Number Your Days

You’ve heard the tragic news:  on June 24 the Champlain Towers South condo high-rise in Miami collapsed.  Eighteen people are confirmed dead, and 145 are unaccounted for.

The suddenness of this calamity is jarring.  One minute normal life is going on at the high-rise home front, and the next moment (it was 1:25 a.m.) everything is extinguished.  We imagine life will go on the way we’ve known it.  Or even if we reckon with the reality of death, we expect at least to see the foe approaching.  But who anticipates this no-warning, instantaneous obliteration?

Still, the Lord doesn’t want us to obsess over the fact that death is coming.  After all, we can’t obey many of God’s commands (e.g., love your neighbor, and rejoice in the Lord always) if we wallow in self-centered, fear-driven living.  Don’t let your upcoming “cross­ing over Jordan” consume you!  Live in the present (Matt. 6:34).

But do make sure and number your days so that you gain a heart of wisdom (Psalm 90:12).  Do make sure to face the fact that this life is short:  whether you have seconds to live or years, in the grand scheme of eternity it’s all very brief.  Living now as if every­thing will just keep on keeping on in the routine ways you know, predictably and comfortably, is delusional.

I’ve wondered if this is one way God works for our good (Romans 8:28) in the trials of aging.  Those aches and ailments, those lost abilities—can you hear the gracious reminder that this world is not our home, and that a perfectly glorious future lies ahead?

Let’s pray for the families who are grieving.  Pray that the Lord of Life will meet them in this darkest hour:  pray that hearts would be receptive to the gospel, and that many would trust in Jesus.  Pray for Miami area churches.  And pray that this tragedy would be used by God to open the eyes of many hearts to the hope, and the promise, of everlasting life for all who turn to Jesus!