A time to be born, and a time to die

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: 

a time to be born, and a time to die; 

a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; 

a time to kill, and a time to heal; 

a time to break down, and a time to build up; 

a time to weep, and a time to laugh; 

a time to mourn, and a time to dance; 

a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; 

a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; 

a time to seek, and a time to lose; 

a time to keep, and a time to cast away; 

a time to tear, and a time to sew; 

a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; 

a time to love, and a time to hate; 

a time for war, and a time for peace. 

What gain has the worker from his toil? I have seen the business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with.  He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. I perceived that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live; also that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil--this is God's gift to man. I perceived that whatever God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it. God has done it, so that people fear before him. 

~Ecclesiastes 3:1-14

The last week of my uncle's journal records his musings on this and other passages.  I don't think there's any way he could have known how soon or sudden his own time to die would be, but I think he was about as prepared for death as a man can be.  His reflections on the passages display his appreciation for the sovereignty of God and the seasons that He has prescribed in our lives, always remembering that,
The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.    ~Romans 8:18b

The last words he wrote echo the promise in Philippians 1:6 and his desire for its fulfillment: for God to complete His work in his (my uncle's) life.

A few short hours later God did complete the work he was doing in my uncle's life, and he took him home.  Those of us who have been left behind for now miss him, but we rejoice in the knowledge that he is now complete and rejoicing in the presence of the Lord he loved and served, and we look to follow his example.

He left behind a wife, three daughters and a daughter-in-law, one son and three sons-in-law, and six adorable grandchildren, as well as a mother and a sister and various other relatives.  It had been a long time since we had all been together, and we enjoyed each other's company, though we wished it had been for a different reason.  

His love of hunting and fishing will be remember by his son and oldest grandson who carried on that tradition together while we were there.  

He will be missed, but we look forward to the day when we shall see him again, when death is swallowed up in victory, and when our time with him then will be far longer and far better than our time with him here on earth.  

For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: "Death is swallowed up in victory."  "O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?"  The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.     ~1 Corinthians 15:53-57

*The obituary can be read here.