In the Western world we’re living longer than ever thanks to advanced medical developments. A girl born in the UK can expect to live until 90 (86.7 for boys) and a quarter of girls born in 2047 are expected to live until they’re 100. But do we actually want to live that long? Many of us are worried about approaching our twilight years, but have you ever wondered why we’re scared of getting old?
I distinctly remember the day my grandpa told me he was afraid of going outside. He had been an elite marathon runner in his time and a successful businessman. He’d travelled all over the world and now he was scared of walking to the local shops. He talked of young people with heads buried in their phones bumping into him as they rushed past. He said he felt invisible.
Feeling cast-aside, irrelevant and overlooked is a big fear for many of us. In some global cultures such as in Korea and in Shona culture in Zimbabwe, the older members of the community are revered and respected. However in modern Western culture, with its emphasis on individualism and independence, the opposite is true. When I visited a village in Thailand my hosts couldn’t wait to introduce me to the village elder – a bed-bound 100-year-old man who was at the apex of the community. In the UK he would probably have been sitting alone in a nursing home.
I don’t mind admitting that this thought scares me. I play in a samba band and we did a gig at a retirement home this weekend. It was wonderful to bring joy to the residents, but I was only too aware of the decreasing number of years until I’m the one being wheeled out in a medical bed to listen to the music, rather than dancing around with a snare drum.
We live in an anti-aging culture where celebrities spend fortunes on lip fillers and surgery to try and roll back the years and many of us deal with the passing of our life with denial, distraction or dark humour. Those in their later years whom we do admire generally have to do something pretty extraordinary to get noticed, like Captain Tom Moore. Most are sadly far less well known than their younger counterparts[1].
All downhill from here?
I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone say, “I’m really looking forward to being old.” and the aging process is often accompanied by a growing sense of dread. Although not everyone has a mid-life crisis resulting in them buying a sports car, getting an ill-advised tattoo (guilty) or suddenly taking up wild swimming (also guilty), passing 40 can be a difficult time for many. For a lot of women, the menopause brings a host of physical and mental problems, and both men and women often struggle with issues of identity and purpose when children leave home, retirements hits, or parents pass away. There are all sorts of things that we fear about being old and often battle against, including physical and mental deterioration and the embarrassment and indignity that accompany them. We may fear losing our independence and worry about being a burden on others or being lonely with no one to look after us. We may also feel a sense of running out of time and regretting missed opportunities as many of our hopes fade.
Loss of independence and loss of attractive appearance seem to be particularly burdensome in our culture which values independence, individualism and physical beauty as defined in a very narrow way by youthful looks and radiant health. There are very few images of beautiful elderly people on the internet[2]. We idolise images of smooth skin, toned muscles and shiny hair but we do so at our peril. As David Foster Wallace astutely points out:
Worship your body and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly. And when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally grieve you.[3]
We worship the appearance of perfection with our Instagram filters, phone cameras that can edit out unwanted blotches and add AI enhancements. We want to be blemish free (and there is something deeply spiritual about that, but that’s for another day). The problem is that, as we age, we can’t edit out the wrinkles, the battle scars, the dodgy knees, the having-to-pee-in-the-middle-of-the-night, the pain of bereavement and the sorrows of loss. We might go into denial and avoid visits to the doctor, or mount a full-frontal attack armed with Botox and Viagra, but the reality is that most of us will get wrinklier, slower and sicker before we die.
Something to look forward to
For those who believe that death is the end, that we cease to exist when our body and brain have stopped functioning, then there isn’t much to look forward to in the aging process. It’s a gradual shut-down of our faculties, an increasing loss of ability and a narrowing of our world. Even if we are surrounded by family and friends and have had a mercifully happy life to look back on, all that we can look forward to is death – the final full-stop to everything we’ve ever cared about. We may have invested in younger generations and left an intellectual, emotional or financial legacy, but if those generations are going to fade and die too, then it all seems in vain.
But what if that’s not the true story. What if there’s hope for the future that brings meaning and dignity to the aging process? The Bible flips our modern youth culture on its head. It values and cherishes children and young people, but also esteems those who are older and have lived more life. Some of the key figures in the history of God’s people are those who would have been drawing their pensions for years in modern day Britain. Moses was 80 when he led God’s people out of slavery in Egypt. The Apostle John was in his late 80s or early 90s when he wrote the book of Revelation, the last book in the Bible. The prophetess Anna, the first person to recognise Jesus as the Messiah, had been a widow for 84 years before this defining moment of her life.
Biblical teaching values people who are elderly, outcast and regarded as not useful by society. The church is likened to a body where every part is essential and equally valued, including those who are more senior.[4] Younger people are taught to honour and respect their elders[5] and older men and women are to be mentors to younger Christians.[6] God’s community is one of multi-generational inter-dependence where the wisdom of age is appreciated and passed on.
Rather than the skin-deep beauty that pre-occupies our culture, God calls us to pursue beauty of character by growing in love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.[7] I love it when I spend time with my friends who have been following Jesus for decades and see these qualities shining out of them. They look more like Jesus with every passing year and this fruit will last into eternity.
Perhaps the greatest comfort of all is that we don’t have to fear being lonely, sidelined or abandoned, because we have a God who will look after us:
“Even to your old age and grey hairs I am he, I am he who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you.”
Isaiah 46: 4
As a Christian, I don’t have to be scared of aging anymore. If I make it to old age, there will be parts of the process that I certainly won’t enjoy, like becoming less physically mobile, gathering wrinkles, suffering illness and losing beloved friends, but the God who understands us and loves us perfectly always gives his strength in our suffering. I love this wonderful note of hope from Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians:
“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.”
2 Corinthians 4: 16
The Bible is realistic about the fact that our bodies do age and decay, but as we journey with Jesus, he is preparing us to enjoy an eternally renewed life with him when he renews all creation. I don’t need to be scared of getting old because Jesus will always be with me and I can look forward to death knowing that it is not the end but the moment I will see my Lord face to face and be like him. For the Christian, the best really is yet to come.
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[1] See for example the Guardian article ‘It’s never too late: elderly high-achievers’, Michael Segalov, Sun 21 Feb 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/feb/21/its-never-too-late-elderly-high-achievers [Accessed 4.8.25]
[2] Although I was pleased to come across this photographer https://en.arianneclement.com [Accessed 4.8.25]
[3] This Is Water, David Foster Wallace, https://fs.blog/david-foster-wallace-this-is-water/ [Accessed 4.8.25]
[4] 1 Corinthians 12: 12-30
[5] 1 Peter 5: 5
[6] Titus 2: 3-8
[7] These godly character attributes are found in the list of the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5: 22.
