Facing Our Mortality

This week I officiated at the memorial service for a very dear friend. Whenever we are faced with the death of a loved one, we are reminded of the trouble we all face at one time or another during this life. As I prepared for this memorial, the news reported the horrible Amtrak train derailment. We have since learned that there was a Canadian killed in that tragic accident.

Additional news this week included a young woman killed in Scarborough when she was struck by a car and a machete attack in Edmonton. Meanwhile a trial is beginning for a heinous stabbing that occurred three years ago.

This week our Daily Bible Reading [1] started covering the remarkable book of Job. We can feel for what Job went through as he lost all his wealth and all his children in one dreadful day. Yet his faith in God did not waiver. Even when his own health was affected, he still did not blame God. He did, however, began to wonder why God was allowing him to suffer and began to lament the day of his birth. We learn that Job understood the fate of those who die (Job:3:11-17[11]Why died I not from the womb? why did I not give up the ghost when I came out of the belly?[12]Why did the knees prevent me? or why the breasts that I should suck?[13]For now should I have lain still and been quiet, I should have slept: then had I been at rest,[14]With kings and counsellors of the earth, which build desolate places for themselves;[15]Or with princes that had gold, who filled their houses with silver:[16]Or as an hidden untimely birth I had not been; as infants which never saw light.[17]There the wicked cease from troubling; and there the weary be at rest.) is to go to sleep.

It is during times of trials, troubles and tribulations that we begin to ask the truly important questions of life such as: what is the purpose of human life; and what does happen after death? Check out the booklet The Road to Eternal Life. [2]

With all that is happening around us, it is only a matter of time before each individual will be affected by a tragedy or untimely death in one’s circle of family or friends. While we can never be prepared for such an event, knowing what is ahead makes something that is so difficult to bear much more bearable.

Anthony Wasilkoff