The Brevity of Life
As I get older I realize my time on this earth is getting shorter. Last week a friend of mine died from colon cancer. I visited him in the nursing home two days before he passed. He was a shell of his former self. Without being disrespectful, the cancer had so emaciated his body he looked like a Holocaust survivor. He was sixty one years of age
Today I heard from an old school friend that one of our classmates from high school passed away last February from heart disease. He was one of my best friends in high school, though we had lost touch over the years. We had a penchant for getting in trouble together. Our escapades always bring a smile to my face. It is hard for me to accept the fact that he is gone.
The Bible teaches us in James 4:14:
14 yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.
Psalm 103:15-16E (ESV)
15 As for man, his days are like grass;
he flourishes like a flower of the field;
16 for the wind passes over it, and it is gone,
and its place knows it no more.
As a Christian I believe we will spend eternity somewhere. For those who put their hope in Christ our future is secure in HIM. For those who do not believe Jesus is our Savior then their’s is an eternity in eternal darkness. I will be honest with you, I do not know where my high school buddy is spending eternity, but I do know where my friend who died of cancer is today. He is in heaven with our Savior Jesus.
Hebrews 9:27-28 (ESV)
27 And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment,28 so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.
The last day I saw my friend in the nursing home we both prayed that God would take him home. His cancer ravaged body was in extreme pain. In four short days he had lost at least 20 pounds, yet he had never lost hope. His only physical solace were the morphine shots and patches that helped to control his pain. In HIS mercy God took him home the next day. I miss my friend, but I know that I will see him again.
60 years, 80 years, 100 years may seem like a long time to many of us, but it is nothing compared to eternity. Please consider your eternal future carefully.
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