From Dust To Dust

“For what happens to the children of man and what happens to the beasts is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and man has no advantage over the beasts, for all is vanity. All go to one place. All are from the dust, and to dust all return.”

~Ecclesiastes 3:19-20

I’ve always had an affinity for cemeteries. I always felt sorry for the people who were in them, and my cousins and I used to take flowers to the graves who had none. In the 8^th grade, my school was across the road from one, so on nights of school dances, my friends and I would sneak off to go ghost hunting. We told stories of the dead and scared the pants off one another so that eventually, we all ran back to the school, sure a ghost or one of the resurrected dead was chasing us. Even now, although I no longer believe in ghosts, or think if I find a tombstone with the date of death the same as my date of birth that it means I’m going to drop dead, I still like going to cemeteries, especially old ones. I find a certain peace there, but I am also brought to the certainty of the finality of life. We are all going to die and whether we end up six feet under, or in the kiln at 1800 degrees, it’s the road everything with breath will eventually follow.

“These all look to You, to give them their food in due season. When You give it to them, they gather it up; when You open Your hand, they are filled with good things. When You hide Your face, they are dismayed; when You take away their breath, they die and return to their dust (Psalm 104:27-29).”

I cannot stress enough the importance of knowing Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. In the spectrum of time, our lives are but a moment before we lapse into eternity. And it is there that we will stand before the Maker of the universe and answer for our lives on earth. We have one life to get this right, and while we will make mistakes as fallible humans, there is only one thing that will separate us from the love of God and that’s to ignore who Jesus Christ is and what He did on the Cross for each of us. That is an eternal mistake that cannot be undone after we die. Even up to the moment of death, we have the choice to accept Christ and change our eternal place from one of devastation and separation to one of joyous revelation and union with our Lord. If you haven’t accepted Christ as your Savior, don’t wait another moment. You may have a hundred years left on earth, or you may have just minutes, only God knows for sure, so don’t trade your eternal soul for a few minutes of earthly pleasure.

“Seek the Lord while He may be found; call upon Him while He is near; let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the Lord, that He may have compassion on him, and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon. ‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,’ declares the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts’ (Isaiah 55:6-9).”

Read Ezekiel 11-16

©2018 Marie McGaha