by Allison Martin
And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.
Revelation 21:4
I wonder how many things I have already done for the last time? That’s a pretty sobering thought. When I was a kid, I loved to build all kinds of inventions out in the yard. My parents actually got so many flat tires from nails I left scattered around that I got grounded from using hammers. (Back then, I thought that was pretty unreasonable. Now, that seems like a pretty generous punishment.) I don’t know how old I was when my hobbies began to change. I don’t have a date on the calendar circled when I moved on to interests closer to what I enjoy now. But somewhere in the passing of time and changing of seasons, I picked up my hammer and scattered my nails for the last time.
Our lives are filled with last times, and we often don’t even realize it until we have the benefit of hindsight. That idea could be somewhat discouraging if we dwelt on it, and that’s not my intention today. Quite the opposite, actually. But it is worth noting that we might value some ordinary, everyday things a lot more if we realized how just fleeting they are.
My focus today is not on the blessings of life that we wish could stay forever, but on the struggles and temptations that we would rather escape from. We have all found ourselves in situations where there seems to be no end in sight. Though we pray for answers and try to keep our faith strong, sometimes we just feel stuck. You may have analyzed the situation from every angle, and see no further possibilities for anything to change. Or maybe you’re holding onto a promise that feels more forgotten by the day. We have prayed some prayers for so long that we honestly feel like we’ll be praying them forever.
So it feels crazy to even ask - what if I’ve prayed this prayer for the last time? What if God is about to move so suddenly and miraculously that I never have to pray this prayer again?
You may have already prayed the last prayer for that prodigal before they come home.
You may have already spent your last lonely night crying yourself to sleep.
Before your daily prayer time tomorrow, God could have turned everything around.
I hope you can take courage today in the fact that we rarely realize our “last time” moments until much later. I want to revive your faith not only that God can move, but that He will. Even when nothing seems to have changed and everything is falling further apart, you never know what God is doing behind the scenes.
Even if this prayer isn’t the last, and there are still a hundred more to follow, I can tell you with confidence that the last time is coming.
One day, you’ll lay down the burdens and questions and doubts of this life. As we walk inside the gates of home, we will see everything that weighed us down and pulled us back- for the last time.
Comments