Everyone loves a love-story. No one loves a death-story. Yet we all have two death-stories.

The first is the one God wrote about how and when we will die, a death-story we cannot know and cannot change. The second is the story we tell ourselves about death, a story we can know and change.

What's your death story? In Chapter 6 of Telling a Better Story, Josh Chatrow identifies some of the stories that secular people tell themselves about death.

INSIDE THE SECULAR STORY

The four most common secular narratives about death are:

• The denial narrative. Ignore it and hope it goes away.

• 'The End' narrative. Death is the end of our story. Therefore live life to the full.

• The fantasy narrative. We’re all going to a better place, so don't worry about it.

• The despair narrative. Death renders everything about this life meaningless.

Questions to ask this narrative include:

• How’s your denial of death going? Is it going away?

• If death is the end, how can this life have any meaning?

• Who decides if we’re all going to a better place and how?

• Would you not prefer a better story of death and therefore also of life?

OUTSIDE TO THE CHRISTIAN STORY

The Christian story about death is so much better:

• Death results from sin, both of which are invaders of God’s perfect creation

• God sent his Son to die, defeat death, and rise again so that his people can die, defeat death, and rise again.

• Death doesn't separate us from Christ’s love but ushers us into his eternal love and life.

• Life and death are packed full of significance and meaning

• Unbelievers will die again and again and again forever.

What’s your death story? Accept God's death-story to have a love-story.