Suicide and Salvation

Philip G. Ney, MD

I have interviewed in consultation, thousands of suicidal people.  To some extent they all want to die but I have never met anyone who wants to be dead. Given a reasonable opportunity, they would like to continue living, but they find life is too painful.  It seems that everyone wants to live forever, but the question is how to attain that.  There are 3 basic ways to find eternal life seen in the religions and philosophies of the world. 

1. Earn enough points by being "good" and not being bad, e.g. the Jews.  This makes people  continuously try to make themselves better and avoid making major mistakes.

2. Suffer enough, e.g. the Hindus.  Hinduism implies that if a person could suffer enough, they would eventually gain enough credit in order to reach Nirvana or some other type of heaven.

3. Accept salvation as a gift.  This is the Christian way.  It is by far the easiest, but it seems to be the most difficult for people to accept.  Proud humans feel somehow they can earn their way into heaven.  To accept Christ as their substitute for the death penalty knocks at their arrogance.  Rather than accept the gift, they constantly seek some other way to find salvation.