OH DEATH YOU STING EVERYDAY
(Compassion: walking with those wrestling with death and grief)
Life can be fun, fair and successful, but only so much, so far and so long!
Oh death we feel your sting!
Oh Jesus heal our wounds!
Our span is (zero to) seventy years… and most of these are toil and pain…
Lord teach us to number our days, that we may gain wisdom of heart…
Death’s sting in November, every year, every month, every day, every hour!
Mortality, death, grief – so real, so cruel!
Distant death, death of clients! Inevitable death, my own death!
Close to home death, death of relatives and friends!
Death of parents or siblings, a dizzying lifelong nightmare!
Death in accidents, wars, disasters, ever shocking, ever numbing!
Lord, why are you doing this to me? Why do you permit this to happen to me or to my loved ones? Lord teach me your ways, help me comprehend your will in life and in death!
Death by evil, death in sin, death in innocence!
Death of carers, death of tyrants, death of idols, death of celebrities, death of intellectuals – so real, so cruel!
Situations that bring us to our knees! Human vulnerability, human fragility, human limitation! Death, cruel, disabling, destroying, traumatising, revenging, humbling, scaring!
Only hope against hope. Only faith in life after death! Only God’s enduring love, only joy in Christ’s victory and salvation! Rhetoric, power, ingenuity, fame, poverty, pain… always come to pass!
Only God, only Jesus, only faith endure and sustain us!
We shall overcome….
Amazing grace how sweet the sound…
In Christ alone my hope is found… It is well with my soul…
Alive or death we belong to Christ…
Come you blessed of my father…
Our life is a short time of expectation…
One must bear this grief, this loss, this sting of death to the end! One must persevere and look death in the eyes and prepare to walk through the lonely gate of one’s own death whenever and wherever!
Diseases, wars, satanic causes of death! Mystery and marvel, God’s will! In tears or in fulfillment, so be it! Let it be well with my soul! Endless deaths, meaningless aspirations, fragile lives!
God help us! We lean on you from conception to natural death!
Jesus, Mary and Joseph help us! Tragedies; emotional, physical and spiritual pain taunt us and many, endlessly!
Our life is a short time in expectation, a time in which sadness and joy kiss each other at every moment. There is a quality of sadness that pervades all the moments of our lives. It seems that there is no such thing as a clear-cut pure joy, but that even in the most happy moments of our existence we sense a tinge of sadness. In every satisfaction, there is an awareness of limitations. In every success, there is the fear of jealousy. Behind every smile, there is a tear. In every embrace, there is loneliness. In every friendship, distance. And in all forms of light, there is the knowledge of surrounding darkness . . . But this intimate experience in which every bit of life is touched by a bit of death can point us beyond the limits of our existence. It can do so by making us look forward in expectation to the day when our hearts will be filled with perfect joy, a joy that no one shall take away from us. Henri Nouwen.
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. Psalm 23:4!
Entire creation is groaning, and we dare to rejoice in the Holy Spirit! We dare to feel, live and share the peace, joy and love of Jesus! We witness or defend it albeit in fragility!
Emmanuel Mbeh MHM, November 2024
