That's a pretty serious question i suppose, especially in a culture that doesn't like to think much about death. Comfort in life is pretty easy. I'm popular, i'm loved, i'm rich, i'm famous, i'm successful. Even if none of those things are true, we comfort ourselves with virtual reality, or our drug of choice. Comfort in life can be found, but what about comfort in life and death?
If there a comfort that goes beyond the grave? Is there a comfort for those left behind. You can't take it with you, they say...but what if you could. The Heidelberg Catechism provides an excellent answer:
That I am not my own, but belong with body and soul, both in life and in death, to my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ. He has fully paid for all my sins with His precious blood, and has set me free from all the power of the devil. He also preserves me in such a way that without the will of my heavenly Father not a hair can fall from my head; indeed, all things must work together for my salvation. Therefore, by His Holy Spirit He also assures me of eternal life and makes me heartily willing and ready from now on to live for Him.
Isn't that wonderful? What's our comfort in life? Not fame or fortune, but that we belong body and soul to a faithful Saviour. What's our comfort in death? That Jesus Christ has paid fully for all our sins with His precious blood and all things must work for our salvation. True comfort in life, lasting comfort in death.
To see this comfort and assurance lived out is a special thing. My paternal grandfather, 'Dadda' passed away on Tuesday morning. He was never rich, or famous, he didn't need to be, his riches were found in the comfort that came from Christ. He fought in a particularly brutal theatre of World War II, protecting the Arctic Convoys after a spell in North Africa and Southern Europe, but he never really talked about it. He came home, put his medals in a box, got married, and lived his life. Even earlier this year, when he could have gone to Buckingham Palace to be awarded the new Arctic Cross medal, he wasn't really interested. His comfort was never in trinkets.
His comfort was in the fact that Christ's blood covered his sins. Out of this comfort he loved his wife, he worked his job, he raised my dad, and took his grandchildren on days out to cathedrals, RAF bases and old race tracks. There's not a village or footpath in Bucks that he was unfamiliar with. He never got lost. Even this summer, well into his 92nd year, he was sill walking canals, still gardening, still sweeping up leaves in the churchyard. His quality of life, inwardly and outwardly, was nothing short of extraordinary.
He no longer lives by faith, but by sight, and his body rests, awaiting his glorious resurrection. I'm glad Christ's death was his comfort in life, i'm glad that Christ's death was his comfort in his own death, and mine today.
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