Make Your Years Count
“Don’t just count your years, make your years count.” ~ George Meredith
Sixty-eight. If we are counting, that is the magic number for me today. Sixty-eight. Today, I celebrate my sixty-eighth birthday. I cannot believe it. Truly, I cannot. I do not know where the years have gone. I think I might be able to account for twenty or, possibly, thirty years. But sixty-eight? Unfathomable.
I guess, in one sense, that is a good thing. That means that my life has progressed as good as it possibly could have and that the years have seamlessly flown by. At the same time, it gives me pause to think about what I have done through those years. If I force myself to stop what I am doing and look back, I can see a lot of highlights along the way. I can see interesting and/or challenging assignments. I can see interesting and/or challenging people. I can see all sorts of ways in which God has touched my life.
We are all, every one of us, a collection of numbers. However, as George Meredith reminds us, we should not merely count the days, weeks, months, or years. We should make every one of them count. After all, we have been placed on this earth for a specific amount of time. No one knows the number of days ascribed to each of us except our God. What we do know is that God has challenged us to make every one of our days count.
If we can point the way to God by the manner in which we live our lives and by the words we choose to speak, we will accomplish God’s will. All of us, at the end of our days, want to hear God say those magic words, “Well done, good and faithful servant. Enter into the Kingdom prepared for you.”
We will only hear those words if we make every day count rather than counting every day.
FAITH ACTION: Make everything you do this day count.
[If I may be allowed to ask, as I count another year of life, kindly say a prayer for me that I might continue to have the energy to do what God has called me to accomplish in my life.]