“died”

Today I attended a Memorial Service. A member of our church family died.

But even before today the word “died” has been on my mind. Why? I came across it in the book First Chronicles in chapter one in my daily reading of the Bible, the Word of the Living God. I am reading the Bible from cover to cover.

Have you read the book “The Prayer of  Jabez” by Bruce Wilkinson? The book is translated into German and I have a copy of the book here before me.  Somebody must have sent it to me as a present. On page thirteen it says that the first nine chapters of the book First Chronicles are pretty boring, even for students of theology because of the Historical Records From Adam to Abraham.

I really don’t know. I have no problems reading the first nine chapters of  First Chronicles. It is the Word of the Living God! Just now I am opening a NLT (New Living Translation) New Testament, and on the first page I read Second Timothy 3:16-17: “ALL SCRIPTURE IS GODBREATHED AND IS USEFULL FOR

—TEACHING,

—REBUKING,

—CORRECTING AND

—TRAINING IN RIGHTEOUSNESS,

SO THAT THE MAN OF GOD MAY BE THOROUGHLY EQUIPPED FOR EVERY GOOD WORK. “

In First Chronicles 1:44-50 you find the word “died” in every verse. In verse 50 you find it even twice. Eight times in seven verses. People are dying every day. But there was no need to tell you that!

I  hope, that the Lord is coming back, before I die.

There is a beautiful portion of the Word of God in the New Testament in  Paul’s  letter to the Romans. Romans 5:12-21: ” Death Through Adam, Life Through Christ.” Listen to verse seventeen.  In the New Living Translation (NLT) it says,

“FOR THE SIN OF THIS ONE MAN, ADAM, CAUSED DEATH TO RULE  OVER MANY. BUT EVEN GREATER IS GOD’S WONDERFUL GRACE AND HIS GIFT OF RIGHTEOUSNESS, FOR ALL WHO RECEIVE IT WILL LIVE IN TRIUMPH OVER SIN AND DEATH THROUGH THIS ONE MAN, JESUS CHRIST.”