1400 a day
Every now and again something comes along to remind us of our mortality. At the moment its Corona Virus. I suppose before that it was HIV. And before that Spanish Influenza. For all our technological innovations and inventive genius we don't seem to be able to stop nature coming up with new ways to try to kill us. And I suspect that God allows this in order to try to keep us focused on the facts. The fact is that we are all going to die. Its the only thing of which we can be 100% certain. Other things might happen, but death definitely will.
We dont think about it much. But in times like these we suddenly get a bit more focused. So yesterday I said to Keith that we must both write down our passwords for various things, and tell each other where we have put stuff, and make sure that if anything happened to one of us, the other would be able to access the bank accounts and know what the pension arrangements were and all that jazz. I've said this to Keith before ( Im someone who actually thinks about death quite alot ) but we havent got round to it. But last week a work colleague of Keiths whose wife is a nurse, told of a chap of 53 who had gone into hospital on Saturday with a cough and was dead by Sunday. Keith is 53. I think it made him start to take this whole virus thing a lot more seriously.
At the moment we are being bombarded daily with figures about how many people have died. And it made me wonder...... how many people die ' normally' on any given day? I mean, it sounds like an awful lot of people when we hear that 650 died yesterday. But when I went and Googled the death rates in the UK it turns out that every single day, on average in England and Wales 1,400 die. Every day. I was quite surprised by that. It seems like an awful lot - especially when you take into account the fact that Scotland and N Ireland's death figures aren't included in that total. Apart from the very occasional ' remarkable' death we never hear anything about those 1,400. We don't hear about how they died, and we don't hear about the people who cared for them and nursed them and operated on them and hospiced them either.
I started thinking about how strangely we respond to death. Most of the time we dont talk about it and we hide it away. 1,400 times a day we are mostly ignorant of someone leaving this life. And yet when a new disease lands on us and starts picking people off at a faster than usual rate - or starts taking people who are younger than we think is reasonable - then we get all obsessed with the death toll. The who and how and when suddenly become important. I'm guessing that this is because many of the 1.400 a day will be those who are either elderly or who have been sick for some time. Their deaths are expected. Whereas Covid 19 is indiscriminate and could just as easily take me or you as the next person. And so we get scared. And as a society we become fixated on the figures as we watch the curve.
Last week there was a story being broadcast about a 75 yr old priest with the virus who gave up the ventilator which could have saved his life, offering it to a younger person because he said he had lived his life and he wanted someone else to have the chance to live theirs. As a result of his compassion to others, his sacrifice of the ventilator and his witness on the ward most of the medical staff who were looking after him came to faith. The priest died. He wasn't scared to die. He knew where he was going and he knew that it was more important to love people and tell them about Jesus than it was to battle a disease and win. How would I respond were I to find myself in a hospital, unable to breathe, needing a ventilator and knowing there wasn't one? I'd like to think that I too would be happy enough to stand back and let someone else have a chance at life. Id like to think that I would trust God, not be afraid and know that if He chose to take me then I'd be ready for it. I have no idea whether that is what would happen or not. I hope it would.
Every day when I hear the statistics about how many have died I think about the 1400 other families who are also grieving. They cant bury their loved ones in the way they would have wanted to. They cant gather to celebrate a life and comfort each other as friends and family. Each one who dies is every bit as important as the covid victim. And if they dont know Jesus each of them is going to an eternity without Him. 1400. Every day. And now even more because of the virus.
Let us pray every day that Jesus comes to every person who is dying, from whatever cause, and that they recognise Him as He stands in front of them and accepts His invitation to go with Him. Pray that eyes will be opened even in dying moments so that what Satan designed for destruction God will use to reap a harvest of souls into His kingdom.
We dont think about it much. But in times like these we suddenly get a bit more focused. So yesterday I said to Keith that we must both write down our passwords for various things, and tell each other where we have put stuff, and make sure that if anything happened to one of us, the other would be able to access the bank accounts and know what the pension arrangements were and all that jazz. I've said this to Keith before ( Im someone who actually thinks about death quite alot ) but we havent got round to it. But last week a work colleague of Keiths whose wife is a nurse, told of a chap of 53 who had gone into hospital on Saturday with a cough and was dead by Sunday. Keith is 53. I think it made him start to take this whole virus thing a lot more seriously.
At the moment we are being bombarded daily with figures about how many people have died. And it made me wonder...... how many people die ' normally' on any given day? I mean, it sounds like an awful lot of people when we hear that 650 died yesterday. But when I went and Googled the death rates in the UK it turns out that every single day, on average in England and Wales 1,400 die. Every day. I was quite surprised by that. It seems like an awful lot - especially when you take into account the fact that Scotland and N Ireland's death figures aren't included in that total. Apart from the very occasional ' remarkable' death we never hear anything about those 1,400. We don't hear about how they died, and we don't hear about the people who cared for them and nursed them and operated on them and hospiced them either.
I started thinking about how strangely we respond to death. Most of the time we dont talk about it and we hide it away. 1,400 times a day we are mostly ignorant of someone leaving this life. And yet when a new disease lands on us and starts picking people off at a faster than usual rate - or starts taking people who are younger than we think is reasonable - then we get all obsessed with the death toll. The who and how and when suddenly become important. I'm guessing that this is because many of the 1.400 a day will be those who are either elderly or who have been sick for some time. Their deaths are expected. Whereas Covid 19 is indiscriminate and could just as easily take me or you as the next person. And so we get scared. And as a society we become fixated on the figures as we watch the curve.
Last week there was a story being broadcast about a 75 yr old priest with the virus who gave up the ventilator which could have saved his life, offering it to a younger person because he said he had lived his life and he wanted someone else to have the chance to live theirs. As a result of his compassion to others, his sacrifice of the ventilator and his witness on the ward most of the medical staff who were looking after him came to faith. The priest died. He wasn't scared to die. He knew where he was going and he knew that it was more important to love people and tell them about Jesus than it was to battle a disease and win. How would I respond were I to find myself in a hospital, unable to breathe, needing a ventilator and knowing there wasn't one? I'd like to think that I too would be happy enough to stand back and let someone else have a chance at life. Id like to think that I would trust God, not be afraid and know that if He chose to take me then I'd be ready for it. I have no idea whether that is what would happen or not. I hope it would.
Every day when I hear the statistics about how many have died I think about the 1400 other families who are also grieving. They cant bury their loved ones in the way they would have wanted to. They cant gather to celebrate a life and comfort each other as friends and family. Each one who dies is every bit as important as the covid victim. And if they dont know Jesus each of them is going to an eternity without Him. 1400. Every day. And now even more because of the virus.
Let us pray every day that Jesus comes to every person who is dying, from whatever cause, and that they recognise Him as He stands in front of them and accepts His invitation to go with Him. Pray that eyes will be opened even in dying moments so that what Satan designed for destruction God will use to reap a harvest of souls into His kingdom.
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