When you know the outcome, your engagement with the subject changes drastically.

You may watch a program on television that you’ve seen before. You may not have seen it for a while, and may not remember all the details, but what you do remember enables you to watch the program differently.

You might watch it while you are doing something else so that you are not fully engaged with the program. After all, you know the story line. 

Then there are times when we might try to avoid knowing the outcome so that we can watch it after the fact but as if we were taking it all in live.

There are some movies, however, that you may have never seen but their outcome is so predictable that you know in advance how they will end. 

I’m thinking specifically of some of the Hallmark romance movies my wife watched over Christmas. I’d watch them for less than five minutes and know what guy was going to marry the girl in the story. 

In those cases I just turned around and found something else to do. 

But the other day I watched the last three minutes of a hockey game I had seen the day before.

It was a close game, a game that mattered to me. I remembered how tense I was as the other team pulled their goalie and had a man advantage. They hemmed my team in their own end and, with each shot, there was a fear that it would weave its way through the crowd of players on the ice into the back of the net. 

At any moment I feared the game would be tied up and sent into overtime. 

When I watched the game I couldn’t turn away; I couldn’t do something else. I was all in, fully engaged in the play.

In the end, my team kept the puck out and with about 4 or 5 seconds left to go in the game they got an empty-netter to seal their victory.

The next day when I watched that last part of the game for the second time, of course I didn’t watch with the same emotion. I knew how things turned out so I wasn’t as tense. 

When the Leafs couldn’t get the puck out of their end, I knew that it didn’t end badly for them. But surprisingly, there was still some emotion and engagement with those last few moments of the game.

I noticed the times when they could have cleared the puck and reduced the pressure, but for whatever reason it didn’t happen. 

I found I analyzed the play more than when I watched it the first time. I even had a few suggestions for the team watching them play the second time around. 

What surprised me was that I was as interested in watching the game the second time around as I was seeing it the first time. … I just had a different perspective. 

Here’s the thing: When you place your faith in Jesus Christ you know what is going to happen at the end of your life on earth. There is nothing up in the air, no fear of a sudden change. But you still live your life to the full, engaged in every moment and detail you experience. It’s just that the outcome is certain.

That’s Life!

Paul 

Question: Do you have the outcome of your life settled? Leave your comments and questions below.