Just back from an hour and half in casualty having an elbow X-rayed after a footballing injury last night, no lasting damage but a couple of days no lifting and on ibuprofen and paracetamol.
But as I was sat in the hospital I was watching life go on around me. There will be those there who will have had the worst possible news this morning, being reminded in no uncertain terms of their mortality. There will be those families for whom this morning life was normal but who now face the devastation of losing a loved one.
Yet elsewhere in the hospital there will have been those getting good news, a cancer in remission, a successful surgery, or an impending birth, or even the safe delivery of their child.
Yet ultimately hospitals are reminders of our mortality, that life is fragile and we are frail. For all our illusions of immortality, advancement and capability we are at the mercies of a patch of ice, or a virus, or rogue growth, or simply someone else's mistake.
What a difference the gospel would make to those who have had bad news this morning. To know that God loves them, that God knows, that he has sent his Son so that death is not the end, so that we can look forward to a world without the A&E department or X-ray or oncology.
That's great news and it is God's gift to his people to be able to live and speak that news to those in just the situation we find them in.
No comments:
Post a Comment