How Can I Stop Wasting the Life God Has Given Me?

The harsh electronic ringtone woke me out of deep sleep. I dreaded these calls.

Living multiple time zones from family meant a middle-of-the-night call meant bad news. I had already received several of these calls in the last few years, and that history meant that my brain immediately began to grasp what was happening.

The screen showed: Dad. The conversation was short, and the summary was that a
good friend of mine had been killed in a vehicle accident. No details, just finality.

I remember hanging up the call and lying there in the dark next to my wife with hot tears streaming down the side of my face. I hadn’t spoken to him in years. The distance of growing older and separate continents meant that our lives had diverged and hadn’t rejoined, but I always thought they would.

The Brevity of Life

Solomon wrestled with the unfairness of life’s brevity. The same event happens to both the good and the bad, the righteous and the unjust. He named this evil. Indeed, it is the direct result of evil coming into the world.

Solomon says in Ecclesiastes 9:5:

For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing, and they have no more reward, for the memory of them is forgotten.

Then he goes on to say in verse 7:

Go, eat your bread with joy, and drink your wine with a merry heart, for God has already approved what you do.

Two Wrong Reactions to Mortality

Solomon understood that life is short and that there are a couple of incorrect reactions to that truth.

The first negative reaction would be to mourn life before it’s gone. To shut down in fear of what may be instead of enjoying what is. You can’t enjoy life because in your mind, you’ve already decided it’s over. What is the use?

The other negative reaction is to take the idea of YOLO (circa 2012). You are going to die, so literally live like today is your last and take chances as if you won’t live to see tomorrow. A sneaky, hedonistic fatalism that says it doesn’t actually matter. It’s going to happen, so why worry? Eat, drink, for tomorrow we die.

If Life Is Short, What Should I Do?

The Stoics wrote about this idea of Memento Mori. Remember that you will die. View everything you do today through the lens of time's fleeting nature, and prioritize what matters. It is the brevity of life that makes it so precious.

Jason Isbell captured the idea of time in our relationships, and the joy and sadness that comes with it.

Maybe time running out is a gift
I'll work hard 'til the end of my shift
And give you every second I can find
And hope it isn't me who's left behind
It's knowing that this can't go on forever
Likely one of us will have to spend some days alone
Maybe we'll get forty years together
But one day I'll be gone or one day you'll be gone

Not a happy sentiment for a love song, but a realistic one. Remember that you are
going to die and in light of this, prioritize your life and your relationships.

Solomon strikes a balance between the extremes. Know you are going to die. Accept that this is unfair and it is evil. Acknowledge that it doesn’t seem right that you share the same fate as the evil neighbor. Enjoy the simple pleasures of life that God has given you.

What are you spending your time on right now? If you look at your time as a priceless, limited resource, are you happy with how you are spending it? Are the motivations of your heart God-centered in a way that you can see the simple gifts He has given?

Ask God for wisdom today on how to live your days. Make Him your focus, and these other things will be added (Matt. 6:33).