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Earlier this week a very dear friend of ours spoke to our community about how much God loves us and how his love transformed her. She spoke transparently about being repeatedly raped by a family member when she was just a young girl. Her infectious joy and love for everyone touched each of us; what she said and how she said it inspired us all to love God more and to love one another through thick and thin.
The next morning, the newspapers reported that a 17-year old rape victim had been euthanized in Holland, at her request. Our friend’s heartbroken response to that news was, “Oh, how I wish I had just had a day with her!”
When a secular state is faced with a depressed teenager who doesn’t want to live, utilitarian materialism goes into action. The reasoning is quite clear and understandable: This girl is hopeless and does not want to live, so we see no reason to hope for her. She will almost certainly be dependent on the state if she continues to live; she is an autonomous individual who wants to die, so we will help her kill herself.
The next day the authorities in Holland put out a statement to clarify that they had not actually killed her; they had just helped her to starve and dehydrate herself to death. I don’t think that makes much difference. The authorities just agreed with her that there was no hope for her future.
When our friend (now late 60’s) was speaking the night before, she was full of humour and joy and had everyone laughing uproariously, but her message was deep and life-changing. When she spoke of her pain as a child and young woman and her desire to die, she said, “Little did I know that God would fashion my pain into an instrument to set others free.” She has now worked with victims of incest and rape in people groups where it is almost the norm for young women. Through her, many have experienced the power of what the scriptures teach, “This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!” (2 Corinthians 5:17).
As far as I know, this is the first case of a person that young being granted governmental help to commit suicide; but it won’t be the last. Now that it has been done, the numbers will increase; that’s just the way our secular drift goes. It will become more and more deadly in this hurting generation of young people. Who will give them hope?
May the Lord call many young evangelists—people who are full of hope and the power of the Holy Spirit to heal people inside and out! As Jesus exhorted us, “So pray to the Lord who is in charge of the harvest; ask him to send more workers into his fields.”
Dutch girl, 17, who was sexually abused at 11 and raped as a 14-year-old is legally euthanised at her home by ‘end-of-life’ clinic because she felt her life was unbearable due to depression
- Noa Pothoven from Arnhem died last Sunday in a hospital bed in her living room
- She had suffered from a post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and anorexia
- In a final Instagram post the teenager wrote ‘Love is letting go, in this case,’ and asked her followers not to try and change her mind
- Euthanasia has been legal in the Netherlands under strict conditions since 2002
By MIRANDA ALDERSLEY FOR MAILONLINE
PUBLISHED: 12:35, 4 June 2019 | UPDATED: 17:57, 4 June 2019
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