Sickness helps to remind men of death. Most live as if they were never going to die. They follow business, or pleasure, or politics, or science, as if earth was their eternal home.
They plan and scheme for the future, like the rich fool in the parable, as if they had a long lease of life, and were not, tenants at will. A heavy illness sometimes goes far to dispel these delusions. It awakens men from their day-dreams, and reminds them they have to die as well as to live. Now this I say emphatically is a mighty good.
They plan and scheme for the future, like the rich fool in the parable, as if they had a long lease of life, and were not, tenants at will. A heavy illness sometimes goes far to dispel these delusions. It awakens men from their day-dreams, and reminds them they have to die as well as to live. Now this I say emphatically is a mighty good.
~ J.C. Ryle
Practical Religion, “Sickness”, [Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1998], 360.