Issue 801 – Bear-ly There – July 17, 2022
One of several young black bears we saw on our recent road trip. They seemed to be feeding dangerously close to the edge of the road. This one stood and watched us for a moment, then bolted across the highway. The bear was bear-ly there long enough to get a snapshot.
Recently, I was reminiscing with my mom about life and how quickly it seems to have zipped past. One moment we were children; before we knew it, we were teens. It felt that we were barely in our teens, then we were adults, newlyweds and then celebrating many years of marriage. She was with my dad for 59 years when he died. Kathy and I have been together for 45 years.
I remember when thirty seemed so old that I could not imagine it; just a few moments later, it seems that a thirty-year-old is a young pup.
My baby boys are parents with rapidly growing children. I’m at that age where my peers are beginning to drop off this earthly coil a little more frequently.
Where did it all go? What comes next?
It went by a second at a time, a minute, a moment.
Next comes a few years, the number of which only God, in His infinite wisdom and grace, knows. Then, an eternity with Him.
How long is an eternity? I really can’t comprehend. I know that 64 years is both a heartbeat and an entire lifetime and those few years pale compared to the life spans of the oldest people who ever lived. Their life spans pale compared to the period between Christ’s first coming and today. That, too, will be dwarfed by the time we spend with the Lord.
The Lord knew us before we were ever thought of.
For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.
Psalm 139:14-16
He designed us to spend forever with Him and put eternity into our hearts.
He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. Ecclesiastes 3:11
That longing for an eternity with God propels some of us forward in a search for an ever-deepening relationship with Him. It also drives God haters to push ever further away from Him.
There is no other eternal destination. We either rejoice with The Lord in glory or rebel against Him in eternal torment. Our lives, no matter how long, seem insignificant compared to that.
The whole history of humanity is but a tiny blip on the scale of eternity. Some days it seems like the Lord is slow in coming, but that is far from the truth.
But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.
2 Peter 3:8-10
We have been waiting our entire lives for that moment. It seems forever, but in reality, we are barely here for a moment of the eternal time clock.
Are you ready to meet Him? That moment is coming soon.
Hallelu Yah (Praise God)
Be blessed
Kevin.
Gleanings From The Word.
Experience an extraordinary God in ordinary life.
Soli Deo Gloria (for the glory of God alone.)
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