The horror of watching buildings disintegrate into dust across Turkey and Syria has been unimaginable. The realisation that rubble is settling on people still alive and pinning them down to their last breath sends a chill down the spine that’s unquantifiable.

At 7.8 on the Richter scale, last Monday’s (February 6) Turkey-Syria quake was reportedly the world’s most deadly in the last decade. Death toll at press time was upwards of 23,000.

Thousands more will die.

Untold numbers remain hopelessly buried under piles of concrete. They are unlikely to be unearthed intact, let alone rescued.

Among those rendered homeless, there will be a proportion who will succumb to hypothermia in the frigid winter conditions.

Unknown others, gripped by trauma, will suffer slow, largely silent deaths, both physical and psychological.

A three-month state of emergency has been declared in 10 Turkish provinces, but it’s clear that a return to any semblance of normalcy will take far, far longer.

Good deeds

Hearteningly, in the face of continuing aftershocks, foreign ground is surely moving in support of those left behind.

In Singapore alone there are organisations like Relief Singapore, Singapore Red Cross, World Vision Singapore and Habibi International gathering money, medicine and all manner of aid to be sent out to the areas of need.

And well it should be. It’s an expression of the compassion that is common to our God-given consciences.

All too soon, however, our predilection for bad and more bad news will run its course and we will no longer watch and wait for the latest reports. Each development will become as humdrum as the next.

Think about how it has turned out with Ukraine. Hardly a year ago (February 24, 2022), the first reports came in of missiles raining down on Ukrainians as they slept.

Then, as now, disbelief swept over our collective consciousness. War was suddenly playing out in real time before our very eyes on every news channel you could click on, plus YouTube, TikTok – you name it.

Our heightened senses also picked up on intensifying geopolitical tensions everywhere else in the world.

As the months passed, however, the bomb blasts faded into social media background until their ripple effects brought inflation indefinitely into our backyards. The issues then became about us and the imminent threat to our livelihoods. 

But, Covid restrictions were almost fully lifted, and we were a society well-positioned for post-pandemic recovery. Christmas was merry, and the New Year was happy.

Life was picking up speed and would soon be moving right along.

Except … there was something of a residual feeling of unease that we all shared. Did we really believe we had any measure of security about our days ahead?

Good news

It wasn’t our theatres and hospitals being blown up last February, and it isn’t our skyline collapsing into smithereens this February.

Still, the apocalyptic sights a mere mobile device tap away are enough of a reminder that we’re inching toward “the time of the end” (Daniel 12:4). It is not yet, but it shall come.

We should not be surprised.

Matthew 24:7-8 has often been quoted on Salt&Light and elsewhere: For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are but the beginnings of birth pains.

God is not slow to fulfil this eventuality.

Rather, He is patient, not wishing that any one should perish a spiritual death but that all should come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9), confessing that we have sinned in going astray from Him and turning to our own ways (Isaiah 53:6).

By grace alone, that acknowledgement opens our hearts to receive the good news that, by his death on the Cross, Jesus paid the penalty for our sin. By His rising from the dead, He conquered death for all who believe in Him.

We are, after all, not bodies with a soul but souls with a body – and that only for a time. When that body becomes lifeless, another reality kicks in: We continue life eternally in God’s presence (what we call “heaven”), or for all time in His absence (“hell”). In which case, there will be “weeping and gnashing of teeth” forever (Matthew 13: 42, 50).

As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. (1 Corinthians 15:22)

So, you can choose to go your way. But today, if you hear His voice, my prayer is that you do not harden your heart.

Jesus – who was so-named because He will save His people from their sins (Matthew 1:21) – still speaks: This is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in Him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. (John 6:40)

MORE NEWS ON THE TURKEY-SYRIA EARTHQUAKE:

“The devastation is immense. We need medicine, food, water”: Church leaders race against time to help freezing survivors

Singaporeans stream in to give towards victims of Turkey/Syria earthquake: Last day of Relief Singapore’s donation drive tomorrow

Let the worst of times bring out the best in you

“I immediately ran to my children; I did not know which one to carry”: Survivor of devastating Turkey earthquake