You are but a vapor...

Yet you do not know ^[b]what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away.

My not so old computer, had a drink spilt on it and I was most concerned about all my pictures that were stored on it.  I just went to the drug store with the copy of the pictures and my camera cards to see what I could do.  The copy of the pictures did not work and I seem to be missing some of my cards.  I have not had a chance or the mental strength I need to figure all this out but immediately I began reviewing all the pictures I had taken in my mind from years back.  I remembered the kids riding the cow like a horse.  Mary Kathryn in her ballet costume.  Picture after picture ran through my head wondering if and what I may have lost.

Another thing that amazed me is how those years have flown by.  The older I get the faster it seems this life is happening.  I can plan my week, thinking about and through it with the Lord, what should I be intentional about, and then the week is gone.  I wake up Monday morning looking to the schedule I have laid out for the week and before I know it, it is Sunday again.  Have you heard the expression...time "Flies" when you are having fun.

I don't know if because somewhere in my mind I feel like I wasted so much of my life in either legalism or depression, but I feel like every moment is precious and it needs to count for something.  What I have come to realize that all this counts.  That all the suffering and even time spent doing the right thing with the wrong heart mattered to Him.  That all the years in depression mattered.  Even then I was in a journey with the Lord.  Even in the desert He was there and none of it is wasted.  I have come to see that He was with me all along.  That every moment is valuable to Him.  That He uses it for purpose and cause.  He had a plan and it all was part of that plan to bring me to a point of trusting Him and not in myself.  I don't live in regret anymore because He has taken it all to the cross.  He promises to redeem my past and for those I love who are called according to His purpose.  To use it all for good and He has and is.

So we maybe but a breath, a vapor but we too are important. So valuable He sent His only Son to get us, rescue us and bring us into His own.  We are valuable and all of life matters. Our lives are but a vapor, they are so short in the scheme of eternity.  A thousand years is like one day to the Lord.  We have but this one shot to trust Him in this life. This one shot at learning to live and walk by faith and not by sight.  It is fleeting.  It is but a moment.  May we live life to the fullest in laughter and silliness and cuteness, masterfully and with much wisdom that only He can impart.

There is no way to stress grace too much.  Our lives are all of grace.  If we think that it is an excuse to sin or to cause pain we don't understand grace.  We don't understand the Love of God for us.  It is amazing to me how patience He is with us.  He is bringing us to a place of life and enjoyment of Him and others.  Even in the hardest of time we can say "I trust you Lord".  What ever happens, whatever the outcome maybe, "I trust you".  The feelings may not be there at that time but He is able to bring us to a point of dependence and leaning on Him for the very breath we breathe, the life we live, the peace and joy we experience.  He is our very hope, Savior and Lord.  

Apart from Him our sorrows and suffering would leave us hopeless.  Our past would leave us in regret and depression.  It did me. We would be so fearful of tomorrow we could not go on.  But He rescues us and brings us out of the pit to understand what I cannot understand on my own.  We are to live in the present, in the moment.  We just have enough grace for when it is needed, when we need it.  It will not be there to make us feel good like we can conquer the world.  That would be self reliance.  We are not to live in the regret of yesterday or the fear of tomorrow but today in Love.  His love, today.  He will do in us the things we just cannot do on our own.  He will teach us to love in daring, bold, colorful, exciting and fearless ways.  We will be intentional in the lives of those around us and wait on Him to tell us what to say.  He is purposeful and deliberate.  We are to do it in faith trusting Him with the outcome. He is our reason for living.  He is life.