Today is the last day of the year 2023. Most of our last days are spent in regret. For example:
- When our children leave home and marry that person that we have been praying for all their lives. That is usually a bittersweet sad day. It’s the last day our child will look to us above other relationships. From this point on they are to leave and cleave to the one they have promised themselves to until death parts them.
- The last day of high school for our child is another milestone we mark with a celebration until they leave for college. I remember our first son was going to be at a school twelve and a half hours from our home. After we left the school, I cried all the way home. Yet, I knew it was the right thing to do. It was time to spread his wings and live life by the principles we had taught him. Unfortunately, we always wish we would have done more to prepare them, but those moments are now gone.
This day, the last day of the year we people all over the world celebrate. We comment that we are putting the year behind us and hoping for a better one. We celebrate as if there is something magical about turning the calendar page, but there isn’t! If it is God’s will, we will wake up tomorrow much the same way we did today. Just about everything will be the same as it was the day before. If we are prepared for the day, that will be good, if not, it’s not a big deal. Things we didn’t get done today we will do tomorrow or next week, or whenever. However, one day there will be a last day, a day we take our last breath and there will be no do-overs. When that day comes, everything we have done in life will boil down to one truth. What have we done with Jesus? This Jesus is the one only a week ago we were celebrating as the newborn King. This Jesus is who we will meet when we take our last breath and live our last day on this earth. In Hebrews 9:27, it is clear we will die, and when we do, we will stand before God and be judged either for the works we have done as His child or as one who has rejected Him and will then be doomed to Hell forever. In Genesis 3:19, God punished mankind for sinning against Him by declaring that one day he would die, and his physical body would return to the earth.
Hebrews 9:27 “And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:”
Genesis 3:19 “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it was thou taken for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.”
II Corinthians 5:10 “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.”
For those who have accepted Him as their personal Savior, it will be the best last day ever! It may be that Jesus comes before we die. Whenever he does, that will be the last day on this earth, but we will be transformed. We will receive a glorified body. A perfect body, now that sounds good to this aging aching body. When He comes, those who are His and died before He returns will come with Him. In the book of I Thessalonians, we find Paul explaining to those who are perplexed about where their loved ones are, and if they will see them again. I can hear Paul telling them to not sorrow but to have hope. If they believe Jesus died and rose again, then those who died knowing Him are with Him and will return with Him. He will descend from Heaven. It will not be a quiet entrance like he made when He came as a baby. It will be with a shout, with the voice of the archangel. A trumpet will blow and all those whose spirits have been with Him since they died will be reunited with a new body as the graves burst open. If we are among those who are still alive, we will experience our last day on earth and our first day in Heaven!
I Thessalonians 4:13-17 “But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”
For His saints, our last day here will not be bad. It will be sad for those we leave behind, but we will experience the best last and the best first in an instant. When He ushers us into Heaven our joy will be full and nothing we have ever experienced will compare. Just think of the ones you have waiting on you there, no they are not sitting around waiting for us to get there, they are having the time of their lives! Are you ready for your last day here? I challenge you to live every day this next year as if it were your last day on earth.
Even thinking about this makes me want to shout “Come quickly Lord Jesus.”
