What Is Your Life?

E.R. Hall Jr.

“For what is your life? It is even as a vapor, that appeareth for a little time and then vanisheth away.” (James 4:14).

How true that is! How often have you thought of things in the past which you thought were only a couple years ago but it turned out to have been five or six years? Also, it seems the older we get the faster time passes. When we think of our childhood it doesn’t seem that long ago. We think of a class reunion which seems that we only graduated five years or so ago, and yet it turns out to be our twentieth or twenty-fifth year reunion. Sometimes it is a little frightening to be made to realize how swiftly our years are passing.

Regardless of peoples’ religious or philosophical views, one thing we all can agree on is that our life is going to end one day. Let this cause us to think soberly on ‘what is your life’? We must acknowledge God’s Word as the “instruction manual” by which to pattern and put together our lives. It contains “…all things that pertain unto life…” (2 Peter 1:3) and it can make us “…throughly furnished unto all good works.” (2 Timothy 3:16,17).

From its pages we can learn that “…it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment” (Hebrews 9:27) and that “we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; …” (2 Corinthians 5:10). We must realize that what we do while we are living is the basis on which we will be judged. The rest of 2 Corinthians 5:10 says, “…that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.” Some have the idea that judgment is going to have God put all our good we do on one side and all the bad we do on the other side and whichever outweighs will determine the verdict. Not so! Ezekiel 18:21-32 shows that when a wicked man repents and does the will of God, all his transgressions will not be mentioned unto him. However, if the righteous turns away and sins and does not repent, all the righteousness he has done will not be mentioned. God has no pleasure in the death of the wicked (verse 32) but “precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.” (Psalms 116:15).

So, what is your life? Do you know God, have you obeyed the gospel, and living faithful to God’s Word? If not, Jesus is coming “in flaming fire taking vengeance…” and you “shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power.” (2 Thessalonians 1:7-9). Only if our life is a life “…faithful unto death”, then Jesus says, “…I will give thee a crown of life.” (Revelation 2:10).