Today, there are more 80-year-olds than 18-year-olds in our nation. By 2020 5% of the population will be over 80.
A couple of decades ago the St. Paul’s Methodist Seminary in Kansas established a professorship in gerontology — the study of old age. The reason for this was that some students found themselves pastoring churches where 100% of the congregation are over 65.
Old age is a blessing to all because it is a reminder of the frailty of life and it is intended to awaken us to what Sir Walter Scott once called ‘the long halt which arrives at last and ends all’.
