)	1:02:02
	(bright upbeat music)	1:04:04

Item Info

Title:

Robert T. Young - "Living beyond Death" (November 2, 1975)

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4rr1tn66

Date:

November 2, 1975

Speaker:

Young, Robert T., 1935-2009

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Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 RR-0799
ref6798_tdi
uachapelsermaud
duke:628038
dcrau002762
ark:/87924/r4rr1tn66
f9734f3c-72f0-4242-b54a-96879b42545c

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Robert T. Young - "Living beyond Death" (November 2, 1975)

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