Life is Fragile

Every once in awhile we get awakened to the fact that life is fragile. We are often lulled to sleep by the rhythms of life much like ocean waves methodically pounding the seashore. We get used to our routines. We busy ourselves each day with tasks of vocation and recreation. Until those routines get interrupted by the sudden reminder that life is fragile. People die all the time. Celebrities die. Paupers die. People in our communities die. So do people we are close to like family and friends. 

James puts it this way in his epistle, "Yet you do not know what  your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and vanishes away." [James 4:14] 

The point is not to focus on the fact that we all have an expiration date. The point is to live today making the most of the time we have at the present moment instead getting ready to live in the future when the time is right. We make plans for the future that might never come true because we may not live that long. I read the story about a lady who never used her China dishes for fear of breaking them. She died prematurely without using them. Not long after the funeral, the father brought out the China plates for supper one night. We make plans for vacations, retirement, home improvement projects, and lifestyle changes. Some do not live long enough to enjoy those things. 

People have clothes they refuse to wear in fear of messing them up. None of us knows what tomorrow holds. What good will those clothes do for us once we are gone? Let's live life to the fullest extent we can while we have today. We may make plans for the future, but we should hold in the back of our minds that life is fragile. Life is like a vapor. Here for a moment and then it vanishes. 

The funeral business is booming. Funeral homes gross between $700,000 and $1.5 million a year. The average cost of a funeral is around $8,000. The average person will attend around 40 funerals in their life time. Horrible things steal people away we love and admire. Cancer. Heart disease. Alzheimer's. Tragedies. 

I once preached a funeral for an elderly man I did not know. The family was not affiliated with a church and gave no indication they believed in Jesus or the gospel message. They just needed a preacher. Sitting to my right from where I preached was a twenty something year old son. He sat with his head down. Ten days later I stood before that same family preaching that young man's funeral who died of a drug overdose. Life is fragile. It can end for any of us without warning. 

Two things are important to keep in my mind. Each of us need to be ready to stand before God in judgment. We are reminded in [Heb 9:27] after death comes judgment. We are also reminded in [Heb 10:31] that it is terrifying to face the living God. Terrifying if a person has not trusted Jesus as their Savior. The other thing we should recall is to make the most out of our allotment of days. Don't waste our lives on things that have no eternal significance. Make the most out of the time you have left because life is fragile.