|
|
|
Are You Afraid of Dying? July 2012 If there is one
thing that is common between the rich and the poor; the old and the
young; the
strong and the weak; the king and the peasant, it has to be the breath
in our
nostrils. But one day that breath will stop and we will meet our
graves.
Statistics tell us that one out of one dies. So none of us can cheat
death, but
the good news I want to share with you is that you don’t have to be
afraid of
death. I hope that by the time you finish reading this article, you can
say
with confidence, “Oh death, where is your victory? Oh grave, where is
your
sting?” Ignorance is Not
Bliss Steve had taken a
vacation to Australia. On his stay there, Steve decided to swim in the
beach.
As he was enjoying his swim, he was attacked by a shark and very
narrowly
escaped with his life suffering minor injuries. Steve made a big
mistake in not
reading the warning board that said, “Shark-infested water. Do not
swim”. Many
of us think ignorance is bliss, but for Steve it nearly cost him his
life. The
ensuing passages are more like the sign board giving you information to
choose,
but the choice is yours. (Although
some of the sections might seem a bit
disconnected, it will make sense as you read on.)
During
the early 18th
century surgery remained the last resort for the desperately ill.
Surgeons did
not know about germs. Without washing their hands, surgeons would wear
operating
garb, usually an old coat filled with pus and blood from the previous
operations.
Surgeons would pick up the scalpel, wiped with an old dirty cloth after
the previous
operation, and carry on with the surgery. Nearly 50% of those operated
on died. One
scientist after another stumbled on
the right sterile techniques. However, each
was humiliated and scorned by fellow physicians.
Professor Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis found that making physicians wash
their
hands drastically reduced the death rate in maternity wards. However,
his
colleagues opposed Semmelweis. Although Semmelweis argued
for hand washing all through his life,
he passed away without seeing his ideas take fruition. Why
were doctors not willing to
implement sterile procedures? The simple answer is this: germs had not
been
discovered during that time. Doctors could not fathom the idea that
washing
hands would make any difference. Is
the Bible True? For
some people the Bible is nothing
more than a history book and for some their whole life revolves around
it. Is
the Bible an authentic book? Can we really trust the contents of the
Bible? When
we look at the manuscript evidence
of the Bible, it is overwhelming to consider the sheer numbers of
manuscripts.
Today we have over 24,000 manuscript copies of portions of the New
Testament.
However, we have only 10 copies of Caesar’s writings and 5 copies of
the
writings of Aristotle. Apart
from the historical proof to back
up the Bible, the prophecies (future predictions) contained in it have
also
proven to be very accurate. There are more than 300 Bible prophecies
regarding
the first coming of Jesus Christ and all of them were fulfilled to the
dot. Going
by the historic evidence coupled
with accurate prophetic fulfilments, it’s safe to conclude that the
Bible is a
book that can be trusted. It is imperative to establish the
authenticity of the
Bible as this article is based on the Bible. The
Suffering of Jesus Christ
I
was pursuing my college degree when
the movie The Passion of the Christ was released here in Chennai. Some
of my
classmates who saw the movie wanted to know why Jesus was punished so
severely
(I will answer this question a little later). Although the actor in the
movie
did a great job in depicting the suffering of Jesus, what we saw in the
movie
was only a glimpse of what Jesus actually went through. They say that
the Roman
crucifixion is the most cruel, painful way to die. The
suffering of Jesus Christ began the
night before He was executed when He was praying to God the Father in
Gethsemane. Being in immense agony and emotional stress His sweat
became as
drops of blood falling to the ground. This is called hematohidrosis, a
condition in which the capillaries in the sweat glands rupture, thereby
mixing
sweat with blood. After
a series of events Governor
Pilate orders Jesus to be scourged. The Roman scourging/beating were
designed
to inflict extreme pain. After removing His clothes and tying His hands
to a
post above His head, Jesus was whipped many times. This whip consisted
of
several leather thongs with metal balls or sheep bones attached near
the ends. The
whipping is carried out with full force, ripping the flesh apart
leaving it
hanging like ribbons with blood gushing out. It is said that many
victims die
at this stage itself. Then
the soldiers force a crown of
thorns into Jesus’ scalp. The soldiers struck Jesus across the head
with a
stick, thereby driving the thorns deeper into the scalp of Jesus. Then
Jesus is forced to carry the
horizontal portion of the cross weighing around 50 kg to Golgotha – the
place
where He is to be crucified. The stress, cramps and loss of blood is
too much
as He stumbles and falls. An onlooker, Simon of Cyrene, is selected by
the
Roman centurion to carry the cross the rest of the way, with Jesus
following
him. On reaching Golgotha, Simon places the cross on the ground and
Jesus was
thrown backward with His shoulders against the wood. A heavy, square,
long,
wrought-iron nail is driven through the wrists of Jesus piercing the
median
nerve. Piercing this nerve can cause, “severe, excruciating, burning
pain, like
lightning bolts traversing the arm into the spinal cord” according to
Dr.
Frederick Zugibe. With both wrists firmly nailed into the wood, the
horizontal
section is lifted to fit into the vertical section of the cross which
was
already driven into the ground. His
left foot is pressed backward
against the right foot, and with both feet extended, toes down, a nail
is
driven though the arch of each. As He sags down with more weight on the
nails
in the wrists excruciating pain shoots along the fingers and up the
arms to
explode in the brain. He places His entire body weight on the nail
through His both
feet. Air can be breathed into the lungs, however cannot be exhaled
out. Jesus,
with His energy-sapped body, fights to raise Himself just to get one
short
breath. Some of the words He uttered shortly before His death on the
cross were
powerful. What did Jesus say to the ones who crucified them? He said in Luke 23:34 (NIV), “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing”. Isn’t that pure love? Where else can we find such love, but at the cross. So
why did Jesus have to go through
this excruciating pain and die like the way He did? Certainly He who
turned
water into wine, He who opened blind eyes, He who healed various
sicknesses, He
who walked on water, He who raised the dead and He who healed the ear
of the
person who came to arrest Him could have easily found a way to escape
from the
ones who came to crucify Him and could have saved Himself all this
trouble,
right? Wrong! |
|
 Copyright © 2012 Articles on Life |