Nathan's Story

Yesterday a 16-year-old boy from Indiana, Nathan Furlong, was walking home from school on the railroad tracks and was hit by a train, according to the Indianapolis Star. The CSX train engineer said that the train hit him squarely while traveling 37 mph. Furlong was thrown 70 feet (a furlong, by the way, is 220 feet).

Nathan is in the hospital this morning, breathing but unconscious. His parents must be horrified and afraid. I suspect the train engineer is horrified as well. The engineer said he blew his whistle 50 times, but that Nathan was wearing earphones and didn't respond.

Can you imagine how awful it would be to know what's going to happen, to warn as loudly as you can, to pray that somehow the boy will move away from danger, to be trying to stop the overwhelming momentum of the train, only to see the boy flung like a rag doll in that last split-second?

There may be much more to this story than the newspaper reported. Maybe he wanted to get hit. Maybe somebody gave him drugs without his knowing. Who knows? I just couldn't help but feel horrible for everybody involved. Today I'm praying for Nathan, for his family, and for the guy who watched helplessly as he piloted the train into tragedy.

At times I have had a recurring dream in which I am in a very high place with no railings (a mountain, a building, an airplane) and I am surrounded by kids. Inevitably one of the kids, in these dreams, gets too close to the edge despite all of my efforts to shepherd. When the child falls I have such an awful feeling. I know what's going to happen to the child. I consider diving after him but I quickly realize that my falling over the edge won't help him. All I can do is watch.

I remember a friend telling me about a dream in which he is on top of a building (I think ... I may have forgotten the details) and the city around him is burning. He can hear the cries of the people but there is nothing he can do.

I can't help but think of Jesus surveying Jerusalem and weeping over the need, over the refusal to hear the train whistle, over the decision faithfully to walk into the burning city, to drop over the edge of the cliff in order to save.

Using Nathan's tragic story: The train isn't sin. The engineer isn't angry and wrathful. Walking on the tracks isn't sin, even if it isn't smart. It's the earplugs. Sin is like ear plugs (I'm wearing them as I type, by the way). Sin makes us deaf to danger. I suspect Nathan was happily walking those tracks and enjoying his favorite song; and that he still doesn't know what happened, even as he clings to life.