A Religion to Die With

For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. PHILIPPIANS 1:21

Catherine Booth had a phrase she used as a final test of any religion. She used it in her address Assurance of Salvation, after describing the believer’s victory over temptation through union with Christ: this, she said, is the joy of salvation, this is the fight of faith, “this is the sort of religion that does to die with!” She used it again at Exeter Hall, speaking of the real transformation the gospel works in the heart: “this is the only thing that will do to die with.” It was not a morbid phrase. It was a practical one. Every religion, she thought, would be tested at the deathbed, and most of the religion she saw around her would fail the test.

The test of the deathbed

She had sat by many dying people, and she had noticed things. In A True and a False Faith she spoke of the thousands who had believed the facts of Christianity all their lives and then, as death came near, wrung their hands, despaired and sent for someone to pray with them. If they had really believed, she asked, why the terror? A head-faith, she thought, is exposed at the end. It has nothing to hold on to.

It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment. HEBREWS 9:27

She saw the opposite too. In The World’s Need she described the dying saint whose last concern was not money, family arrangements or even personal comfort, but some prodigal still outside the kingdom. When the light of eternity streams on the soul, she said, it sees the value of souls and nothing else. Such people go out of time praying, as their Redeemer did, for those they are leaving behind.

Sweeping through the gates

And she expected the believer’s death to be a victory. In A True and a False Faith she promised those who would commit themselves to Christ that He would be their friend all through life, and with them when they were dying. “You shall not go trembling and shrinking out of time into eternity like a thief and a robber; but like a victorious warrior you shall go sweeping through the gates!”

O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 CORINTHIANS 15:55–57

She loved the story of two martyrs led from prison to the stake, one rejoicing in the presence of God, the other in darkness though still faithful. They agreed that if the Lord came to the second on the way, he would give a sign. The Lord came, and the man could not keep to the sign. He threw up his arms and shouted, He’s come, He’s come. She told it to show that real religion cannot always be kept quiet. It also shows what she expected at the end.

When her own time came

In 1888, as the chapter on her life has told, she learned that she had cancer. She had nursed her own mother through the same disease, and she knew what was coming. She did not hide it, and she did not treat it as a failure of faith. She had gone to a specialist to be told the truth, and once she knew it she went on working as long as she could, and preached her last public sermon that summer. Then came two years of illness, much of it in severe pain, at Clacton-on-Sea. Her family and Army officers came to her room, and she dictated messages to the Army and spoke of the work going on without her. She died there on the fourth of October, 1890, with her husband and children around her.

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. PSALM 23:4

What is striking, reading her sermons in the light of that death, is how little she needed to change her message. She had always said that the only religion worth having was one that would do to die with, and when the test came she was living in it. The Christ she had preached to others was the Christ she leaned on.

For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day. 2 CORINTHIANS 4:16

Children at the gate

One of her deepest comforts was the thought of those she had led to Christ who had gone before her. In How to Work for God with Success she spoke of passing through conflict and trial and encouraging herself by remembering those who had sent her word from their dying beds that they would watch for her, and be the first to hand her to the Saviour when she arrived. She had told her hearers they would have children in the faith; she believed hers were waiting.

Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints. PSALM 116:15

Weighing it

Her confidence is a gift to anyone facing death. But one caution needs to be added, and it is pastorally important. She expected a victorious, even joyful, death for the believer, and many do die so. Not all do. Some of God’s truest servants have died in confusion, in fear, in darkness, or with their minds clouded by illness or medicine. That is not proof that their faith was false. The Lord Himself cried out on the cross, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? (Matthew 27:46). The ground of our hope at death is not the quality of our feelings in the last hours, but the faithfulness of the One who has promised never to leave us. A dying believer who cannot sing is held as firmly as one who can.

I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness. 2 TIMOTHY 4:7–8

That is the religion she meant, in the end: not one that guarantees a triumphant exit, but one that has joined the soul to a living Christ, so that neither death nor life can separate it from Him. She had it. She wanted everyone to have it. And she was right that it is the only kind worth having.

FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION

1. Ask her question directly: is my religion the sort that will do to die with? What in it would still hold if everything else were taken away?

2. If you were told today that you had two years to live, what would you change? Change one of those things now.

3. Think of someone you would want to be waiting for you on the other side. Pray for them, and if they are still here, speak to them.

4. If you fear dying badly, bring the fear to Christ. Your hope rests on His faithfulness, not on your last hours.

5. Visit or write to someone who is dying or grieving this week, and bring them Christ as simply as you can.

A PRAYER

Lord Jesus, You have tasted death for me and taken away its sting. I do not want a religion that will fail me at the end.

Join me so closely to Yourself that nothing can separate us — not illness, not pain, not the last enemy.

If You give me a joyful death, I will praise You for it. If my mind is clouded and my feelings fail, hold me anyway.

And let there be some, when I come, who were brought to You because I spoke. Amen.