In Memoriam +Evelyn Krenz+
October 4, 2025 - White Salmon, Washington
“Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints” (Psalm 116:15; ESV). So we pray with the Psalmist in Psalm 116.
What a strange thing to say. Death is precious? What could that possibly mean?
Well, it doesn’t mean God thinks death is irresistibly cute, as in, “Oh, how precious!”
It doesn’t mean that He really
likes it when people die.
It doesn’t even mean that death is a good thing in His sight. It isn’t. Death is always tragic. Even when it is expected. Even when the person has lived a good, long life. God designed us for life, not death. Death is the wages of sin. Death is the reality in a world that is fallen. Death is never how it was supposed to be. Death, Paul says, is the last enemy to be defeated (1 Cor. 15:26).
So, it doesn’t mean those things. Rather, it means this: When a Christian dies… and that is what the word “saint” means here… a Christian… not a sinless one (we are all sinners), but one whose righteousness comes from Jesus Christ alone, given as a gift, received by faith… When a Christian dies, God holds the death of that Christian, and the Christian herself, sacred. Worthy of His full attention. He attends to that death. He does not abandon His beloved one. The Christian is not alone. Not even then. So that, even as the Christian… like Aunt Evelyn… breathes her last, and closes her eyes to this world, she opens them in heaven to behold the Lord God, and breathe in His life-giving Spirit. She opens them to behold the One who held her death so precious, He suffered it for her, on the cross. To reverse it. To undo it. The One who died, but who is now risen from the dead, and lives, and reigns. She beholds Jesus. Face to face.
And He will raise her, on a Day known only to God, but a Day that is coming soon. And He will do the same for you. And think about what that means. Because the death of Aunt Evelyn is precious in the LORD’s sight, she is not gone. She lives. In Jesus. And we can live, in Jesus. And we can be with her, whenever we’re in Jesus. And we’ll see her again. And we’ll embrace her again. And we’ll laugh with her again. And talk with her again. Because of Jesus. Let us comfort ourselves, then, with these words.
“Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints.” What a strange, and wonderful thing to say. Aunt Evelyn lives. Because Jesus lives. And she is precious to Him. In the Name of the Father, and of the Son X, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.