More than a decade ago, I kept watch at the bedside of my grandmother as she approached death in the hospice wing of a local hospital. As the day progressed, I took a break and walked down the hall, peering into darkened rooms where others lay dying .. alone. A nurse, seeing the concerned expression on my face, explained these other patients had families that chose not to be there. They would call to know the status of their "loved one" and ask when they could expect to pick up their belongings, once they passed. Perhaps those family members lived far away and could not make it in time; perhaps they simply could not look death in the face. Whatever their reason, is not for us to judge.
Someone once described death as birth in reverse. She had kept watch at her father's bedside as he slowly slipped from this world. Perhaps in death, like in birth, there are those waiting for our arrival. Life on earth is short whereas death draws us to eternal life. We came from God and, at the end of our lives, we get to go home.
More than a decade ago, I kept watch at the bedside of my grandmother as she approached death in the hospice wing of a local hospital. As the day progressed, I took a break and walked down the hall, peering into darkened rooms where others lay dying .. alone. A nurse, seeing the concerned expression on my face, explained these other patients had families that chose not to be there.
That's terrible.
They would call to know the status of their "loved one" and ask when they could expect to pick up their belongings, once they passed. Perhaps those family members lived far away and could not make it in time; perhaps they simply could not look death in the face.
I suspect so.
Another link I trot out ever once in a while, on our society's problem facing death: Funerals from Hell Where Have All the Graveyards Gone?
Life on earth is short whereas death draws us to eternal life. We came from God and, at the end of our lives, we get to go home.
Some of us.
"42 Q. Since Christ has died for us, why do we still have to die? A: Our death does not pay the debt of our sins. Rather, it puts an end to our sinning and is our entrance into eternal life."