I am often asked about my end game in life. In response, I look to 2 Timothy 1, Colossians 1:28, Titus 2, Matthew 28:18-20, and Acts 1:8 as my guiding principles. My end goal is to finish well, living this life for the glory of God and committing all my actions to Him. I strive to do everything well and represent Him rightly, redeeming my time on earth for eternity. Although my efforts may be feeble, I rely on His grace for completion.
I believe that it’s not how we start, but how we finish that matters most. Paul’s life serves as a prime example of finishing well. Despite facing numerous challenges, Paul persevered and passed the torch to Timothy, encouraging him to continue the race. Finishing strong requires courage, which is intentionally supplied by God. No matter what hardships we face, we become our best selves when we align our direction with God, rely on His grace, delight in His mercy, and keep hope for eternal life.
I have found goal-setting and decision-making to be profitable through prayer, Bible study, reading, and receiving counsel. David Gibson’s book, Living Life Backward, provides an excellent exposition of the book of Ecclesiastes, and its questions for personal reflection have been helpful. Here are a few quotes from the book, with the last being the best:
“Where are you going? What is the goal of your life? What is it that you want out of life more than anything else? What do you want to be remembered for when you’re gone? What is your legacy?”
“We don’t live forward until we learn how to live backward.”
“We should not be surprised if life is often paradoxical and apparently contradictory; we are living life backward.”
Death can radically enable us to enjoy life. By relativizing all that we do in our days under the sun, death can change us from people who want to control life for gain into people who find deep joy in receiving life as a gift…life in God’s world is a gift, not gain.
If you haven’t ever wondered why what you do matters, given that you will be a forgotten nobody one day, you haven’t thought much about the reality of death.
The very limitation that death introduces can instruct us about life. Think of it as death’s helping hand.
But the wise person sits at the funeral home and stares at the coffin and realizes that one day it will be his turn. The wise person asks himself, “When it is my turn, what will my life have been worth? What will they be saying about me?” He loved his bowling and his partying and his holidays. Is that it?
The sermons death preaches can tell us more about the way we love and the way we live than we ever realize is actually going on while we love and live.
To die well means I realize death is not simply something that happens to me; it happens to me because I am a sinner.
Preparing to die means thinking about how to live.
The path of wisdom along life’s road is to enjoy the gifts God has given you, the simple things that give you pleasure…God takes pleasure in your pleasure.
Ecclesiastes urges us to think about life under the sun from the perspective of life above the sun…Think about time from the standpoint of eternity. What you do, and how you do it, matters because God will bring everything and everyone to the day of judgment.
Your friendships aren’t there to bolster your confidence or your security or self-image so that you can now go and do something with your life. Don’t use people like that; your friendships are themselves the gift.
Putting one foot in the grave is the way to plant the other on the path of life.
Human destiny rests on a word of divine promise.
We can labor for Christ while we live, and we can live with Christ when we die. Your death and the judgment to follow – the great fixed points of your life – are the very things that can reach back from the future into today and transform the life God has given you to live.
Debbie Swindell 