life's too short...

I seem to go through "themes" in my life where for a certain period of time, all my moral lessons revolve around one thing - right now, that thing is simply the brevity of life.

I easily seem to determine what's fair and just and "normal," and that I should live to a ripe old age of 80, or whatever the life expectancy for a male in the US is these days, and then die a happy old death from old age. But what I envision seems not to be the case - it's not "fair," so to say, because I don't deserve to live that long. I've constantly been learning that I have to give myself and my will and desires up.

Recently, when I was back home in Blacksburg, my friend James told me that one of his dormmates passed away in what you could call freak accident. This dormmate was riding down a hill on James' longboard, and when he hit a turn, the board fishtailed and he fell off and skidded down the hill on his back, except that his head snapped back and hit the asphalt. He went into a coma and died a few days after.
That sent me a wake-up call, to be sure. Pastor Seth always talks about urgency and how urgent it is for us to act in ministry, for us to do the kingdom work while we're on Earth. But I put it off so easily - after high school, after college, "I'm too young now," etc.. The excuses never end. Even a simple "I'll do missions during the summer" seems ridiculous now, thinking about it. I wouldn't expect a servant of mine to put things off like that, especially when his life is within my control, so why should I expect God to?
No longer do I want to have to have my own time and my time for God separate - to combine them is to be able to serve him wholly as a man of God, and that's what I should be aiming for, not a half-hearted commitment.

And when teenagers, people I know, and people I hear about are dying at exactly my own age, maybe even younger, I feel as if I have no right to proclaim the fact that it's "unfair" for me to die now. He will keep me as long as He has work for me, and my duty is clear: to work for Him, day in and day out, because life's just too short for me to be wasting it on useless things.