Watching Anderson Cooper on CNN tonight describe the horrors at a cemetery in Port-au-Prince was really heartrending. He spoke of those who brought bodies to the cemetery looking for places to bury or dispose of the bodies. In some cases, bodies were being shoved into any available space with no markers to indicate who they were burying. Cooper remarked that with the passage of time, there would be no way of knowing who was buried where.
I’ve visited some of the cemeteries where my ancestors are buried. In upstate New York, I walked through the woods to touch the stones and markers of my father’s ancestors, stretching back almost 200 years. I’ve walked among the stones and markers of Christ Church Cemetery in St. Michaels, Maryland, to touch the stones of my mother’s people.
Not too long ago, I visited the perpetual care cemetery in Florida where my parents are buried. While their markers are only bronze plaques in the ground, the record of their lives is available to be seen by those who visit that site.
This tragedy reminds us that God’s eye is on the most forgotten among us. The Bible says that God sees even the sparrow that falls in flight. The people of Haiti have not been forgotten by God. Though the names of a whole generation may be obliterated by the crushing weight of rubble and dust, God knows who they are. We can only trust in the beneficent grace of God and leave our questions at the foot of the cross. It is only by looking at the cross that we see the incomparable love of God who endured the tragedy of the death of his only begotten son.
The thousands who are lost in this incredible tragedy join the incalculable numbers of others lost in other tragedies who are known to God. Only God knows the communications that occur in the final fleeting seconds of life, when time stands still on the threshold of eternity. We can only believe that they are remembered by the One who breathed the breath of life into their beings and gave his only son for their redemption.
Grace and peace!
David Felter
About David J. Felter
David J. Felter is general editor and Holiness Today editor in chief. As general editor, he oversees editorial content in books and publications for the Church of the Nazarene. In addition to his role as editor in chief of the denomination’s primary magazine, to which he was elected in 2004, Dr. Felter also is the senior editor of NCN News. He pastored for 21 years in Iowa, California, Oklahoma, Indiana, and Kansas. Since 1985, Dr. Felter has held assignments at Nazarene Headquarters, having served as education program manager, coordinator of Evangelism Ministries, executive editor of Adult Sunday School Curriculum, director of Adult Ministries/Lay Training, and director of Communications Services. He and his wife, Sandra, have two married sons, David and Jib, and five grandchildren.