This is probably the third post that I attempted with the title of....Thoughts From A Greybeard....insights that cannot come from a seminary. They are thoughts emanating from God's Word that require many decades to see beyond the obvious of what the words may say....to an actual experiential knowledge. It is almost as if God saved this blessing for older Christians....to give them something when their energies and physical and mental abilities wain....even vital blessings....but like all other blessings....younger believers may not want or even recognize what they are hearing.
If you are anywhere near my age....you might think of....say twenty to pick a round number....celebrities from the entertainment world from when you were young....Redford....Spencer Tracy....Bogart....Hepburn.....Fonda.....Elvis.....Sinatra. Each one of them at the time....had it all.....at least as far as we in the public knew.....money....fame.....even power. They received what they wanted from this world....and used it....whether for good or bad or in-between. They were the obvious winners.....to be asked for an autograph if you had the chance. It was their day....and they seized that day. Some may have died alone....from drugs....others may had lived into their eighties...with five kids and twenty-five grandkids. Some had a handle on their life....and some beat others with a handle in their hands.
Just about all of these men and women.....not all....there are still the Redfords and the Fondas and the Jaggers and the Dylans out there....but most of them are dead and buried....and just about all of them if they are still alive are wrinkled up and almost unrecognizable. A recent short video interview with one of the younger ones....Jeff Bridges....comes to mind. They had their day. It must have been fun. I would have taken that path if I could....and surely proceeded to destroy myself....but it is now either over or near over.
Not a whole of surprises or profundity yet right....everyone gets old and dies? I heard a second-hand story just three days ago....a card party of ladies.....some elderly....and the conversation is always light....but this day one of those ladies....ninety-three years old....surprised with this thoughtful comment...."Has anyone thought about what happens after we die? There's some kind of eternity after we die?" From what I heard....that was the end of that train of thought.....but when I heard the story I was amazed. People that old....from my experience....usually have no questions or even concern about what happens when they die....they're too tired to think about that stuff....but here was one....who maybe after ninety years of not knowing Jesus Christ....might yet come to know of His glory and mercy! I've been praying and thinking about this since hearing this ladies comments.
This past Lord's Day....an associate pastor at John MacArthur's church was in the pulpit....I can't even remember his name.....and he told this second-hand story.....from John Piper.....the short version of which was....'an eighty or ninety year old man was converted during a sermon.....and after the sermon.....he cried and cried....just muttering about how he had wasted his life all those years.'
So speaking here primarily to the young....who today observes....idolizes....their own idols out there....the Taylor Swifts of today....take the time and look to what happened in the past. This fame can go on for a lifetime....but it has an end....Mick Jagger types notwithstanding. Go ahead and....'enjoy'....this cultural lifestyle if you wish....but the day will come.....it cannot be put off forever....and a figure will stand before you....blazing in its glory and holiness....and as they say.....it will be time to pay the piper....(not John Piper)
If you are old like me.....hey....I may not see the river yet.....but I can hear it.....and I may not see the Celestial City yet.....but I can hear the rejoicing! (These are allegorical terms from John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress) If for even a moment you may think that it's too late.....let me say this....yeah.....you will cry for a time thinking that you wasted your life.....we all cry for the things we have not done for our Lord....and things we have done....but you will be as....locked-in....to salvation....every bit as much as was Billy Graham who lived to be months shy of 100 years old!
So if you will....whether you are young or old....look to these celebrities of the past who are still alive. Is this really what you would want in your old age? I knew this man once....thirty years ago....he was in his upper 80s....and walked with very short steps....and very careful steps. He was then alone in life....and took care of his classic orange Oldsmobile Cutlass....and drove it to church every Lord's Day....and always gave the most edifying and beautiful greeting....in a low voice for he could not speak any louder. It was obvious that he had been humble and meek his whole life. He is now living in glorious rapture in the kingdom of his Lord and his Savior and his king! Who won in this folks....the celebrity who received praises from men for ninety or a hundred years....satisfied only in that his or her legacy will keep his or her name alive....or this gentle man....who became a king....with a crown....only to throw that crown in thanksgiving and worship at the feet of the King of Kings?
