Here One Moment And Gone The Next

On June 18, 2025, I had a close encounter of the wrong kind. A vehicle on a two lane road was passing other vehicles and coming toward me in my lane. Only because I quickly turned to the right allowing the passing vehicle to squeeze between my car and the one being passed was an accident prevented.

This serves as a reminder that every day the unexpected can happen that could take our life. Psalm 39:5 says, ”Behold, you have made my days a few handbreaths, and my lifetime is nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath.”  A handbreath is the measure from the thumb to the little finger. This is a reminder of how fleeting life can be. We can be here one second and gone the next. James 4:14 further adds, “Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.”

We must make every day count with purpose and not drift along with the flow of the culture. What is my purpose? It is to live a godly and obedient life of faith that honors God, and to continue to use my gift of writing to spread the gospel to those who have no hope and purpose for living. This is why I am still here.

I became very angry at the driver who could have made my wife a widow and left my son without a dad. However, my anger had to be replaced with thankfulness that by the grace of God I am still here. One or two seconds could have made the difference. It wasn’t my time to leave this life.

When it is my time to go, I know where I am going to spend eternity. In Revelation 21:3-5 the Bible describes heaven as a place where all people would like to go. However, it also mentions a place of eternal darkness with fire and weeping and gnashing of teeth. Read Matthew 13:42 & 50, Matthew 25:46, and Revelation 21:8.

Where one spends eternity depends upon one thing. That one thing is what a person believes about Jesus Christ. Believing that He was simply a good teacher, or lived a good moral life, or was a prophet, will not get you to heaven. To believe that makes Him nothing more than a mortal human like the rest of us. One must believe that Jesus is the son of God in human flesh. He died on the cross for your sins and mine, but rose from the dead. He is the one and only Savior for all of humanity and each individual person. “Believe in the name of the son of God that you may know that you have eternal life”(1 John 5:13).

If you have not already done so, accept Jesus as your savior today. Then you will have the assurance of spending eternity in God‘s Presence in heaven, in case the unexpected happens.