My Thoughts on Suicide: In Memory of Christian Taylor

               Recently, a friend and colleague of mine committed suicide. His name was Christian Taylor, and undergraduate student at Texas A&M University. Christian, in my experience, was a generally happy guy who loved to ponder scientific and philosophical questions. We shared the same office since the beginning of the summer and as a result had quite a few interesting discussions while working together. On October 15, Christian ingested sodium cyanide, he was rushed to the hospital and he went on to be with the Lord on October 17. While attending his funeral, another friend of mine asked me if suicide was a sure way to hell. I disagreed with him and explained my reasons. I would like to repeat these reasons here as a tribute to the memory of a friend.
                Now as I said, I don’t think that suicide is a sure way to hell. By my beliefs, there is only one sin that can send someone to hell. This sin is dying an unbeliever in Christ. By this, I mean that if you leave this world and you have not accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you will be eternally cast away from the presence of God in a place known as hell. This being said, I do view suicide as murder against oneself and the admission that you do not trust God to bring you through whatever trial drove you to make this choice. If you are a Christian and make this choice, I believe that you are forgiven, but I certainly wouldn’t want to face my heavenly Father on judgment day and tell Him that I didn’t trust in his plan for me while on this earth. Now some may argue that suicide was part of God’s plan for that particular person. This may seem like a valid point until we consider that nature of God. God is the ultimate representation of good and cannot by his very nature compel us to perform evil.

                That all being said, Christian committing suicide was indeed a tragic event and I wish it could have been avoided. Alas it has happened and it has affected his family, his friends, and his coworkers. I pray for peace during this hard time for all of us. If you are going through a difficult time and you have thoughts of taking your life, I beg you to reconsider. Not only are you removing any hope of your situation improving, you are also making a selfish choice that will break the hearts of more people than you think. While you may not see it, God does have a plan for you and He will bring you through these hard times if you will allow Him to. If you are struggling in life, please consider allowing Christ into your life to grant you peace beyond understanding. May God bless you and have a good rest of your week. 

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