Enjoy Life

Scripture

Young people, it’s wonderful to be young! Enjoy every minute of it. When people live to be very old, let them rejoice in every day of life.

~Ecclesiastes 11:8,11 NLT

Quote

Life should begin, in a very significant sense, at age seventy.

~Colonel F. J. Miles

Just a few years back I would have laughed at the quote. There are a lot of things this 70 year old cannot do. The energy and strength levels are not as high as they once were but yet I do agree with the colonel. Year 70, to this point, may be the best year of my life. It is true that most of my youthful dreams have long since be shattered, like broken pieces of pottery lying in the dust, I have seen my idols crushed one by one but I feel no sense of loss–to the contrary, I feel a great gain. Young people get fun and joy confused. They are lead to believe that hedonism is the way to enjoy life but hedonism is a false god and it leads to dead ends and emptiness. The only way to enjoy life to its fullest is to delight in the One who gives life. He and He alone can help us find our true self and our divine purpose. A fish is happy to be in the water and a bird in the air because the Creator designed one to live in the water and the other to live in the sky. A fish who spends its life trying to fly will be miserable and frustrated.

In a way, life is like climbing a mountain. In our youth and vigor, we are concerned with gaining new heights and we are competitive in how quickly we can reach these heights. We are so busy and our pace so hurried that we don’t stop and enjoy the view. At age 70, you have less energy and the climb has drastically slowed its pace but you are more observant. You begin to enjoy the view from the plateau that you have reached; you are excited by the horizon beyond and so very thankful that the valley below are behind you. You begin to realize you are the fish getting ever closer to the water. You see, we were not created for a world of death, disease, divorce, loneliness, hate and violence. At 70, you are confident and at peace with the fact that this world is not your home. You see the young frantically feathering their nest, enlarging it, making it more comfortable and using every waking moment to do so. You sigh with a breath of relief, you give thanks that you do not have to return and make this same mistake again because you did the exact same in our youthful enthusiasm. Slow the pace, it is more of a climb than a race.

I’ll not confer with sorrow till tomorrow, buy JOY shall have her way this very day. Your attitude will determine your altitude.

The world is going nuts: I’m having a hard time believing this knee jerk reaction to the flu. The Media is making a mountain out of a mole hill. There are no cases of the corona virus in Alabama and only one in Tennessee and they are not allowing fans to go to ball games. It is insane.

I have a couple of Senior Adults for you to pray for: Lou Hayes and Ray Edwards.

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