How do we face the twilight years of life? With feelings of dread…or of hope?

The French-born film and vaudeville actor Maurice Chevalier (1888-1972) remarked glibly, “Growing old is inevitable for all of us. The clever thing is to accept it and always plan your next move well in advance.” His recipe for contentment in old age gives cold comfort.

Evangeline Booth had a better perspective on aging. She said, “It is not how many years we live, but what we do with them.”

Contrary to the myth about aging, seniors do not necessarily decline in intelligence or lose their decision-making abilities. History gives us countless examples of creative, active and productive seniors:

• At 71, Michael Angelo (1475-1564) was appointed the chief architect of St. Peter’s Cathedral in Rome.
• After he was 63 years old, Joost Van den Vondel (1587-1679), Holland’s greatest poet, wrote Jephta, Lucifer and Adam in Ballingschap (Adam in Exile).
• George Bernhard Shaw (1856-1679), Irish dramatist and author, wrote Farfetched Fables at 93.
• Polish-born Arthur Rubinstein (1888-1982) gave a stunning performance at Carnegie Hall at the age of 90.

Like these famous people, there are millions of elderly people who are still productive and active in their own way and want to remain so.

Aging in the Old Testament

Scripture regards great age as the supreme reward of virtue. The aged were shown respect and honour. Old age is a blessing and not a curse. Scripture says,

“Rise in the presence of the aged, show respect for the elderly and revere your God” (Levitucus19-32).

The psalmist testifies to growing old in hope. He says,

“The righteous…will still bear fruit in old age; They will stay fresh and green, proclaiming, ‘The Lord is upright; He is my Rock, and there is no wickedness in Him’” (Psalm 92:14-15).

Growing old became a symbol of blessing, wisdom and righteousness – an honourable process by which God rewarded those who were obedient, for example, in honouring their own parents:

“Honour your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you” (Exodus 20:12).

In Proverbs readers are essentially promised a long life if their hearts will but,

“keep my commandments; for length of days and years of life and abundant welfare they give you” (Proverbs 3:1-2).

The very display of gray hair itself, a sure sign of growing old throughout the centuries, becomes in Scripture,

“a crown of glory; it is gained in a righteous life” (Proverbs 16:31).

By pushing the elderly aside to fringes of society, we diminish them and make our society the poorer through the loss of their experience and maturity. When Moses was 80 years old, God called him to lead His people to the Promised Land. At that greatly advanced age, Moses became the historian, leader and statesman of Israel. At about 85 years of age, Joshua was divinely commissioned to succeed Moses. At his death at 110 years of age, he was deeply mourned and his eminent service widely acknowledged. (see Joshua 24:29-31)

A New Testament blessing too

In the New Testament the attitude toward aging is no different from that in the Old Testament. Those who reached an advanced age were honoured and esteemed in the community. Aged saints have a significant role in the opening chapter of Luke’s Gospel. The first characters to appear on the stage are the priest Zechariah and his wife Elizabeth, who were both “advanced in years.” (Luke 1:7) They are the instruments of God’s purposes and the first interpreters of God’s saving acts.

Simeon and Anna are the prophetic chorus welcoming the child Jesus on the occasion of his purification in the Temple. (see Luke 2:22-38) The remarkable thing is that the aged Simeon dies in the beginning of the Gospel account. His eyes are fixed in hope on the one newly born, in whose life, death and resurrection the world will know peace. He has long been hoping for “the consolation of Israel” and has been promised by the Holy Spirit that he will not die before he has seen the Lord’s Messiah.

Anna – an eighty-four-year-old prophetess who frequents the Temple to worship and pray night and day - recognizes Jesus, gives thanks to God, and declares the news about Him “to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem.” (Luke 2:38)

As people who have clung to God’s promises over many years, they embody the virtues of long-suffering patience and trust in God’s ultimate faithfulness. They also exemplify faith and hope, even when circumstances seem hopeless.

Aging was not seen by the early Christians as a “problem” to which some sort of religious solution was required. In the entire New Testament, particularly in the pastoral epistles, the respect due to older members of the community is emphasized. The exhortations imply and speak explicitly of dutifully caring for widows, honouring the elderly, imitating their faith, and faithfulness. For example, “Do not rebuke an older man, but exhort him as you would a father.” Here we find also specific directives that the community should provide assistance to widows over age of sixty and that women recognized by the church as widows should devote their energies to prayer, hospitality and to service to the afflicted. (see 2 Timothy 5: 3-16)

In our youth obsessed culture, the elderly are strongly tempted to act youthful. They are expected to get a workout to remain in shape, get beauty treatments to rejuvenate themselves and to dress in youth fashions. Should seniors long to be young again? I don’t think so.

For Christians old age is not a dead-end street. As we age, we can still grow spiritually. The apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians,

“Do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day” (2 Corinthians 4:16).

He said to the Ephesians that we can progressively succeed in putting off the old self and putting on the new self and, “be made new in the attitude of our minds.” This renewal through the Holy Spirit impacts our mental attitude, state of mind and disposition with respect to God and His world throughout our life. In other words, we continue to develop our walk with God. (see Ephesians 4:22-24)

Never too old to serve the Lord

Dr. Viktor E. Frankl, who suffered unspeakable horror in Nazi concentration camps, says that there is no reason to pity old people. And he adds this remarkable statement, “Instead, young people should envy them.” Why? Because seniors have something young people don’t possess. Frankl says that seniors have realities in the past – the potentialities they have actualized, the values they have realized – and nothing and nobody can ever remove these assets from the past.

In Book X of his Confessions, Augustine (354-430) calls memory a “vast court” or “great receptacle.” The elderly have a rich storehouse of memories, and inner landscape to explore: times lost in idleness, opportunities well used, a fulfilling career, children grown up and suffering gone through with dignity and courage.

What an opportunity for our youth to tap into the memories of their grandparents! Covenantal obligations never cease. The Christian faith is passed on from one generation to the next. It depends on that transmission. There must always be a most intimate relationship between the present and the coming generation if there is to be a future generation of Christians.

The church cannot be the church without the elderly. They are the embodied of the church’s story. Of course, we do not expect that all the elderly of the church should express the “wisdom of their years.” But there can be no substitute for some old people in the church passing on their wisdom to the younger generation.

The youth simply cannot do without the older generation. In our culture, for a few years young adults may pretend (egged on by social and cultural forces) that they can live forever as autonomous, self-reliant, self-fulfilling beings. The pretence, however, collapses soon enough. The presence of the visible vulnerable elderly is a reminder that they are not their own creators. They too will age. Their dark or blond hair will turn grey. Consequently, young Christians need the elderly so they will not take their lives for granted.

The church cannot be the church without the elderly. They are the embodied of the church’s story. That’s why throughout history the church has frowned on separating the young from the old through conducting youth services. I have even read about a church where no older people were expected to attend. But according to scripture, old and young belong together. They are all part of the great family of God.

The youth need our wisdom

Our covenant youth need to hear from their grandparents and seniors in the church what it means to be a Christian. Grandparents know the family traditions and values. They can tell the story of their wartime experiences, and if they were immigrants, the story of their immigration with its hardship and adventures and the reasons for leaving the country of their birth. Seniors can give to the youth the lessons and spiritual resources that have been harvested over a lifetime.

Our times are so confusing and threatening for our young people. Why not explain to them that the Christian faith is for all of life: hence the founding of Christian schools, colleges, universities, a Christian labour association, Christian magazines and bi-weeklies and a Christian political party? Why not tell them that doing good works is doing your work well? Why not testify to them how the Lord’s promise, “Surely I am with you always” (Matthew 28:20) is a reality and not a myth? The lessons learned from godly grandparents and other Christian seniors are often long remembered.

Florida does not exist

Some seniors have a phobia about aging. They see their retirement years as a curse of boredom and uselessness. Others see them as an opportunity for the pursuit of leisure. During the winter some seek a warmer climate, away from their family, friends and their local church. But the church is the kind of community that insists that those who have grown in years are not relieved of moral and spiritual responsibilities. They cannot move to Florida and leave the church to survive on its own. For Christians, there is no “Florida,” even if they happen to live there. From the biblical perspective, seniors are a significant resource God can use for His kingdom in these critical times….

Old age is not just a time to relax and play golf, or is it a time only to reminiscence about the past. (Though relaxation and reminiscence surely have their rightful places in our lives.) Instead, in old age, as throughout our lives, we must continue to pursue the way of service, conforming our own lives to the self-giving pattern of Jesus. The Christian practice of growing old is shaped by the example of Jesus, who emptied himself and became obedient, even to the point of death, for our sake. (see Philippians 2:1-13) Our Lord never promised His followers an easy path to tread. The way of discipleship leads to the cross. (see Mark 8:34-38; Luke 14: 25-27)

How can I help?

Seniors can still do so much in reaching a spiritually dark world for the Lord. Some retirees are engaged in volunteer work for a mission agency. They spend time overseas assisting in some building projects. Others volunteer for city mission work in one of the big cities in North America. The volunteers I have met over the years have all testified how blessed they felt in Kingdom service in their retirement years. They still considered themselves useful soldiers in the Lord’s army.

Of course, not every senior is able to volunteer for mission or church work. Some have multiple health problems. Their physical disabilities limit them in their activities. Yet they can still engage in spiritual warfare as they pray for the advance of the Gospel around the world. Millions of unreached people are still held captive by the strongholds of Satan. Multitudes are blinded by the “god of this world.” (2 Corinthians 4:4)

Why not encourage seniors to think of the great ministry of prayer available to them? The younger generation can tell them, “You are able to spend more time in prayer than us! You know more about the ups and downs in life than we do. You can pray especially for missionaries on the field. They need your prayer support! And pray for your pastor and congregation. We need your prayer ministry!”

A missionary leader wrote that one of his greatest fears is the lack of interest in missions by the praying and giving church of North America. Every week I receive via e-mail urgent prayer requests from missionaries and mission organizations. As an old hymn says:

Prayer is the Christian’s vital breath,
The Christian’s native air,
His watchword at the gates of death;
He enters heaven with prayer.

Seniors can be brought specific prayer requests. The persecuted church requires constant prayer support. Our covenant youth need intercessory prayer. Someone wrote that no other population segment of Christians has more discretionary time for serious, global prayer than the experienced, mature elderly! Prayer offers a wonderful and powerful opportunity for kingdom involvement.

Hope in Christ

As we age, we become more aware of the swift passing of years. We can either let the fear of death put a mental stranglehold on us or look to the future with hope. The best is yet to come! Jesus Christ, the risen and ascended Lord is the ground of our hope and the promise of our deliverance. The hope of the resurrection lies at the heart of the way in which Christians embody the practices of growing old. We serve a faithful God who will never forget us! We are strangers and pilgrims on earth, the older we become the nearer we are to our eternal home. This truth encourages even the oldest individual to cherish each moment of life while preparing to relinquish it.

Each day is a gift from God. We look to Him for our daily bread while making sure that we seek first the kingdom of God rather than squandering our time and energy on secondary concerns. With the prospect of a glorious future for all who are in Christ, we can identify with Martin Luther’s suggestions that,

“in the purpose of God, this world is only a preparation and a scaffolding for the world to come.”

I also think of John Calvin’s teaching in his Geneva Catechism that we are,

“to learn to pass through this world as though it is a foreign country, treating all things lightly and declining to set our hearts on them.”

We all face death some time or another. When we are old, it is more of a reality than in the days of our youth. I pray that our attitude toward death may resemble that of Lutheran pastor, scholar and resistance leader Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who with shining face in joyful expectation, said to the two Nazi guards who had to come to take him to be executed,

“For you it is the end, for me the beginning.”

Originally published in Reformed Perspective, November 2004. Used with permission of the author. Copyright © 2005 Christianity.ca.

I am 68 years of age and retired, so I suppose I am considered old. In our politically correct times, I am called either a “senior citizen” or “chronologically gifted.”

What is aging? How do we react to it? These questions are no longer academic for me.

When I was in my teens, I thought that people in their fifties were old. At this juncture in my life, a fifty-year-old seems relatively youthful. So aging is ambiguous. Bernard Nash describes aging as a paradox:

“Does it not strike you that we all want to live longer but none of us want to grow old?”

Throughout our lives we think other people grow older until we gradually realize that we ourselves have aged. Some say that aging can be compared with the fall season when the fruits ripen and the leaves fall; others claim that the moment of aging has arrived when the sum total of memories has become greater than our expectations.

“Aging,” says the American gerontologist Howel, “is not a simple slope which everyone slides down at the same speed. It is a flight of irregular stairs down which some journey more quickly than others.”

To grow old means to lose acquaintances and lifelong friends to distance, illness and death. Obituaries testify that life is the process of aging and aging is the steady progress of dying within us. Every moment we are alive, we are aging. Life and death are intimately linked. The day is coming when all our earthly possessions will be swept away, including our ability to enjoy them. This is not a morbid view of life – it is simply reality. As the 17th century poet Robert Herrick wrote,

Gather ye rose-buds while ye may,
Old Time is still a-flying.
And this same flower, that smile today,
Tomorrow will be dying.

So how do we cope with aging? We live in a society that has shown little understanding of growing old, and valued it even less. Most literature on aging is written in the language of the academy: sophisticated and complicated. Christian literature on aging is sparse. What is available generally confines itself to giving information and practical advice. Christian media and education about family life have focused primarily on child-rearing. Little attention has been given to caring for aged parents.

Fear of aging

Aging confronts us with our mortality. I look in the mirror and see my graying hair and wrinkles. Should old age be feared? Even the most cursory survey on contemporary literature on aging reveals fear to be a dominant motif.

When I read the novel Van Oude Mensen, De Dingen Die Voorbygaan (Of Old People – The Things That Pass By) by Louis Couperus (1863-1923) I became saddened by the real fear of aging expressed by Lot, one of the main characters. He is obsessed by his fear of growing old. He talks about it constantly. He says to his fiancée Elly, “I hope never to become old. Elly, don’t you find it terrible to become old, every day older?”

Simone de Beauvoir (1908-86), who was associated with the French existentialist Jean Paul Satre, had an extremely negative attitude toward aging. She summed it up with the words “decrepitude, ugliness and ill-health.” In her monumental work Old Age, her major concern was with the social aspects of old people. She put aging within the context of a Marxist class struggle. She says that it is the fault of society that the decline of old age begins too early, that it is rapid, physically painful and, because they enter in upon it with empty hands, morally atrocious. She dreamt of an ideal society where old age would be virtually non-existent. According to her, old age exposes the failure of our entire civilization.

In her book, de Beauvoir viewed age as the worst time of life. She paints its portrait in severely gloomy tones and remarks, “the vast majority of mankind looks upon the coming of old age with sorrow and rebellion. It fills them with more aversion than death itself.” Later she intensifies this viewpoint when she observes that age is “a degradation or even a denial of what (previous life) has been.” She writes with a sense of despair: “When memory decays…former happenings…sink and vanish in a mocking darkness; life unravels stitch by stitch, leaving nothing but meaningless strands of wool in an old person’s hands.”

I’m not old!

The fear of aging has contributed to a denial of reality.

A common goal among many aged is to stay young. In contrast to the past, youth is now the ideal. In the past to be an adult was the ideal. Now the older generation wants to look as young as possible. Some try to camouflage their age by dressing like teenagers.

In his own inimitable and not very flattering way, British journalist Malcolm Muggeridge reported on a month he spent at a resort in Florida. He said that everything was done to make senior citizens feel that they were not really aged, but still full of zest and expectations; if not teenagers, then keenagers. These seniors, he said, had withered bodies arrayed in dazzling summer wear, hollow eyes glaring out of garish caps, skulls plastered with cosmetics, lean shanks tanned a rich brown, bony buttocks encased in scarlet trousers. Muggeridge’s description may be exaggerated, but it does say something about the affect contemporary youth culture has on our society. It has a negative and morbid view of aging. And the advertisement industry contributes to this mood.

Forever on earth?

We not only want to avoid suffering and decline, both physical and mental, but we also expect to retain the strength to accomplish the same things as the young. Our hidden hope is that physical immortality can be achieved. New Agers have developed “human-potential” programs for seniors. It includes techniques for enhancement of physical functioning and mental skills, through yoga, martial arts, proper nutrition and aerobic exercise. Furthermore, we mirror a society that has encouraged our youth to think of growing old not as part of the human condition but as a solvable scientific and technical problem. Hence, scientists search for a solution to the “problem of old age.”

This secular hope to extend life expectancy appears to come down to one simple idea: more time in our lives is sought by almost everyone; science can bring it about; therefore science ought to bring it about.

What are the chances that scientific advance will find a way to extend life indefinitely? A number of investors have paid large sums to have their bodies frozen at death by means of cryogenics, which is used to freeze beef and vegetables, as well as people.

But as Dr. Russell points out in his secular work Good News About Aging, those who cherish dreams of being defrosted and living forever, sometime hence are probably cherishing an implausible dream because freezing destroys human body cells. “Further, even if we can overcome this and other problems, no scientific evidence suggests that we can expect to eliminate death now or in the future because all things break down over time.”

What if we could live forever in a fallen world? Would we really want to? In his 1922 play The Makropulos Secret, Karel Capek probes this issue with the 337-year-old character Emilia, who notes:

“… no one can love for three hundred years – it cannot last. And then everything tires one. It tires one to be good, it tires one to be bad. The whole earth tires one. And then you find out there is nothing at all: no sin, no pain, no earth, nothing.”

What a hideous future! To be given an everlasting longevity without being regenerated by the Holy Spirit, without hope to be with the Lord in the new heaven and earth, is a dismal prospect. It is to live under a curse.

If we could live on in this world with all its pain, conflicts, without solving the immense human problems, a medically expanded life would simply set the stage for more of same human conflicts and social injustices.

Death and aging

Not everyone experiences the aging process the same way. Some accept their twilight years of life with grace; others can’t imagine that death will come for them. Yes other people die…but not them.

Thus some find visiting a nursing home for the elderly a burden. They can’t imagine themselves ever being there. Because they know that it is old people who most often die, they fear becoming old or being long in the presence of those who are old, for they fear death.

The denial of the reality of aging and the suppression of discussions about death go hand in hand. We view frankness about death as deviant, a subject not to be discussed in polite company. Unable to face the brute finality of death spawned by atheistic philosophical naturalism and an unwillingness to return to a biblical perspective, a new generation puts faith in reports of out-of-body experiences and New Age mysticism. For a while, death was the last taboo in Western culture, and for many it still is; for others it has become an exploited sentimentality. Our society has struck death from their vocabulary. People don’t attend funerals anymore, but instead “celebrations of a life lived.”

But try as it might, the world cannot keep death out of sight and out mind. The moment we are born, we begin to die.

Generational conflict

What are the expectations of being able to age gracefully in our therapeutic culture? Aging frustrates modern youth. It interferes with their desire “to get things done.” Have you ever noticed the impatience shown in a lineup at the bank when a senior is trying to carry out a transaction? The slower pace often exasperates the clerk and the younger customers waiting for their turn.

The conflict between the generations is a subject of much discussion. Many seem to view aging as a process to endure and suffer through, rather than a temporally contingent gift from God to be approached with gratitude.

The Canadian philosopher George Grant observed that old age is more and more seen as an unalleviated disaster, not only for those outside of it but by those people who are old themselves. And he noted that we do not see age as that time when the eternal can be realized and we therefore pity the aged as coming to the end of historic existence.

Sociologists even refer to ageism, which can be defined as a general distaste for the elderly in our culture – equivalent to racial prejudice, but in this case unfair generalizations are made about any who are old: “all elderly people are forgetful”; “all elderly people are ill-tempered”; “all elderly people suffer from depression”; or “mental impairment is endemic to aging.”

Old age is seen as a time of weakness, sickness and dying. Ageism also comes about because people know little about old age and because what they know is based on myth and fear.

People even talk about generational wars. In recent years, the conflict between the generations has become most noticeable due to the decreasing ability of government to pay for health and pension benefits. The conflict is entirely seen within the realm of economics. The American Senate Special Committee on Aging argued in a 2002 report that without significant reform, “the United States could be on the brink of a domestic financial crisis.” According to financial guru Alan Greenspan, America “will almost surely be unable to meet the demands that the retirement of the baby boom generation will make.”

The pinch is already provoking generational conflict in the ambitious welfare states of Northern Europe, where birthrates and immigration rates are lower than in the United States and where the elderly wield considerable political clout. Young Europeans are complaining about the high cost of healthcare for the elderly and are resentful of fees that are eroding the tradition of free university education. One German youth leader gained notoriety by suggesting that old folks should use crutches rather than seek expensive hip replacements.

Unfortunately, this generational conflict is also seen in churches today. Seniors don’t like to call their dominee “Pastor Jack” and they certainly don’t like his casual appearance when he comes visiting. But when a vacant church thinks of calling a pastor, there is a strong emphasis on youth. It seems that some search committees look for a 25-year-old man with 30 years of experience.

A Christian alternative

The differences between the generations don’t need to lead to conflicts. Christians can offer alternative understandings of aging.

The Bible views the conflict between generations as abnormal. Yes, youth is a wonderful thing, but it is not the only thing. It is a blessing in many ways, but it can, on some occasions even be a curse. When Isaiah pronounced judgment on Jerusalem and Judah, he said,

“I will make boys their officials; mere children will govern them” (Isaiah 3:4).

Young and old can come to mutual understanding and appreciation of each other. In the Kingdom of God,

“Children’s children are a crown of the aged, and parents are the pride of their children” (Proverbs 17:6).

Old men dream dreams and young men see visions. (see Joel 2:28; cf. Acts 2:17) And God promises that He will be with His people of every age bracket.

“Even to your old age and gray hairs I am He, I am He Who will sustain you” (Isaiah 46:4).

Next: Part 2 – WOW…I’m Getting Old