Oh, how true I’m finding this. I wake up with more creaking and go to bed with more grunting. I do not feel old, but I guess I’m feeling older. New doctors, athletes and actors who all were older than me, surprisingly are now younger than me. I do not feel old, but I guess I’m feeling older. And older eventually means wasting away.
It's probably been within the past five years that I’ve been feeling older. And it’s only that sense of the slow march of time that would allow me to read this sentence from Paul and pause. When I was young, it seemed like young was a perpetual state; I could not imagine anything about me wasting away. Now, I get a glimpse.
I have a friend who’d said that if you assume that 80 is about the end of many lives, or at least productive lives, you can divide your life into quarters. Birth to 20, 20-40, 40-60, and finally 60-80. She was struck when she hit 60 to think that she was in the final quarter. Yes, people live beyond 80, but the concept still holds. I’m heading into the final quarter. The outside is wasting away indeed.
But I can also attest that the second part of Paul’s comment is increasingly true for me too. Our inner nature is being renewed day by day. I am hearing or reading parts of Scripture for the 100th time, and it sounds brand new. I have new understanding and appreciation for Jesus, and what he means to me. I have an increasingly committed sense of my calling on this earth and to God’s children.
It's too bad we can’t have some of the inner renewal and understanding when our outward bodies don’t creak and groan. But maybe we wouldn’t sit still long enough to hear, or be focused enough to understand. For now, I’m grateful for the time I’ve spent in this game, regardless of the quarter I’m in, and actually grateful for some time sitting on the bench, watching, thinking and being renewed.
No comments:
Post a Comment