The Hæven of John

While I was on my way back home after attending a Thursday service, I passed-by an on-going suicide attempt situation. A guy was on top of the tallest billboard at the corner of Quezon Avenue and EDSA. When I arrived at the scene, the situation already lasted an hour or two.

Follow up:

Rescuers from the local government of Quezon City were already at the scene. Some of them were also at the top already trying to get near the suicidal man while the negotiators talks to him.

Since I am not part of the media (I don’t have a “Press/Media” ID), I am restricted to where the most of the ususeros are. One guy I was talking to (or interviewing since I kept on asking him questions) said that he will not jump no matter what. In his view, the guy is only trying to get the attention of somebody and he’s guessing it’s the government.

I walked around, took photos, and I can’t believe what I saw. The suicide situation turned into a live drama. There were people sitting, taking photos, calling their friends telling them what’s happening, and some were eating too!

But what distressed me most was that there are people shouting that he should jump now or go to jail. And every time the guy positions himself or act like he’s ready to jump, the people are turning their heads away - they can’t take to watch him jump and kill himself!

Maybe they were just sarcastic or sadistic but I’m sarcastic and sadistic myself and those thoughts never crossed my mind. The guy needs help, he got a problem, he need someone to talk to, someone who will listen, someone who will understand him.

That’s where the negotiation attempt went to being a little irritating. One of the suicidal man’s relative (his sister or wife) was up on the longest fireman’s ladder I’ve ever seen. She’s talking to her brother or husband (sorry I missed this info) and all of what I heard from her during most of her time there was “maawa ka sa amin", “maawa ka ‘kin", “bumababa ka na dyan".

Nice way of convincing someone thinking of committing suicide to come down. I was praying that time to the Lord Jesus Christ to give her wisdom. In a few minutes, she finally started talking, that’s when they got a breakthrough (at least from my perspective).

, the guy went down and joined his sister/wife. They were then lowered to the ground and escorted by the police to an ambulance. I thanked the Lord Jesus for a peaceful and successful solution to this crisis, that was the first thing I did after I arrived, to pray and give the man and the rescuers the wisdom they need to solve this.

I later talked to one of the rescuers and according to him, the man was trying to get the attention of the local government of Quezon City to ask them for help. As the story goes, his brother was killed in front of him, stabbed to death so now the only way to get the attention of the authorities is to commit suicide - or at least pretend to commit suicide.

We’ll have to wait for the news tomorrow for the complete details and the actual reason behind all these. After 5 hours, the situation was solved. All thanks are due to our Creator up above, then next kudos to the negotiators and the rescuers who themselves risked their lives by getting up there to save a man’s life.

My friends, we can not compare a human life, a human soul, to anything in this world, not even the whole planet or the whole universe. Let’s value that. Suicide or hostage, we pray, have faith, and hope for the best. If we’re part of the rescue team, or we’re the relatives, we talk to them and listen.

This isn’t about any live show or drama. This isn’t about ending a crisis the fastest that we can. If it will take time, even days, then so be it. What is important is no life will be wasted (or at least no more lives will be wasted if it’s a hostage situation).

Definitely, it isn’t a laughing matter nor time to be sarcastic and sadistic. Let’s be human.

Have faith! God Bless to all of you.