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To Be Plucked by a Strange or Timid Hand
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The Beguines
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Carry Me
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The Soul of Medicine
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Readers Respond: Issue 17
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Family and Friends: Issue 17
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The Hunter
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Beyond Racial Reconciliation
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Science and the Soul
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Money-Free Medicine
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Patient Perspective
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On Being Ill
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On Eternal Health
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Adirondack Doctor
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Christ the Physician
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What’s a Body For?
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Begotten Not Made
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The End of Medicine
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Perfectly Human
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Let Me Stand
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All Sorts of Little Things
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The Measure of a Life Well Lived
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Siegfried Sassoon’s “Before the Battle”
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Editor’s Picks Issue 17
Sickness is part of the work of death, and death is ultimately a consequence of sin. Destruction of any kind is disorder. It does not belong to life. There is nothing natural about sickness, nothing beneficial; it is something oppressive and contrary to life. Death in the last analysis is a punishment, a punitive power. It is an enemy – indeed, the last enemy!
This is why Jesus calls his church to fight the forces of death. It is no wonder that nursing homes and hospitals originated in the Christian community. We dare not give up on those who are sick and dying, for it belongs to our human dignity and calling to nurture life. Jesus did not say, “Don’t bother about what happens to your life.” No, he calls himself the resurrection and the life. “The one who believes in me will live, even though they die” (John 11:25).
Therefore, live and resist the spirit of death. Take courage, no matter how much you have to suffer. Protest against death. It is your human task to live! The judgment against our life is now lifted through Christ. Through him everlasting life can flow into us, and we can overcome our fallen existence. This temporal life, cursed by death, need no longer play the tyrant.
From The God Who Heals: Words of Hope for a Time of Sickness (Plough, 2016).
Erin Hanson, Cactus Rainbow View Full Painting
Reproduced by permission from Erin Hanson
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Nelson Banuchi
Great article! Reminds me of Dylan Thomas' poem where we read, "Do not go gentle into that good night,...Rage, rage against the dying of the light." There are many Christians who seem to think that God gives to us sickness and death even as gifts! This is not only a very sad theological view to take, it also terribly obscures and mars God's good and gracious character as revealed in Christ's life and His sacrifice on the Cross for our sin in order to free us from Satan's prison of sin, sickness, and death.