DUST AND THE SLEEP OF DEATH

You turn people back to dust,
saying, “Return to dust, you mortals.”
You sweep people away in the sleep of death—
they are like the new grass of the morning:
In the morning it springs up new,
but by evening it is dry and withered.

Psalm 90.3, 5-6 (read Psalm 90:1-6 NIV

I am old and will turn 86 on May 2^nd if I get that far. I feel the realty that all comes to an end. Nothing lasts forever. But I'm happy. I was once only dust, and even that was a privilege. I didn’t ask to become me, but it happened and I’m glad. I don’t know how long it will last, but while I’m here I’m trying to cultivate wisdom.

I’ve learned that the beginning of wisdom is to know that I don’t know. In my very early years I thought that there were final answers to life’s questions. In my first year of primary school I thought that whoever graduated from a university knew everything. When I finally graduated, I realized I was still just beginning to learn.

Yet, when I got religion at the age of 16 I was taught that the religious “truths” of the holiness movement of which I was a part were absolute and unchanging. In my religious naivety I thought that our movement was the most correct of them all, that we had all the answers and could explain everything. This closed system of thought became my defense before the great mystery of life. I wanted to feel safe and secure. I needed a "shield" to protect me from uncertainty. At first, I did not realize that this “shield” was also protecting me from truth. As time passed and my world expanded the shield became too heavy to bear and slowly I lowered it and started a new stage of growth.

Fortunately I've always been curious, wanting to see ahead of the bend in the road ahead and to go beyond the horizons. One road would lead me to other roads and new horizons kept appearing. I discovered that there are no definitive answers, not even in the "exact sciences." We cannot see as far as the end of the universe or reach the center of an atom, let alone prove a philosophy or even the existence of God. Everything is mystery. Whoever claims to have the answers is living a delusion.

Wisdom has taught me to live with and enjoy the Great Mystery. To enjoy eating bread and butter, I do not need to know how a black cow can eat green grass and produce white milk which makes yellow butter. We use domestic and electronic devices without understanding the technology behind them. Nature is infinitely more complex, and we are ignorant of the forces operative in it. Wisdom seeks to live in harmony with its forces, knowing that they are manifestations of the great mystery which many call "God", and others don’t try to give it a name.

To be wise is to revere the mystery of the natural order and to live in harmony with it. In the Psalms we find a spirituality which makes confident statements and asks many questions but does not try to explain anything.

When I see a beautiful sunset I am delighted with the beauty of the sun as it approaches the horizon and disappears. Each day its color combination is different from the evenings before. “Beautiful”, I think, "There I go! Hopefully my twilight will be as beautiful!" Then I remember the words at the beginning of Psalm 90: "Lord, you have been our dwelling place throughout all generations." I feel that I am in the hands of the Great Mystery that brought me to be who I am and has conserved me thus far. I feel that the twilight of earthly life is as beautiful as its dawning and that I will always be in the hands of the eternal, without beginning or end. The Psalmist speaks of the “sleep of death”. Death may be a going to sleep here and a waking up in some other reality.

PSALM 90:1-6 – NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION (NIV)

Lord, you have been our dwelling place

    throughout all generations.

Before the mountains were born

    or you brought forth the whole world,

    from everlasting to everlasting you are God.

You turn people back to dust,

    saying, “Return to dust, you mortals.”

A thousand years in your sight

    are like a day that has just gone by,

    or like a watch in the night.

Yet you sweep people away in the sleep of death—

    they are like the new grass of the morning:

In the morning it springs up new,

    but by evening it is dry and withered.