Lord, remind me how brief my time on earth will be. Remind me that my days are numbered – how fleeting my life is. You have made my life no longer than the width of my hand. My entire lifetime is just a moment to you; at best, each of us is but a breath. We are merely moving shadows, and all our busy rushing ends in nothing. We heap up wealth, not knowing who will spend it.” Psalm 39:4-6 (NLT)
I am not sure if it is the beginning of the year that makes us think about where we are in life, or if it’s fallout from the last year that motivates us think about where we want to go for the next 360+ days. January is a month of coming down from a lot of festivities and it starts a season of planning. We start planning our holidays, vacations and even how we may want to spend our sick days. We look ahead on school calendars, jot down birthdays, weddings, meetings, and all sorts of activities. But this year I want to sit back and meditate more on how short our life is compared to the big picture.
David had a lot going on in his life when he wrote the Psalms. Talk about a busy parent who went through extreme highs and lows and spent a good deal of time running from or to something. Yet in the midst of all this busyness, David never lost sight of his one true Love. He remembered how small he was and how much undeserved grace he had been shown by God. His son, King Solomon, took that a step further by being just as, if more, busy than his father. Solomon gained wealth, status and power. He could buy anything and experience anything — but in the end he was unfulfilled and realized that all of that material gain came to nothing.
So this year, I am remembering each day that God holds my internal time clock in His hands. Everyone has an appointment with death, and God knows the time and date. If I keep this in mind, the external day-to-day fires that we put out will not ruffle my feathers as much as they used to. I can take a step back and make sure the big picture stays big so I can get on with the more important things in life — my relationships with God and family. I don’t need to worry about heaping up wealth (I’ve never been a heap up wealth kind of person anyway) and wondering who will spend it. If I am able to help my sons, I will help them now when they can benefit most from it, not when I am long gone. I can stand strong and continue the race without quitting. One thing Dwight always tells our sons is, “MacPhersons never quit.” No matter how hard a task or life goal seems, we make sure that we finish strong and depend on God to help us. Things may not work out the way we want them to, and this is something we taught the boys early on.
Lord, help me to take it one minute at a time. Help me to live each nano-second in the moment and savor each day that is given to me. Every time I open my eyes on a brand new day that You have chosen to bless me with, may I never take it for granted. It is a good and perfect gift from You.
So what do you plan to do this year with the time that God will give you? I asked each of our sons to give me one thing they would like to do this year. I loved their responses:
Clayton: “To work on being more responsible, respecting, and harder working. I also want to be more social so I can be more effective in witnessing.”
Duncan: “I would like to continue to improve on self-discipline and study more books of the Bible.”
Logan: “I want to do more devotions.”
In His Perfect Love,
Rebecca
