What is Life?

by Dick Buckingham
Administrator

Every other year, I have the challenging task of working through the difficult course of Ethics with our junior and senior students.  We approach this first from a philosophical perspective before taking specific ethical issues and trying to respond to them Biblically.  This is a challenge that I am increasingly finding more difficult.  The influence from our society and the long-term effect of evolutionary thinking has caused many to curve from truth.  Most of us move about our day to day lives using little more than a feeling as to what is right and wrong.  Indeed, God has given each of us as part of His reflected image a sense about morality.  Unfortunately, due to being marred by sin, none of us gets it right all the time and many seldom do.  As a society, we struggle with changing morals usually by taking a poll or survey and going with what the majority feels is right.  As a result, what is unacceptable now may become acceptable in the near future and often has.  There is a crisis of morals in our world and it is increasing because we aren't doing a good job of instructing our children about some basic absolute truths.

The first and most important truth that we must impress upon our children is that there is an absolute standard of ethics.  It is not one that is subject to polls or opinions, but has been carefully crafted and communicated to us by our Creator.  So often, critics insist that we cannot push our belief system upon someone who doesn't share our belief system.  While most would agree with that basic conclusion, the premise it is founded upon is faulty.  The assumption is that the ethics we say are absolute are the product of men or a religious perspective.  The reality is, they are the declaration of the Maker of us all, and His pattern given to us to function in this world.  It is true, I have no right to foist my opinions upon another and insist they must change theirs to match mine.  But it is God’s right to do so, as both Framer and Judge who will hold accountable.   We may not like what He has to say, but He has every right to say it, press it upon us, and hold us completely to its standard.

A second important truth, that needs to be impressed upon our children, is that life is a precious custodial gift bestowed upon us all by a gracious Creator and He requires us to treat it as would a caretaker, to promote it, maintain it, and treasure it no matter the cost.  So many of the issues we wrestle with in our society today have to do with the definition of life.  Questions regarding the ethics of abortion, suicide, assisted suicide, capital punishment, euthanasia, and more all hang from this one pendulum.   

In a particular year, on a test given at the end of this Ethics course, I asked my students to consider a woman who had been brain damaged due to an accident and required care for just about everything she did including being sustained with food and liquid via a feeding tube.  There was little hope of recovering any amount of significant function that would allow her to be productive.  Yet her condition was not so severe that she required extraordinary medical help to stay alive.  Other than the daily hygienic care everyone usually does for themselves, the only medical convenience was the feeding tube to provide daily sustenance.  The question I asked was, would it be Biblically acceptable to remove the feeding tube from this person to allow them to starve, dehydrate, and die.  Though we had talked about life during this course, all but one felt the Biblical thing to do was to remove the feeding tube.  Needless to say, I was shocked and dismayed.  None of them based this on any scriptural passage or example but upon what they deemed to be a definition of life.  They used arguments based on definitions that true life is only present when one is fruitful or productive.  Some assumed that life is our personal possession and that we may discard it at any time and for any reason.  Others suggested that since life with God is so much superior to this one, ending this life to enjoy that one is justified.  One even went so far as to give me Webster’s definition, as though this was the absolute answer and would settle all question.  The problem is, it doesn't matter what Webster or anyone else thinks about what life is.  The only thing that matters is what God thinks about life and how He defines it.

As soon as we begin to try to qualify what is life and what is not, we have entered a very dangerous area that

opens the door to all sorts of problems.  If life is defined on the basis of how fruitful one can be, then there are many in our society that should be “graciously” put out of their (our) misery because they can no longer or may never have been able to contribute something.  And who is to say what the level of contribution has to be in order to be determined worthy of life?  If receiving life giving sustenance from a tube is the line that we draw, then no infant in the womb deserves to live as they are sustained only by life’s original feeding tube.  Several of them felt if the person themselves had expressed a desire that they not live in such a way, then that was justification for the removal of the tube and starving them to death.  But isn’t that just suicide, and the removal of the tube assisted suicide?  So much of our society believes that life is something that is our personal possession and we are free to do with it whatever we choose.  It is a grave error when we view life is such a way.   Did we do anything to produce life in ourselves?  Did we create it?  Purchase it?  Earn it?  Then how can we claim that it is ours?  If it is not ours, then whose is it, and what is our role in handling what has been granted to us?

In Genesis 2, we see that God determined to fashion man in His own image and He breathed into man the breath of life.  Thus life belongs to God and He alone bestows it as a custodial gift upon each of us.  It is not like a gift that our parents give us which we feel free to abuse and discard as we please.  It is the most precious gift given to anything that God made and our Maker requires us to give it the highest regard and care.  Therefore He gives instructions and commands that we are to hold life in the highest regard and do everything we can to promote and maintain not only our own lives, but the lives of others.

Though I had taught my students this perspective of life from God’s Word, I was unable to persuade them to hold fast against the pressure of our world.  A Christian school teacher cannot do it alone.  A Christian pastor or youth leader cannot do it alone.  As Christian parents, we must understand the high responsibility we have to impress this upon our children.  The influence of the society around them is great and takes all our concerted effort to overcome.