“It is well there is another life after this, for death stains all the glory of this, and lays it in the dust.”
-Matthew Henry

Jonathan Edwards once resolved “to think much on all occasions of my own dying, and of the common circumstances which attend death.” I’ve been going through Ecclesiastes off and on this past Fall and I’ve got to say, it’s an amazing book. It’s full of the wisdom of a man who has truly had every kind of pleasure at his disposal and found it still lacking. It’s an old man’s account near the end of his life of what is truly important in this life. I’ve come to think a lot about death this semester, which might sound odd coming from a relatively healthy, non-binge-drinking 24-year-old. I don’t suspect it to be imminent, nor do I look upon it from a gloomy perspective, but as an ultimate reality. I am going to die. Every morning I wake up is one less time I get to do it. Death is the inescapable road we all must walk one day.

Moses once wrote “So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom” (Psalm 90:12). The reason behind my frequent dwellings on death comes in large part from this verse. To recognize inevitable fate is to understand what must be done now, before it happens. I’m going to get at most maybe 70 or 80 years. Every human being alive right now will one day be replaced by an entirely new population of humanity. Then they will die. Every teenager who scoffs at their parents will one day have their own children to impart their wisdom to, only to be told they don’t understand. Every young adult who mocks the elderly will one day take their place, struggling to do the things that were once so easy to them while being mocked by a new generation who will one day come to understand on their own.

I don’t remember the first time I opened my eyes, but it was probably to see the people I would come to know as Mom and Dad. And someday, God-willing, I’ll be the first sight of my own children along with my wife before I close these eyes a final time. Sons become fathers become grandfathers. Such is the circle of life, and it has been this way since the beginning of the world. After circling the same area enough times, eventually we must ask why. What is the purpose? Life is short, and it is all vanity if that’s all there is. I work. I go to school. I fellowship with friends. But every dollar I will have ever made in my life will one day be gone. My degree won’t mean a thing after I’m dead. My friends and I will sooner or later be parted. What is the point of any of it? The friend of a thousand meets the same fate as the hermit.

“Man is like a breath; his days are like a passing shadow” reads Psalm 144:4. I believe that the great frailty of our lives and the shadows that are our lives only put that much more emphasis on that which is eternal. Only what is eternal will last. Thinking about the transient nature of life isn’t harsh, it’s reality. How we choose to confront what awaits us is what makes life tragic or beautiful. I believe the curtain of this world will pass away into a new one that will last forever. I believe a day is coming when I shall again open my eyes for the first time, never to have them closed again, when all I see will never pass away, when the eternity which all hearts crave will be fulfilled, and when I shall be forever in the company of friends I once feared to lose.

The knowledge of death serves to keep our priorities in order. Surely there’s more than just to enjoy myself for 80 years and then depart. Paul wrote to Timothy “for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction” (1 Timothy 6:7-9). The failure to take into account the fleeting nature of possessions in light of the imminence of death is what destroys lives. Life is more than our stuff. Most of what I own will either break down or become obsolete. Unfortunately I can take nothing with me when I die. But I can start a separate account redeemable at the time when I do awake from my final sleep. Jesus told us to lay up for ourselves treasures in heaven where no one can steal it. That is what this life is for. My mere 80 years is worthless unless I spend it accumulating eternal rewards and helping others do the same. I do that by telling people about Jesus, by praying with others, by feeding the poor and providing my second anything for someone who doesn’t have any. Nothing I do for others and for the glory of God will be forgotten. He is not so unjust as to overlook my work and the love I’ve shown for his name in serving the saints (see Hebrews 6:10). My possessions after I awake from death will be from the works I did here. How often have I done stupid things in my life that I wish I could take back? None of them can. But neither can the good I’ve done for God’s sake be taken back either. As surely as these cannot be reversed, neither can the subsequent rewards be taken away which are the rewards of obedience to God.

The purpose of this life is not to keep living. To live forever will come later, but this life is meant to end. And for all of us it will. Should we disregard the fact that death will come is to waste our life. But to let it guide how we choose to use what little time we have here is to have lived well. Now is the gathering season. Gather liberally.

“In sorrow we must go, but not in despair. Behold! We are not bound for ever to the circles of this world, and beyond them is more than memory.”
-J.R.R. Tolkien

“Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier. Be the living expression of God’s kindness: kindness in your face, kindness in your eyes, kindness in your smile.”
-Mother Teresa

“What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.”
-Pericles

“Therefore we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it.”
-Hebrews 2:1

This verse scares me a little bit.  It gives such a simple instruction and then warns of the terrible cost of failing to obey.  To every Christian who feels distracted by the world and who is going through spiritual dryness, this is the antidote.  We must pay much closer attention to the things of God.  “For lack of wood the fire goes out” says the proverb (Proverbs 26:20).  It’s an appalling thought to a Christian to outright deny Jesus Christ and his work on the cross.  I’m not worried about that in my own life, and there’s very few brothers and sisters in my life who I can say I worry about publicly renouncing the faith.  What’s scary though is that we don’t have to renounce it.  There’s a far more subtle way to separate yourself from Christ: drifting.  We drift from God in proportion to the less attention we pay to the Gospel, to things above (Colossians 3:1-2).  We drift when concessions are made concerning the trajectories of our minds and our hearts.

Matthew Henry writes “Our minds and memories are like a leaky vessel, they do not without much care retain what is poured into them. Those meet with an inconceivable loss who let gospel truths slip out of their minds.  All is lost, if the gospel be lost.  If we do not well attend, we shall not long retain the word of God; inattentive hearers will soon be forgetful hearers.”  Tend well to the things of your heart.  You cannot care for that which scarcely darkens the door of your mind.  Such scarcity makes a subject knowledgeable at best to us, something of which you’re mindful of only in that it exists.  Anything you wish to retain and grow in must be given a high place in your life.  It must be tended to.  You must pay much closer attention to it.

What does this look like?  At its most skeletal level, I believe that whatever is precious to us must be tended to in the morning and in the evening before you go to bed.  Time with God is at its purest when it breaks the silence of a new day and when it lays you to rest.  I love movies, and I’ve spent many a night falling asleep to movies.  Sometimes I’ll even intentionally put a movie in to fall asleep to.  I’m not going to suggest that this is wrong, but I do believe that if this is my chronic bedtime melody, I’m wasting a lot of opportunity.  I grossly understate the significance of silence in my last waking moments of the day.  It is a time to reflect on what God did in my life during the day, to meditate on my victories and failures, to marvel at the nocturnal beauty of my creator, and to be reminded of the sleep of death I must soon take.  David wrote “In peace I will both lie down and sleep; for you alone, O LORD, make me dwell in safety” (Psalm 4:8).  Proverbs 19:23 says “The fear of the LORD leads to life, and whoever has it rests satisfied; he will not be visited by harm.”  David again writes (most beautifully in my opinion) “My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips, when I remember you upon my bed, and meditate on you in the watches of the night; for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy” (Psalm 63:5-7).  I miss out on such reminders if I’m consistently falling asleep to noise.

As an instant society, Christians must come to realize that intimacy with God is not instant.  As drifting is gradual, so is the journey towards greater Christ-likeness.  It must be consistent and in good quantity.  I recently came across a couple of books which downright upset me.  One is called the “Thrive Teen Devontional: Take a Turn for God in Just 5 Minutes a Day.”  The other is “The Busy Mom’s Devotional: Ten Minutes a Week to a Life of Devotion.”  I’m sorry, but if five minutes is all God gets from us, we are either terrible stewards of our time or we need to seriously loosen up our schedules.  I’m not saying these books aren’t good.  Maybe the devotionals in it are great, but if that’s your entire time with God, you’re missing out.  Scripture isn’t learned in five minutes a day.  Doctrine isn’t learned.  Prayer can barely happen and is bound to exclude either personal or intercessory prayer.  Jesus compared the kingdom of heaven to a treasure found in a field.  The man who found it sold all he had to buy that land.  Such preciousness does not consume a mere five minutes a day (or ninety seconds if you’re on the ten minute a week plan).

There are two things that people absolutely cannot fake.  One is money.  You can talk a big game about being anti-materialism and how orphans in Africa need our help, but your vindication comes with your checkbook.  Secondly, I believe we absolutely can’t fake how we use our time.  No one is so busy that they don’t make time for what is most important to them.  If you are, you officially have too much on your plate and need to let some things go.  How precious is Christ to me?  Time spent with him will betray any error to whatever answer I verbally give.  Our lives are all subservient to something.  What’s yours subservient to?

Five minutes a day will not provide enough attention to the Gospel.  Time with God shouldn’t be something to “get done” for the day.  Rather, let us approach him reverently and with the attitude of David who said “I will not enter my house or get into my bed, I will not give sleep to my eyes or slumber to my eyelids, until I find a place for the LORD, a dwelling place for the Mighty One of Jacob” (Psalm 132:3-5).