Publisher's Synopsis
TRANSIENT LIFE is a book that focuses on how to understand the true meaning of life, how to accept death and how to help the dying and the dead especially in this time of COVID-19 when death and life have become strange bed fellows. It is a book that brings to our knowledge the essence of life, and the definitive stamp death puts to the particular quality of each person's life and makes it a permanent contribution to the ongoing development of history. For believers death is never a destruction but a continuum of life. Life is a continuum - we live to die and die to live. Death is a conditio sine qua non-a necessary condition that must be fulfilled. No doubt the spread of COVID-19 from Wuhan China has brought with its shock staggering number of deaths with over 200,000 deaths across the globe. It had left many memories of heart break, destruction, pain and economic woos. Businesses have crumbled or even totally destroyed, workers have been sacked with world's economy described to be on recession with its attendant implications. At the last count, over 30 million persons have filled for unemployment benefits in the United States alone with many across the globe. African countries that have run a mono economy of crude oil have seen their economies crumble as the price of the crude had dangerously plummeted leaving them to leak their wounds.This book therefore relates to us as individuals and encourages us to move on even when every other thing around us says otherwise. Suicides, domestic violence and the likes that were occasioned by the massive "Lockdown" enforced by all nations in their bid to minimize to the barest minimum the spread of this virus has proved not to be a solution. Something has to be done! The lockdown though worked in some cases, it equally worsened the economy as it imposed unnecessary restrictions on movement. The movement of goods were hampered and the citizens of most developing countries had to choose to die of hunger or die of COVID 19. This was another quagmire people had to face.Transient life comes to remind us of that image of God which we were all made of. The image which is but a reflection of the original. It reminds us that though the image may be hazy and distorted, it still does not exist on its own. Beyond the image is the reality. The Image of God in us not only helps us to see who we really are even in this COVID 19, but also reveals God to us. This image implies dominion and glory which God had bequeathed to us by the reason of our creation.The book now unveils and reveals why it seemed God had abandoned us. It points out the great tragedy of the universe as been that, while human beings were made to show God's glory, we have all fallen short of this purpose and "exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man" (Rom.1:23) . But suddenly, "COVID 19" has brought to the chagrin of our world the collapse of all those illusory things were our trust had hung on for so long. The world that had changed the beatitudes to suit their wimps and caprices suddenly wakes up to the existence of a strange virus that afflicts both the poor and the rich. Infact it started with the rich, those who fly, those who could afford expensive travel overseas, and those who feel money 'answereth' everything. The best of medical science has had no answer to it. Those things that had made us to see life from our own perspective have all crumbled under our very noses. The book also brings to our knowledge certain men and women whose focus were not on this world but on God. It was this focus on God that was the secret of their successful lives. Through trouble, God speaks strength and courage into our lives as we fight against the forces of the adversary. We can complain, blame ourselves or the government. but we are responsible for what we give our attention to. Our focus determines our our perceptions. Transient life therefore is for us to refocus on God .