Dr. Barclay with Something to Think About - THE DASH

 THE DASH

In Psalm 89:47 David asked the Lord to “[r]emember how short my time is; For what futility have You created all the children of men?” In James 4:14, the shortness of time is mentioned this way: “…whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.”

In many cases, if you look at the memorials to deceased persons, one’s life is often represented in the manner Date of Birth and Date of Death. For example;

XXXX - YYYY

1960 - 2010

Where the Date of Birth and the Date of Death is separated with just a dash in between. How short is life when it can be represented by just a dash. A dash which contains all of life’s activities between the dates.  All of one’s ambitions, hopes, and planning.  All of a person’s achievements and disappointments, successes and failures, training and careers.  The work, vacations and retirements, the good and bad times, the ups and downs of life, the families and friends and the births and deaths which come to us all. All included in that short dash between birth and death. And yet we spend so much time trying to plan for, work towards, and worry about what will happen in that short dash.

Perhaps we should think of existence more like this:

______________________________________XXXX - YYYY___________________________________

Of something more than just the dash between dates.  We are certainly told of a life that can extend long after our earthly demise and perhaps we should start thinking of an existence that may begin long before we’re born; there is some evidence for this.  A life that is infinitely longer than the time represented by the dash between the date of our birth and that of our death. But where we spend so much of our earthly existence preparing for a life and career in the “dash” we spend so little time and effort in preparing for eternity.   

King Solomon tells us that whatever we do without God is in the end vanity; either prideful or meaningless. And as we all must die, our earthly bodies will end; but what after?  Matthew 10:28 tells us to “…not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.”  The point is that without God, life ends at the dash.

With Christ, however, the line will go on forever. Which would you prefer? Just something you should think about.