Beam me up Scotty!

Beam me up Scotty! There’s something epic about those words. I can’t say I was ever a hard-core Star Trek fan, but this is one line that really stuck. Maybe it tapped into an inner deep desire to experience teleportation – how cool would it be to just get beamed places?

Well now it’s happened… to Scotty. The ashes of actor James Doohan, who played ‘Scotty’ in the 1960s TV series of Star Trek, were beamed into space on board a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. They are expected to orbit the earth for about a year before the rocket’s second stage falls to ground and Scotty gets burned up again on re-entry. You can do it too if you wish. It will cost you $2995 for every gram of your ashes, with a minimum fee of $12,500.

I learned of this as I was driving to the hospital for chemo this morning. It must have tickled the announcer’s fancy, because he asked people to ring in and discuss what they’ve done with their loved one’s ashes or what they’d like done with their own. One bloke said he’d invested so much in his house and property that he wanted his ashes scattered over the lawn. Another spoke of the urn getting used as a door stop until other family members objected. One woman wanted hers put into the garden to fertilise the tomato plants, and another described scattering them on the ocean.

However, one caller left me gob-smacked with what she had done with her partner’s ashes. They’d been compressed to make a diamond! For real! You can take a cup or so of ashes and get them fashioned it into a flawless diamond. They can make it different colours to suit your choice. You can have different sizes, a half-carat or a one carat stone. Presumably it can be set on a ring, a brooch, or a necklace, so you can carry the remains of your loved one with you. They can be on your body all the time, or put on for special occasions. Once again, you can do it too. Most say ‘price on application’, but word is you’ll be looking upwards of $15,000 for a one carat gem. Someone commented on radio that you could be worth more dead than alive!

It used to be dust to dust, ashes to ashes… but now there are more glamourous options, for the rich and eccentric anyway. I’m not sure how the conversation would go if you were complemented on your pendant, and then replied “That’s my husband. I had him made into jewellery.” I suspect it’d stop pretty quickly, that is until they moved on and couldn’t stop speaking about you to others! 

I get the space thing, even though I would never blast that kind of money away. It celebrates the life of the deceased. Just like a gardener might want to be used as fertiliser or a fisherman used as burley. If something is so much a part of their life, its nice to celebrate or at least respect that in death.

And I kind of get the diamond idea. Perpetual memory, something beautiful and precious, ongoing respect, even if a tad elitist. But maybe there’s also the sense of not wanting to let go and not wanting death to be the end. Maybe the diamond is seen as a hint of victory over death, something of substance that will last for eternity?

But let’s get real, it’s only a rock. It can’t replace the person. It won’t listen or respond. It can’t offer comfort or help. It might have the DNA (I don’t understand all that stuff) but it is not the person. And maybe one day it will be lost or stolen or given away to someone who doesn’t appreciate what it is, and the grief will flood back all over again.

So much effort to blast ashes into space or to fashion a diamond. They can’t take away the harshness of death. And what’s more, they don’t offer any substantial hope beyond death. Death is cruel and unnatural. It’s an ugly stain on our existence. It’s no respecter of persons. It makes a mockery of so much that we consider to be important in life. It’s a final undoing. These words from the Bible are blunt, but true:

By the sweat of your brow
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return.  (Genesis 3:19)

Naked a man comes from his mother’s womb,
and as he comes, so he departs.
He takes nothing from his labor
that he can carry in his hand.  (Ecclesiastes 5:15)

I’m a little surprised, yet pleased, that we had a quarter hour of radio talkback about death this morning. I admit it was probably the quirky that caused it, not the mundane fact of death. We rarely talk about death. We’d prefer to ignore it, because it’s going to hurt, and we don’t have any answers. But taking the time to think about the reality of death can make a huge difference to how we live life now. You’re more likely to make wise decisions for your life following a friend’s funeral, than you are at a New Years party, even with all the resolutions. Consider these strange but wise words from the Bible:

² It is better to go to a house of mourning
than to go to a house of feasting,
for death is the destiny of every man;
the living should take this to heart.
³ Sorrow is better than laughter,
because a sad face is good for the heart.
⁴ The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning,
but the heart of fools is in the house of pleasure.
(Ecclesiastes 7:2-4)

The important question remains, is there be any substantial hope beyond death? Or is the crematorium fire, the last word on our existence? We want to cling on to our loved ones. We’d dearly love to be reunited on the other side. Is this possible? Is there something more personal, more relational, more real than ashes to diamonds? The Bible’s answer is yes. The answer is the promised resurrection of the body. Consider these words:

³⁵ But someone may ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come?” ³⁶ How foolish! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. ³⁷ When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or of something else. ³⁸ But God gives it a body as he has determined, and to each kind of seed he gives its own body.³⁹ All flesh is not the same: Men have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds another and fish another. ⁴⁰ There are also heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies; but the splendor of the heavenly bodies is one kind, and the splendor of the earthly bodies is another. ⁴¹ The sun has one kind of splendor, the moon another and the stars another; and star differs from star in splendor.

⁴² So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; ⁴³ it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; ⁴⁴ it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body.

If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. ⁴⁵ So it is written: “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam [ie. Jesus], a life-giving spirit. ⁴⁶ The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that the spiritual. ⁴⁷ The first man was of the dust of the earth, the second man from heaven. ⁴⁸ As was the earthly man, so are those who are of the earth; and as is the man from heaven, so also are those who are of heaven. ⁴⁹ And just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall we bear the likeness of the man from heaven.  (1 Corinthians 15:35-49)

This is God’s promise to those who will listen to him, and trust in Jesus. There’s evidence in history that Jesus has conquered death, and this gives us good reasons for hope beyond death. Not wishful thinking. Nor absolute certain proof beyond any shadow of a doubt. But reasonable and rational confidence based on reliable historical evidence. I’d recommend investigating these promises. They offer so much more than getting beamed up like Scotty!