How Can We Call This Living?

This is an adaption from a journal entry written on Monday, April 16th, 2007--the day of the Virginia Tech shooting.

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4.16.06
Leaning back against the van seat, I put my arm behind my head and rested it. Miles of scenery passed by me outside the vehicle window. This was comfortable.

To enjoy such relaxation is often the envy and desire of this world. "Oh, if only we could just relax and live." We have a notion in the back of our minds that we really are living when we are free from concern--free from physical and mental burden. Yet, as I leaned back in my amiable seat, the thought crossed my mind: how can we call this living? I think of the biographies I've been reading. Men such as brother Andrew, whose life mission was to carry the gospel of Christ into Communist countries. I doubt his life was free from concern. I doubt that his life was easy. But as I read his biography, I know he lived. Men such as Hudson Taylor--he too risked all comfort to carry the gospel to those who didn't know Christ. Hudson was often sick, but he carried on. These men really lived. I don't doubt that these men's lives were hard, both mentally or physically. Yet, they lived to show Christ; they lived to rescue lives, comfort hearts, and save souls. These men are my heroes.

This morning, 32 people were killed. A gunman released an odor of death across the campus of Virginia Tech College. I am stunned. I watch the news, and then in my awkwardness I tell my TeenPact host family, "I think I'm going to lay down and rest a bit." Lay down and rest? How can we call this living? How can we be content to lay back while the world around is being torn --hearts across America are being shattered with grief as they learn of the massacre of their loved ones. People were killed today, and I am resting. How can I call this living?

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Edit: After a few questions from a friend, I should clarify this post. My intentions and heart of the above thoughts were not to promote restlessness about the condition of the world around us. If read wrongly, this post may have come across as advocating 'worry'. That's not what I meant to imply in any way. As Christians, we should rest in hope of God and have an incredible peace in Him.

What I was trying to communicate was that we should be concerned about those around us--we shouldn't be content to just sit back and 'relax' while we still have time to share the gospel of Jesus Christ.