Remember Death
The Surprising Path to Living Hope
by
This title was previously available on NetGalley and is now archived.
Send NetGalley books directly to your Kindle or Kindle app
1
To read on a Kindle or Kindle app, please add kindle@netgalley.com as an approved email address to receive files in your Amazon account. Click here for step-by-step instructions.
2
Also find your Kindle email address within your Amazon account, and enter it here.
Pub Date Aug 31 2018 | Archive Date Aug 05 2018
Talking about this book? Use #RememberDeath #NetGalley. More hashtag tips!
Description
Claiming that the best way to find meaning in life is to get honest about death, this book aims to show readers the practical effect of remembering their mortality in order to make the most of their lives today.
A Note From the Publisher
PDF may not be compatible with all reading devices
Advance Praise
“Matt McCullough’s meditation on death is haunting, profound, and stirring, reminding us of our identity and our destiny apart from Jesus Christ. Death casts a shadow over our lives, showing us, as McCullough points out, that we aren’t the center of the universe. Those who live rightly and those who live forever often think of death, but at the same time they live with hope since Jesus is the resurrection and the life. This book reminds us why we die and teaches us how to live.”
—Thomas R. Schreiner, James Buchanan Harrison Professor of New Testament Interpretation, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary
“This is a brilliant book. Rightly advocating ‘death awareness’ but not ‘death acceptance,’ McCullough powerfully demonstrates that in order to remember Christ well, we need to learn to remember death well. This book shines with scriptural truth, pouring forth the light of Christ upon our fleeting, fear-filled lives.”
—Matthew Levering, James N. and Mary D. Perry, Jr. Chair of Theology, Mundelein Seminary; author, Dying and the Virtues
“This is a profoundly helpful book. With a preacher’s turn of phrase and illustrative eye, with a pastor’s care for precious people and their greatest fears, and with a theologian’s grasp of the Bible’s big picture and the heart of the gospel, Matthew McCullough writes to overcome our detachment from death and deepen our attachment to the Lord Jesus Christ. These pages will repay careful thought and meditative reflection on their surprising riches.”
—David Gibson, Minister, Trinity Church, Aberdeen, Scotland; author, Living Life Backward; coeditor, From Heaven He Came and Sought Her
“Can we face death and find hope? According to Matt McCullough, yes. Remember Death rightly reorients us to the impermanence of this world and the brevity of our lives, witnessing to the paradox that grief is necessary for faith. Richly informed by Scripture and a feast of other sources, this book vitally forms our longings for the world to come. I can’t wait to recommend it.”
—Jen Pollock Michel, author, Teach Us to Want and Keeping Place
“Through the lens of Scripture, McCullough looks death squarely in the eye and reminds us that it is nothing to be afraid of. For the Christian, it has truly lost its sting. Remember Death is a welcome conversation in a culture that doesn’t know how to think about mortality.”
—Andrew Peterson, singer/songwriter; author, The Wingfeather Saga series; Founder, The Rabbit Room
Available Editions
| EDITION | Other Format |
| ISBN | 9781433560538 |
| PRICE | $19.99 (USD) |
Featured Reviews
Linda J, Reviewer
Well written and important book. The following quote from the book sums it up:
"Throughout this book I have tried to establish and ironic claim: facing up to the truth about death can lead us to deeper hope in life. My first goal then, has been to encourage greater honesty about the facts. Perhaps more than any other culture anywhere in time of space, we in the modern West has detached ourselves from the reality of death. We've lost our feeling for death's sting."
I think he did this well.
I received this book free from the publisher for the purpose of an honest review.
Will T, Reviewer
I still remember the cold and indifferent eyes of the two young men who just walked past me. Maleek was just shot seventeen times in front of our house. A crowd had gathered as we waited for the cops to give another scoop and run. The shots ringing out, the blood-stained shirt, the lifeless body. That all hit me, but nothing like the cold indifference in those two guys eyes. They walked past me, past a motionless Maleek, and past a growing crowd without a hint of compassion or care.
Death, or the mere presence of it, should strike a level of fear within us. I saw no fear in their eyes. No remorse. No sadness. No hopelessness. Just cold indifference. Another guy their age was just shot down in the street and they were walking by without a care directed toward the hysterical crowd only a few feet away. It disturbed me then and continues to haunt me today.
We should respond to death. It should move us. It should break us, wound us, and by God’s grace shape us. This is what Matthew McCullough argues for in Remember Death: The Surprising Path to Living Hope. Considering and calling to mind death should lead us to Jesus Christ the Living Hope.
Death is a constant reminder of who we truly are. It reminds us that we are not too important to die. That’s probably why we are constantly waging war against it. We seek to suppress the knowledge and reality of death. We long to live life devoid of the constant remembrance that one day we will all die. And of course, we have no idea what that day will be.
McCullogh calls us to consider death. To think about it. To remember it. To ponder it. And his argument is that our pending death should drive us to the Giver of Life. Our consideration of death should drive us to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Remember Death is a helpful and necessary reminder for all of us to slow down and to reflect upon the words of the psalmist:
As for man, his days are like grass; he flourishes like a flower of the field; for the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place knows it no more. But the steadfast love of the LORD is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him, and his righteousness to children's children, to those who keep his covenant and remember to do his commandments. (Psalm 103:15–18)
