Monday, August 29, 2016

Who’s Really Playing God?



Image result for images of a medical doctor

Sometimes a doctor dares to tell a person
How long he or she will live,
Such predictions often amuse me
Since last I checked life was God’s to give.

More than such prognoses though
There is another matter we must contemplate,
This also has to do with doctors
And the god-like decisions they sometimes take.

For example take the following scenario
In which a doctor must make a decision
Whether to euthanize a dying patient
Or extend the life of a terminally ill person.

Such a question brings to the fore
Some very thought provoking considerations
Like whether life can still have meaning
In times of severe suffering or loss of vital functions.

Image result for cartoon images for the brain

Who among us including the doctor
Can determine when life no longer has meaning
Or whether a machine hooked up person
Has brain capacity to keep thought streaming?

And what about the will of God?
Shouldn’t this also be of critical thought?
Isn’t it God who gives life purpose and meaning?
Isn’t He the one through whom life is wrought?

Image result for images of a medical doctor

Isn’t my life and yours a gift from God?
And as such should we not seek to preserve it?
Isn’t He sovereign over its beginning and its end?
And as such should we not cherish every little bit?

Is it not murder to actually take one’s life?
Therefore what about euthanasia or mercy killing?
Is it any different when a doctor does it
In particular to relieve a patient’s suffering?

Suffering which is a part of our natural life
Performs a vital developmental roll
Particularly in the life of a born again believer
Whom it helps to spiritually grow.

Is he not playing God when he determines
How much suffering is really too much?
And what about the Hippocratic oath he swore?
Isn’t he reneging on this when he takes a life as such?

Is he not also playing God when on the other hand
He dares to prolong the existence of a patient
Who is hooked up to numerous machines
And whose natural life is already spent?

No life activity other than the machines,
No brain activity, no semblance of thought,
Only the experimentation of doctors in charge
In their attempt to buy what cannot be bought.

Image result for images of a medical doctor

Life is God’s to give and to take
Time here is not man’s to create or make,
Mercy killing is a God’s alone decision
Prolongation of death is not a God-given provision.

Consider the following gauge if you will
Of the difference between preserve and prolong:
To preserve natural life is certainly right
But to prolong death is absolutely wrong.

In the final analysis it would appear to me
That life must be permitted to run its course,
Actively speeding up death is wrong
And prolonging the same should not be enforced.

Rather than Play God we should let God be God,
Either of the two is encroaching on His domain,
In life-ending matters depend on God for wisdom
And consider what is meaningful while life remains.

Stewart Russell © 2016

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