But if a righteous person turns from their righteousness and commits sin…because of the sins they have committed, they will die. – Ezekiel 18:24

Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them—do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no\! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.” – Luke 13:4-5

The righteous perish, and no one takes it to heart; the devout are taken away, and no one understands that the righteous are taken away to be spared from evil. – Isaiah 57:1

Honor your father and mother that your days may be long – Exodus 20:12

Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned — Romans 5:12

The last enemy to be destroyed is death. – 1 Corinthians 15:26

These verses in the order presented above present tremendous illumination around the causes and remediations of sudden death which can be often profoundly triggering. Perhaps the first and most important takeaway is that the primary cheat code for physical death due to direct human cause is to honor your Father and Mother.

That being said, one of the common things that happen when a death occurs is to ponder if it was truly God that took them away. Make no mistake Death is indeed an enemy introduced by our very own sins yet not even one piece of our hair may be touched without God knowing of it. God is magnanimously glorious, faithful, just and loving and no one can go to heaven and think of pointing a finger claiming a dot of any evidence showing otherwise. When we learn of the puzzling death of someone we presumed ‘fairly righteous’ however, there’s a lot of wonder on what really transpired.

Why this should not be our concern most times, we may take solace in understanding the existence of death. God being perfect and full of Love would he not surely harvest a tree that has borne the little fruits it could bear on time? All men having sinned by their own hands invited death and now we all merely live by the grace, love and mercy of God. This is why rejection of God’s grace and mercy is deserving of instant death – this happened a lot to the Israelites in Numbers and Christ further explained that the blasphemy against the holy Spirit would lead to eternal death.

“Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.” – Matthew 7:19

While we can say that sometimes death is the calling of a righteous one after they have borne fruits in their prime (accomplished their primary purpose on earth), or at times adamant separation from God through sin, spiritual stubbornness/hard-hearing and rejection of God’s grace. We should first and foremost always be compassionate and pray for the dead. There are however still cases like aborted babies which sometimes can be likened to the case of damaged vehicles but all in all, it only reveals death truly as an enemy of whom the biggest antidote is to ensure we live in grace. Having the blessings of parents is also important if one wishes to live long in the world. However when we live a life of absolute trust in God’s love and repent of sin, living a life of prayer, even the hour will be made known to us, therefore rendering the power of the enemy useless.