Terminal
I started working when I was 14 (really before that if you include helping my dad with his small farm) and when I turned 16, I got a regular all year job. By the time I got to college, I was working full time at a Toy Store, where I was the head cashier. While there were 30 miles between the school and the job, it worked out fine for the first couple of years.
By the time I became a junior, the effort in my major pushed me into cutting back my hours working for my academic endeavors. My dad was instrumental in this in that he paid off my car note which reduced my financial obligations significantly. However, I still needed college and spending money so besides cutting my hours at the retail store, I got a campus job in the Physics department. For the most part, there was little for me to do so I was able to study for myself with the occasional lab cleaning chores or answering the phone (or helping the jocks get through the easy physics course).
Anyway, one day, the Physics professor and I were talking - by the way, I smoked cigarettes at that time and so did he - and he was lamenting that I should quit smoking (as he was trying to) because it gets harder the longer you smoke. He went on to theorize that all young people, due to a lack of experience and youthful vigor, believed that they were invincible only to be forced to come to grips with their morbidity and how their youthful choices impacted said morbidity as they got older.
I’d love to say that his elegant philosophy impacted me that day and I quit smoking but it ended up taking me almost 20 more years before I stopped smoking cigarettes.
Fast forward 40 years and I was in our living room and the tv was playing one of the Despicable Me movies (the third one I believe). I wasn’t really paying attention to it and focusing more on something online. Anyway, my son, who visited us, came in and asked me if Dru (main character) was ok. Having watched the movie before I replied that it did not look good for him and I hoped he found a way out of his predicament. But it got me thinking - “I know the outcome to this movie.” No matter how closely, or not, I pay attention, the ending is already set.
“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment. The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son. But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.” - Revelation 21:1-8 ESV
I’m at the opposite end of my life’s continuum now in that I know that, even though I’m in good health mostly now, my number of years left on this earth, even under the best outcome, are far less that the number I’ve already experienced. But that’s ok because I know the end of the movie.
Praise God that all my bad choices have been forgiven and when I die or see Jesus’ second coming while still alive, I will be given a new body where I will never experience pain or hardship ever again. And, more importantly, I will spend eternity with God.
This is the promise I look forward to with every praise in my soul.
