If these facts are appreciated in any degree, we shall also appreciate the words of

Ecclesiastes "the day of one's death is better than the day of one's life". At death the

pilgrimage ceases, the lessons are over, the discipline done. For the believer sin's

punishment, power and presence will have for ever passed away. The death which has

fallen upon him shall never fall again.  The present life with all its blessings and

pleasures and opportunities is a life spent in corruption, and in the sphere of a curse.

Such a condition cannot be immortal. Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of

God, neither can corruption inherit incorruption. This being so, even though the mind

and heart shrink from the valley of the shadow of death, one can see that it is a necessity

("change" will be the equivalent for the living saints) if we would enter into the full

blessedness of redemption.

Ecclesiastes is under no false idea that death is a "friend" or a "bright angel". That is

left to the unbeliever in his endeavour to hide the terror of the last enemy. The believer

taught by the Scripture is under no illusions as to death. Job could even dare to speak of

"worms destroying his body" when he knew that his Redeemer lived. Paul can speak of

death and the grave without softening either awful word, because resurrection robbed

them of their sting and their victory. Ecclesiastes teaches that the only ones in this life

who can "enjoy" any good in it, in the true sense, are those who have faced its transient

character, realized the fact that this is not their rest but their school, and who, knowing

that life in its fullness cannot be entered until we awake satisfied with Christ's likeness,

set their mind on things above where Christ is. As a result of believing that the day of

death is better than the day of birth, Koheleth continues:--

The man of the world argues in an exactly opposite direction. Seeing that death is the

end of all men, he says, "Let us eat, drink and be merry, for to-morrow we die". Again it

is the hope of resurrection that makes the difference. Both can say "to-morrow we die",

but the one as a result says "feast", the other "fast". It is a natural thing to say, "If this

brief life is to end in death, why not make the most of it? Why not get all the good one

can out of it, in other words, put sadness and sorrow out of sight; eat, drink and be

merry". That is natural. Taught by the Spirit of truth however, we reason that if this

present life is to end in death and the full blessings of redemption cannot be entered by

flesh and blood; moreover, if there are spheres of service to be entered in the life to come

that shall bear some analogy to our faithfulness here, and if an eternal weight of glory lies

over against a light affliction which is but for a moment, if moreover, love to our

Redeemer compels us to stand on His side, go without the camp and suffer His

reproach--then we cannot help becoming pilgrims and strangers, declaring by our very

abstention that we seek a country that lies beyond the grave, that our pleasures are

associated with our Saviour, and that while sin and death and the curse are everywhere

apparent, we cannot find it in our heart to eat, drink and be merry, but rather find greater

and deeper joy in those circumstances which superficially are the saddest and darkest

hours of life.