Make It Count!

November 1, 2003
Michael Evans
  

You are going to die!  Happy Thanksgiving.  Unless Jesus returns in your lifetime your mortal body will be “swallowed up by life” and you will either live forever in eternal glory or eternal torment.

My (unsolicited) gift to you all this Thanksgiving is to remind you of this all-important fact.

The Bible tells us that “…it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment….” (Hebrews 9:27).

In the busy-ness of everyday life this is easy to forget.  

As a wise man has observed we will all indeed assume ambient room temperature some day. 

What we do with our lives between this and that day is how we will be remembered. 

Salvation is by God’s grace alone through faith alone, but there is also a judgment of “works” for which we must appear before the judgment seat of Christ and give an account.

In the classic old movie Papillon, the main character was a criminal who was imprisoned for life for crimes against the French State. 

The movie portrayed the dreams he had while in prison.  In one dream, he stood before a tribunal for a crime. 

He pleaded with the judge that he was not guilty of the crime for which he was being tried.  The judge replied that he was not being tried for that crime, but for a crime that is the most heinous crime of the human race.

Papillon asked what crime it was.  He replied, “The crime of a wasted life.”  Papillon wept, “Guilty, guilty.”  The judge pronounced the sentence of death (1500 Illustrations for Biblical Preaching, p. 357).

Since God has set eternity in the hearts of men (Ecc. 3:11) it follows that only by engaging in labor and life with a Kingdom perspective can we have a satisfying existence.

Whether teaching a timid teen about titration or cavorting in communities of commerce, it is imperative that we see our life’s work as Kingdom work. 

As much as our children seem to enjoy learning they still occasionally ask legitimate questions (not always accompanied by legitimate attitudes) like: “Why do I have to do school?”

This would be a worthy subject of an entire column sometime.  For today, though, I shall present just one good reason.

If the question is “Why do I have to learn math?” one answer is “Because I said so.”  A better one is “Because Dad says so.” 

Much better than both of these, however, is this answer:  “So that you might present to God a heart of wisdom.” Huh?

Psalm 90:12 says, “So teach us to number our days, that we may present to Thee a heart of wisdom.”

No math.  No counting.  No counting, no heart of wisdom.  We want you to be wise.  Sit down and do your math.

Of course, learning math is no guarantee that one will gain a heart of wisdom. 

There are many fools who are good in math.  But at least the tools will be in the toolbox should anything change in the future.

Those of us who educate our children at home especially need help in this area of numbering our days aright. 

With the hurricane of life’s activities constantly demanding more than we can offer, we must strive to be good and eager pupils under the authority of the best Teacher of all.

If you are serious about wanting your three score and ten to count for something then I exhort you to pray Psalm 90:12 on a regular basis.  But only if you mean it!

Years ago when we lived in Michigan there was an older man in the church whose testimony in this regard both haunts and helps me to this day.

Jim was an airplane enthusiast who availed himself of every opportunity to fly. 

He flew those little Cessna-type planes and was an avid student of aeronautics and aviation.  He knew much about the physics of flying as well as the elementary “do’s and don’ts” of flying.

In his later years he jumped onto the Ultra-light bandwagon and built his own little airplane…you know those things that look like balsa bicycles with a weed-whacker engine on  the back.

One sunny day as Jim was flying around the fertile hills of southwest Michigan he began to have engine trouble.

The engine began to sputter and soon completely shut off (It was later determined that the fuel shut-off valve had never been turned on). 

Jim frantically tried to restart the engine but to no avail.  Two-hundred or so feet above terra-firma and no where to go but down.

Ultra-lights are not like paper airplanes that land lightly on their own power.  When heavy objects are flying through space and lose power they will assuredly hit the ground harder than they otherwise would.

Nevertheless Jim did not consider this a life-threatening situation.  He reasoned that he could gently glide the aircraft into a nearby field and escape with little or no injury.

One of the cardinal rules of flying is that if an aircraft loses power you don’t want to turn. 

For some reason Jim’s normal aeronautical sense was suspended for just a moment and he did indeed turn the aircraft.

When he turned the plane it dropped like a rock and he lost the ability to control it.

He zoomed into the fertile soils near Kalamazoo in a near free fall from 200 or so feet up.

The ultra-light dug into the ground four or five feet.  My friend Jim, who did survive, didn’t know at first that he had survived.

After the crash he remembers opening his eyes and being unable to see anything at all.  It was complete darkness.

As it turns out, his body, along with the plane, were both drilled into the earth.

It’s important to note here that Jim was a follower of Christ.  He had no question, this side of the grave, of his eternal destiny.  

But, we can’t always control the thoughts that come into our minds can we.

As Jim opened his eyes his immediate thought was that he had died and had gone to hell.  He describes the unspeakable trauma of thinking that his life had ended and that he was now in hell.

It’s one thing to have a scary dream now and then.  It’s quite another to be consciously aware that you have just experienced a crash through which no human being should have survived and find yourself awake, eyes opened, staring into blackness.

Jim survived the crash but with severe and extensive injuries. 

After he had recovered somewhat from the trauma of it all he made a tape wherein he describes the entire experience with a view to exhorting people to get right with God…to number their days aright.

It changed Jim’s life and it changed the way he did business. 

I was an associate pastor in the church there and Jim, who owned two greasy fried chicken places, gave us the “perk” of free chicken once a week for the family at either restaurant.

I went as much for the sign that he posted at the checkout counter as much as the chicken, which probably shortened my life.

The sign simply said this: “Only one life will soon be past.  Only what’s done for Christ will last.”

Don’t be ridiculous and even think that only vocational ministries and missionaries are included in this profound little statement.

“Whatever you do in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father” (Col. 3:17).

It is very possible for Christian home-schoolers to educate their children in a way that is not “for Christ.”

It is very possible for a pastor to live and conduct himself in such a way that it is not “for Christ,” but rather for himself.

The common experience of us all is death.  What are you leaving behind? 

This past week we had a sudden and tragic death in our church.  A healthy and trim 65-year-old deacon in the church suffered a heart attack and died.

As I listened to the family share their stories of this man’s life I was deeply moved over the things I heard over and over again.

In addition, I was allowed to view the letters that his children and grandchildren had written to him (last June) in honor of Father’s Day 2003.

In these I read things like, “I’ve always felt safe, secure and loved by you…” and “I don’t think anyone ever talks to you without also talkinig about something of eternal consequence.”

And in listening to the family talk I heard things like, “We want to become what he was for us.” 

There was plenty more, but let me tell you, when one starts thinking about this “one life [that] will soon be past” it jolts one back to the reality facing each one of us.

Namely, what in the world are you doing with your life?  Are you making it count for something beyond yourself and your family?

On that day you and I assume ambient room temperature what will they say?  More importantly, what will our Father in heaven say?