A Beautiful Death: Dead people don't care about being wrong
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“I’m wrong” has to be the most unpleasant phrase in the English language to utter.
I was reading Richard Swenson’s book, Margin: Restoring Emotional, Physical, Financial and Time Reserves to Overloaded Lives. Swenson, a medical doctor, took a “diagnose and prescribe” approach throughout the book. The most bitter medicine in the whole book was a quotation from cardiologist Dr. Meyer Friedman. Friedman routinely prescribed that his “Type-A” patients, “Purposefully say, ‘I’m wrong’ at least twice today, even if you’re not sure you’re wrong.”
Immediately, I knew it was medicine I needed. So, I took it. I try everyday to say, “I’m wrong” out loud to someone else. At first, it was difficult and bitter.
But as my motto sinks in deeper, the phrase itself is not so painful anymore. Sometimes it even just slips out. It still has an effect on the people around me, but more and more, it just feels natural. My motto is, “I am a servant, and I’m already dead.”
One revolutionary idea that enables the Christian life is that we were already, “Crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me” (Galatians 2:20). Therefore, we are able to deny ourselves, take up our crosses and follow Jesus (see Matthew 16:24). We have already died to self-interest, and nothing serves self-interest like being right. Dead people, by contrast, do not care whether they were right or wrong. They have absolutely no ego about it.
Albert Einstein, for instance, died in 1955 at age 76. He has been dead for 62 years.
In life, Einstein is best known for his theories of Special and General Relativity. In order to make the equations for General Relativity work, Einstein had to introduce a value he didn’t really have much evidence for other than it made all his equations work. He called it the “cosmological constant.” When scientific evidence disproved the assumption Einstein thought made the cosmological constant necessary, he rejected his own landmark theories and, considered the cosmological constant ugly, and considered it a great regret. His mistake caused him distress.
But he wasn’t wrong. As his intellectual descendants revisited his equations, they found that the cosmological constant perfectly predicts some of the most groundbreaking discoveries in physics since his death. It turns out Einstein just thought he was wrong, but he was wrong about being wrong.
Do you know how much he cares about that now? He doesn’t. He’s dead. I’d wager it doesn’t matter to him one bit. Einstein is not frustrated that he was wrong to reject the cosmological constant. He’s not glad he was right to begin with. He’s dead.
If we live lives of death to self, we won’t care so much about being right either. Admitting we were wrong about matters of fact would be easy. But even more than matters of fact, even matters of sin would be easy to admit.
Second Corinthians 5:17 claims that believers in Christ are “a new creation.” Romans 6:2 claims that we have died to sin. If this is true, then a follower of Jesus should have no problem admitting their sin. Someone who has died to sin should experience no pride or ego when they are confronted with their sin. Someone who is “a new creation” should not be reluctant to repent of their sin because “old things have passed away” and “all things have become new.”
Jesus said, “Moreover if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother” (Matthew 18:15). When we are confronted with our sin, the ideal is to hear our brother or sister and reconcile. Since we are already dead to self-interest, we don’t
When he died, Albert Einstein was cremated. His ashes were scattered at a private location. Imagine you were to discover that location and travel there to argue with Einstein. Imagine telling him he was wrong. Do you think he would argue back? Do you think he would defend himself? Or would you hear a peaceful, silent concession? The Bible’s standard for confronting our own sin is the same.