Welcome to Nancy Guthrie’s guided journal “Hoping for Something Better,” which she based on her book of the same title (Tyndale 2007).
New journal entries will appear in your profile Monday-Saturday for 6 weeks. If you missed any so far, stay subscribed to this feed and you can begin when it starts over. Be sure to start your own journal within your Beliefnet profile or in a notebook to respond to Nancy’s prompts.
Day 9
There is something better than being enslaved to a debilitating dread of death. It is being set free by the promise of unending life.
Read Hebrews 2:14-18.
Most of the world lives in major denial about death—with the illusion that if we don’t think about it, it won’t happen, and with the superstition that if we dare to discuss it, it is doomed to happen. We don’t want to talk about death or do much preparing for it in an attempt to keep it at bay.
What are we so afraid of?
I think we’re afraid of what is unknown about death. We fear the pain of death and the pain our death will cause to others. We fear the separation that is inherent in death. We fear the loss of control that death and dying bring. We fear the finality of death. Many of us fear the judgment that will follow death.
The thing about death is, no matter how old the person is who dies, no matter the cause of his or her death, no matter how many times someone tells us that death is perfectly natural, something deep inside us cries out, This is not right. This is not how it is supposed to be.
What are your thoughts and feelings and fears about your own death or the death of someone you love?
What would it mean to you to be freed from slavery to the fear of death?
In what way was the devil destroyed by Christ’s death (2:14)?
–Nancy Guthrie