Ecclesiastes 9:4-6
Anyone who is among the living has hope --
Even my mother-in-law who had Alsheimers' became a Christian, realizing that Jesus took her place on the Cross. And God placed this memory of being saved directly into her long-term memories, because she had lost all her short-term memory capacity!
For the living know that they will die, --
So they can prepare for death.
but the dead know nothing; they have no further reward, --
There's no second chance after death to earn any more than they already have in life.
and even their name is forgotten. --
Very few people's names are still known years, decades and centuries after their death.
Their love, their hate, and their jealousy have long since vanished; --
Vanished from this world, as their life has left this world.
Never again will they have a part in anything that happens under the sun. --
Only while we live can we have an influence on what happens in this world. When we die, that opportunity ends. No one who is is dead--no saint, no ancestor--can any more have any part in Earthly happenings. They may be able to watch us (see Hebrews 12:1), but they can't do anything for us. It's all up to us now.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
