I stumbled upon my own grave last month, and the incident provided a fresh perspective on what Christ meant when He said we must "die to self."

This is a difficult saying for modern Christians to hear, because we barely know what death is.

The funeral industry and the religious establishment seem to have teamed up in American culture to rob the bereaved of what they need most – the opportunity to grieve. Bodies are cremated or lowered mechanically into the ground after the family has gone home. Cushioned caskets are over-priced and touted as being hermetically sealed – as if its occupants will care. The latest fad – caskets decorated with NASCAR scenes or the logo of your favorite rock group – try to obscure the finality of their purpose.

To properly accept the death of a loved one, mourners need to throw a handful of dirt into the grave and actually hear it hit the casket, Christians need something similar to accept their own spiritual death on the cross with Christ. But instead, both experiences are being sanitized and gutted of their effectiveness.

Three of my close friends died within the space of a few weeks. One friend, Steve, died by his own hand. Before the police had finished their work, I glimpsed his lifeless body, and knew that torment, guilt, fear and desire would no longer wrack him. A group of us gathered on his porch at 2:00 am and sang "Amazing Grace" through our tears while the police and medical examiners looked on in amazement.

My cousin Larry died less than a week later.

Norwegian Lutheran funerals in Minnesota still have the tradition of an open casket during "visitations" in which friends and neighbors can express their thoughts and feelings to the family. The formal funeral service lasted about two hours, again with an open casket, followed by a graveyard ceremony in the church cemetery across the street.

This was the graveyard where all my relatives are buried. After the ceremony, I stayed and wandered around, trying to find my father's tombstone. I read the inscriptions one after another until I came to a name that rooted me to the spot.

Into the tombstone were chiseled the words "Ole Anthony."

It was a few seconds before I remembered that I was named for my grandfather, who died before I was born, and this was his grave, not mine. But that was enough time to catch the full implications of my own frail, finite existence.

By the time the third friend died a few days later, I was sure that this triple conjunction of extinguished lights had some important meaning to impart. But what, exactly?

The Apostle Paul said we are to "reckon ourselves dead." Christians are called to experience the death of self internally so that the life of Christ can be revealed in us. We need an open-casket "visitation" at our own wake.

We all know the right words. We try to live by them, but God has made it impossible for us to perform. Good intentions and best efforts are among those many things absent in a dead body. Words and doctrinal positions fall away like chaff when we come face to face with our own death. And, thank God, when there's nothing left, He is there in all his resurrection power.

I pray that we all, very soon, will stumble upon our own graves, and reckon ourselves crucified. The result will be life as described in the short piece called Dying to Self that I've kept in my Bible for years. It is a wonderful reminder of how our death to self and His life in us will appear. Of course, when we see that we do not and can not meet the standard, our response can only be repentance. For us, ever and always, truth will remain a sustained consciousness of error.

DYING TO SELF

When you are forgotten, or neglected, or purposely provoked, and you don't sting and hurt with the insult or the oversight, but your heart is happy, being counted worthy to suffer for Christ – THAT IS DYING TO SELF.

When your good is evil spoken of, when your wishes are crossed, your advice disregarded, your opinions ridiculed, and you refuse to let anger rise in your heart, or even defend yourself, but take it all in patient, loving silence – THAT IS DYING TO SELF.

When you lovingly and patiently bear any disorder, any irregularity, any impunctuality, any annoyance; when you stand face-to-face with waste, folly, extravagance, spiritual insensibility – and endure it as Jesus endured – THAT IS DYING TO SELF.

When you are content with any food, any offering, any climate, any people, any raiment, any interruption – THAT IS DYING TO SELF.

When you never care to refer to yourself in conversation, or to record your own good words, when you are uncomfortable with commendations, when you can truly love to be unknown – THAT IS DYING TO SELF.

When you can see your brother prosper and have his needs met and can honestly rejoice with him in spirit and feel no envy, nor question God, while your own needs are far greater and in desperate circumstances – THAT IS DYING TO SELF.

When you can receive correction and reproof from one of less stature than yourself and can humbly submit inwardly as well as outwardly, finding no rebellion or resentment rising up within your heart – THAT IS DYING TO SELF.

In these last days, the Spirit would bring us to the cross. "That I may know Him...being made conformable unto His death." (Philippians 3:10)