When Should We Pray for God to Take Us Home?

00:00:00.000 | (upbeat music)

00:00:02.580 | - Welcome back to the Ask Pastor John podcast.

00:00:07.880 | And before we begin, if you haven't already,

00:00:10.200 | make sure you download our mobile apps

00:00:11.880 | or visit us online at desiringgod.org/askpastorjohn.

00:00:16.880 | Today's email comes in to us

00:00:20.320 | from a young podcast listener named Austin,

00:00:23.200 | who writes this, "Dear Pastor John,

00:00:24.640 | "I'm 17 and I have terminal cancer.

00:00:27.920 | "Doctors say my cancer will come back

00:00:29.740 | "and that my body cannot handle any more chemo

00:00:31.840 | "or bone marrow transplants.

00:00:34.160 | "God has used the past five years of fighting it

00:00:36.280 | "to bring me closer to him and to use my situation

00:00:39.520 | "to bring a few people closer to himself as well.

00:00:42.360 | "But I'm getting weary and I'm ready to go home.

00:00:45.920 | "I don't like to admit it,

00:00:47.120 | "but I pray that God would take me home,

00:00:48.940 | "but he keeps sustaining me.

00:00:50.440 | "His answer is clearly no or not yet.

00:00:53.380 | "How do I keep my joy even when life is hard and painful?"

00:00:58.880 | I feel like when I approach this question,

00:01:02.180 | it's entering into holy ground.

00:01:04.920 | What I mean by that is ground just outside heaven.

00:01:09.340 | This is like a step away from heaven.

00:01:11.460 | I'm standing here on the edge

00:01:14.160 | and heaven has made this ground holy.

00:01:17.340 | It's like giving advice just outside the door

00:01:19.540 | of God's temple and he can hear what I'm saying.

00:01:22.780 | Of course, he can hear what I'm saying all the time,

00:01:25.400 | but there's something sacred about talking to someone

00:01:30.220 | who is likely about to stand before Jesus

00:01:34.240 | in a very short time.

00:01:36.620 | So I want Austin to know that my faith is strengthened

00:01:41.620 | and my love for God is intensified

00:01:44.720 | in hearing him ask the way he asks.

00:01:47.820 | Mainly because you, Austin, have not expressed anger

00:01:52.820 | and bitterness towards God.

00:01:54.940 | You may have had at some time,

00:01:56.800 | and of course he can handle that, but you didn't.

00:01:59.880 | You seem to speak with remarkable faith.

00:02:04.120 | And so you have the aroma of heaven already on you

00:02:07.640 | and that's mighty strengthening to me.

00:02:11.640 | So let me just focus on your last words.

00:02:14.260 | You say, "I'm getting weary and I'm ready to go home.

00:02:18.180 | "I don't like to admit it,

00:02:20.220 | "but I pray that God would take me home."

00:02:24.540 | But he keeps sustaining me.

00:02:26.300 | His answer is clearly no or not yet.

00:02:29.620 | How do I keep my joy when my life is hard and painful?

00:02:34.620 | And maybe the first thing, the first encouraging thing,

00:02:38.440 | I hope, that I can say is that you don't need

00:02:42.580 | to be embarrassed to admit that you are praying

00:02:46.580 | that God would take you home.

00:02:48.900 | At least you don't have to be embarrassed around me.

00:02:51.780 | I have prayed that many times

00:02:56.060 | and have offered to go more times than I have prayed to go

00:03:02.780 | if it would be of greater effect than my life would be.

00:03:07.940 | Lord, I give myself to you.

00:03:10.460 | You know what I long for in my life.

00:03:13.140 | If not having my life would help that come about,

00:03:17.500 | I'm ready, take me out.

00:03:20.820 | Frankly, Austin, I think that a person

00:03:25.820 | who has been a follower of Jesus for some time

00:03:29.860 | and has never prayed to go home to heaven with him

00:03:33.020 | either hasn't seen Jesus very clearly

00:03:36.780 | or has not been involved in much misery

00:03:39.780 | over our own and others' sins.

00:03:42.980 | Paul had zero shame in saying he wanted to die

00:03:47.700 | and be with Christ.

00:03:50.740 | It's an honor to Christ to want to live this life

00:03:54.900 | and be with him.

00:03:56.120 | But you, Austin, clearly are right in believing

00:04:01.120 | this is God's decision, not yours.

00:04:06.020 | Suicide, assisted, merciful, or otherwise,

00:04:09.540 | is not just self-murder.

00:04:12.860 | It is role-reversing with God

00:04:15.700 | and your right to leave it with him.

00:04:19.360 | So your great struggle is how to make it

00:04:24.360 | to God's appointed end, short or long,

00:04:28.140 | with joy when your life is painful.

00:04:31.900 | So let me just, there's so many things that could be said,

00:04:35.400 | but I'm gonna go with what's right on my front burner.

00:04:38.380 | I'm reading a biography of John Knox.

00:04:40.340 | I'm just gonna let John Knox finish this off.

00:04:43.260 | When John Knox, the great reformer of Scotland,

00:04:46.300 | was dying in 1572, he asked his wife

00:04:50.980 | to read him two things.

00:04:53.780 | First, he said, "Go to the place

00:04:56.260 | "where I first cast my anchor,"

00:04:58.860 | meaning the first sermons he preached were from John 17,

00:05:03.700 | and he meant these words.

00:05:05.500 | Jesus lifted up his eyes to heaven and said,

00:05:07.620 | "Father, the hour has come," namely, to die,

00:05:12.300 | "Glorify your Son, that the Son may glorify you,

00:05:15.560 | "since you have given him authority over all flesh,

00:05:18.460 | "to give eternal life to all whom you have given him.

00:05:23.460 | "And this is eternal life,

00:05:25.260 | "that they may know you the only true God,

00:05:27.500 | "and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent."

00:05:30.540 | And then he asked his wife to read him

00:05:34.540 | the sermons of John Calvin on the first chapter of Ephesians,

00:05:39.460 | especially verses three through six, which say this,

00:05:43.700 | "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,

00:05:46.700 | "who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing

00:05:50.180 | "in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him

00:05:54.940 | "before the foundation of the world,

00:05:56.720 | "that we should be holy and blameless before him.

00:05:59.240 | "In love he predestined us for adoption as sons

00:06:02.480 | "through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will,

00:06:05.980 | "to the praise of the glory of his grace."

00:06:08.920 | So Knox wanted to die with the rock of God's absolutely free,

00:06:13.920 | electing love and electing grace under his feet.

00:06:19.920 | He wanted to hear from John 17, from the mouth of Jesus,

00:06:24.600 | "I give eternal life to all whom you have given to me."

00:06:29.600 | He wanted to be reminded that God has chosen him

00:06:35.020 | and given him to the Son,

00:06:37.000 | and the Son had authority infallibly to give eternal life

00:06:41.320 | to all whom God had chosen and given to the Son.

00:06:44.400 | And he wanted to hear it from the apostle Paul,

00:06:48.560 | that before the foundation of the world,

00:06:52.800 | he had been chosen under the praise

00:06:54.640 | of the glory of his grace.

00:06:57.120 | I've never been in Austin's shoes,

00:07:00.560 | except for maybe a few weeks after a cancer diagnosis.

00:07:05.600 | A few years ago, which turned out to be treatable.

00:07:10.000 | But John Knox walked in these very steps right to the end.

00:07:15.000 | So maybe this simple glimpse into how he moved

00:07:20.640 | towards the presence of Jesus at the end will help.

00:07:24.080 | Someone might say, "Well, how in the world

00:07:26.480 | "does the doctrine of unconditional election

00:07:31.240 | "help a person who's dying?"

00:07:34.160 | And my answer would be threefold.

00:07:36.560 | Number one, nothing makes it clearer

00:07:40.640 | that no sin of mine could ever have been the ground

00:07:45.640 | of God refusing to choose me.

00:07:48.800 | He chose me unconditionally,

00:07:52.440 | absolutely unconditionally before I was born.

00:07:57.100 | Therefore, no foreseen sin could ever stop him

00:08:02.100 | from choosing me.

00:08:04.000 | And number two, nothing makes it clearer

00:08:08.480 | that my salvation is by grace, all grace,

00:08:12.200 | all grace than that I was chosen

00:08:15.660 | before I had done anything good or evil

00:08:17.800 | before the foundation of the world.

00:08:19.840 | And number three, nothing is deeper and stronger

00:08:23.780 | and more sure than the eternal purposes of God.

00:08:28.480 | And that's the kind of rock we need

00:08:32.920 | at the moment of death.

00:08:35.720 | So Father, I pray for Austin and others like him

00:08:40.720 | and all of us eventually

00:08:42.640 | who have been told our time is short.

00:08:47.480 | Open to him, I pray, the door of heaven

00:08:51.680 | and let the light of your glorious sovereign grace

00:08:56.600 | lead him home.

00:08:58.480 | Amen.

00:09:01.200 | Thank you, Pastor John.

00:09:02.580 | (silence)

00:09:04.760 | (silence)

00:09:06.920 | (silence)

00:09:09.080 | you

When Should We Pray for God to Take Us Home?

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