Living The Dash Series

Living The Dash

(What you do with your life matters)

One Month To Live (part one)

WOW – last Sunday was an incredible day… God really spoke to us His people in a huge way about what His Son accomplished on that first Easter Sunday 2000 years ago. THAT’S – why we decided to leave the Easter Door up for one more week… TO REMIND – each of us, that Jesus is STILL alive – that the wall between us and God (between us and the life God created us to live) is STILL knocked down and that the Easter Door (the door of forgiveness, restoration and hope) is STILL open for you to walk through and experience: forgiveness, restoration and hope.

OKAY – I want to read 4 passages as we begin today… THEN – we’ll invite God into our time this morning…

God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity he restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in him.

– Romans 8:29 (Msg)

God wants us to grow up… like Christ in everything. We take our lead from Christ, who is the source of everything we do. – Ephesians 4:15 (Msg)

In your lives you must think and act like Christ Jesus. - Phil 2:5

Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the miracles themselves. I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. – John 14:11,12

Prayer…

BACK – in the early 1980’s I was in the USN stationed in Newport News and I lived in Yorktown Va. I attended a church there (Lebanon Church of Christ) that was started in 1825 and surrounded by history. Across the street from the church was the house where George Washington slept on his way to the battle of Yorktown. The chapel we met in on Sunday nights was built in the early 1860’s and was occupied during the Civil War. FIRST – by the Confederate Army who turned it into a commissary and then later by the Union Army who turned it into a stable. Outside of the chapel was a cemetery.

A lot of times either before or after church I would walk through the small cemetery reading the names and looking at the dates on the gravestones. IT – was crazy seeing the names of people who lived over 100 years ago and who fought in the civil war. I would find myself wondering what life was like in the mid 1800’s.

AND - looking at those tombstones, I couldn’t help but notice that when all was said and done that entire lives were reduced to two dates and one little dash. I would look at the dash of a particular person’s marker and wondered, What did they live for? Who did they love? What were their passions and dreams? What were their biggest mistakes and greatest regrets?

OKAY - I want to asked you to do something that I asked some of you to do back on December 30th. TAKE OUT - a pen if you haven’t already (share if you need to). AND - what I want you to do, (on the tombstone provided in your notes) is to write your name and then underneath it write when you were born – (now you can hide it with your hand if you want to) – then put a dash and then I want you to write 20__ __. Because we don’t know what the day is. Go ahead and do this – and as you are writing yours I write down mine…

(Yeah, that was a little creepy, wasn’t it?)

NOW - I want you to look at your tombstone. LISTEN – every one of us has one of those days on left. And we all mark that day. We celebrate that day. We eat cake, blow out candles and receive gifts on that day. YES - we all have one of those days on the left and do you know what we all have one of those other days too. UNDERSTAND - one day that right hand date will also be completely filled out. NOW – we don’t really like to think about it all that much – but it’s inevitable, it’s coming.

AND JUST AS - we had no control over that first date (I MEAN - I didn’t say, “Okay Thursday 6:30 am February 4th 1960 – this looks like a good day,” No, I just kind of showed up) - we also, for the most part have no real control over that other date, the day we will die, the day our physical bodies will leave this earth, the day our life here is over…