Skip to main content

Death Bed

I remember, having recently graduated high school, asking myself that if I could throw all my energy into developing one talent, what that would be. Considering the options, I decided that nothing would develop me more than reading. With the knowledge I would develop in my studies, I thought, I could learn a range of skills that would be more useful than any I would learn from another pursuit. It suited me, too, because for the first time in my life, I liked reading. Thus, I took up the task of reading, learning all I could from my college classes in order to be a thoughtful, informed, and useful person.

Over time, I found that others had set themselves to the same task. In fact, the very discipline I chose-- history-- proved to me that men had long ago not only developed themselves, but had gone much further and had thought about the great problems of the world. They had built in their minds ideal societies with equally shared resources, perfect prisons, satisfied subjects, and equality between the sexes, among other things. They had pored over tomes to construct in their minds perfect civilizations, and they had dreamed of seeing their visions for posterity come to fruition. They wanted to share their learning with others, writing volume upon countless volume to educate the studied elites, to convert the world and so begin to realize their progressive societies. If this had been my goal, I had been born too late.

Actually, I never had any intention of changing the world in such revolutionary ways. I wanted simply, in my adolescent self-importance, to be someone important. More than anything, I wanted to be noticed. It wouldn't surprise me to think that many of the men I'd read about started out the same way. Some of them, at least, pursued immortality with their philosophic or scientific discoveries, hoping they would be praised by history. They certainly had the talent and drive to do so.

Juxtapose these men and me, however, with Jesus. Here was a man (the God-man) who spent three years in the service of a human race that would reject him, who had little privacy and little rest away from the masses, and whose pursuit of his Father's will to the end-- an end that included an excruciating and spiritually lonely death-- proved that he wanted so much more than to be remembered by history as a "good man." His intentions are much more visible when you think of what he knew. He knew that those he healed would leave him, that those he taught would harden themselves against him, and that those he loved would question him even after his physical resurrection. Here was a man who said he came not to bring peace, but a sword, who knew that his words would "turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law." Add to all this the fact that he never sinned-- not once-- amid more turmoil than any of us have ever experienced. Realistically, I would likely have stopped doing near the beginning-- for the benefit of my own comfort-- what he continued to do for so long.

It's easy to call yourself a failure when comparing yourself to God, I guess; but I hope my knowledge of just how much of a burden he chose to endure for so much more than the title of "good man" in the history books will remind me to be humble with others. I hope it will remind me of how life could have turned out without his sacrifice, how derelict and empty I would be in this world without the hope of relating to and drawing on my Creator. On my death bed, it will be good to think not of what I have done, but of the fuller life I lived because it was in his heart to relate to me.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Heroes

Although we have several examples of heroes in our day, one of the best known is of a woman named Agnes Gonxhe Bojaxhiu (“Gonja Bojaju”), who devoted her life to sustaining the “poor, sick, orphaned, and dying.” Her venue was Calcutta, India, where she served as a teacher until she began to take notice of the poverty there. Seeking to do something about it, she began an organization that consisted of just thirteen members at its inception. Called the “Missionaries of Charity,” the organization would eventually burgeon into well over 5,000 members worldwide, running approximately 600 missions, schools and shelters in 120 countries; and caring for the orphaned, blind, aged, disabled, and poor. As her personal work expanded, she traveled to countries like Lebanon, where she rescued 37 children from a hospital by pressing for peace between Israel and Palestine; to Ethiopia, where she traveled to help the hungry; to Chernobyl, Russia, to assist victims of the nuclear meltdown there; and to ...

The Nice Guy Fallacy

I read part of a poem recently by one of my favorite poets. It reads: I envy not in any moods The captive void of noble rage The linnet born within the cage That never knew the summer woods. I envy not the beast that takes His license in the field of time Unfetter'd by the sense of crime To whom a conscience never wakes. Nor what may call itself as bles't The heart that never plighted troth But stagnates in the weeds of sloth Nor any want-begotten rest. I hold it true, whate'er befall I feel it, when I sorrow most 'Tis better to have loved and lost Than never to have loved at all. At base, Tennyson contrasted a life of risk, and consequent pain, with one of security. He sides conclusively with the life of risk, and says he fails to envy those who have faced no hardship. I agree with him; and, for good or ill, his words are just as relevant today as they were in the nineteenth century. Like then, there are those today who choose to live their lives with as little risk as...

Comparative Medical Care

One thing I'd like to understand is why there is such a difference between medical costs here and those in Haiti. At the time the book Mountains Beyond Mountains was written, in 2003, it often cost $15,000 to $20,000 annually to treat a patient with tuberculosis, while it cost one one-hundredth of that-- $150 to $200-- to treat a patient for the disease in Haiti. Even if the figures aren't completely accurate, the sheer difference would still be there. Indeed, the United States pays more per capita for medical care than any other country on Earth. My first guess for why the disparity exists is that there is a market willing and able to pay more for medical treatment, so suppliers see the demand and respond with higher prices. According to at least one doctor (go to http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/2009/05/what_is_the_cause_of_excess_co.php), part of the reason is administrative prices here. People here have a higher standard of living, and so the cost of care is shifted to ...