“Is the death of the will any less painful than the death of the body? Call it figurative if it makes you comfortable, but in reality the death of the will is far more traumatic than the death of the body.”
“Yes. Yes, you are right. In the death of the body the nerve endings soon stop feeling. In the death of the will the heart doesn’t stop its bleeding so quickly. Those were my own words."
from "When Heaven Weeps: Newly Repackaged Novel from The Martyr's Song Series (The Heaven Trilogy Book 2)" by Ted Dekker
It's so hard to know the truth.
Many (most?) would think the death of the body would be worse than anything.
Many (most?) would also look at the image at the top left and think "He who does the will of God abides forever" means giving up our free will. That it means the death of our will.
Somehow - both thoughts just seem to make sense.
Like what's worse than death - the end of our lives?
And how can we do the will of God without giving up our own free will?
The first problem
Generally, when there's an incorrect conclusion from a very short logic sequence - like the one that says death / the end of our life is the worst thing that can happen - that incorrect conclusion comes from a wrong assumption at the very beginning.
In this case - the wrong assumption is that death is the end of our lives.
Yes - death is the end of life here - on this planet - in this carbon based body.
But that doesn't mean there isn't something after death.
The hope of all Christians is resurrection and then eternity with Jesus.
In that case - death isn't the end.
Death is a necessary step to the next portion of our lives. Eternity.
The second problem
The second problem is also based on a wrong assumption.
God wants us to have free will.
One thing we learn from Adam & Eve is just how important our free will is. God wants us to love Him - but He still gives us the opportunity to choose whether or not to do that. As I've pointed out many times - love without free will isn't really love.
Free will also extends to the quote in the image, which is from the verses in 1 John 2 that the NIV subtitles Do Not Love the World -
Do Not Love the World
1Jn 2:15 Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For everything in the world—the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does—comes not from the Father but from the world. 17 The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.
I know - it seems weird. Doing what someone else wants isn't necessarily giving up our own will.
But - it's true. Just look at what Paul wrote about his own struggles with doing what God wanted -
Struggling With Sin
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