LITTLE BOY

On this day in 1945 an estimated 80,000 people were instantly killed off in one of the most devastatingly diabolical events in human history.  It is further estimated that this already deplorably disturbing death toll rose to 140,000 by the end of 1945.  The city of Hiroshima in Japan became the world’s very first air to ground target of a nuclear attack.  At around 08:15 on that fateful morning a B29 bomber plane, Enola Gay, dropped a nuclear bomb onto Hiroshima which, by the end of 1945, had killed 40% of the total population of the city.  The powers at be had the audacity to name the bomb LITTLE BOY.  This incredulously indignant irony is completely lost on my insufferably empathetic heart.  To add further insane insult to inhumane injury, just three days later on 9 August 1945, hideous history repeated itself and Nagasaki, another Japanese city, became the world’s second air to ground target of a nuclear attack.  By the end of 1945, 70,000 people in Nagasaki had been killed as a result.

One of my most precious friends who is closer than a brother, was only two months old and her husband (naturally also a precious friend of mine) was 13 months old at the time of the Hiroshima bombing.  Bombs don’t discriminate.  It is designed to kill people irrespective of age, gender, social standing, intellect, net worth, achievements, qualifications, health, temperament, criminal record, marital status, intentions, dreams, desires, etc.  Unborn babies, neonates, toddlers, preschoolers, children, teenagers and adults (young, prime, middle-aged and senior) died on that dark day in Hiroshima.  Those who were not instantly incinerated, likely succumbed from injuries related to the intense heat wave OR structural destruction due to the powerful shock wave OR acute radiation sickness from fatal doses of radiation.  At this point it is worth mentioning that radiation is one of the most powerful forces of nature capable of both good and evil.  But the rampant radiation in Hiroshima was of the last mentioned kind, a gruesome gift of evil which keeps on giving.  With the innate propensity to kill instantly OR to cause pain and suffering until it kills later OR to sneak itself into human DNA and kill on a generational scale.  

As members of the human race, the only species created in the image of God, we are assigned to the task of managing His creation.  However, since the fall of man in the Garden of Eden, we live in a broken world where proud, self-promoting people will continue to strive to rule, kill and destroy until the end of days.  If this was not true, Marvel and the entire superhero-industry would not be a trillion-dollar success story.  We use our superior intellect to come up with selfish plans to yield powers beyond our control to gain control over others, but in doing so, our conduct reveals nothing more than actions of people giving in to urges of their animalistic hind brains.  Mortal people killing other people, nobody wins.  In Hamlet, Shakespeare coins the idiom “Hoist by their own petard” which refers to being harmed or caught off guard by one’s own clever, scheming smartness, but I much prefer the Afrikaans idiom SLIM VANG SY BAAS.  It roughly translates to SMART GETS HIS ASS HANDED TO HIM BY HIS OWN HANDS.  

Please take a good look at the picture I chose for this reflection.  This is my grandson Alex de Beer and his gestational age is 28-weeks-in-utero.  Alex is a LITTLE BOY.  He represents the purest, most innocent form of human life.  Created in the image of God, Creator and Ruler of the entire universe, he is hidden deep inside his mommy’s belly to grow and develop until such a time when he will be ready to be expelled from there to sustain life on the outside.  On that day, he will bring joy, blessing and profound gratitude.  The abominable package in Enola Gay’s belly was the detonation pin of the grand finale of an irreversible cycle of abhorrent annihilation which started with depraved commands from indifferent leaders and ended in mass murder on the grandest, most gruesome scale when it was expelled.  Devastation.  Loss.  Tragedy.  Pain.  Suffering.  Evil.  NOT A LITTLE BOY!

My heart breaks for all the pain and suffering dumped onto Hiroshima and Nagasaki 79 years ago.  My heart breaks for all the pain and suffering today.  However, my hope remains in Jesus Christ, Son of God, Who paid with His Life so that I will live forever on the other side of eternity.  He, too, was once a LITTLE BOY like my already beloved Alex, grew into a big boy like my beloved Micah and then by the time He was roughly the age of Micah’s daddy, my beloved firstborn son Daniel, selfish people employed their superior intellect to make devious plans to execute the urges of their animalistic hind brains and kill Him.  They succeeded.  They killed Him, but death could not keep Him, He rose again!  HE LIVES FOREVER!