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(Text
for a small booklet)
WHEN
SOMEONE
DIES
Every
person in the world loses someone -
It
doesn't matter whether we are
Young
or old -
Not
a single person ever misses out -
Rich
or poor, unknown or famous -
Mothers,
fathers and children -
Nobody
is able to avoid it -
At
some time or other -
When
we expect it or when we don't -
Eventually,
Inevitably,
We
all lose someone we love.
But
why do people
have
to die?
This
booklet will help you understand.
As
soon as we are born we begin to die. Ageing and death are part of living and
growing. The process begins in our mother's womb, and continues for about 75
years, if we live about the average number of years, until finally our body
stops working . . .
Have
you ever wondered why we die?
And
where did death come from?
To
find the answers to these very important questions, we have to go to the Bible.
In
the Bible, in the first few chapters, we read that God created this world beautiful
and full of life.
And
on to this beautiful world God created living things - animals, plants, fish,
dinosaurs and birds. When everything was ready, God also made two human
beings.
For
a while, the first humans were obedient to God, and so God kept them
alive, and He was going to keep them alive for ever - but one day they disobeyed
God.
God
had already warned them that if they disobeyed Him they would begin to
grow old and die, but they went ahead anyway . . . so the punishment came to
them, and then it spread to the whole world.
This
is why people, and animals, and plants, and fish, and everything grows old and
dies. We have all inherited the punishment which the first humans were given.
So
death is the consequence of everyone's disobedience, as well as Adam and Eve's,
because nobody obeys God with all their heart - not even the verybest
Christians.
BUT
YOU CAN FEEL SAD
Just knowing
why people die doesn't stop us from feeling sad when they do die.
Its
OK to feel sad.
Its
OK to cry.
Its
OK to go somewhere and shut the world out for a while.
This
is normal.
It
is all part of normal grief, and its real, and most people feel the same way
when it happens.
But
after a while the sadness goes away and you can smile again.
SO
HOW DO YOU FEEL?
When
someone we love dies, people can feel all sorts of things. Here are some of the
things they feel :
disappointment
resentfulment
fear
anger
tiredness
confusion
loneliness
and
sadness
These
feelings are all normal.
Everyone
has them -
Old
people and young people,
Mothers
and fathers,
famous
people and not so famous people.
All
these feelings are part of being real.
SEVEN
THINGS SAD PEOPLE
OUGHT
TO KNOW :
1.
It is normal to feel sad.
2.
It is normal to want to cry, so cry.
3.
It is normal to feel confused, or weird, or down, or up, or stupid.
4.
It is normal to think that you are the only one who is feeling sad.
5.
Other people will be turned off by your sadness but that's OK - they
can't help it. They may feel unable to help you.
6.
Eventually you will feel happy again. Your sadness won't last
for ever - unless you want it to.
7.
Some people get over their sadness quickly, and some people take a long
time.
.......................
In
our world, it is hard to find someone who really cares about us - who is
willing to talk about the hard-to-say things.
If
you have a friend who loves you in spite of your sadness, you have the best
friend in the world.
Where
does God fit in to all this?
Well,
getting back to the Bible, we read that, at the beginning, God wanted people to
live for ever, and to be happy, but they messed everything up. Death
was their fault, not God's fault. He never wanted death to happen to
anyone.
If
you read the Bible a bit more, you will come to four little books, called
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. These four books tell the same story, about a man
called Jesus Christ, who came from heaven, and who spent his life helping
people.
He
healed the sick, and gave sight to the blind and he even made dead people come
back to life!
But
at the end of his work, when he was about 30 years old, Jesus died on a cross.
The
Bible says he gave his life as a sacrifice for our disobedience. Because
the first humans, and all their children, (including you and me) disobeyed God,
they all had to die, but Jesus died for everyone, so that means he must
have died for you and me too.
Three
days after Jesus died, he came back to life.
After
that he went back to heaven, and sat on the throne beside his Father. Jesus is
the Son of God.
One
day Jesus will come back to this earth again, and on that day all the people who
have died will come back to life, because he will command them to.
That
will be the happiest day this world has ever seen, for all the people who have
loved Jesus, and died, will come back to life again. They will be with him in
his happy kingdom for ever!
Ever better, they will never be sad again - ever.