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- Will I Go Out With a Bang or a Whimper?
If You Think This Present World is Good – Just Wait!
God’s creation is amazing! From landscapes to insects, we marvel at the beauty and intricate wonder of the world around us.
Even the birds and the bees fill us with awe.
And then there are the animals of all sorts.
We could continue non-stop with amazing pictures of God’s creation. The shock comes when we realize that these views of our world come from nature in its sin-cursed state. God told Adam in Genesis 3:17 that because of his sin the ground (the creation) would be cursed. This leaves us wondering how beautiful and awesome the creation must have been before the fall of man.
The apostle Paul talked about the creation waiting in anticipation for the day when it will be set free from its bondage. “For the creation eagerly waits with anticipation for God’s sons to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to futility—not willingly, but because of him who subjected it—in the hopethat the creation itself will also be set free from the bondage to decay into the glorious freedom of God’s children.” (Romans 8:19-21 CSB)
The apostle Peter looked ahead and said, “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief; on that day the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, the elements will burn and be dissolved, and the earth and the works on it will be disclosed.Since all these things are to be dissolved in this way, it is clear what sort of people you should be in holy conduct and godliness as you wait for the day of God and hasten its coming. Because of that day, the heavens will be dissolved with fire and the elements will melt with heat. But based on his promise, we wait for new heavens and a new earth, where righteousness dwells.
John put it this way in the Revelation. “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away…Then the one seated on the throne said, ‘Look, I am making everything new.” (Revelation 21:1,5 CSB)
God is preparing an entirely new place for us. As glorious as this present world is, I can’t even imagine how wonderful and amazing the new heavens and earth will be. It will be worth all the sacrifices of this present time. God will make everything new. Like Peter, we ask God to, “Hasten its coming.”
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Will I Go Out With a Bang or a Whimper?
One of the problems I find with being 82 years old is the constant downward slide. It takes longer to remember words and names. My mind begins a search through the labyrinth of neural connections in my brain, trying to find what I’m looking for. Unfortunately, some of the connections have been unplugged making the search take longer. The good thing is that eventually, I find it. The bad thing is that it may be tomorrow before it pops into my consciousness. I take a walk or go to the gym to work out on the exercise machines. That’s great, but the enigma is that every few months I’m forced once again to cut back some more on my walking speed and/or distance and to put less weight on the machines. When I go for a walk now I use a hiking pole to make certain I stay upright.
Where will it all end? In reality, I know it will end with death, but I don’t know how far down I’ll slide before I die. And so I take aspirin to keep my blood thin, another medicine to regulate my blood pressure, and one to lower my cholestrol. And now each doctor wants me to come in every six months to see if those medicines are still working. And I still haven’t found a way to eliminate that pain in my lower back. To borrow the words of T.S. Eliot, I don’t know if I will go out with a bang or a whimper.
It isn’t unusual for people as they age to get paralyzed by all the “what-ifs.” What if I fall and can’t get up? What if that happens in the grocery store? What if I go on a trip and something happens? What if I get too energetic and it triggers a stroke or a heart attack? What if despite all the tests my doctors miss something important? What if that pain means I have cancer? What if I go deaf or blind? What if I die before I’m ready? What if I haven’t done enough to go to heaven? Often, these what-ifs become like magnets that stick us to our recliners. And so we face the question, “Is staying active worth the risk?”
Obviously, I can’t do a lot of the things that I could do twenty years ago (or even one year ago). So now, I have to either accept my limitations but continue to do the things that I can do, or sit down and wait to die. For example, I’m no longer able to travel to Eswatini, Africa and teach a full load of classes at African Christian College. But I can teach classes at the church here where I live. I can’t meet with a full load of counseling clients each day as I did before I retired. But I can visit with five or six people a week to see if there is any way I can be of help to them. I enjoy nature photography, but I have to decide if the potential picture is worth the pain in my hip that the walking to get the picture will probably bring. But I also realize that I won’t get very many pictures if I’m not willing to put up with some pain.
I’ll catch you later. I’m headed to the gym.
What’s It All About Alfie?
(Burt Bacharach asked an important question in his song with the title above.)
I read about a man who was incredibly rich and powerful. He was also a philosopher who was searching for life’s ultimate meaning. As he sought to find what would give his life both pleasure and purpose he decided to utilize the power and wealth he had to find the answers to his questions. He educated himself well. He experimented to see what effect a substance such as wine would have on his mind. He pursued every avenue of pleasure that came to his mind. He built a palatial mansion and surrounded it with beautiful gardens. Servants took care of everything. If he heard of good entertainers, he brought them to perform at his mansion. He had large herds and flocks of livestock. The bankers were amazed at the money he had. He became a womanizer. Simply put, if he thought of something he might want or thought he would enjoy, he used his money and power to get it.
When he stepped back and looked at what he had been doing, he found that he was no closer to understanding life than when he had started. In fact, he described everything he had done as futile and said he might as well have been chasing the wind. He thought this pursuit would give his life meaning, but even as he was surrounded with the trappings of comfort and power, he found his life was empty. And so he dropped down to a lower level of life and looked at things like hard work, being frugal, and using his time well. Still, he found no real meaning for his existence. Then to make it worse, he realized that the one thing he couldn’t even hope to change is that after all our efforts and struggles to accumulate power and wealth, we die and leave it all behind.
By now, you’ve probably realized that this person is King Solomon as he described his life in the book of Ecclesiastes. He satisfied all the desires of the flesh. But he found his life was still empty and pointless. He ultimately realized that life’s meaning is only found when we look beyond temporary physical comforts and enjoyment and focus on the spiritual aspects of life that are eternal. Physical comforts can be enjoyed, but they do not contribute to our having a life with purpose and lasting meaning.
It’s an old story with outcomes that are always the same. Solomon’s grand experiment and our own experiences demonstrate clearly that happiness and the meaning of life are never found in circumstances. We’ve all seen people with riches and power who were happy and some who were miserable. Many poor people have found happiness and a meaningful life while others who are poor bemoan their misery. And yet we continue to travel the avenues of self-enrichment that all end in life’s cul-de-sacs, with no place else to go. To put it another way, our lives can be filled with the fluff of convenience and ease, or they can be filled with the pursuit of things that have eternal significance.
I’m grateful Ecclesiastes didn’t end as nothing but a treatise on the futility of our existence. At the end of his search, Solomon found the one thing that will bring the right focus into our lives. Here is his conclusion:
“Remember your Creator in the days of your youth…Now all has been heard, here is the conclusion of the matter: Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the duty of all mankind.” (Ecclesiastes 12:1,13 NIV ).
“The Heavens Declare the Glory of God”
When she was in the early stages of intense treatment for metastatic breast cancer my wife found some of the early Hubble telescope pictures from deep space to be encouraging. As she pondered what the ultimate result of her struggle to overcome this often deadly disease might be, she found these images pointed her more and more to the power and glory of God.
First, to realize that we serve a God who simply spoke and this universe came into existence is almost more than the human mind can fathom. What kind of power can bring something out of nothing and do it in such an immense way? How is it possible that the universe contains at least 2 trillion galaxies? Beyond that, we can see places in the depths of this creation where stars are still coming into existence. God is still active in his creation. (The gigantic cosmic columns of dust and gas pictured below have been named “The Pillars of Creation, as they continue to generate stars.”)
One night as we talked she commented about how much these insights into the amazing work of God had helped her. She realized more than ever that our God has the power to do anything. He could heal her if he chose to do so. Or he could walk with her through the struggles and take her to live with himself whenever he found that to be the best thing to do for her.
God chose to give her seven more years of an active and good life. In those years, she often found that her struggles led to opportunities to minister to other struggling people. Seeing and feeling the presence of God in both the universe and in her own life enabled her to always look forward in anticipation of whatever was next. She never saw herself as dying but rather realized that her life itself was transforming and she was coming closer to moving into the eternal realities that God is preparing for all his children.
Realizations such as these seem to be at least part of what David is describing in Psalm 19:
1 The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the expanse proclaims the work of his hands.
2 Day after day they pour out speech;
night after night they communicate knowledge.
3 There is no speech; there are no words;
their voice is not heard.
4 Their message has gone out to the whole earth,
and their words to the ends of the world.
All of God’s children are serving this glorious God of the creation. Our challenge is to trust him to make our lives good, even though we are living in a world cursed by sin with all the consequences that brings. When life becomes overwhelming, he is there. When a loved one is given a short time to live, God offers us comfort and hope. When there are financial struggles, marital difficulties, challenges of parenting, or whatever it may be that is confronting you, don’t forget that we serve the God of creation and if we put our total faith and trust in him, he will do whatever is best.
Personal honesty: When I am in the throes of some crisis, I don’t always like the direction in which God takes my life. But, I have never failed to look back later and realize I was wrong and what God did was best. Trusting God isn’t always easy, but it’s always best. I’m thankful our God has revealed himself to us.
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Live ’til You Die
“Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, be steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the Lord’s work, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.”
1 Corinthians 15:58
Sister Carrie taught me a lot about life. I don’t know how old she was, but she had been retired from school teaching for several years when I first met her. She was the stereotypical “old maid schoolteacher.” She had no car and lived in a rented house in a run-down neighborhood. But she was present for every daytime church activity. She made it to every funeral for someone from our church.
The most impressive thing Sister Carrie did was to regularly visit the two hospitals in the city. Every week, she made it a point to visit everyone in the hospital that registered with the same church preference as hers. Often that involved 30-40 patients, which would take the biggest part of two days. She would sometimes be seen catching a city bus back to her house just before dark. Early one morning I received a call saying that she had experienced emergency surgery during the previous night. I hurried to the hospital, expecting to find her in bed. Instead, she was sitting up in a chair and smiling when I walked in the room. “I’m so glad this happened to me,” she said. “I’ve never been in the hospital before. Now when I visit people, I’ll understand better what they are experiencing.”
After ten years, I moved on to preach for another church. About three years later, I was called back for another funeral. Sister Carrie was living in a nursing home by that time. So, I went there to see her. Walking in, I met her in the lobby as she came pushing her walker out of her wing of the building. I walked over to greet her, expecting to have a nice visit. But she quickly told me that she didn’t have time to talk because she was on her way to a Bible study with another resident in the home.
Sister Carrie taught me the importance of “living ‘til you die.” She knew that we all die, but she also was determined not to be paralyzed by a fear of death or totally stymied by the physical limitations that come with age. As long as she lived, she would serve her Lord in any way that she could. Retirement for her was not a time to sit back and take it easy, but it simply let her focus her service in a different direction from school teaching. Increasing age diminished her energy and what she could do in her service in God’s kingdom. But she kept searching for ways to serve God by serving people.
Too often retirement becomes all about me. It’s time to have fun and do all the things I couldn’t do while I worked. “It’s somebody else’s turn,” can become the mantra. Or it can become a time to find new and even creative ways to serve the Lord. For all of us increasing age brings limitations to our physical and mental capacities. As a result, we can choose to sit and watch life go by, do primarily self-serving things, or find ways we can serve our Lord.
Prior to retirement it’s easy to postpone service and talk about how we will serve God when we retire and aren’t so busy. But it’s not likely we will start serving then either because genuine service has not been part of our lives. We have been primarily takers rather than givers. Then in retirement we continue to take.
A challenge: Make a list of some acts of kindness you could do for people you know, or whom you want to get to know. Add to that list some church or charity projects you could help with. Then start activating some of the things on that list.
Whether you are you are young or old, now is the time to begin to “live ‘til you die.”
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