“My religious beliefs teach me to feel as safe in battle as in bed. God has fixed the time of my death. I do not concern myself with that, but to be always ready whenever it may overtake me. That is the way all men should live, and all men would be equally brave.”
That was said by Confederate General Stonewall Jackson, and regardless of your feelings about him, his take on life and death is one that I think all people should consider. It sends the message that you shouldn’t worry–live your life, and God will have you when he wants you.
But underneath this message is the fact that there’s an impartiality to death, and that it comes for everyone. No one is so special that God doesn’t have a time and place for them. Not dying during an event where death would have been more likely doesn’t mean God loves you more than the person who didn’t dodge death in that moment. It just wasn’t your time.
This is a fact that Joy Behar of “The View” doesn’t understand. We can toss that onto the massive pile of things she can’t seem to comprehend, but more than that, I find it absolutely hilarious that Behar decided she was an expert enough on the mind of God that she could make the declaration that she did the morning after Donald Trump gave his speech at the RNC.
During the RNC, Trump stated that God was with him when he dodged the bullet that grazed his ear, after he miraculously turned his head just enough in the nick of time. Behar’s response to that was to call Trump “narcissistic,” because that implies that God wasn’t with Corey Comperatore , the retired firefighter who was hit and killed.
She said that saying such a thing was a very “un-Christian” thing of Trump to say:
Behar is wrong. God was absolutely watching over Trump that day. Trump’s time here on Earth clearly isn’t done yet. He still has a purpose to fulfill on this planet, and as such, God hasn’t deemed it as his time to go.
But God was also with Comperatore when he died. For this is God, our God forever and ever. He will be our guide, even to death. Psalms 48:14.
While we mourn the dead because they departed from the realm of the living, in the eyes of God, death is just another part of the journey of the soul, or more accurately, your journey. What we call “life” is only called that because it’s all we know, so when someone leaves what we call “life,” we consider it a tragedy in our ignorance.
To be sure, someone losing their life and being taken from you isn’t exactly a joyous thing. Being separated from that person in any way can be a very painful thing, but it’s hardly the last time you’ll see them. Their time here was just done. God had set that time aside for them to move on to the next step, and He guides them there, always with them.
So, God was with Comperatore, and while we can say with confident faith that he was with Trump that day, Comperatore doesn’t need to say it with faith. He saw God. He was greeted by Him. It’s an established fact for Comperatore.
One day God will come for Trump, after Trump has served his purpose in life. Until that day, a million snipers could take a million shots and not one would hit him because it’s not Trump’s time, but one day it will be just like one day it will be yours. Perhaps it will happen during an accident or tragic occurrence that some may survive but you won’t. However, no one can say that God loved others more than you because you didn’t survive.
God loves you just as much, and He’ll tell you Himself in that moment.