Living Life To The Fullest

                Two very well-known movie stars....one who died relatively young a few years ago....the other still going strong today. They had worked together on on a film thirty years ago. I came across this comment from the one actor of his friend...."He wanted to live life to the fullest." It's a phrase that we hear fairly often.
                Without getting into specifics....I have the opportunity....not rarely but not infrequently either....to watch over an elderly person. It's somewhat odd using that phrase....'elderly person'....with him because he is only sixteen years older than I am. I spent a few hours yesterday literally pounding the weights in a Planet Fitness....and then walking for a few miles....and this person cannot walk across the room without assistance of some kind....sixteen years difference! We do not know what a day brings....and our life as it pertains to our physical bodies is not linear....in other words.....our bodies do not degenerate as if on a straight line on a graph. I do not know if I will need assistance a year from now....or months from now....or tomorrow!
                 My wife and I have had similar caregiving opportunities with the elderly for many decades....and the story is always the same. Maybe these folks had....'lived their lives to the fullest'.....as the saying goes.....until age overtook them....but their lives near the end were similar.....television all day....in the background....the Wheel of Fortune....or whoever the latest daytime talk or game show host may be....maybe a movie....maybe a soap.....maybe a game of cards? 
                 So did this famous actor really live life to the fullest? In reading his biography it surely seems like a life lived to the fullest....movie stardom...flying planes....jumping out of them! The other actor keeps making films....and making the news. Has he lived life to the fullest? The answer is that neither of these men lived or are living life to the fullest.....nor have any of these talk show hosts....or the audiences that fill the television studios....cheering on cue the inanities presented to them as entertainment.
                 So I'm sitting here listening to the game show host....this from another room....say something about....'curtain number one'....and it's as if I want to cry. The glories of Jesus Christ are on the other side of a threshold….but they cannot turn their gaze away from the pixelated screen.
                 Living life to the fullest? We all will be aware of the full extent of what that means the moment after we die. As it stands right now with me....living life to the fullest involves in part almost breaking down in tears watching people that are lost....but do not even know it. Living life to the fullest also involves rejoicing....for it is a pilgrimage that we are on....always moving....meeting new people....crying at times....petitioning God always....laughing....struggling....repenting....always vigilant....and praising God for the mercies of just letting this pilgrimage go on!