Dying Archives - Life Hope https://lifehope.blog/category/dying/ Life Hope Tue, 18 Jan 2022 02:59:38 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.6.2 195989472 What are our idols, and will they get us through? https://lifehope.blog/what-are-our-idols-and-will-they-get-us-through/ https://lifehope.blog/what-are-our-idols-and-will-they-get-us-through/#respond Tue, 18 Jan 2022 02:56:06 +0000 https://lifehope.blog/?p=1141 The post What are our idols, and will they get us through? appeared first on Life Hope.

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“Idols” in the survey was taken to only mean “celebrity idols”

That was a surprise to me! What about “idols” that we make in our lives as being of the greatest importance to us personally, and as a society? Things like money and wealth. Like sex and leisure. Like sport and entertainment. The list would be enormous!

From the answers that were given by those in the market, we see that entertainers were the tops, followed by those who had overcome or done something very special. 

 

 

 

Photo by Pablo Heimplatz on Unsplash

A celebrity idol who can change me forever?

Seeing the answers of others, I thought, “These celebrities are themselves going to fail, and to fall out of that celebrity status. Who will last and give me meaning and positive change all the way through to the end?”

Only Jesus…

He wasn’t flawed then, when performing miracle after supernatural miracle. Nor when he purposely gave his life on the torturing cross, taking our shame and punishment in our place for our rejecting God and his laws. Especially when he came back to life as he had promised, he certainly wasn’t in any way flawed. 

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
John 3:16 (NIV) (http://www.laridian.com)

“I voted for Jesus as my enduring idol, giving me meaning now and ongoing. 

 

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]]> https://lifehope.blog/what-are-our-idols-and-will-they-get-us-through/feed/ 0 1141 With at least 1 out of 4* occupants destined to die, isn’t the womb the most dangerous place to live? (*WHO) https://lifehope.blog/with-1-out-of-4-occupants-destined-to-die-isnt-the-womb-the-most-dangerous-place-to-abide-who/ https://lifehope.blog/with-1-out-of-4-occupants-destined-to-die-isnt-the-womb-the-most-dangerous-place-to-abide-who/#respond Thu, 02 Sep 2021 03:01:00 +0000 https://lifehope.blog/?p=294 The post With at least 1 out of 4* occupants destined to die, isn’t the womb the most dangerous place to live? (*WHO) appeared first on Life Hope.

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The WHO statistic is disquieting, isn’t it?

Nowadays it’s difficult to know what percentage of pregancies end in spontaneous abortions (miscarriages), and what percentage from induced abortions (terminations of pregnancy).

It seems that the spontaneous ones are mostly due to chromosomal problems, while the induced result from human choice. Whatever the reason, both are tragic. Very understandably, the events sum up to a huge rollercoaster of emotions for those intimately involved.

The womb should be the safest place to live. After all, when a lady is pregnant, the baby is the most delicate and vulnerable of us all.

Ultrasounds are amazingly detailed these days, and also show that detail earlier and earlier in the pregnancy.

Seeing the skull, the spinal cord, the limbs, as well as the beating heart, touches us in a most amazing way. We are usually full of wonder at these sights.

Whenever my wife has been pregnant, my reflex desire has been to love and care for them both.

Photo by Pablo Heimplatz on Unsplash

The sanctity of each human life

This is a precious principle. I think it should apply from conception to death, the bookends of our lives. Some of this is reflected in Psalm 139 written and preserved from 4,000 years ago. For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
[14] I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
[15] My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place,
when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
[16] Your eyes saw my unformed body;
all the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be.
Psalms 139:13 (NIV) (http://www.laridian.com) What are your thoughts?

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]]> https://lifehope.blog/with-1-out-of-4-occupants-destined-to-die-isnt-the-womb-the-most-dangerous-place-to-abide-who/feed/ 0 294 What will happen to me after I die? https://lifehope.blog/what-will-happen-to-me-after-i-die/ https://lifehope.blog/what-will-happen-to-me-after-i-die/#respond Tue, 31 Aug 2021 07:25:43 +0000 https://lifehope.blog/?p=420 What happens to me after I die? Judgement by Jesus, go to heaven, go to hell, reincarnation, nothing at all, rest in peace, start all over?

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A great question!

Since everyone ends up dying, then it makes sense to ponder the question, don’t you think?

Benjamin Franklin apparently said: “… in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.”

Not everyone pays tax, but everyone gets to die!

So what happens next?

Nothing? Recycling? Come back as a unicorn? Heaven? Hell?

What have you decided? Is it a fixed thought, or waiting for more enlightenment?

I hope to end up in heaven. Not because I am any better than anyone else, but because I am forgiven by God. That happened when I accepted what Jesus did for me on the cross. He then came to life again, so I will be able to also. 

Photo by Pablo Heimplatz on Unsplash

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]]> https://lifehope.blog/what-will-happen-to-me-after-i-die/feed/ 0 420 Which big questions of life do we try so hard to avoid and ignore? https://lifehope.blog/which-big-questions-of-life-do-we-try-so-hard-to-avoid-and-ignore/ https://lifehope.blog/which-big-questions-of-life-do-we-try-so-hard-to-avoid-and-ignore/#respond Tue, 31 Aug 2021 05:21:59 +0000 https://lifehope.blog/?p=414 Big questions in life we try hard to avoid or ignore. Like death, life after death, judgement, justice, God, and the like.

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Photo by Pablo Heimplatz on Unsplash

The Big Questions? 

Different for everyone I suspect.

Maybe we have some respectable questions that we allow ourselves to mention to others.

And then some we keep nicely hidden and secret for just ourselves to wrestle with and worry about. Maybe that’s because if we admit to having them, and also having them very unanswered, then we would so easily expose our weakness and vulnerability.

However, wouldn’t it be good to get realistic answers, that in the long run, will prove to not let us down, but be truly true?

What are those hidden ones for you?

Try these 

1. Where have we come from?

2. Why am I here?

3. How should I live?

4. What will happen to me after I die?

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]]> https://lifehope.blog/which-big-questions-of-life-do-we-try-so-hard-to-avoid-and-ignore/feed/ 0 414 Who goes to heaven? Is there a heaven? https://lifehope.blog/who-goes-to-heaven/ https://lifehope.blog/who-goes-to-heaven/#respond Sat, 14 Aug 2021 08:06:20 +0000 https://lifehope.blog/?p=63 heaven
no heaven
who goes?
good people go to heaven?
bad people go to heaven?

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Who goes to Heaven?

The statement opposite is one I presented for responses recently in the market, before the last lockdown happened for Covid.

“Only bad* people go to heaven.” (*conditions apply)

Most people who voted thought there was ‘no heaven’.

The second group said a ‘No’ to the statement.

A few of us voted for the statement being true.

What do you think?

Any idea why I went for that seemingly weird answer?

The ‘*conditions apply’ is the key…

If we see ourselves as created human beings owing our very life to the Creator God, then some things follow. If we also consider how we have rebelled against him, ignored him, bad-mouthed him, then you may see where the ‘bad’ people part of it comes.

As well,  Jesus said,

“It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. [13] … For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

Matthew 9:12 (NIV) (http://www.laridian.com)

The patients who see themselves as being sick are the ones who go to the doctor. Those who think of themselves as being well, don’t, even though they really are sick. It parallels our perception of our actual spiritual state before God.

Forgiveness is the key to open the door to God’s heaven

In the same way, people who see themselves as needing God’s forgiveness, which is exactly what Jesus offers in full, are the ones who can go to heaven!

The Bible’s heaven promises to be wonderful, while Hell terrible. You could almost say that those who actually deeply love God go there, while those who don’t, find the other by default…

“What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard,

and what no human mind has conceived”— the things God has prepared for those who love him—

1 Corinthians 2:9 (NIV) (http://www.laridian.com)

What do you think?

 

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