Before the Mist is Gone
“Long time no see!” As I walked into our neighborhood workout facility, I waved at a gentleman I hadn’t seen at the gym in a while.
“I guess it’s been almost ten years since I exercised here,” he said. “My wife and I joined another club, and just cancelled our membership, so I’m back.”
Almost ten years? Wow. It seems like yesterday.
“Yeah, the last time I saw you, you were working on your seminary degree. Did you ever finish that?”
I realized a lot has happened since he and I chatted while toiling away on the elliptical machines, but it also hit me that time is moving faster than I realized, like a cheetah on the hunt.
And there’s nothing I can do to cage it.
In the Bible, James describes our lives as mist. Some translations use the word vapor. “It’s here for a little while, then it’s gone” (James 4:14).
My biggest concern is that “when it’s gone,” will I have any regrets? Will there be missed opportunities to share God’s love, to speak the truth about Jesus and his saving power?
As Christians, we should be prepared to give a reason for the hope we have, and we should not be intimidated by spur-of-the moment opportunities. Time is short, and we don’t know how long our timeline is, or how long anyone else will be misting the Earth.
We should treat this as a life and death matter.
Yesterday, I had a short window while my car was being serviced, so I stopped in to a salon halfway between the dealership and my house for a badly needed pedicure. I thought I was going to unwind and take a break, but as I sat there, the male technician, a professing Buddhist, asked me, “So what makes Christianity different from other religions?”
This was not a question I expected to answer in my hour of pampering, but I took a deep breath, prayed, and began to share the Gospel with him. Meanwhile, the 25-year-old Finnish gentleman in the chair next me was also a believer, and chimed in with his knowledge of the faith.
When we were done, the bright, young nail technician, scurried back to playing video games on his phone, but was hopefully processing the seeds we planted while our feet were planted in a tub of water.
What about you? Does life seem to be stuck on fast forward? Before you know it, ten years will vaporize, and you will wonder where they went.
Before the mist evaporates entirely, let’s ask God for divine appointments to reach those who have no hope. And let’s use the Apostle Paul’s word to the Colossians as a guide: “Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone” (Colossians 4:2-6).