A little anecdote: The other night it was time to read Ethan his bedtime stories, and as usual I let him pick. To my delight, he picked one of the Jesus books. If you read my post last week, you would understand my joy. The book he chose basically chronicled the life and death of Jesus. After the book was over, he instinctively said "The End!" to which I replied, "No, not to this story."
I said this first and foremost because the story didn't talk about Jesus coming back, and therefore left out a very important part. Second off, even if it did talk about His resurrection, and even his ascension, the story still would not be over.
People look at the life of Jesus as a typical story, with a beginning, middle, and an end. The beginning being Christmas, the middle being His life, and the end being Easter. If Easter truly was the end of Jesus, that would be kinda bad.
People that have read previous posts would say that this is another post about anticipating the second coming of Christ. And in some ways it is. In fact, a lot of my life is spent thinking about the future. Things like: When will I start seminary? How old will I be when I graduate? How long after graduation will I be ordained to the priesthood? What will I do about dinner tonight? You know, the important stuff. The fact is that it will be over two years before I start seminary, but a lot of focus has been on that lately.
I'm sure that other people are in similar positions, but the goal is different. Things like: When will I retire? When will I get that next raise or promotion? When will I be able to move into a bigger house? Or get a bigger car? What will I do about dinner tonight? Let's face it, that last one is universal.
Let's apply this attitude to driving. If you plan on driving from New York to Los Angeles, and you have this destination focus, you will only have Los Angeles in your mind, and your focus will be entirely on getting there. The truth of the matter is if you have this attitude about driving, you may end up on the side of the road because you were too focused on getting there that you forgot stop and get gas. You may get into a wreck because you were too busy looking toward Los Angeles you didn't notice the eighteen-wheeler in front of you.
Some emphasis has been given to the second coming of Christ in some of my past posts. This is an important thing to look for, just as all the examples mentioned earlier are also important. But it is a journey to get there. Sometimes you are right where you are because that is where God wants you to be. I'll use me as an example. I am so focused on being a priest, that I keep thinking about what ministry will be like as a priest. What kind of church will I be in, where will my church be, etc. But what I fail to realize is that I do not need to be a priest in order to do ministry. I can't be focused on ministering to people that I haven't met yet, that I ignore the needs of the people around me.
I don't know if you think about either the second coming of Christ or about when you meet Him in Heaven upon your death, but it should be something that you need to think about. But you should realize that it is a journey to get there, and if you miss something along the way, it might distract you from your final destination.
Amen.
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