Are you in the process of learning to live healthier? Maybe your New Year’s resolution was to eat better, exercise, or in some other way improve your physical health? Join us for the next few days as we offer scripture, insight, and encouragement to help on that journey.
Today’s scripture: Ecclesiastes 9:7-10 (NRSV) (The Message) (KJV) What might God be saying to me?
My thoughts (Tyler Connoley):
Get on with it! Eat joyfully. And drink with a merry heart. For God has long ago approved what you do. Always dress up, and never forget to shower. Enjoy life with the one you love all the fleeting days of your life on this earth. This life is your reward, and this work is all you have on earth. Whatever you find to do, do it well. For there is no doing, planning, or thinking in the land of the dead where you are going. (Ecc 9:7-10, author’s translation)
Some of us need to make resolutions to party less, eat less, drink less. Others of us — and I’m one of these — need to make resolutions to live more. We get so caught up in the things we think we ought to do that we never do the things we want to do.
Maybe you never enjoy the food on your plate, because it’s only a fueling stop before you run off to your next obligation. Maybe you’ve vowed never to dress up for a party until you can finally fit into that cocktail dress that’s three sizes too small for you. Maybe you rarely enjoy your family and loved ones, because you’re too busy with the “big important things” of life — as if the people you love aren’t important. Or maybe you slack off at your job, because it’s not the high-powered position you aspire to.
Whatever your reasons for not living, the author of Ecclesiastes challenges you to get on with it. Stop making excuses, and start living. Not tomorrow, today. One of my favorite fictional characters put it another way. Auntie Mame said, “Life is a banquet, and most poor suckers are starving to death.”
Thought for the day: Are you waiting to die before you start living? Why not do some living now?
We encourage you to include a time of prayer with this reading. If you need a place to get started, consider the suggestions on the How to Pray page.