USNS Comfort arrives in New York: The best way to live every day

The USNS Comfort has arrived at New York Harbor.

The massive hospital ship will provide medical help to a
city overwhelmed with rising numbers of COVID-19 cases. The USNS Comfort’s
sister ship, the USNS Mercy, has already been deployed and is moored in Los
Angeles. It has been serving patients since Sunday.

New York City has already converted the Jacob K. Javits
Convention Center into a temporary hospital. It is setting up another field
hospital in Central Park. The USNS Comfort will provide medical services to
those not afflicted by coronavirus, hoping to relieve some of the stress on
hospitals that are struggling to treat patients with the disease.

The image of the USNS Comfort sailing past the Statue of Liberty is one I expect to see for many days to come.

The best way to live every day

Every step we take in helping those suffering from this
horrific disease is obviously a step worth taking. But there’s another reality
COVID-19 is forcing us to consider: the fact that we will all die sometime of
something, unless the Lord returns first.

Paradoxically, mortality does not need to be a morbid
thought. To the contrary, it can provide a powerful incentive to live with
joyful purpose.

The writer of Ecclesiastes noted: “A good name is better than precious ointment, and the day of death than the day of birth” (Ecclesiastes 7:1). Few except our parents remember the day of our birth or its circumstances. But many will remember the day of our death and how our lives ended.

It’s sometimes said: where you start the race isn’t important; it’s where you end that matters. This is not entirely true, of course. Where you start the race can be relevant to running the race. If you’re at the back of the pack, you have more distance to make up and more runners to pass.

But the larger sentiment is worth remembering: runners run
the race to win. In this sense, as Ecclesiastes 7 notes, “Better is the
end of a thing than its…