I intend to live forever or die trying

Check this out: if you were 119 years old, you still have a 10% chance to live beyond 120. At least, according to the Social Security Administration’s actuarial life tables.

But the truth is, only one contemporary person has ever cracked the 120-year mark — Jeanne Calment, a French woman who made it to 122 plus some change. Of course, the Bible chronicles some people who made it to ages way beyond that, but such times didn’t last long, which is why you find David writing, “As for the days of our life, they contain 70 years, or if due to strength, eighty” (Ps. 90:10).   

That dovetails pretty well with the latest life expectancy data, with men clocking out at about 75 years and women living longer and making it to 80. If you’re reading this and are in your 20s or 30s, that seems like such a long time off, but not if you’re mid-life or older.

I just saw The Eagles in Las Vegas at The Sphere and their lead singer, Don Henley who is 77, said onstage that his life has gone by in the blink of an eye. It’s like James said: “You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away” (James 4:14).

Most times we don’t give that fact much thought, but occasionally the reality of it sinks in. Maybe that happened to Bryan Johnson, a mid-40s tech entrepreneur who is spending $2 million a year in an attempt to reverse his aging. 

No one really believes he has a shot at it. The Fortune article covering his attempt has one of the doctors involved in the field saying: “As much as we would like to be able to control our fate, it’s just not possible.”

No, it’s not. Johnson doesn’t know it, but he’s living out the old Groucho Marx joke, “I intend to live forever or die trying.”

When it comes to our here and now, the Bible says: “A person’s days are determined; you have decreed the number of his months and have set limits he cannot exceed” (Job 14:5). But Scripture is also clear that doesn’t mean we’ll cease to exist and it’s adamant that such an assertion is more than just wishful thinking.

You have never talked to a mere mortal

To the question Job posed, “If a man dies, will he live again?” (Job 14:14), many secular philosophers answer no. Or, at most, some give a half-hearted reply of ungrounded hope much like writer Francois Rabelais did in his final poem before his death when he said, “I go to seek a Great Perhaps.”

In his book, Being and Nothingness, Jean-Paul Sartre wrote “Death is not my concern, so long as I am, death is not; and when death is, I am not.” Seneca agreed saying, “Death is the wish of some, the relief of many, and the end of all.”

If true, there is a terrible trickle-down effect on all of us. Sartre sums that up when he writes, “Life has no meaning the moment you lose the illusion of being eternal.” No matter how people who deny the immortality of human beings try to spin life without eternity, he’s right. 

For those who hope for something more than that, the question is, how do you really know there’s life after death and that we can do better than a “Great Perhaps”? 

Outside of Christianity, I don’t think you can. Last time I looked, there was only one religious worldview with an empty grave for its founder. And that vacated crypt makes all the difference in the world when it comes to answering the question of life after death.

For Christians, it brings sureness and trust in the One who said, “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies” (John 11:25). It’s why Paul could confidently write, “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 6:23) and “But it [salvation and eternal life] has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, who has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel” (2 Timothy 1:10).

But what about non-Christians? The Bible says they’re immortal also, no matter what those who embrace the concept of annihilationism or conditional immortality say.

This is why C. S. Lewis said: “There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations — these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit”.

Dr. Maurice Rawlings found this out in an unexpected way. Rawlings was an atheist and a cardiologist who hadn’t given much thought to immortality until he started seeing patients die in front of him.

Rawlings witnessed first-hand the reactions of those dying and observed that the experiences lined up with what the Bible teaches. Those encounters changed him into a God-believer and caused him to research the subject in depth, all of which resulted in his books Beyond Death’s Door and To Hell and Back.

He sums up his book’s conclusion in a powerful way when he writes, “There is a life after death, and if I don't know where I'm going, it is not safe to die.”

What about you? Is it safe for you to die?

If not, how about you stop what you’re doing right now, give the Gospel of John a read, and see what the only Man who came back from the dead and stayed that way has to say about life after death. No one deserves to be listened to and trusted more on that subject than Him.