Articles
Alive Because of Another Person
Alive Because of Another Person
I am alive today because of the death of another person. One afternoon when I was 16 years old, I began to feel sick while at school. I finished the school day, but by the time I got home, I was feeling very bad. My symptoms were not unusual, fever, chills, fatigue, body aches. My wife and my mother will both tell you that I don't get sick very often, and when I do I usually do my best to ignore it. This time something was different, and for some reason I was scared. When I called my mother at work, she could hear it in my voice. Instead of telling me to get some fluids and go to bed, she had my father come pick me up and take me to the doctor. It was at this juncture that my life was spared due to the death of another.
About a year earlier, a boy name Ricky, who was 1 or 2 years younger than me, had become ill with the same sort of symptoms. The family doctor was not too concerned by it and treated him for Strep. Three days later, Ricky was dead. What the doctor had thought was a Strep infection had in fact been Septicemic Plague. Septicemic is the rarest of the 3 major forms of plague, and it is also the deadliest. In medieval times, mortality was 99-100%. But caught early, and with the right treatment, it can be cured in most cases.
Because of his death, the doctors in our community were on the lookout for this disease. When I arrived at the doctor's office, I had a 104 fever, and they did a blood draw and found my white blood count was extremely high. I was admitted to the hospital, and treatments were started immediately. Here I am 30 years later because of it.
All of us are infected with a plague. The plague we have is called sin. Its symptoms are not unusual, anger, selfishness, lust, greed, envy. This plague is anything but rare. Each of us can recall the time when we realized that we were infected, and how scared we were at that moment. Left untreated, the plague of sin has a 100% mortality rate. But with the right treatment, it is 100% curable.
1 Peter 3:18 says, "For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit."
All of us have the opportunity to be cured of the plague of sin and live due to the death of Christ. Young Ricky did not knowingly give his life so that mine would be spared. However, Christ knowingly and willingly gave his life so that each of us would be spared. We have spiritual life because of him. As we come together around this table, we do so to memorialize Christ, and to remember that because of his death, we have spiritual life.
