Burned or Buried?

“To wash and dress a corpse is a far different thing from making it alive: Man can do the one—God alone can do the other.” – C.H. Spurgeon

My wife Deanna is adamant about one thing: she wants to be cremated when she dies. “I don’t want a viewing,” she has told me repeatedly. I guess she doesn’t like the idea of people walking by her open casket and saying, “Doesn’t she look good?”

Being buried – or burned – doesn’t matter to me, but I’m likely to follow Deanna’s lead so that our ashes can be interred together. After 38 years of marriage and counting, it would be a bit weird to be buried in one place and have Deanna’s ashes scattered elsewhere.

Sound morbid? Maybe so, but as you age, subjects like this begin to occupy your mind. In fact, I have already given Deanna and our kids some instructions for my memorial service. I want Teddy Roosevelt’s “The Man in the Arena” speech to be read and the “Impossible Dream” from The Man of La Mancha to be sung. I also would like “It Is Well with My Soul” to be sung and a strong gospel message preached including an invitation to trust Jesus Christ as Savior. I sure hope that either Dave McMurray, Larry “Chap” Lilly, Bill Waltz, or Tom Cox is available to give the altar call.

If anyone could instill life in a dead body, it would be one of the aforementioned men. Not only are they great friends and mentors, but they are all top-flight preachers. But alas, not even these gifted and anointed pastors can accomplish the impossible. Only Jesus can do that… and He will, reuniting my spirit with my glorified body someday.

Until then, I plan to share the gospel with as many people as possible so that they will experience God’s abundant life here on earth (see John 10:10) as well as His eternal life in heaven. I also plan to love my beautiful bride, my three adult children and their spouses, my six precious grandchildren, and all my friends to the very best of my ability while I’m still here.

The bottom line is this: it doesn’t matter what happens to your earthly body once you’re done with it. Of far greater importance is what you did for God while you still inhabited it… so let’s get busy!

“And the sea gave up the dead who were in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them, and they were judged, each one of them, according to what they had done.” Revelation 20:13 (ESV)

- Rev. Dale M. Glading, President