The Ideal Escape
It was the best weekend ever!
Reference: For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. (Philippians 1:21 NIV)
Explore: A year ago my husband went away for a weekend. We set up our 20 year old daughter to fend for herself and our 4 and 5 year old stayed with family friends. It felt like it had been ages since Cam and I had had some time to ourselves and we looked forward to these couple of days away.
We decided to drive a couple of hours west to spend a few nights by the beach. This sounded great… until we saw the weather forecast – rain with wind. Not the best climate for a beach escape.
We had no other options by the time the weekend came, so we packed our thermals and headed out.
It was the best weekend ever!
Because we were house bound almost the whole time we slept heaps, I finished a great book that I’d been trying to read for months, and we caught up on all our favourite TV series. And to top it off, we spent hours and hours, just the two of us together.
Application: It would have been easy to see the weekend as a wet and dreary occasion, but looking back we can see some great advantages that the average weather brought.
When the author of the Philippians looked at his life situation he was able to see the best of both worlds. If he was to continue living, he would serve Christ with all he had. If he was to be killed in the process then he would find himself serving Christ with all he had, just in heaven instead of here on earth. He saw it as a win/win.
There are times when life can be tricky or we fear our impending death. However, our faith helps us to live boldly and die boldly.
Nothing can stand in God’s way to connect with us. Let’s not allow anything to stand in our way to connect with God.
Prayer: Lord, forgive us when we fear. May we walk boldly through life into death. Amen.
How do you feel about death?
This article was written by Linda Bailey
Linda started theological studies in 1999 in Australia. After working for ten years in various church ministries, she now works as the breakfast producer at 89.9 LightFM - the Christian radio station in Melbourne, Australia. She writes blogs every day about passages she is currently reading in the Bible. Follow her on Google Plus +Linda Bailey or Facebook by clicking the like button on the right of this page.