Fears, Strength, and Wasting Time

Sunday morning dawned like many of the previous Sundays have; I set my alarm the night before as if I would actually get up before the 8 o clock breakfast time, knowing that I wouldn't, and pushing snooze with alacrity when the alarm went off. I slept-walked down to the breakfast table, downed the food and coffee that my father had prepared, took a shower, climbed into the car, and perused the new biography of Paul Simon I'd bought the day before on the way to church. Equipping hour, as it is called in my church, was the beginning of a video series by John Piper on future grace; the key point of the first teaching was about how we should not serve God, assuming that we have something to give Him (at first glance, this can seem sticky. Think about it, and ask me about it if you still don't get it). By the end of that short slot, it was time to head upstairs for the main service, which was going to be preached by my brother Johnny on the fall of man near the beginning of creation.
In the waiting before the first song began, I saw my dad talking with Johnny and Stephanie at the back of the sanctuary, and wondered what was going on, based on that and some subtle hints exchanged between my parents that morning and the evening before. The first few songs finished, the announcements gone over, and the time of silence commemorating 9/11 completed, Johnny took his place at the pulpit...and something was wrong. There was something in the way he carried himself, something in the way his words as he began to speak weren't flowing like they usually do, something in the way his eyes looked slightly unfocused. He explained that his brain was moving slowly, that he'd had doubts about whether he should give the sermon, but that he'd decided to give it (despite the fact that one of the symptoms of his slow-moving brain was an inability to make decisions).
He began the sermon, full of much of the same profundity and soul-reaching truths that characterize a "Johnny sermon," but there was a haunting discordance, a disconcerting disconnectedness in his words, confusion in his transitions, and, at times, even a complete loss of a train of thought. Something is wrong, something is wrong, something is wrong... my brain repeated as if on a looped track. Despite the awkward wording and evident confusion on his face at times, he concluded with a chill-inducing, hard-hitting series of truths: "As Creator, He made the world knowing  the suffering that He would undergo. He knew that some beauty can only be seen through suffering, that some love can only be shown through sacrifice, some joy only experienced through pain."
Johnny prayed, finished, and the fears began to swell. His conduct worried me, reminded me of John Nash in A Beautiful Mind, of my grandfather late in life, of all the stories I had heard of the people who were beginning to be affected by...brain tumors. The tears began to drip from my eyes as thoughts trampled through my brain like a group of renegade elephants: What am I doing, wasting my time on futile pursuits? What if this sermon is the last that Johnny will ever give? What if today is the healthiest I will ever see him again? What if I won't have a chance to pour out my heart to him ever again? What if this is...it? The tears rained down my face, running in rivulets in a volume I'd not experienced since 2009. The reasoning in my mind ran wild, and the fears swelled as I noticed Johnny and Stephanie's absence, of my father breaking the bread in his place, of their children in the arms of Stephanie's family. I walked to the bathroom, tried to get a grip. Up the stairs again, only to discover that they had indeed gone to the emergency room. 
I don't want to waste time. I can't afford to do it. What if today is my last? What if this will be the last blog post I write? What if the time I spent with friends tonight is the last interaction we will ever have? I can't afford to waste time. If I am not influencing my friends and family toward encouragement in and toward Jesus, then what am I influencing them toward? 
"All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field." (Isaiah 40:6)
Time is short. Johnny looks as though he is recovering, but there are unknowns, and there are fears, and I can't afford to waste time on my own selfish desires. May God grant me the grace, strength, desire, and knowledge of my weakness that will enable me to make my days, hours, and minutes count. 

A Love That Conquers(ed)

         There's a song by the Swell Season (an absolutely amazing band) called A Love That Conquers. It's a good song, but its message isn't as powerful as it could be if it were referring to THE love that conquers, has conquered, and does conquer: Jesus'. This is the truth that I need to remember every day, the one that has changed my life and will change my life more, the more I remember it.
       There was a really great sermon given today at my church, by an amazing man who I am blessed to have as my brother. He talked about the passion of Jesus Christ, the pain that He went through because of the sins of all...or, more specifically, my sins. He said some things that I had never thought about before really. One of which was this thought, in my words: what Jesus experienced on the cross was not just the punishment for the sin of all...He experienced the personal hell of every single person who ever lived or would live. He was separated from His Father for the first time ever, a union that was stronger, healthier, and closer than any marriage could ever be. Rejection from the One He had always experienced complete communion with is the sacrifice that Jesus made for me, going through my hell along with the hells of every other person ever.
         When Jesus finally uttered the words, "It is finished," He wasn't just saying that His life was ending. I think that more than that, He was proclaiming victory: IT IS FINISHED! All of my sins were cleansed in one act of intense pain, incredible love, deep humility, and utter separation. That love is the love that conquers, and there is no other. Only when that love loves through our sinful natures can we even come close to knowing what true life is all about.
         Something Johnny said in another sermon is that the best life is the one that experiences God to biggest extent possible. That's what life is about, experiencing God. Through Jesus, we can do that, and see God's beauty in the first flowers of spring, the individual and unique snowflakes, the laughing faces of the ones we love, and all the other manifestations of the huge, infinite love that God has for us.