Life is Short

April 25

(Psalm 39:4-8 NIV) "Show me, O Lord, my life's end and the number of my days; let me know how fleeting is my life. {5} You have made my days a mere handbreadth; the span of my years is as nothing before you. Each man's life is but a breath. {6} Man is a mere phantom as he goes to and fro: He bustles about, but only in vain; he heaps up wealth, not knowing who will get it. {7} "But now, Lord, what do I look for? My hope is in you. {8} Save me from all my transgressions; do not make me the scorn of fools.”

(James 4:13-17 NIV) ““Now listen, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money." {14} Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. {15} Instead, you ought to say, "If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that." {16} As it is, you boast and brag. All such boasting is evil. {17} Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn't do it, sins.””

Life is short. David describes it as “fleeting”. When compared to eternity, our life is like our breath on a cold morning. It appears for a brief moment and then disappears into the vast atmosphere as if it were never here. Our days are over in a blink of God’s eye. So what will you spend this brief moment doing? Will you squander this “handbreadth” of time we’ve been allotted bustling around trying to make money? Will you waste this pittance of a lifespan heaping up wealth that will belong to someone else in a heartbeat? Or will you spend your small allotment of days getting ready for eternity? Will you put your hope in the Lord who made you and who will take you home? Will you do the good that you know you ought to do? Never presume you will have tomorrow. No one is guaranteed even one more day. Live today like it was your last. Life is short. -- Friar Tuck’s Word of the Day