beginning

by

Goodbye End; Hello Beginning

The end has come, but the beginning will start soon. … I never would have said those words years ago, but they are fitting today.

Goodbye end; hollow beginning

Today we close up our cottage for the season and we won’t be back until the end of April or beginning of May – that is six months from now. 

… The end of the cottage season has come to a screeching halt. There will be no more trips up here for six months. 

Today I will put the finishing touches on the close. The final task before turning off the power and locking doors is blowing out the water lines. 

They say that everyone has the same amount of time, that we all have 24 hours in a day, and 365 days in a year. 

We all work within those time constraints, but I tell you that time seems shorter for me these days. That 24 hours for me is not like 24 hours for a 7 year old. 

I remember being young and trying to savour every bit of my birthday because the next birthday seemed forever away. 

I remember thinking that grade two was never going to end and that grade three would never happen. Well, that’s partly because I repeated grade two.  

But there was this sense that, in some cases, time seemed to stand still. 

When the summer was over, it wasn’t coming back any time soon.

But that is not the case now. Today we will lock up the cottage and walk away from it for the entire winter … but that time seems to go so fast now. 

It won’t be long before we are back at this place. The leaves will be budding on the trees and not falling off as they are now. Everything will be turning green, new and fresh, and not brown, yellow, red and orange. 

Now all the foliage is decaying – I filled three big paper yard bags full of shredded leaves yesterday. When we come back the grass will be growing at a rapid rate.

Between now and then, the same amount of time passes as it always has. But the time seems to pass more quickly.

I know this because it doesn’t seem that long ago that we were making our first trip of the season to the cottage. 

And that time has gone so quickly!

Yesterday I shot some video with my drone – sort of my way of saying goodbye to our retreat place (you can check it out here).

That video will stay on my YouTube channel all winter long and through the spring. But any time I look at those clips I will not be thinking of that day, but about the days to come. 

Maybe that is why time seems to go so fast. We are looking forward to what is coming up ahead. 

Children live in the moment and time seems to stand still for them. Adults look to tomorrow and time seems to move at lightning speed.

Maybe we need a little balance between living in the moment and looking to tomorrow.

Here’s the thing: Christ will come one day and this life we have had here will seem like it was a flash in time. The eternity that lies ahead of us, what we have anticipated for so long, will stretch before us as endless days to be savoured moment by moment. We will be able to live in the moment AND look forward to tomorrow … provided that we have here and now made the commitment to follow Jesus and submit our lives to Him.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: How would living in the moment help you? Leave you comments and questions below.

by

The End Will Make Up For The Beginning

Sometimes the end can make up for all the disappointment that’s gone on before it.

That kind of sums up yesterday for me. I woke up to rainy drizzle which kind of set the tone for the day.

I checked the weather to see what I could expect and, though the rain was supposed to stop, it was to remain cloudy and cool for the rest of the day.

The outlook was not favourable to hit the beach, or really do anything outside; I wasn’t sure I would even be able to get my exercise in.

I have a radar app on my iPad which I also checked and noted that once the rain had ended there would be no more.

However, that proved to be a lie because there seemed to be a blowing mist in the air that made me feel like turning around and going back inside every time I attempted to go outside.

So what do you do when the weather is like that? … There were some who went golfing, but at 16° C with precipitation in the air, that’s not my kind of golfing weather.

In those conditions, if you hit a shot thin, your hands start to vibrate and, even if you don’t have arthritis, you’ll feel like you just got it for a few minutes. Sometimes your whole body feels like it’s vibrating – like a cartoon character that has just been electrocuted.

That’s not for me.

So the beach was out and golf was off my list. The only thing left to do was go shopping in town.

I went to a few big box stores but, though I didn’t have to focus on the weather while I was shopping, I wasn’t having any success finding the things I was looking for.

Another disappointment.

By late afternoon I was done with shopping and back at the cottage, a little more depressed and kind of tired from all the walking I’d done in the stores.

It didn’t help my mood that I had to have the windshield wipers on intermittent the whole way back.

I couldn’t bring myself to exercise so I just flopped on the couch for a while. Then out of sheer determination and fear that I would break my exercising streak of about half a year, I braved the outdoors again and exercised.

It provided little comfort, however, and didn’t put me in any better of a mood.

Well, that was until about 7:30 pm when the clouds rolled away, the wind stopped swirling and the sun came out and brightened things up.

And even that late in the day, with very few hours to enjoy it, somehow the day was redeemed. The sun made an appearance in the end and it changed everything about the day.

Here’s the thing: That is what it’s going to be like when Christ returns for those who follow Him. It won’t matter how bad the day, or life has been up until that time. All the disappointments, the discouragement, frustration and even harm that has taken place won’t be a consideration. When Christ comes it will be like the sun coming out at the end of a cloudy, rainy, cold day. And it will change our outlook and our disposition completely … forever.

It will be a great day.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: Are you prepared for Christ to change your day? Leave your comments below.