This week saw an historic legal battle wherein a 14-year-old girl, who is terminally ill with cancer, won her case in the High Court to have her body cryogenically frozen at the point of death in the hope that one day she will be brought back to life.
Cryogenics is a medical method of preserving the body of the deceased in extreme cold temperatures at the point death. The hope is, when science has advanced enough in the future, they may be able to revive the deceased.
This type of practice, where the body is preserved is not cheap, and comes at a cost of more than £100,000, to get your whole body cryogenically preserved, and for a smaller fee, you can get your brain preserved on anticipation that in future scientist will be able to clone your body.
The teenager is reported to have said, ‘I don’t want to be buried underground. I want to live and live longer and I think that in the future they might find a cure for my cancer and wake me up.’
Oftentimes, we think longevity of life demonstrates the quality of life but, as a matter of fact that is not always the case as it is the ‘contribution’ that we make to life that demonstrates our quality of life.
Jesus, at the height of his success and popularity, was cut down in His prime, having only been in the public sphere for only three years. Yet others, who had lived longer, had made lesser contribution to life or the world in general.
Whilst this young girl wishes to wake up in the future, her wish is no different to the Christian wish of one called the resurrection, where it is our wish to be woken by the trump of God.
As in 1 Thessalonians 4;16 ‘the dead in Christ shall rise’. This is not about cloning or preservation, as this body is riddled with sin, subject to destruction, sickness snapped in sin and iniquity and therefore our inheritance is a new body.
In the words of Abraham Lincoln, “And in the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years”.
Let us live each day in Christ, die in Christ, be buried in Christ, in hope that one day we shall be risen in Christ. Let this hope preserve us and keep us steadfast in our faith.