Spending Time With Nova

My grandson Nova turned two on May 18. Hard to believe. I waited and waited for a grandchild and now he is already two years old. I will turn sixty this fall. Next year I will have a forty-year-old son, a thirty-eight-year-old son, and a thirty-six-year-old son. It is incredible how slowly time went when you were taking a test in school. Or as you are watching a baseball game. But, somehow, one day, you wake up and you are just a few short years away from getting social security.     

You know who doesn’t get old? God. He has just always been. “Before the mountains were born, before you gave birth to the earth and the world, from beginning to end, you are God” (Psalm 90:2). The LORD doesn’t own a watch because time is of no consequence to Him. God transcends time. He sees all of eternity’s past and eternity’s future. As a result, the time that passes on earth is of no consequence to Him. A second is no different from an eon; a billion years pass like seconds to the eternal God. As Psalm 90:4 says, “For you [God], a thousand years are as a passing day, as brief as a few night hours.”

Over the past twenty-six years, I have officiated the funeral of a five-year-old boy, a fifteen-year-old girl, and a forty-two-year-old man, and a 111-year-old woman. Each one precious to God. Each one obviously had a different lifespan. But God isn’t really concerned about the number of days we have here on earth. He is concerned with something far more important – our eternity. The LORD knows I am looking forward to retirement in about eight years so I can spend more time with Nova, but God is really more interested in me spending time with Him. It’s the same thing He wants for all of us.

In the early years of the church, believers were asking where Jesus was? He told the disciples He would return. They thought that meant soon. As the years passed they began to wonder. Why isn’t He here yet like He promised? Peter answers them in his second letter. “The Lord isn’t really being slow about his promise [to return], as some people think. No, he is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed, but wants everyone to repent. But the day of the Lord will come as unexpectedly as a thief. Then the heavens will pass away with a terrible noise, and the very elements themselves will disappear in fire, and the earth and everything on it will be found to deserve judgment” (2 Peter 3:9-10).

Yes, God wants each and every one of us to confess, repent, believe in His Son Jesus, and be saved. I know He loves me. I know He loves Nova. However, where we spend eternity is the most important thing to Him.

Regardless of how many years you have been on this earth or how many you think you have left. The question is, are you ready for the LORD to come as unexpectedly as a thief. One day He will show up. At that point it is too late to make a decision. At that point He will separate the sheep from the goats, the wheat from the chaff, which are just colorful ways of saying separating believers from non-believers. When Jesus does return there will be no warning. Like a thief in the night. Jesus says, “That night two people will be asleep in one bed; one will be taken, the other left. Two women will be grinding flour together at the mill; one will be taken, the other left” (Luke 17:34-35).

I am looking forward to spending more time with Nova. But I’m even more interested in spending eternity with him in heaven.

I do hope you enjoy your time here, however long it may be, but please make sure you are ready for what comes next. That means confessing our sins to God, repenting (changing how we think and live), and believing in Jesus.          

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Remember you can email praises and petitions to southchurchprayer@gmail.com. I lift them up every Wednesday at 4:00 pm on Facebook Live.