Cremation or Burial?

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00:00:07.000 | Cremation or burial? It's a question that many of you have asked us to address and of course every one of us and every family will

00:00:14.000 | face this question at some point. For some Christians who live in a densely populated area where cemetery space is scarce,

00:00:20.000 | financial factors can weigh heavy on the decision. In Japan, for example, over 99.9%, over 99.9% of people

00:00:29.000 | are cremated. Cities like Tokyo have ordinances requiring it. But taking away the financial factors and all things being

00:00:37.000 | equal, from a biblical perspective, what's a better choice? Cremation or burial? It's an interesting question addressed by

00:00:44.000 | Pastor John a few years ago in a Q&A context. Here's what he said.

00:00:48.000 | Does it matter whether we're cremated or buried? Not ultimately, but I don't ever counsel people towards cremation.

00:01:00.000 | An old couple had me over a few weeks ago. He's pushing 90 and she's close behind. And the son was there.

00:01:11.000 | And the son said, "The reason I wanted you to come is to tell my dad what you think about creation and cremation and burial."

00:01:20.000 | A real situation here. They're years away from this, months maybe. Who knows?

00:01:25.000 | Because he had heard me talk about it. And he wants to bury his dad. And the dad's thinking, "Quick, efficient, get it done.

00:01:34.000 | We'll need to do that cheaper." Well, it may not be cheaper. But anyway, here's the essence of what I said.

00:01:43.000 | The biblical pattern is that burning your children is pagan and burying your loved ones is a sign that you believe in the resurrection.

00:01:56.000 | I think I'm going to encourage people towards burial because what it says about the body.

00:02:03.000 | The body is precious and it is going to be raised from the dead. And so I know it decomposes.

00:02:14.000 | I know it's no more there in 100 years than if you burn it. I know that.

00:02:19.000 | This is, we're talking symbolic significance of a body stretched out there in a coffin, looked at, and lovingly kissed and buried.

00:02:32.000 | Rather than, to me, the horrible prospect of my wife or my child or my dad being burned, incinerated.

00:02:44.000 | I would have to do a major mental escape in order to keep from feeling like that's so out of sync with what the body means to God.

00:02:58.000 | He created it. He's going to resurrect it. There's going to be continuity between what you were and what you are so you can recognize each other.

00:03:05.000 | You don't want to symbolically destroy it. You want to symbolically put it to rest.

00:03:12.000 | Because that's the language of the Bible. You're sleeping. Right?

00:03:16.000 | He will waken those who sleep. Whether we sleep or wake, we belong to the Lord.

00:03:20.000 | So the picture of the New Testament is the dead are asleep. They're going to be raised from the dead.

00:03:26.000 | And they are alive to God. So I've probably overstated my case now and made all the people who have ever cremated feel terribly guilty.

00:03:34.000 | I'll go back to where I began. It is not ultimately an issue of mattering. It doesn't matter ultimately.

00:03:46.000 | It's just not a custom I think the New Testament would naturally lead us to.

00:03:55.000 | That was Pastor John in a Q&A session several years ago.

00:03:59.000 | It's probably a good place to reiterate something I said back in episode number 301.

00:04:03.000 | And in light of the success of the Ask Pastor John podcast, I wrote Pastor John to ask him how he wants listeners like you to think of these podcasts.

00:04:12.000 | Pastor John wrote back this, "The way I would like listeners to receive my counsel in these podcasts is in the spirit of 1 Thessalonians 5.21.

00:04:21.000 | Test everything. Hold fast to what is good. And the test I hope they use is first the Bible.

00:04:27.000 | That's where I try to find all of my responses to people's questions.

00:04:30.000 | And secondly, I hope they esteem the spiritual leaders of their own churches highly and talk to them about the issues they face, which is also 1 Thessalonians 5.13.

00:04:39.000 | There's one final authority and it's God's word, not mine. I want to exalt God's word over and over and over as true and wise and sweet."

00:04:50.000 | So please listen to every episode in that spirit.

00:04:53.000 | Well, in light of all the religious traditions in the world and all the holy books of those religious traditions, how can we know with absolute certainty that the gospel is true?

00:05:03.000 | That's the question on the table tomorrow.

00:05:05.000 | I'm your host, Tony Reinke. Thanks for listening to the Ask Pastor John podcast.

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Cremation or Burial?

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