Recently, I’ve been ruminating on a subject that is frequently heard online and elsewhere: the endless pursuit of a longer, or eternal, life. A recent interview with a multi-millionaire who has gone to extraordinary lengths seeking to live forever is an extreme but not uncommon example. His purpose in life is to live forever so that he can finally discover his purpose in life.
Here’s the question I’ve been pondering: is it an absolute good to continually strive for a longer life span? Such a question may seem odd coming from a physician whose mission is to restore and maintain health and prolong life. But a recent article describing the striking changes in health and longevity of our present age seemingly presents this achievement as an absolute good, leaving me a tad uneasy — perhaps because I find myself increasingly ambivalent about this unceasing pursuit of a longer life.
Of course, long life and good health have always been considered blessings, as indeed they are. But long life, in particular, seems to have become a goal unto itself — and from where I stand, this is most decidedly a mixed blessing.
Many of the most challenging health problems we battle, which drain our limited resources, are primarily a function of our longer life spans. Pick a problem: cancer, heart disease, dementia, crippling arthritis, stroke — all of these increase significantly with age and can result in profound physical and mental disability. In many cases, we live longer, but doing so is restricted by physical or mental limitations, making such an extended life burdensome for us and others. Is it a positive good to live to age 90, spending the last 10 or more years with dementia, not knowing who you are, or recognizing your friends or family? Is it a positive good to be kept alive by aggressive medical therapy for heart failure or emphysema, yet barely able to function physically? Is it worthwhile undergoing highly toxic chemotherapy or disfiguring surgery to cure cancer, thereby sparing a life then severely impaired by the treatment that saved that life?
In some way, these questions cut to the very heart of what it means to be human. Is our humanity enriched simply by living longer? Does a more extended life automatically imply more happiness — or are we simply adding years of pain, disability, unhappiness, and burden? The breathlessness with which authors often speak of greater longevity or the cure or solution to these intractable health problems seems to imply a naïve optimism, both from the standpoint of likely outcomes and the assumption that a vastly longer life will be vastly better. Ignored in such rosy projections are key elements of the human condition
— those of moral fiber and spiritual health, those of character and spirit. We who live longer in such an idyllic world may not live better; we may indeed live far worse.
Should we somehow master these illnesses which cripple us in our old age and thereby live beyond our years, will we then encounter new, even more frightening illnesses and disabilities? And what of the spirit? Will a man who lives longer thereby have a longer opportunity to do good, or rather to do evil? Will longevity increase our wisdom or augment our depravity? Like Dorian Gray, will we awaken to find our ageless beauty but a shell for our monstrous souls?
Such ruminations bring to mind a friend, a good man who died young. Matt was a physician, a tall, lanky lad with sharp, bony features and deep, intense eyes. He possessed a brilliant mind, a superb physician, but left his mark on life not solely through medicine nor merely intellect. A convert to Christianity as a young adult, Matt embraced his new faith with a passion and province rarely seen. His medical practice became a mission field. His flame burned so brightly it was uncomfortable to draw near: he was as likely to diagnose your festering spiritual condition as your challenging medical illness—and he had no reluctance about drilling to the core of what he perceived to be the root of the problem.
Such men make you uneasy, for they sweep away the veneer of polite correction and diplomatic encouragement that we physicians are trained to deliver. Like some gifted surgeon of the soul, he cast sharp shadows rather than soft blurs, brandishing his brilliant insight on your now-naked condition. The polished conventions of medicine were never his strength — a characteristic that endeared him not at all to many of his professional peers. But his patients — those who could endure his honesty and strength of character — were passionate in their devotion to him, personally and professionally. He was a man of extraordinary compassion and generosity, seeing countless patients at no charge, giving generously of his time and finances far beyond the modest means earned from his always-struggling practice.
The call I received from another friend, a general surgeon, requesting assistance with his surgery was an unsettling one: Matt had developed a growth in his left adrenal gland above the kidney. His surgery went deftly, with much confidence that the lesion had been entirely excised. The pathology proved otherwise: Matt had an extremely rare, highly aggressive form of adrenal cancer. Fewer than 100 cases had been reported worldwide, and no successful treatment was known.
Nevertheless, as much for his wife and two boys as for himself, he underwent highly toxic chemotherapy, which sapped his strength and left him enfeebled. Despite this, the tumor grew rapidly, causing extreme pain and rapid deterioration, bulging like some loathsome demon seeking to burst forth from his frail body.
Matt died at age 38, alert and joyful to the end. His funeral was a most remarkable event: at an age in life where most would be happy to have sufficient friends to bear one’s casket, his funeral service at a large church was filled to overflowing
— thousands of friends, patients, and professional peers paying their respects in a ceremony far more celebration than mourning.
There was an open time for testimony—and such a time it was, as one after another took to the lectern to speak through tears of how Matt had touched their lives, of services rendered, small and large, unknown before that day, of funny anecdotes and sad remembrances that left few eyes dry, and not one soul of that large crowd untouched or unmoved.
A journey such as his casts a critical light on our mindless pursuit of life lived only to endure longer. In Matt’s short life, he brought more good into the world, touched more people, and changed more lives than I could ever hope to if I lived a century more. It boils down to purpose: mere years are no substitute for a life lived with passion, striving for some goal greater than self, with transcendent vision multiplying and compounding each waking moment. This is a life well-lived, whether long or short, weakened or well.
Like all I trust, I hope to live life long and seek a journey lived in good health and sound mind. But even more – far more indeed – do I desire that those days yet remaining, though long or short – be rich in purpose, wise in time spent, drenched in prayer, and graced by love for others and for God.
