Review of Ligon Duncan with J. Nicholas Reid, Fear Not! Death and the Afterlife from a Christian Perspective, Fearn: Christian Focus, 2010.
It is more customary to review books that have been recently published, but this is one that many will find to be a help in dealing with subject of impending death. We tend to find the resolutions of Jonathan Edwards a little confronting: 'Resolved, to think much, on all occasions of my own dying, and of the common circumstance which attend death.' As a contrast, we find many a friend and neighbour who would imitate King Louis XV of France who demanded that his advisors not use the word 'death' around him. He may have been known as Louis the Beloved, but he still died, in 1774.
When the Baptist preacher, William Kiffin, lost his wife, he wrote: 'Her death was the greatest sorrow to me that I ever met in the Lord.' Yet there is a way – and only one - out of such sorrow. Death is the curse that God blesses (see 2 Kings 22:20; Luke 16:22; 23:43; John 14:2; 2 Cor.5:8; Phil.1:21,23; 1 Thess.4:13).
For the Christian, Christ has won the victory. As Isaac Watts meditated on Psalm 23:
Here would we find a settled rest,
While others go and come;
Not like a stranger or a guest,
But like a child at home.
The resurrection changes everything.
Not all questions are answered. According to Duncan and Reid, those who are saved will recognise each other in heaven, but the authors do not know how those who have died as little children or as aged saints will appear. I have always assumed that they would be raised as fully grown, rather like Adam and Eve at the creation. They also mention the new heaven and new earth, but do not fully incorporate it into their work. Instead, they content themselves with heaven, which they see as enjoying eternity in the presence of God with a mediator.
I have given copies of this book to people who were struggling with cancer or Motor Neuron Disease, and it is ideal for those situations. For the unbeliever, death is the fearful unknown, but the Christian can take great comfort: 'Fear Not!'
- Peter Barnes
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