Live Long and Prosper

18,265

 Thats about how many days there are between the ages of 20 and 80. In other words, if you are  in your twenties and intend on living into your eighties thats roughly how many days you have left. Sure isn't as many as I had planned.

So what will you do with your 20 grand? Every four years you take a solid grand away from that number. And remember, this count assumes you will live to a nice old age. The odds are some of us will not live to see our 80's.

Psalm 90:12 reads,

"So teach us to number our days,
 That we may present to You a heart of wisdom."

Here we see that it is indeed important to take stock of our days and see what we can do with them.


Psalm 103: 15-16 also says,
"As for man, his days are like grass;
As a flower of the field, so he flourishes.
¹⁶ When the wind has passed over it, it is no more,
And its place acknowledges it no longer."


 As important and busy as our current lives seem, we need to realize that what we deem important today may be unimportant by next year, next week, or even tomorrow. We need to readjust our perspective and look at things from a point of view that is aligned with God's. We need a perspective that is focused on the eternal, not the temporal. C.S. Lewis said it well when he said, "If you read history you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were precisely those who thought most of the next. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this."

So what is your main goal in life? Graduation? Marriage? Starting a family? Owning a home? Having a 6 figure job? Winning the lottery? A Porche?

While all these things are not inherently evil, making them the main goal of our lives is. If we become too concerned with this world we cannot focus on what really matters in life. If we focus only on our own pleasure we will fail to attain even that.

We've all heard that money doesn't buy happiness. I've heard more then one person say that they would like to test this theory. But why doesn't money buy happiness? Doesn't it feel good to buy stuff?

Yes, it feels great to buy new stuff. And when that fades we buy more right? So money does buy happiness then. Actually, we feel happy because we have something we feel we deserve, or even better, more than we deserve. We love beating the system, winning the lottery, cashing in on a good sale, or getting the better of an insurance company. We like getting stuff because we like being more important than others. But this doesn't last, if you already have a car, you want a newer one. If you have a new one, you soon want the nicer, pricer car. Eventually we run out of things and we still have this need and desire to have more, better, richer. We cannot win the endless circle of stuff. In the end we will have spent all our time on chasing something that wasn't possible to keep. What do we need then?

Well, what do we desire? We desire attention, affection, being given more than we deserve. In short, we want to be special. Can that happen? Lets look.


Psalm 139 addresses our uniqueness before God wonderfully. We were created unique, in God's very image, He breathed life into us, He loves us. This is what can fill our desire for being special. We are unique beings before God. We can come before Him and thank Him for this. We can praise His name for the gifts He has given us.

Ironically, to realize our uniqueness we need to first realize Who God is. Only when we do this can we appreciate the fact that He loves us, created us, and desires us to be His sons and daughters. We need to remember this as we number our days so we use the 18,000-20,000 days we have wisely. Let us turn toward the Author of Life so we may make the short lives we have truly count.

Conclusion

So, let us turn our hearts toward God. Without Him, no matter how many cars, houses, or Swiss bank accounts you hold, you will always be going for more. I don't know about you, but 20,000 days of chasing my own tail seems awfully tiring to me. Let us turn our hearts to him and present hearts of wisdom.

"So you too, when you do all the things which are commanded you, say, 'We are unworthy slaves; we have done only that which we ought to have done.'" -Luke 17:10