A note before this: this reflection is personal, and it's meant to be — this is the one slot in the week where first-person testimony belongs.
In Chapter Two of NOTHING WASTED, we heard a line from "halle-lujah" by Tenroc & nobigdyl.: "I should've been dead and gone, so I just gotta give You thanks."
For most people, that line is a way of describing where they'd be without Jesus. It's true for them, and it's true for me.
But for me, it's also a date.
May 13, 2021
On May 13, 2021, I died.
And Jesus sent me back. He said five words: "There's still so much for you to do."
I've told that story many times, and I'll keep telling it. But this week, listening to these songs, I heard something in it I hadn't fully noticed before.
Days I Wasn't Supposed to Have
Every day since May 13, 2021, has been a day I wasn't supposed to have.
That changes how you think about how you spend them. I don't have the luxury of treating my days like they're unlimited. I don't have time to waste on things that don't matter. Every one of them was handed to me — like bread at the table — with a purpose attached.
The Part I'm Still Learning
Here's what I'm still learning, and it's why this week's theme hit me the way it did.
Knowing your days are borrowed can make you afraid. Afraid you'll spend them wrong. Afraid the hard days — and there are hard days, days the work costs more than it used to — are somehow wasted days. Afraid that the parts nobody sees don't count.
1 Corinthians 15:58 answers that fear: "Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain."
Not in vain. Not the visible days or the invisible ones. Not the good days or the hard ones.
Why This Matters for You
You may not have a date like mine. But your days are borrowed too — everyone's are. "My life is but a vapor," the finale says.
So spend them. Give yourself fully. Carry what He's asked you to carry, even when it leaves splinters.
He'll make sure none of it is wasted.
— JDOT Pine
