When Suicide Beckons
WHEN SUICIDE BECKONS
Most of us have hit low points when despair moved us to wonder if life was worth the effort. During these down and dry times, some have even considered or completed suicide. Financial difficulties, family problems, poor health, the bondage of alcohol or other drugs may contribute to moving one toward this tragic exit.
During the past few decades, some religious groups have been seduced by death. Mass suicides in California, Central America, Canada and Europe have produced heartbreaking headlines describing the demise of large numbers of deluded people who chose to end their lives at the direction of misled leaders.
In 1997, millions were shocked by the “Heaven’s Gate” tragedy in which thirty nine members of this California group ended their lives thinking they were shedding their “earthly containers” to move to “the level above.”
And those of us old enough to remember will never forget the 1978 Jonestown, Guyana nightmare when 914 followers of Jim Jones became victims of a mass suicide plan. Actually, the number of victims of suicide goes well beyond those who end their lives because all who love them have been victimized also.
I know.
My father made this terrible choice in 1964. In 2006 so did my grandson. Our family knows the shocked, sinking feeling that comes when the reason for death is discovered. We know what it is to be haunted by the unwanted but recurring question: “What could we have done to prevent this?” We know the desire to turn back the calendar a few days or weeks to have time enough to fix whatever was wrong.
But we also know what it is to find peace.
The words of Jesus, when He prepared His disciples for His coming crucifixion, have become in a very personal sense, the source of our strength (John 14-16). We read them again and again, allowing their comfort and faith building power to flow through our minds and quiet our hearts. As I begin each new morning prayerfully revisiting these and the myriad parallel promises provided in scripture, I’m reminded again that on the darkest day, faith drives the clouds away.
Following the “Heaven’s Gate” disaster, attorney Tim Stoen wrote an article in Newsweek entitled “The Most Horrible Night of My Life,” in which he told of the night he knew his son would die with 913 others at Jonestown and he was unable to do anything to prevent it. He concluded his moving story by saying he came to faith in Christ in 1991 and now knows God’s forgiveness and peace, adding he hoped the families of the “Heaven’s Gate” victims would find peace too.
Stoen was writing about the same peace my family and I have found and that is available to you – no matter what is going on around you.
Suicide is never God’s will. It is an irreversible solution to a temporary problem that God is able to solve.
Silence that sinister voice that insists you have no reason to live. God has a wonderful plan for your life (Jeremiah 29:11). Look beyond your present problems to the One who loves you.
Give your cares to Him. He really cares about you (1 Peter 5:7).
Roger Campbell was an author, a broadcaster and columnist who was a pastor for 22 years. A new book containing over one hundred of his best columns, “Everywhere You Go There’s a Zacchaeus Up a Tree,” is now available at your local or online bookseller. Contact us at rcministry@ameritech.net
