So, What?

If the above title I have chosen for this post comes off sounding rash or sarcastic, I appeal to your willingness to forgive me. But if you sit down and read what I am about to share here, you will hopefully appreciate why I chose to use it. Paul wrote to the church at Ephesus, 5:16, "Redeeming the time, because the days are evil." Two key words here are, "redeeming" and "time." Paul used redeeming here to mean in the Greek, rescuing from loss. And he used the word time, (kairos), also Greek, to mean a prescribed period, such as days, months, or even years.

Of course, all that the apostle wrote in this epistle, he meant them to apply only to believers, not those outside of Christ. Paul was always a man with a strong sense of urgency. This is not to even imply that he was impatient. It means that he was simply a man who could quickly size up a situation and be ready to deal with it when it came his way.

I believe what Paul meant here paralleled much with the Lord's admonition:

"For what will it profit a man if he should gain the whole world,
and lose his own soul?"Or what will a man give in exchange for
his soul?"

What is the value of a long earthly life if that life is not lived for the glory and honor of the Savior? This is what I cannot help hearing, ringing loud and clear in my heart and soul. We live in a time, yes, "time," when many people are so very health and long life conscious. We are bombarded nearly every time we turn on the television, with commercials that sell foods and beverages designed to build strong bones and a healthy heart. There is a program on the air featuring people who are overweight and who desire to lose it through an intense training and diet regimen. And the person who loses the most weight during a given time, will win a large sum of money.

Now, while I am not cutting down such things, or insinuating that they do not have any sort of importance, I do feel led to say that if a person is more concerned with keeping himself physically fit and well, than he is with nurturing his spiritual life, he or she is wasting precious time rather than redeeming it. And the time that I would waste on pursuits which have no eternal value, that is time which can never be restored. It is lost forever.

But Paul says that while there is still time left, live out that time focused upon living it for God. Over the past several months, amounting to a little over a year now, I have had the chance , by the Lord's grace and mercy, to take a careful look at the way I had been living. Our heavenly Father will bring to us anything which He knows is necessary, to cause us to stop and reevaluate our lives.

During my long walk and time with God this afternoon, it struck me, now being 61, that if He were to give me another thirty-two years on this earth, and I did nothing with those years to glorify God, that it would be thirty-two years completely wasted. Every time I think about a man like David Brainerd, whose earthly life ended at 29 years of age, but during those tender, brief years he gave his life completely to his God, preaching to the Indians, and composing thousands of gospel tracts for people of New England to read for their eternal welfare, I feel rather shamed. I feel this way mainly because here was a man who saw his life as being of value only as it was faithfully lived for his Lord and Savior.

What if the Lord should grant me, or you, or anyone, for that matter, a long healthy existence, say up to ninety-plus years? So what? If those years are wasted on frivolous endeavors, namely becoming rich in this world's goods, or making a big name for myself in busines, art, music, or whatever might grab my fancy, it will be a wasted life indeed. This is not my opinion. This is the solemn truth given in God's holy Word.

The Lord is working on me heavily these days, giving me some set backs in the body that remind me I am not what I was when I was 20 years old. But if that is what He knows is necessary to make and shape me into the vessel of honor He means for me to become, then I gladly welcome and accept it. He is doing me a great and wonderful service in so doing, because I would rather He give me only a short time longer, enabling me to bear much fruit for Him during that short time, than for Him to let me stay here till I am a hundred, and after that stand in His glorious presence empty handed. I am looking forward to heaven and the new earth to come, but I do not want to waste the precious hours, days, weeks, months, and years He might give to me until that great Day arrives. And neither should you, dear Christian brother and sister. Let us begin now, redeeming the time we now have, for they are very few at best.