What matters? If you don’t come back to WHY YOU DO WHAT YOU DO – as my dad always tells me – then you’re a lost cause, and whatever you do is done in vain.
I feel like I’m in the “final act” of my teen years. You people would be telling me to chill and just enjoy the remainder of it! But I have a feeling that if I don’t carefully use and harness this remainder, I’ll blow it. I’ll waste this precious time. It’ll be gone forever. I’d miss the chance to ‘get my act together’ and be ready when the time comes to crossover into the “real world”.
Yes, enjoy while you are young. Even the wise King Solomon said in Ecclesiastes, ‘Young man, let your heart give you joy in the days of your youth; follow the ways of your heart and whatever your eyes see…’
But here’s the catch, too:
‘Know that for all these things God will bring you to judgment.
So remember your Creator in the days of your youth.'
'Oh time is slipping fast
See the fine-grain'd sands falling
To the bottom half of an hour-glass.
Oh life is flying pass
Like the scorching sun blazing
Over the fields of withering grass.
Alas, alas
The gentle wind blowing
Tis' sweet dandelion to its utter ruin
Yea, it is gone...
And the world remembers it no more.'
- Janielle
I don’t want to forget what matters. I don’t want to live carelessly and stumble into the next phase of life half-blind. I want to see clearly and do what counts for eternity. Well it’s easy to say. But to really follow through? To seek thoroughly and know fully, with a God-given peace in my heart that this is what I have to do? Wow, that’ll no doubt be a tough journey!
But I know it’ll be worth the seeking & searching, the days spent in silence, waiting, praying. I know 100% God will show up. He has before. But should I fail, it will be my fault alone. Because that means I didn’t take time to seek, to sit in silence and listen. That means halfway down the track, I got distracted by what the rest of the world’s got to offer. Yes, along the way, all the high-flying dreams you have, all the idealism and fervor of youth will be watered down. It sounds terribly disappointing…
So what is the key? What matters?
I realize today that we will all fail. And even no matter how successful some people may get, in the end, what matters is if JESUS was at the CENTER of it all. If He wasn’t, or isn’t, then you’ve lost it all.
I must see myself, my life, my plans, my thoughts, in relation to my Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Nothing else matters. But right now, I’m pretty sure Jesus is not really the center of my life. If He was, then a lot more things would be in their rightful places. But now, things are still messed up. I’m still wasting my time on a lot of nonessentials and bickering over things that don’t matter in the end. I’m still getting distracted, tossed to and fro by the whirling ideas and opinions around me.
To stop ourselves from getting swept down the current, we need to ask ourselves: WHO AM I in relation to God? What is my position when viewed in relationship to Jesus Christ?
Just like the earth, moon and stars orbit around the Sun, so must our lives revolve around the Son. Jesus has to be the center. Otherwise, we’re all just acting for ourselves. And believe me, that’s a very precarious position to be in. You’re basically flailing aimlessly in the dark, infinite black hole of the universe – all alone. Yikes, God knows what you’ll crash into next!
This life is about FINDING MY IDENTITY IN JESUS CHRIST.
Am I just another hapless chimpanzee that’s part of the ever-evolutionary zoo on this God-forsaken planet called earth?
Are you simply a nobody prancing about on the center stage of this short, miserable 70 years called life?
Is that it?
Then I’d agree with Shakespeare that –
“Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
But here’s the heartening news! We are NOT simply hapless monkeys or pitiful, estranged creatures wandering aimlessly or strutting miserably on the stage of life. It does not end here. Our short life now is merely for us to work out where we will stand in ETERNITY. Here’s our time to choose right, to work out our identity and position in Christ!
It all sounds crazy. It sounds like a hopeful man’s fairytale. But no, it is not. Life does not magically become a happy-ending story once Jesus takes center stage. But it does take on a new meaning, a new purpose, a new hope. Oh thank GOD we’re not alone or flailing in the darkness after all! If anything, don’t blame God. It is WE who have turned away from the Light and chosen to wander in the shadows of darkness…
Solum Christum cognoscere,
Janielle =)
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