Posted on Facebook, a version of this comment received hundreds of likes:
“Hug your children today, because tomorrow they’ll be adults.”
We understand they won’t really turn into adults overnight; it only seems that way. We’ll look back, wonder where the years went, and ask ourselves how our time with them could have slipped away so quickly.
Life is like that. We have to take care of the important things today. Tomorrow is too late. We can never relive the time that slips away when we’re so busy we’re not paying attention to those we love most.
Hosea 13:3 illustrates the transient nature of life.
“Therefore they shall be like the morning mist or like the dew that goes early away, like the chaff that swirls from the threshing floor or like smoke from a window.”
Whatever we touch, it’s here and it’s gone, just that quickly. What, then, should we do? How should we behave? Where is our substance to be found?
1 Corinthians 6:19-20 tells us divine understanding of who we are is our first step.
“Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.”
2 Timothy 2:15 gives us a plan for living day to day.
“Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.”
Ephesians 4:28 says we can change to become new in Christ.
“Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need.”
Let’s look back to Facebook for a moment. Hug your children today. That sums up the Christian message pretty well. Do what’s right, what counts to other people. Show we care. Take time for those who need us. Think of others first. Put our fellow man above our selfish desires. After all, isn’t that what Jesus asked us to do?
Matthew 7:12 reveals the Master’s words:
“So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.”
We call Jesus’ words the Golden Rule, a way of behaving that sums up the teachings of the Bible. When is our time to hug others? Now. Today. This very moment. We have to seize the opportunity while we can, because it will be gone in a puff of smoke, and we can’t bring it back again.
It may be a simple hug to us, but to others, it’s the compassion of Jesus flowing through us, and it makes all the difference in the world to them.
Copyright © 2016 MyChurchNotes.net
Originally Published 4-11-16