Last year in one of my classes, there was this old poster that said, "You are the author of your own life story." I pointed at it in the beginning of the year in my Romans class and told the students that we would find that that simply was not true...and then at the end of the year we would rip it down and replace it with a more accurate statement.
I got up this morning and continued reading through the book of Job and came to this verse:
"Are not his days like the days of a hired hand?" (7:1b).
There is a Divine appointment that rules over human lives. This past weekend, we took a ski trip to Winterplace in West Virginia. On the trip, one of the groups that was with us received word that another student in their group had been killed in a car accident. Saturday night, we mourned alongside of these students.
We take such little thought of death. I just saw yesterday that at some gas stations, they're putting up tv's at the pump. It seems that we have to occupy our minds constantly in order not to think about deeper subjects such as death. Here are some statements about death that I read this morning from Thomas a' Kempis's book, The Imitation of Christ:
"What canst thou see anywhere that can long continue under the sun?"
"Didst thou oftener think of thy death than of thy living long, there is no question but thou wouldst be more zealous to improve"
"Very quickly there will be an end of thee here; look what will become of thee in another world"
"Ah, foolish me, why dost thou think to live long, when thou canst not promise to thyself one day?"
Praying that we would fix our hearts on the things that are unseen.
