Thoughts on Mortality

This one might be on the verge of morbid so you've been warned.

Working with trauma patients makes you realize how seemingly random life really is. There are people who get hit by a bus walking down the street or go to work one day and get shot by a crazy employee or stop to help someone by the side of the road and lose both their legs. It can get to you if you think about it long enough, because it makes you look for the situations that put you in danger. I'm driving up the Tollway and think "if I made one slight wrong turn of the wheel, I would be dead". And that's the reality.

Good things happen to good people. Bad things happen to bad people. Bad things happen to good people. And so on. There's no formula and, while you can calculate the risks to some extent, it's still out of our hands.

If you're like me and ponder such things, you are forced to decide what you think about these "spontaneous and unpredictable" events. Is it some kind of natural law of fate? Is it karma? Is there a God? How can He be good if He allows horrible things to happen?

Take the tragedies around the world lately. People were at home fast asleep in bed when suddenly their house crashed in on them. Here in America, we support financially and pray and do what we can but the truth is we don't want to dwell on that. We don't want to believe that such things could happen to us. It makes life too real. And most of the time, we prefer our ignorance induced by television and convenient distractions. I do it too, it's a natural reaction.

So I made my decision about this subject. And that's how I sleep at night. And go to work everyday. And drive on the Tollway.

"Who has understood the mind of the Lord, or instructed him as his counselor?" Isaiah 40:13
Everyone from Job to Isaiah to the Psalms has struggled with this question and the answer is that God is sovereign. He does what He pleases. And His ways are right and good.

I will never understand why bad things happen but I can rest because my Father knows. He planned it out and He works for the good of those who love Him, who are called according to his purpose. So as Jesus says "You must be ready" for we do not know the future. And I can trust that.

So for now, I do my best to help those people heal and I try and not take my health, my security, my comforts for granted. Because you never know.