Sorry if that sounds morbid. It’s actually the title to an Agatha Christie book that just blew me away with it’s “twist” ending. I read it years ago, so maybe it wouldn’t “wow” me today as it did then, what with all of the movies out there with twist endings. But the title sure stuck with me. And lately I’ve been mulling over what that really means.

Maybe it’s because we’ve heard of so many funerals these past few weeks, but death is something worth pondering. Especially since it really does come as the end to all life, whether we like it or not. And where we spend eternity will be going on a whole lot longer than where we spend our life on this earth.

I think sometimes that we get too wrapped up in today. People live for the here and now with no thought to the future. We avoid talk of death in a positive way – and yes, there is a positive side to it – but fear of the unknown makes us push it far from our thoughts.

Ecclesiastes tells us that it is better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting because in the house of mourning, where someone has died, the righteous will ponder their own mortality and take it to heart. (My paraphrase)

So that’s what I’ve been doing – thinking about the lives of those cut short, wondering where they woke up when they closed their eyes forever on this earth.

For some, they woke up forever separated from God, in a place called hell. I know, not a popular word these days, but it is a real place. For others, they opened their eyes to the glory of God and forever left behind all that troubled them here.

The thing is, we need to remember that our life here is temporary, so pondering what comes afterward is a good thing. Taking care to find out whether we are on the right track, trusting in the right things, finding the real truth, is wise.

Look around and see – death happens, like it or not. And despite centuries of searching, no one has found an eternal fountain of youth or invented some pill to keep us alive for eternity on this earth.

I know of two people who died on Memorial Day. One was 86 and had been sick for years. The other was 21 and was killed in an unexpected car accident. One was an old friend of the family, who loved the Lord. The other was a distant cousin that I never knew, and I have no idea what kind of faith she possessed, if any.

Death is no respecter of age. It does not care how much money or power or fame we possess. It falls on the evil and the good. Death comes as the end.

And that is something worth thinking about.