Guest Author - LeeAnn Bonds
I went to a friend’s funeral yesterday. Everything about it—the hope-filled music, the slide show of family photos, the testimonies from friends and students, the notes from her study Bible read aloud—testified to a life well-lived. She had redeemed the short time given her, and used it to glorify God and share His love and truth with others. What else matters?
Time is an amazing invention. It’s more astonishing than water. We can see a single drop of water glistening on a leaf, drink a cup of water, and gaze on an ocean swelling with unimaginable tons of water. Time, in contrast, we are able to experience only second by second. Though we can remember the past and envision the future, we live in this moment alone. That’s worth thinking on, because all that we accomplish in this life we have to do one second at a time, and it's all too easy to fill our days with trivial to-do's while pushing vital but challenging tasks off into the future. An unhurried contemplation of the gift of time cannot help but bear the fruit of a more effective life, especially in an age where multiple forms of media scream for our attention 24/7, and exhausted is the default setting.
We were designed to live forever, back in the day. Our lamentable but temporary constriction to an eighty year lifespan (or a bit more, or much less) causes difficulty when our made-for-forever brains try to cram every dream, idea, plan and project into such a tiny space. My list of things I’d love to experience is years long. Decades long. Actually, it’s centuries long. I have matured enough to admit that I will never get to a tiny fraction of the list during my planet-side years. At least, I know this when I periodically pause to think about it. But I usually still operate with an underlying assumption that I can do and be anything I want to do and be. That was the prevailing message my generation received in our youth, but it’s not true, because everyone’s time is limited. We just have to let that whole idea go. We have to narrow our focus.
To the Psalms for wisdom: please study Psalm 90 with me for a few minutes. I had in mind to mention just verse twelve, which reads “Teach us to number our days carefully so that we may develop wisdom in our hearts.” That is the heart of the matter, but the entire Psalm is an eloquent meditation on time, and we will benefit from taking a moment to read through it. Moses wrote it, and if anyone had the right perspective on time, he did. God gave him forty years to grow up, then about 80 years of desert travels to help him figure out the important things.
Verses 1 and 2 set the stage by describing our everlasting God, the Creator of time. Verses 3-11 express the brevity and fragility of our lives, and our sinfulness before God. After absorbing all this (take a minute or two) we are ready, in verse 12, to ask our Father to teach us to number our days. Each day that we live, while brief, is incredibly important. In fact, every one of our days has been written in God's book before any of them began (Psalm 139:16). We are not promised tomorrow. We must make the most of today, and live it as if it were the only day we have, which it very well could be.
Verses 13-15 suggest a proper morning prayer to begin each day: “Return, O Yahweh! How long? Have pity on your servants! Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.” It is good to begin by recognizing that life here is not as it should be, and by pleading with God to return according to His plan to set all things right. Even so, come Lord Jesus. We have His love to undergird every day and give us purpose, so that we can rejoice as we work through the hours.
In verse 16, Moses asks God to show His work and His power. This request sets us on a right path for the day, with the purposes and glory of God in mind, burning away the allure of distractions that do nothing but help us busily waste away our lives. Perhaps you have heard these lines from a poem by C.T. Studd: “Only one life, ’twill soon be past, Only what’s done for Christ will last.” The same goes for each day. We must be clear about what’s important and devote ourselves to do those things. Ah, and here is the answer. My friend loved cooking, and camping and dogs and dancing. But what people told about at her funeral was her love for Jesus, and her love for them. She had wholeheartedly focused her life on loving God and loving people. As Psalm 90:17 says, the favor of the Lord was upon her, and He established the work of her hands.
When my days are over and my life is remembered in a slide show and stories told by friends, I don’t want my loved ones to recall a scattered life, busily dabbling in everything and accomplishing nothing. I want them to remember a life of peace and purpose. I want it to be crystal clear to all who knew me that I loved and lived for God; that I loved His people, and did my best to make known to others His glory and truth and His love for them. What else matters?
I have so very much work to do on this front. I need to pray. I need to clear away the noise and clutter. I need to walk a path straight along the compass needle. I will listen for the voice behind me saying, “This is the way, walk in it” when I am tempted to turn to the right or the left. I will walk in that way each day, beginning this very day, until the day He calls me home.
