By the Way: The Beautiful Shore – Embracing the Promise of Life Beyond Death

By Scott Raible on November 15, 2025.

A question that I have received often throughout the years, especially when involved in end of life care, is what happens when our loved one who is a Christian dies. When I think about what happens when we die, I turn to Scripture, because my own opinions can’t carry us across that threshold – but God’s Word can. And as I reflect on my own mortality, I hear Jesus speaking to my heart, with the same words that He said to His followers in the Gospel of John saying, “Let not your heart be troubled … I go to prepare a place for you.”

Death is not the end; it is a doorway. Paul says in his second letter to the Corinthians that to be “absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.” That tells me something deeply personal and profoundly comforting – when my final breath leaves this earthly body, my next conscious moment will be with Jesus. Not floating, not wandering, not asleep in confusion, but in His presence.

Now, I know the Bible also speaks of the body “sleeping,” and I feel that sleep in my own bones – this body is temporary, fragile, wearing down. But the sleep Scripture talks about is the body’s rest, not the soul’s disappearance. My spirit, redeemed by Christ, continues living with Him.

And when I picture that moment, I don’t imagine fear. I imagine a hand reaching out – His hand. I imagine hearing my name from the same voice that called Lazarus from the tomb. Because Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in Me will live, even though he dies.”

That promise is personal. It’s for me. It’s for you.

Death is not a closing chapter but a passage toward the place our hymns have long pointed us – toward the “beautiful shore”, the “celestial shore”, where the redeemed gather and God’s children are welcomed home.

“What a day of rejoicing that will be” when we see our Savior, face to face. When our journey on earth finds its end, we will step into glory’s bright light and into the peace of His presence.

And Paul reminds us we have both a promise and a mystery at Christ’s return, when God will clothe us with resurrected bodies, bodies free from every shadow of sickness, pain, or sin.

Therefore for those who have a relationship with Christ Jesus, we do not need to fear death. We instead anticipate the embrace of the One who conquered it for us. We are like weary travelers who have spent years on the road – sometimes climbing, sometimes stumbling, sometimes singing. But at the end of the path, there is a porch light burning.

We round the final bend not into an empty house, but into a home prepared, where the Father steps onto the front steps, arms open, saying, “You made it. Welcome home.”

Scott Raible is a lay minister serving at St Barnabas Church in Medicine Hat and at St Ambrose in Redcliff. Scott started Christian radio in Medicine Hat with Alive 99.5 and was an announcer and music director with 93.7 Praise FM. Scott can be reached at scottraible@gmail.com

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