Home Pastors Articles for Pastors We Are Not Our Own: On God, Brittany Maynard and Physician-Assisted Suicide

We Are Not Our Own: On God, Brittany Maynard and Physician-Assisted Suicide

On the Edge of the Grand Canyon

Brittany Maynard has sweetened her last days with trips to the Alaskan glaciers and the Kenai Fjords and the Grand Canyon. In one sense, this is totally understandable. We were made for beauty. But in another sense, it is puzzling. For there is one thing that standing on the edge of the Grand Canyon does not do for you: It does not enhance your sense of autonomy. It makes you feel small and vulnerable in the presence of greatness and majesty.

That is a good thing. For we are small and fragile. We are not autonomous. We were never meant to be. Beauty, yes. Joy, yes. Greatness, yes—outside of us, filling us with worship and wonder. We were made for God.

In one of her videos, Brittany wisely says, “Make sure you’re not missing out. Seize the day. What do you care about? What matters? Pursue that. Forget the rest.”

I could not agree more. What matters is that we have been bought with a price. We are not our own. We live and we die and we suffer for the glory of Christ, our Lord. And we never forget the truth that makes everything worth it: “The sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us” (Romans 8:18).