Curated Sermon Illustrations on Eternal lIfe

Ted Williams—often called the greatest hitter in Major League Baseball history—has spent the years since 2002 not in a hall of fame or resting beneath a headstone, but inside an unassuming warehouse near the airport in Scottsdale, Arizona. That’s where he was taken shortly after what most of us would call his death—but what the Alcor Life Extension Foundation, his caretakers, prefer to describe as the “conclusion of his first life cycle.”

Though Alcor won’t publicly confirm it, Williams’ daughter has. When he died at age eighty-three, his body was packed in ice, flown to Arizona, treated with a human anti-freeze solution, and placed in a stainless steel chamber. There he remains, suspended at -196°C alongside dozens of others, all waiting—hoping—for science to someday thaw them into a second chance at life. 

It’s hard to blame a man with a .344 career batting average for wanting another swing at life. In some ways, Williams is just a more extreme version of most people: afraid to let go of this life and unsure where their next destination might be. This is one gift that all true Christians hold in common: we know how the story ends, even if the world does not.