pramsay posted on December 04, 2007 07:02 2719 views
Like the Morning Fog or a Vanishing Mist!

Nervously you stand behind the curtains. It’s your annual school play. Your costume is hilarious but it complements your role. Your mind is racing as you go over your lines. Any minute now you could get the signal. You mentally race through your act; how many steps forwards, the three somersaults, the pounding of the fist on the table, kicking the garbage can, scowling your face and posturing your body to display outrage, a frantic shaking of your head, your well-rehearsed quip which is actually the punch-line for the entire act. It will all be over in so short a time and then you’ll walk off the stage, with a sigh of relief and guzzle down some water.

Even though you are only on the stage so briefly, it IS a big deal. If you mess up, forget your lines, trip and fall or even faint – people tend not to remember what you did right; for some twisted reason we remember the failures.

James, one of the half brothers of Jesus wrote these words:

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town
and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”—
yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring.
What is your life?
For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.

Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.”
As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.
So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.

(James 4:13-17)

We have only one life to live for the Lord. We came out on to the stage of Christian living the day we trusted Christ as our Saviour. We’re still on the stage today. The curtain hasn’t fallen; our act is not over. People are sitting in the auditorium watching us up on stage doing our unique thing; interacting with others; moving about; responding; displaying our personality and the extent to which the grace of God is evident in all our actions, interactions and reactions.

What is the audience whispering about just now? Did they just connect me to Christ in their minds because of something I did or said? Am I getting the point across to them that Christ is everything in my life? Listen to the applause. I think they’re clapping because they’re looking for authenticity and they think they see something genuine in me. I hope I don’t let them down before I’m finished.

The metaphor of the stage wasn’t given by James. He used the fleeting mist or the vapor or the morning fog. One minute you see and feel it. It is very much there. It is not a dream. It’s real. But it’s there for such a short time.

Sometimes we put our spiritual lives on the back burner, thinking we will catch up later. Cramming might work at exam time and the teacher/professor will never know the difference. But last minute cramming doesn’t work for eternity. The Lord catches on quite quickly. There is no slowness with Him.

What is important to you today? What are you striving for? How significant will it be when you walk off life’s stage and enter eternity? What message are you presently communicating onstage to the watchful audience?

Is there something you know to be ‘right’ but you have not done it yet? Your life is like a mist. This could be your last month or your last year. How’s the stage performance? Will you get a good rating or a poor one?

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