[AI translation] On this Sunday, the now traditional Old and Sick Sunday in our congregation, when our love and prayer is especially directed towards our elderly or sick brothers and sisters - let the teaching of God's Word speak among us about an old man! A believer on his way home from the last stage of his life. Sometimes it is good to reflect on old age and its problems, even if it is not yet topical for someone. Not only because time is passing over everyone, and the brightest youth is passing - but how quickly it passes... and the evening is coming soon - but also so that young people do not forget one of their most beautiful duties, one of the most important human and Christian virtues: understanding and appreciating the elderly! Because that is what a man, who is already burdened enough by the weight of many years, needs most of all! Let us look at a dear old man from the Bible, who, like fruit in the summer sun, is slowly ripening for eternity. The life and arrival of a man on his way home is presented to us in the Word.One of the characteristics of this last stage of life is announced in the Scriptures: "And Sarah died" (Genesis 23:2). Short, simple news, like any obituary the postman brings today. And those who read it often don't even think about how much pain and tearful sadness there must be in the heart of the person who wrote and sent the obituary. The Sarah who died was the other half of Abraham's life. She was left here in Abraham's late old age like an old tree, half of which has been cut down by lightning. Dismembered, wounded, maimed! Someone who had been his companion in good times and bad, in joy and sorrow, in the waiting and fulfillment of the great promise: gone... Forever! Someone with whom his heart, his soul, his destiny, his faith, his prayer, had been united for a long, struggling life, is dead! Oh, how hard it is to be alone with someone who has been with someone else for a very long time! That is one of the greatest burdens of the last stage of life, that one has to face more and more the sad fact that this little word "dead" means. This one is dead, that one is dead. Of those with whom he once went into life's struggles, with whom he rejoiced or grieved, with whom he was one, with whom he understood: there are fewer and fewer of them now, in eternity. Soon there will be none of them left. New generations have grown up around him, and even the older ones think differently, their minds walk differently, even their vocabulary is different from what he was used to. He is becoming nervous in his surroundings, orphaned in spirit...
In the story we read that when Sarah died, "Abraham went in to mourn for Sarah and to weep for her". So, he did not go in to the dead man to gnaw his soul with grief, he did not retire to the good old memories - as many mourners so wrongly do, now living only in his memories and for his memories - but Abraham went in to God! Into the inner room that Jesus spoke of in connection with prayer. That is the good thing at such a time, that is what the sorrowful soul needs. Not to deal with its sorrow, but to be alone with the Father! To complain to Him of all the pain, to weep tears before Him! In silence before God, the soul is always at peace. It is in inner communion with God that one can learn to see even the greatest pain in a light that human words and human wisdom could never illuminate! It is there, in inner communion with God, that man feels the reality of the mystery that every time someone dies beside him, a new thread is woven between him and eternity - and that mysterious, invisible world becomes almost more real to him, for many dear souls, each representing a piece of his life, are already there, and are weaving him more and more into it! And to the eternal gnawing sorrow of every grieving heart that it is burdened with defaults towards the departed, which it can no longer atone for: for this too it can find a solution only there, in communion with God within: in the fact that there is forgiveness for this too, for the sake of Jesus. Sins of omission can only be laid under the cross, in the grace of God! Abraham knew this, and that is why it is written of him that he "went in to mourn for Sarah and to weep for her." It is the great privilege of the believer to have One to go to, and One before Whom to weep his sorrow. Jesus said, "Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted" (Mt 5,4).
Then we read, "Now Abraham was an old man, a man of full age" (Gen 24:1) These two words, old and full, though related, express two quite different aspects of old age. The word "old" refers to the exhaustion of the vital forces, to the physical wasting away, to the darkening twilight. The growing weariness. And this is a particularly heavy spiritual burden for the old man. Because he feels that he is a burden on his environment, that no one takes advantage of his being alive. And he would so much like to help, to be active - but they won't let him, perhaps he can't. He has so much more to say, so much advice, so much admonition, but they don't take him seriously. He is forced to pass the time idly, while life goes on around him, while others' hands are full of work. This is the most distressing feeling for someone who has spent his life in serious work. And there is no crueler cruelty than when your surroundings make you feel it! How many bitter old men are waiting for the moment when they will not be in the way of the young! It is terrible how we humans can make life so difficult for each other! Let us at least not make it difficult for those whose age alone makes it difficult enough! For a kind word, a loving gesture, there is no one more grateful than an old man! Let's appreciate them, let's love them while we can, until it's not too late!
But old age means not only weariness, but also what this other word means here in connection with Abraham: "full of life". This word means the achievement of a lifetime of toil, the fullness, maturity, maturity of a man's personality. That is, a state of being a fully ripened fruit, which has not yet fallen from the tree. And that is the beauty of old age! Isn't a ripe peach beautiful? Or a fully ripened bunch of grapes? Beautiful! Useful, tasty! That's the beauty of the word "ripe". And here we are talking about a believer, because Abraham's life was truly a life of faith in God. And the life of a believer in God is precisely the life that is thus, with age, fulfilled, matured. The life of a believer in God is called, destined for eternity. The human life that is nourished by faith from eternal life, however feeble in its manifestations, does not in fact grow old, because it is called to eternal life. That which in such a life becomes wan, faded, darkened by old age is only the physical force: the eye, the foot, the heart, the organism, the bodily organism, in which the actual life of man - as in a tent - still now dwells. And even if one has had many services, struggles, perhaps illnesses, disappointments over the long decades, all this was only to mature that wonderful thing we call life. Something like the Old Testament verse might mean, "But the path of the righteous is like the light of dawn, which grows brighter the longer it goes on, until the full noon." (Pro 4:18) There is something in the believer that moves not toward darkness, but toward ever-increasing light. The white hair that frames the wrinkled face almost seems to reflect the noonday rays of eternity... That's what the word "alive" means! Oh, how beautiful, oh, how splendid, a man who is alive! A great gift of God!
Such was the old age of Abraham. (Genesis 24:1) It means that out of everything he had lived through, out of everything that had happened to him in a long life, out of every event, every fall, every joy, every sorrow, he had received some blessing from the Lord. The happy realization that "the Lord has done everything so well", which one can usually see in retrospect, is what made Abraham's old age so rich, so happy! For the real blessing of a life is not that everything was great, or that he was able to do something great, or that he was able to maintain his physical health and vigour - but that in everything he lived there was something blessed hidden for him from God. There are some people who seem to be living in truly fortunate circumstances and yet feel as if they are in hell. There are people who seem to have everything going for them, and yet lament their lives as wasted, wasted time. But if a person has found God's blessing in what has happened to him, what he has gone through, it will never make his heart bitter, no matter how heavy the cross - in fact, it will inspire him to give thanks to God! Perhaps the purest joy and happiness can be found when, in the twilight of a life, one can look back on the journey he has made and recount his long life's experiences: It is true: "that to them that love God all things work together for good" (Rom 8:28) It hurt me, it hurt me, it was not what I had imagined at one time - and yet it was good, yet it was what I received the most blessings from God!
At the very end of such a life, there is almost no sadness in what is reported: "And Abraham went out and died in a good old age, old and full of life, and was gathered to his people." (Genesis 25:8) Above this brief announcement shines the joy and glory of the arrival. And this faint glimmer of that afterlife was powerfully illuminated by Jesus when, precisely in connection with the resurrection, he said, "God is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob," and added, "God is not the God of the dead, but of the living - Abraham is alive!
Yes, in death all that we have gained does not crumble away, but we take with us the imperishable things that we have already received in our fellowship with God in this life on earth! For it is not life itself that is shattered for us in death, but only the material vessel with which life in this earthly world is connected. For those who have received Jesus into themselves by faith, death is no longer the end of life, only the end of transience - it is there that life itself becomes perfect and complete!
And finally, this expression "full of life" does not mean tired of life, as one who is already tired of it, but ready to go home! As if he knows that he is now really entering into life! Now life is coming to its fullness! Eternal life! I can imagine that for someone who is "full of life", this is his last experience on earth, death must be his happiest experience!
Brethren, the God of Abraham is our God, our Saviour, our Redeemer! Jesus once said: he who believes in Him has already passed from death to life. In this happy certainty - that is, with Abraham's faith - it is not only possible to die peacefully and happily, but in this certainty it is also possible to live truly, to live usefully, to be a blessing in this earthly world, old and young, making life more beautiful and easier for others! Yes: with Abraham's faith! By the grace of the Lord of Abraham - who is also our sweet good Father, through Jesus!
Amen
Date: 13 June 1965 (Old and Sick Sunday)
Lesson
1Móz 23,1-4