The Last Enemy

It was the 17th of October 1988 when a beloved sister intently searched the scriptures for a comforting prayer in an hour of deep despondency. The Lord led her to Psalm 139:23, 24…” search me, 0 God, and know my heart; try me, and know my thoughts: And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” The hopeful sister, thus, laid open her heart before the eye of a merciful God. “Only God, who knows our inmost thoughts, can lead us safely. We all need an infallible Guide.” (3BC p. 926)

She continued to pray intently, now with her own thoughts, gaining courage with each agonizing work. Many unbearable problems had overwhelmed her until she was irretrievably locked in a sea of frustration and loneliness.

She pleaded and cried out to the Lord that He might give her the strength and wisdom to rationally convince her doctors and loved ones that she was truly and seriously ill. No one would lend a sympathetic ear to her pathetic complaints of a racking and gnawing pain in her afflicted abdominal area. The unfounded accusation was that she was suffering merely from anxiety and fright, but even more horrible, that she was pitiable and eccentrically insane!

Desperately praying further, she earnestly pleaded with the Lord to cleanse her absolutely, to deeply purify her body and soul, leaving her ego entirely behind and placing her life hi His hands.
Pleading despairingly to the Lord again, she guardedly asked Him to help her reach the optimum limits of her strength for the impending trial ahead.

The excruciating abdominal pain now accompanied by a high fever, were unmistakable signs that something was critically wrong. However, the Lord compassionately responded within a day to her fervent prayers, by granting her all of her requests. The trial she faced became a blessing as she felt as if she was talking to Him face to face during this state of purification and healing. Miraculously those involved with her and dearest to her finally approached the Lord with awe and wonderment.

Now in retrospect, the “mysterious” illness she suffered through was of a one-year duration encompassing a series of questionable outcomes. She underwent two major operations and one gravely critical episode after the first operation which confined her to an intensive care unit for several days where she hung by thin threads to her dear life. It was during this “blessed trial” that she resolutely approached Jesus, as she never did before with an abiding faith. Her life was truly in the hands of a healing Lord, as she had offered up and promised earlier in her soft prayers.

In the intensive care unit the struggle begins as her life is pivoting on a hinge of life or death. Her blood pressure and pulse is rapidly approaching zero, yet she is inflexibly conscious and her courageous mind, in this stricken condition, is ritualistically functioning! In this inarticulate, sepulchral state she gathers enough strength to utter an audible prayer.. .perhaps a dying prayer.

She then becomes convulsively spasmodic, a terrifyingly strange condition as her life slowly ebbs and fades away. “The darkness of death is like the evening twilight; it makes all objects appear more lovely to the dying.” (Richter) “Men know not how soon the arrow of death may strike their hearts.” (MH 454) Will the ghastly death battle punctually waive or idly linger?

With her eyes closed she sees with a dauntless heart a glowing heavenly picture. Off in the celestial distance is the kingly head of Jesus fading away into the heavenly sky with His royal and billowing white garment of righteousness trailing behind Him down to the groaning earth. She gently lies on His delicate garment to ease the intolerably stabbing pains. Her languid pulse is no longer perceivable, breathing is very shallow and labored until it stops! She desperately clutches this white garment and murmurs in a soft whisper, “Lord, If you want to take my life now, I am yours, but if you don’t want me to die yet, I will live to be your humble servant and your messenger, praising Thee here on this bare earth.”

This macabre yet blessed scene lasted five hours, as she was informed later by the doctors and staff.
With a deep heave and a sigh her last breath leaves, and she slowly fades away into the throes of death. With a deathlike grip on the royal white garment, she finds her fragile strength leaving her, but suddenly her grip on the Lord’s garment returns. She relentlessly holds on, refusing to part with the divine Lord, knowing that she is dying. Her thoughts now aimlessly begin to wander as she is face to face with death… “O death, where is thy sting? O Grave, where is thy victory?” (1 Cor. 15:55)… “am I prepared to pass in review before Thee Lord?” Popular theology represents the righteous dead as in heaven, entered into bliss and praising God with an immortal tongue, but Hezekiah could see no such glorious prospect in death. With his words agrees the testimony of the psalmist: “In death there is no remembrance of Thee: in the grave who shall give Thee thanks?” “The dead praise not the Lord; neither any that go down into silence.” (Psalms 6:5; 115:17) (GC 546)

She yearns with a devoted love for those she will soon leave behind, especially her generous husband and lovely daughter. She accepts this as God’s will, a natural circumstance of life, not painful or begrudging.
Her faithful thoughts now drift back to the radiant face of Jesus. Her ego does not exist anymore, but only appears as an infinitely small dot on the white garment. She is free at last, at peace, and has reached tihe ultimate limits of her strength she asked for in her earlier prayer. Her thoughts now are steadfastly fixed on Jesus on the cross, and how agonizingly humiliating it was as He hung there for so many bitter hours. Now she belongs totally to Jesus. She is going far away…Jesus is her Saviour now. She is no longer faintheartedly afraid for she knows that, “Friends, and loved ones, separated by death, will be united at the second advent.” (EW p. 16, 287)

After a remote and stirring period she heard the alarmed but tender and angelic-like voice of the nurse saying… “she is coming back” Another academic question and the answer, “five hours”! Later she was told that for five hours she was grimly close to death.

This extraordinary, yet striking phenomenon of her bout with death and return to life was the buzzing and heartsearching talk of the hospital the next day. Many doctors made providential visits to her room during and after her confinement in the intensive care unit, to view this Lazarus-like patient. Her personal doctor said, “God must love you…He gave you life again.” She graciously remained silent at this, but knew it was confessedly true.

She was now filled with uncomplaining and serene patience, for “tribulation worketh patience.” (Rom 5:3) She was no longer in the clutch of lurking fear, but with reverence and Godly fear, for “fear of the Lord is a fountain of life.” (Prov. 14:27) With the blessed fruits of patience and fearlessness, she was a miraculous and “professional” testimony to her newly “reverend” doctor who had subtle yet intimate knowledge of her dying prayers. He studiously and vigilantly observed her as a rejuvenated creation… a providential sign from God.

She gave herself to the Lord without being bewilderingly doubtful and by allowing no one to plant seeds of doubt in her heart. The Lord covered her with His radiantly healing white garment, giving her an all-embracing life and sufficient grace to shroud her husband and daughter who faithfully stood by this beloved sister.

She can now confidently claim “The promise of the kingdom, for the ‘mysteries’ of the kingdom are now revealed and are ‘at hand'”. “Then cometh the end, when He shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father, when He shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. For He must reign, till He hath put all enemies under His feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. ” (1 Cor. 15:24-26)

This beloved sister poured out this precious and personal testimony to comfort and encourage other brethren and sisters in urgent spiritual need, and to give assurance to those facing death. She genuinely offered up prayers to our Lord in thanks with all her heart for His wondrous and tender mercy, abiding love and cherished gifts. “For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” (1 Cor. 10:13)

For divine and steadfast strength, “let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him return unto the Lord, and He will abundantly pardon.”‘ (Isaiah 55:7)
Indeed the Lord forgives generously and the only path you have to take is through repentance to follow His heavenward way. Only then, after the Holy Spirit has touched your heart, can you properly understand how immeasurably great is the forgiveness of the Lord, and who saves by His precious blood. In the words of the Apostle Paul to the Philippians. “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” (Phil 4:13) She found immense strength to overcome the most distressing and gravest crisis in her life.

Fresh inspiration was found in Psalm 103:2. 3 “”Bless the Lord. 0 my soul, and forget not all His benefits: Who forgiveth all thine iniquities. who healeth all thv di?eases.”‘

It may be oddly providential that Socrates wrote. “Be of good cheer about death, and know this of a taith. that no man can happen to a good man. either in life or after death”… And Sister EGW wrote. “Look to Jesus. Taist in Jesus, whether you live or die. He is your Redeemer. He is our Life-giver. If you fall asleep in Jesus He will bring you forth from the grave to a glorious immortality. May He give you peace and comfort and hope and joy from henceforth.” (2 SM p. 254)

Dear brethren and sisters, may the Lord comfort, strengthen and bless you. by this joyful and triumphant testimony. Remember that. “The last enemy to be destroyed is death.” (ICor. 15:26). but that, “faith is a mightier conqueror than death”‘ (MH p. 62) for “death is swallowed up in victory.” (1 Cor. 15:52-54). Death is not the last sleep, but is the last and final awakening
AMEN