The concluding issue I want to bring to your attention is death. Yes, during this pandemic many people have died from the coronavirus. It has been sad and very difficult. However, deaths of any kind happen every day. During this lockdown death and loss, if they could have become harder they have. It has affected both the dying as well as the living. The dying have been affected by the fact that they are dying with no family present. Nurses and care givers have been their last personal vestige of human touch. Let me take the opportunity to thank all the nurses and caregivers for the sympathy and empathy toward their patients. Many blessings to you. Death has taken its toll on them as well.
Let me make two observations about death. In one way all of us are alonewhen we die. No one physically can die for us. However, for those who have a personal relationship with Christ; we are never alone. Christ is with us and when we die we are more spiritually alive than we have ever been and will remain that way for all eternity.
The living have suffered and grieved in more challenging ways during this lock down. First, they have not been able to be with their loved ones as they passed into eternity. What a woeful time. Then due to the lockdown normal calling hours, funerals and graveside services have been seriously altered or postponed to a future date. This has created two grief issues. First, abbreviated services with limited people available to give their condolences has created only a partial and temporary relief from grief. Secondly, when services, calling hours and celebration of life are postponed they create a partial limited grief experience that will become a reopened grief wound in the future. I want to suggest that both at the time of death as well as at the future services that you take time to grieve appropriately and completely.
Please allow me to complete this article by communicating the ultimate path to surviving the coronavirus pandemic and lockdown. All that we go through in this life both good and bad is temporary no matter how long it lasts. One day it will all be gone. We’ve all experienced some loss during this time either physically or materially. When it’s all gone only the eternal will last. There is only one way to acquire the eternal and that is through a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Jesus said, “I am the way the truth and the life, no man cometh to the Father but by Me”. (John 14:6).
God loves you so much that He gave His Son to die for you that through Christ’s death and resurrection you may have eternal life. (John 3:16; I Cor. 15:1-4).
I pray this article was an encouragement to you. If it has please contact me through my email:
jtovissi@cantonbaptist.org.
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