What is death?

I am very fortunate to have lived 25 years and never seen death.

I have a large family, a few good friends, and people I love, but no one I've ever been close to has ever died.

We've had plenty of close calls in surgery. We're cancer survivors. We're blessed.


I was asked not to post specifics because it's very sensitive... but one of my relatives has been in the ICU for a week. All that I can say is that he's very ill. Machines keep him alive, and that's a terrifying thought. At one point, I considered him a father figure. We used to be close, but have drifted apart this past decade because of petty misunderstandings.

I was scared to see him today.
Me, scared of so little, standing next to his bed, silent, terrified.
All past crap aside, I still love him.
I stood next to my grandmother as she talked to him. Whether he can hear us or not... nobody knows.
After she finished, I stayed by her side and just walked out. I didn't know what to say.

She's so strong, my grandmother. Afraid, but she's not showing it. She had lost a daughter the year before I was born, and had always told me how I'm the image of her.. We've always been close, partly for that reason, I think.

Anyway...

My family, large as it is, has always been close.

They're Christians. They follow the Bible and attend church weekly and pray for everything.
I've never been religious. I don't care one way or the other, as long as people are good people, that's what matters to me. I will always be a good person, and I don't think my religious views would condemn me to burn for eternity if there even is a Hell.

But I watch them and listen to them all get together and pray. It's never anything petty. It's just for faith and good judgment and health. We always take care of each other. Feed each other. Listen. We were taught to give everything we have, if another person truly needs it.

I feel conflicted, because I'm not in that circle of religiousness.
Yet everyone else in my family is so sure about God taking care of us when we need it.
I wonder if there truly is power in prayer, because the few deaths in our family have been of old age, peacefully.
We've been so lucky.

Now, seeing him supported by tubes and wires...
this is new.
Yet I have every faith he'll get better, and I don't understand why.

Is it possible that faith is keeping us alive and together?
Is it God and prayer?
or are we just really resilient?