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One of the most haunting images from Sept. 11 is of the people trapped on the upper floors of the World Trade Center towers who knew they were going to die shortly and who had to endure the agony of waiting for death to come. It reminds us of an earlier horrifying tragedy – the sailors in the stricken Russian submarine Kursk, trapped on the floor of the ocean, knowing that they were surely going to die. Perhaps not quite as traumatic are the millions of people who have been diagnosed with inoperable cancer or some other disease and who have been told by their doctors, “You are going to die in a year . . . in six months . . . in six weeks . . . ”
We frequently catch ourselves saying, “If I die . . . ” But the preposition should be “when”, not “if”. There is no question. We are all going to die. Maybe not for 40 years or 60 years or 80 years or even 100 years, but make no mistake, we are all going to die.
Two thousand years ago, Jesus Christ talked about the tragedy of another tower collapsing. He said: “Those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them – do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish” (Luke 13:4-5, the Bible).
If death is unavoidable, what does that say about how we should live?
The main articles in this issue of Encounter were written by Jim Coggins, editor of Encounter, and James Toews, senior pastor of Neighbourhood Church in Nanaimo, B.C.
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