Sometimes death just plain sucks

A great human being died this past Monday. My friend, Mark, who had been battling leukemia for several years finally lost the fight. He was a strong and mighty man, full of vigor, and the disease had to do its best to claim him. He fought on when most would've thrown in the towel. He was a man with a heart of gold and who spread kindness wherever he went. He had a twinkle in his eye whenever I saw him.
I got to know Mark years ago through church service. There I found out that Mark wasn't just a good man, but a great one. I loved him like a brother. The world will miss this guy, and so will I.

So this is what it's like being good...

I've been watching the series, Marvel's Daredevil on Netflix . It's bloody, brutal, gory, and has some bad language. The characters are rough, compelling, and often heroic. Over the past few episodes, I've watched as Daredevil's character has interacted with another character, named Elektra. Elektra is a martial artist who has really been sort of amoral through the entire time that she's been on the show. In the most recent episode I watched, Daredevil says that he needs to rescue some innocent hostages, rather than going after the evil guy Nobu, as Elektra wants to do.
She refuses to accompany him so he sets about trying to rescue the hostages from their Ninja captors alone. A few minutes after he begins the fight, Elektra shows up to join him. "I was getting bored," she says.
They rescue the hostages and send them out of the building, but more Ninjas have gathered. The two fight, side by side. As the battle nears completion, Elektra is stabbed by Nobu, mortally wounded. The fight stops as she drops to the ground and Daredevil, who has had a romantic relationship with her in his alter-ego, Matt Murdoch. Holds her close.
"So this is what it's like to be good," she says. "Does it always hurt so much?"
Matt pauses, then says, "Yeah....it does."

I thought about that in life we are often called upon to do the good, and sometimes doing the good instead of what seems to be the most pleasant, really can hurt. In the long run though, it's worth it.

Challenges and decisions

One of my favorite quotes is from The Lord of the Rings:

Frodo: I wish the ring had never come to me. I wish none of this had happened.
Gandalf: So do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.

Sometimes, we get great responsibility thrown upon us, through no fault of our own. We cannot keep the evils that happen in the world from happening, nor the challenges that life places upon us. But we are given a certain amount of finite time, and with that time, we can add to the evil, or we can choose to fight it. It's our choice. Free will is the name of the game. Let us be brave in these times of challenge. Let us strengthen our faith. Let us choose to be on the side of good, even if that costs us some perceived security.