They will still bear fruit in old age, healthy and green, to declare: “The Lord is just; He is my rock..”
I have always been blessed with an abundance of energy. The normal pace for me has been more of a steady trot than a walk. People are always saying to me… “slow down, relax, take it easy”. But that has never been my body’s pace! I liken myself to the EverReady Bunny, as I just keep ‘going and going’, which I’m sure gets some help every now and then from my pacemaker.
My eyes see something that needs doing or that is going to create a problem, and my body jumps into high gear trying to correct the situation. I sometimes liken it to a ‘Martha’ syndrome, as it often distracts me from what is really needed at the time.
In the last couple of years, I have noticed a troubling change happening in my old body. I have these young energetic eyes, that has my brain convinced they belong in a young body! Well… that is until my young eyes look in a mirror and I think “Who is this person? And why are you invading my body and sabotaging my trot?” Or… until my old body balks and says to my young eyes “I quit”, and completely runs out of fuel even though I just refilled the tank!
Sometimes my old body says “time to stop and rest”, so I sit down in a chair and then horror of horrors, a few times my old body has fallen asleep amid thoughts of what my young eyes are itemizing needs doing. Much to my dismay my old body is taking over more and more of my young eyes delusional territory.
However, I have noticed an upside to this dilemma in which I now find myself. The times that my old body forces me to rest has opened up some wonderful opportunities for me to listen and talk more with Jesus. It helps me to pay more attention to the problems of others around me. This gives me the opportunity to pray for them, often right there on the spot. And that seems to satisfy my young eyes and old body at the same time.
That is until I hear the words “alright time to rock and roll!” That’s when my young eyes snap open and my old body feels young again, gung-ho to tag along with whatever work Jesus has put before me.
Here’s what I get from tagging along with Jesus.
- Adventures of which I could never have dreamed or imagined.
- Gifts graciously endowed that I could never accomplish on my own.
- A heart overflowing with love for others. Even those with whom I don’t see eye to eye.
- A Joy unstoppable, unspeakable. I can’t explain it. It is just there, even in the down times.
- A glimpse of eternal splendor. Wow! Talk about ‘out of this world’.
- A body that may look old to others, but God sees as an instrument He can still use to accomplish His purposes.
- Young eyes that somehow know Jesus will give my old body the strength to accomplish these adventures.
So all you old and aging bodies out there, comfort yourselves with this thought… In Heaven’s time, I am considered a ‘Babe in the Woods’, and as far as eternity is concerned well… my eyes and my body are both in the ‘infancy stage’. Syb Brodie