What would you do with your last days? Many with terminal illnesses have had to face this reality. We, the healthy, go through life thinking very little about the end. King David wrote, “LORD, make me to know my end and what is the extent of my days; let me know how transient I am. Behold, You have made my days as handbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing in Your sight; surely every man at his best is a mere breath” (Psa. 39:4-5). James writes, “Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that” (4:14-15).
While the brevity of life will help us to keep things in perspective, we must realize that we are living in the last age of the earth. “God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world” (Heb. 1:1-2). It is evident that we are in the last days. There has been confusion about this. Even in the time of Paul, some were writing letters to the Thessalonians telling them that Christ had already come (2 Thess. 2:1-3). Paul assures them that the Lord will come as a thief in the night, no one will know when, and with trumpets and shouting, everyone will know that it is happening (1 Thess. 5:2-3; 4:16).
Christ teaches us how to live in light of His pending arrival. “Therefore be on the alert, for you do not know which day your Lord is coming. But be sure of this, that if the head of the house had known at what time of the night the thief was coming, he would have been on the alert and would not have allowed his house to be broken into. For this reason you also must be ready; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour when you do not think He will” (Matt. 24:42-44).
With these two immutable facts before you, the frailty of life and the pending second coming, live each day as it were your last. Do not forget the words of admonition from Peter, “Know this first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking… saying, ‘Where is the promise of His coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation.’ For when they maintain this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God the heavens existed…the earth was formed out of water and by water…the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire…But do not let this one fact escape your notice…the Lord is not slow about His promise…the earth and its works will be burned up” (2 Pet. 3:3-10). Are you ready?