In life there is nothing more consistent than the passing of time. We attempt to slow it down and even at times make it stand still, but it is undeterred, steadily marching onward. Benjamin Franklin said, “Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time; for that’s the stuff life is made of.” Time is irretrievable. You cannot repeat it or relive it. In life, there is no such thing as instant replay. The minutes that travel with us each day have eternity wrapped up inside them. How are you using yours?

The metaphors God uses in the Bible to describe our lives are sobering. In James 4:14, He calls life a “vapour.” In 1 Chronicles 29:15, He describes it as a “shadow.” In Job 7:6—a “weaver’s shuttle.” In Job 9:25 He likens life to a hurrying messenger or “post.” In Isaiah 40:6–7, the prophet declares: “All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: because the spirit of the LORD bloweth upon it: surely the people is grass.”

Unless the Lord returns first, each of us will one day find our way to a cemetery. At the head of the grave our family will place a headstone with our name, date of our birth, and date of our death. Between those two dates will be a tiny dash. It won’t take the engraver of the stone long to place that dash there, but it will represent our entire lives. Just as God said—our lives will be reduced to a simple dash.

What we do with that dash is completely up to us. The story is told of an old Norwegian who had kept very careful notes of his life in a series of notebooks he kept on the shelf of his business. On his eightieth birthday he went to the store and pulled the books from the shelf and began to compute his life. He was surprised to find that he had spent five of his eighty years waiting for people. He had spent six months tying neckties, three months scolding children, and eight days telling dogs to lie down and be quiet. When I read that rather humorous account, I wondered if he ever took a few minutes to listen to the Gospel and pray the sinner’s prayer. If he did, I wonder how much time he had spent in church, in prayer, reading his Bible, or telling others about Christ. Read more »