Death with Dignity: Euthanasia and End of Life

Today's Reading

Read Ecclesiastes 3:1-2: "For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die."

Then read Job 1:21: "And he said, 'Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.'"

Reflection

The conversation about the sanctity of life does not end at birth. It extends to the other end of life, where questions about suffering, dying, and death have become urgent in ways previous generations could not have imagined. Medical technology has given us the power to extend life far beyond what was once possible — but it has also created situations where "living" means being tethered to machines in a state that bears little resemblance to the life God intended.

The assisted suicide and euthanasia movement has grown rapidly across the Western world, driven by a compelling argument: if I have the right to control my life, should I not also have the right to control my death? If I am suffering unbearably, with no hope of recovery, why should I be forced to continue suffering?

These are not questions to be dismissed with a wave of the hand. Anyone who has watched a loved one die slowly — in pain, stripped of dignity, begging for release — knows that the desire for a merciful end is not selfish. It is profoundly human. The church that has nothing to say to such suffering except "you must endure it because God says so" has not understood either suffering or God.

Ecclesiastes 3 acknowledges with unflinching honesty that there is "a time to die." The Teacher does not pretend that death is not real, not coming, not part of the human experience. There is a season for it. The question is not whether we will die, but who determines the timing.

Job's response to catastrophic loss is not stoic resignation but anguished faith. "The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away." Job does not pretend it does not hurt. He weeps, he tears his robes, he falls to the ground. But in the midst of his devastation, he recognizes that his life was never his own possession. It was given, and the One who gave it retains the right to take it.

J.I. Packer, drawing on the Puritan tradition of the "good death," argued that this principle extends directly to the end-of-life debate: "God, not man, is lord of the deathbed, and any who presume to hasten death thereby presume to act as God." For Packer, the issue was not about maximizing or minimizing suffering. It was about who holds sovereign authority over human life. If God is the author of life — as Day 1 of this plan established — then the conclusion of life is also his prerogative.

This does not mean that Christians must pursue every possible medical intervention to extend life at all costs. There is a crucial distinction between killing and allowing to die. Withdrawing extraordinary medical treatment and allowing a natural death is not euthanasia. Refusing to eat through a feeding tube when one's body is shutting down is not suicide. The Christian tradition has long recognized that there is no moral obligation to use every available technology to delay an inevitable death.

What the Christian tradition resists is the intentional termination of life as a solution to suffering. Keller noted the deeper issue: "There is a great deal of pain in life and perhaps the only pain that can be avoided is the pain that comes from trying to avoid pain." This is not a glib dismissal of suffering. It is the recognition that a society that treats death as the solution to suffering will inevitably expand the definition of "unbearable suffering" until it encompasses loneliness, depression, disability, and old age. The evidence from countries that have legalized euthanasia suggests that this slippery slope is not hypothetical.

Going Deeper

How do you want to die? This is not a morbid question but a practical one. Have you made your wishes known to your family? Have you thought about the difference between extraordinary measures and ordinary care? A living will, prepared thoughtfully and discussed openly with loved ones, is one of the most loving things you can do for the people who will one day stand at your bedside.