Thinking in Reverse

Behold my friend
as you pass by
as you are now
so once was I
As I am now
so you must be
Prepare for death
and follow me

Epitaph from an old cemetery stone





Olive Bebee

Died August 1st 1850

Age 53 years








There is nothing like a stroll through an old cemetery to put one's life in perspective. This past summer I found this stone. The woman buried here was just three years older than myself.

The message reminded me about how my life is really here today and gone tomorrow, how truly like a mist, a vapor, a fading flower I am.

Olive Bebee's epitaph is a sobering one. If we are wise we will prepare for our death, but not just in the practical arrangements around our last will and testament and burial. I want to be prepared by living in a way that insures that I am making every day count. Those two dates between the dash on the tomb stone I have no control over, but the dash, now that is another story. We have been reminded in our series called One Month to Live that we need to be living the dash, not dashing to live.

Not to be morbid, but to be wise, I need to think about the day people will gather around my casket and consider what they might say about me, what might be important enough to remember and share with my loved ones that remain. What would I want them to say about me? What would I want them to remember?

Even as I type these words on the screen I realize that it is not just what people say about me that is really important. What is really important is what God thinks of me... what God will say about me, to me when I see Him face to face. That is the kind of preparing for death I want to be about.

So you see, thinking in reverse is not really a morbid thing at all. It is in thinking in reverse that gives me direction in the moving forward with a renewed intentionality and purpose.

I am grateful for Olive Beebe's epitaph. A cemetery stroll every now and again is indeed good for the soul.

"Well done, good and faithful servant, you were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things, enter into the joy of your Master. Matthew 25:21

Until Next Time,
Peggy