A kind friend sent me a link - he thought I would appreciate the blog - and so I do. I can see I will be more than dipping into this blog. It leaves me a bit like when I read Darwin’s Black Box - I couldn’t put it down. While Behe did a good job of coming down to the layman’s level there are concepts that on the one hand I found difficult to grasp and yet on the other hand fascinated by them. Reading him made me wish I had the mind to follow the sciences when I was younger. Dr Terry Hamblin (Read his, ‘About Me’ on his blog), uses medical terms about his condition, probably for his peers, but I just skip over those for the value of what he has to say on life - and on suffering and death. Brilliant in his theology! Here is a health professional who has treated cancer patients - read the grateful comments that follow his post - and is now himself a cancer patient. Here is a ‘hands-on’ scientist who unashamedly reveals his Christian faith in the Person of Jesus Christ and shares his hope of seeing Christ at His Second Coming and the Resurrection. It mght be surprising how many health professionals there are in the UK who are practicing Christians. This is a case of not ‘science V faith’ but ‘science and faith’.
In The God Delusion Richard Dawkins suggests a contradiction for Christians, if they believe what they do about the after life, why are they afraid to die? On page 356 he asks, “Could it be that they don’t really believe all that stuff they pretend to believe? Or perhaps they do believe it but fear the process of dying.” On page 357 he asks, “what are we to make of the obsevation of a senior nurse of my acquaintance, with a life’s time experience of running a home for old people, where death is a regular occurance? She has noticed over the years that the individuals who are most afraid of death are the religious ones. . . . Whatver it is, it doesn’t, on the face of it, speak strongly of religion’s power to comfort the dying.”
While this is anecdotal evidence, I feel sure that on this that Dawkins may well be right. Being religious doesn’t mean one has a personal relationship with Jesus Christ upon which a Christian’s confidence about the future is based. In the UK 2001 Census 72% identified themselves as Christian but I wonder what small percentage of this number could express their hope or know what the Bible teaches about what lies beyond death? I just read this post by Dr. Terry Hamblin. It is a bit lengthy as a blog post - but here is a Christian physician who can explain to all of us what wrestling with suffering means. And although Dr. Hamblin expresses optimism over his treatment elsewhere on his blog, for Christians who are unsure about life after death, as well as expressing certainty for his future to family and friends, he explains clearly the Christian hope beyond death. Posted May 14, I would not have missed reading, “Suffering” by Dr. Terry Hamblin.
