It all boils down to this

Today's sentence of wisdom, from our friend Solomon, has been passed down from generation to generation - and it is still so so TRUE.

"We all come to the end of our lives as naked and empty-handed as on the day we were born. We can’t take our riches with us."- Ecclesiastes 5:15

When we come to realise this fact we slowly start to detach ourselves from the obsession of holding onto our "things". Most of us take a long time to learn this, but eventually it dawns on most of us. We can't take any material things with us when we die.

Jesus said it like this:

"“Don’t store up treasures here on earth, where moths eat them and rust destroys them, and where thieves break in and steal" (Matthew 6:19).

Living in Grace

D3LM3

Learning the hard way

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Psalm 90:10-12

Our days may come to seventy years,
    or eighty, if our strength endures;
yet the best of them are but trouble and sorrow,
    for they quickly pass, and we fly away.
¹¹ If only we knew the power of your anger!
    Your wrath is as great as the fear that is your due.
¹² Teach us to number our days,
    that we may gain a heart of wisdom.

Sometimes we just don't learn to 'number our days' aright. It takes the sudden death of a close friend or family member to jolt us back to our senses. May we all comprehend how fragile our lives are and what they are from Jesus.

Living in Grace

D3LM3

Write it in stone!

Charles Spurgeon reflected on life and death by saying the following:

"A good character is the best tombstone. Those who loved you, and were helped by you, will remember you. So carve your name on hearts, and not on marble."

One day we will all have a marble tombstone of some sorts, but the bigger challenge is whether we are carving our names onto the hearts of others.

“This new plan I’m making with Israel isn’t going to be written on paper, isn’t going to be chiselled in stone; this time I’m writing out the plan in them, carving it on the lining of their hearts. I’ll be their God, they’ll be my people. They won’t go to school to learn about me, or buy a book called God in Five Easy Lessons. They’ll all get to know me first-hand, the little and the big, the small and the great. They’ll get to know me by being kindly forgiven, with the slate of their sins forever wiped clean.” – Hebrews 8: 6-13 (Message)

Start chiselling. 

Living in Grace

D3LM3

Dylan Thomas, death and hope

As I prepare to share in a Memorial service today, I came across this old poem from Welshman, Dylan Thomas. One of the stanza's says this:

 “And death shall have no dominion.
No more may gulls cry at their ears
Or waves break loud on the seashores;
Where blew a flower may a flower no more
Lift its head to the blows of the rain;
Though they be mad and dead as nails,
Heads of the characters hammer through daisies;
Break in the sun till the sun breaks down,
And death shall have no dominion.” - Dylan Thomas

It is such an awesome reminder that 'death shall have no dominion' over those who follow Christ. Even though we all face the inevitable date with death, we need not fear that moment - Christ has conquered sin and death.

Romans 8: 31-35 -  If God is for us, who can be against us? ³² He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? ³³ Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. ³⁴ Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. ³⁵ Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

Living in Grace

D3LM3