The trip to the cemetery last week was a lot more impactful than I expected it to be. When we first arrived I felt cheery and kind of confused why we were there. Then a fellow student commented on my attire, which was a brightly colored shirt. She mentioned how it did not really fit the mood very well. This comment really got my brain going and it made me realize the rawness of a cemetery and death. When I first arrived I did not really get the point of the whole exercise, but that soon changed when we started class.
At first I was just walking around reading all the headstones at the cemetery and not really thinking about any of it. Then I started thinking about the poem we had just read and the heaviness of it. There was so much heartache and pain in the words. The author seemed not only as if someone else had died but also as if a part of him died. That made me start thinking of all the people in the cemetery, all of the people who had died. They all had people who loved them, who knew them, who missed them. Each headstone was a resemblance of someone who was once on this earth, breathing and living, and now gone. There were so many headstones, some young, some old, but all were gone. On some of the headstones the names and dates were no longer visible, and it made me wonder if anyone remembered that person, or were they just lost now.
We often think of death in a nonchalant way, but this trip brought a new light. After I died, and was buried in the ground would people remember me? Would anyone remember me if my headstone no longer showed my name and date? What do we have to do to make an impact that will last far beyond our headstones?
I really love your insight on the matter. I always think of Ecclesiastes when I think about life and death. I remember on a mission trip the director had our group read Ecclesiastes for two weeks! I thought it was unnecessary, for we were speaking about salvation, not the meaningless of life. It was only until later did I realize the truth and power of Salomon's words, for our life is meaningless without God. If all our life adjusted to was to be lived well and fair only to die and have a tombstone mark our existence then it would be meaningless. However, with God our life is much more than a tombstone, it is a gift to be one who lives for being in accord with our Creator.
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