Isaiah 57:1-2

¹ The righteous perish, and no one ponders it in his heart; devout men are taken away, and no one understands that the righteous are taken away to be spared from evil. ² Those who walk uprightly enter into peace; they find rest as they lie in death.


All of our lives belong to God. He created each living soul and he did so with a purpose that was of his own doing. Similarly death that comes to each individual in life, has been designed for purposes that glorify the Lord.

To you and I and most everyone we know, death is often the greatest tragedy, especially when it occurs in a manner that we deem as being early or premature.

Notice with me from this passage that sometimes a seemingly tragic death is actually an act of mercy on God’s part, designed to spare someone the heartache of future evils that only God in his omniscient nature, who operates outside of the framework of time, knows about.

That reveals to us a glimpse into the nature of death that we are not capable of comprehending. It also reveals to us that God has purpose in everything that befalls the believer, whether seemingly good or bad in nature from our point of view.

When someone close to us dies, we are heavily struck. It affects us deeply because we will never see them again in this life. But as believers we must understand that God has a purpose in our deaths just as he has a plan and a purpose for us through our lives.

Because our lives are not our own (Jeremiah 10:23), and because God says that man does not have the right to direct the steps of his own life, we recognize then that the choosing of the hour of our own death through suicide is also a grievous evil.

Suicide is an ultimate act of rebellion against a God who loves us and has a very different plan and purpose for our lives. That’s why we understand there is no eternal hope for those who take their own lives. Only God has the right to say when this life is over for any living soul since every soul belongs to him.

We also see another truth at work in the scriptures that gives us further insight into God’s perspective regarding those who have died. God can freely communicate with someone who has died just as easily as when they were alive.

I don’t believe it is a tragedy to God when people die because to him they are still alive. No soul is truly dead to God, though some souls are truly lost to him.

To God all are alive.

This was made apparent to us during the transfiguration when Jesus met face to face and had a discussion with Elijah, who has not yet ever died, and Moses, who did die and yet now lives on in the presence of God. The dead Moses, and the live Elijah were seemingly indistinguishable in nature one from the other when they met with Jesus on the sacred mountain as Peter called it, where they heard the voice of the Majestic glory saying:

“This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”

That scene depicts for us, just a glimpse of God’s perspective regarding death; how all are alive to him; how death is not the barrier for him that it is to us; and how God defines death much differently than we perceive it.


Takeaway points:

All of our lives belong to God. He created each living soul and he did so with a purpose that was of his own doing. Similarly death that comes to each individual in life has been designed for purposes that glorify the Lord.

Sometimes a seemingly tragic death is actually an act of mercy on God’s part, designed to spare someone the heartache of future evils that only God in his omniscient nature, who operates outside of the framework of time, knows about.

Suicide is an ultimate act of rebellion against a God who loves us and has a very different plan and purpose for our lives. Only God has the right to say when this life is over for any living soul since every soul belongs to him.

To us death is often just a tragic end, but to God it serves some purpose of his, a purpose that may bring glory to his name. God has a plan and a purpose for every death, just as he has a plan and a purpose for every life.

God does not consider it a tragedy when people die, the only time death seems tragic to God is when they die in a state of rebellion towards him.

Ultimately, every death fulfils the universal spiritual law of sin and death. Ultimately every death fulfils the requirements of spiritual justice, and justice brings glory to God.

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