Sharing a Final Memory

One year ago tonight, I sat with my mom on what ended up being one of her final days, and talked with her about life, death, God, eternity and sin...

I had come to her and Dad's house to stay for a few days. She had just gone into Hospice care and I wanted every moment I could have with her. At that time, I was finishing up a semester at seminary, much like I am now, and I had about 5 papers I needed to finish in a matter of just a couple weeks. Mom was in her room laying down and I sat in the livingroom, pulled out my laptop and books and began working on one of my papers. The only sound in the house was the sound of her oxygen machine humming. My brother came into the livingroom, plopped himself down on the couch and wanted to chew the fat. I said, "Go away" (probably could have found a nice way to say it but I had to be strong and not give into the temptation to stop studying) He understood and went into another room and I continued studying.

Then I heard my mom get up. She was puttering through the house, closing window blinds for the night, checking the locks on the doors then working her way out to her chair in the livingroom. As she began to sit down, she looked at me, saw the laptop and books in my lap and said, "Oh, I'll go in the other room, I don't want to bother you."

"Nope." I closed my books and put down my laptop. "It's completely interruptable." There was no way I was going to miss a time to sit with my mom and talk with her. I didn't know how many more times I would have.

Mom began talking about the fears she had about dying. She told me that she had read in scripture where death is the enemy. That would be from I Corinthians 15:26 that says, "The last enemy to be destroyed is death." She believed that if she died, that meant she was doing something wrong.

As I watched the tears stream down her face I wanted to get through to her that the death referred to in that scripture was not physical death, but spiritual death. I told her that if what she believed was true, Paul would still be alive and he would be over 1,000 years old. "I'm sorry Mom," I said, "But, I don't want to live to be 150 years old."

"What do you believe then?" she asked, through her tears.

"I don't believe physical death is such a bad thing. Think of where we go, when we are in Christ, after we die. We go to be with the One we have loved to the best of our abilities here on this earth. We go to a place where we know only joy, only peace and only love. We are released from the bodies that have wracked us with pain. We are taken out of this world that has put demands on us that are not of God in any way, shape or form. We are truly free!! How can that be a bad thing? How can that be a punishment or a result of us doing something wrong? We don't die and go to be with the Lord because of what we've done wrong; we die and go to be with the Lord inspite of what we've done wrong."

We talked that night for a couple hours at least. I got no work done on my papers and I didn't care one bit. The day after that conversation, my mom thanked me for that talk. She said she felt so much better about things. It turned out, that was the last big conversation I had with my mom. She died just 3 days later.

Had I not put my books down. Had I sent her out of that room because I was studying. I would have missed it. I thank God for ministering to both of us that night.