As another year is about to draw to a close it is a suitable time to reflect on the fleeting nature of time and on the use we are making of the time given to us. We are at present in a time state but soon, oh how soon, must time give place to eternity. For those who have reached middle life or have come to old age, as they look back on the years that have gone and think of so many whom they knew here but who are now inhabiting eternity, there comes an awareness that time is swiftly passing and the great eternity drawing near. How clear it is that the place which knows us now shall soon know us no more for ever. Yet how slow we are to lay it to heart.
Time hastens on, passing almost unnoticed. Moments swiftly fly. We are carried along inexorably on the wings of time. A moment passes and it is gone for ever, never to return until time shall be no more. Only then shall those moments of misspent time re-appear to be a swift witness against us at the day of judgment and to seal our eternal doom if we die impenitent. Misspent moments and hours and days and years will be the charge laid against many when they appear to give in their account.
As this year begins to close let us reflect and think back on the days and the years that are gone. How have we spent these years and days and moments of time? Have we to confess sadly that they have been spent in “seeking our own, and not the things that are Jesus Christ’s?” If so, how solemnly we should reflect upon such a course of life. If I have to say that this has been my manner of life from my youth up, must I not ask myself whether this is going to be the manner of my life to the end of my days. Let each one reflect on this for himself or herself. Let each one address these questions to his own or her own soul — Must I go on as I have gone on hitherto? Is there any way of escape from a Christless and Godless and self-centred life? Is it possible that even so far along the course of time there is deliverance for such a sinner as I? After so many misspent moments and hours and years, is it possible for such a one as I am to begin to live unto God?
Let us now look at the answer to such questions as these. To find the answer let us go to the 37th chapter of the prophecy of Ezekiel. There we find the same question put — Can these dry bones live? And what was the answer given? As well as the command to prophesy unto the dry bones, the answer was given in these terms — “Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.” Oh, what encouragement is here, poor needy sinner. Is there not here what will lift up your drooping spirits? In Christ there is salvation and by the breathing of His Spirit even your needy soul may live and in living “taste and see that God is good.” By faith in Christ’s Name, the closing days of this year may become the beginning of days to you and herald the approaching glory of that endless day of eternal bliss which has a beginning but knows no end.