There is power in this moment. Don’t miss it. Don’t let it rush by you. Grasp it, taste it, savor it. This moment will be unlike any other you will ever encounter. This moment is the key to the rest of your life. Have you ever stopped to consider the decision you make in this moment will have ripple effects cascading into all the moments to follow?
That’s amazing, and more than a little frightening. It means this moment matters. It means every moment matters. None are to be carelessly tossed aside or ignored. Each moment carries within it a small fragment of eternity. We should be careful with them.
It takes patience to live each moment to the fullest. We want to rush ahead and grab the next moment, but we do so at the peril of the one we currently hold. At least in Western culture, we are rarely fully present, fully engaged in what is transpiring in the moment before us. We waste our moments splintering our attention between things that matter and things that don’t. We sacrifice conversations and relationships for the sake of checking our social media feeds, email, or distracted by what’s on the television. Moments that matter are squashed without thought but with much consequence.
I see this played out in the lives of Christians desperate to find what it is God wants them to do with their lives. Convinced they are on a quest for some hidden treasure somewhere in the future, they forget to dig where they are to see what might be underfoot. Have you ever considered you may be in this moment in precisely the place God intended for you to end up? What if instead of looking to the horizon, we lowered our gaze to discover by whom and what we are currently surrounded? Wouldn’t it be amazing to discover after all your striving, after all your anguished prayers, you had actually arrived?
We’ll never know if where we are is where we’re meant to be if we won’t take a breath and examine this moment in time. We’ve arrived here due in large part to choices and decisions we’ve made in moments past. All the moments of our life have led to this one. Doesn’t it make sense to stop and examine it? How will we ever know we’ve arrived at our destination if we never slow down enough to read the signs?
All of life is this moment. The only thing that matters is now. You may be standing on the very treasure you’ve been building all your life. Each step of obedience to Jesus brings us one step closer to fulfilling the work He has given us to do. We have choices to make in this moment. We can obey, or we can reject. We can love, or we can despise. We can serve, or we can demand service. We can pause, or we can run ahead. All this and more will occur in this moment. This is your life. This is everything. This moment is yours to cherish or to throw away. What will you do?