Tomorrow May Never Come

Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring forth. (Proverbs 27:1 NIV)

Beautiful One, if today was your last day on earth, would you be satisfied with what you did with the time given to you? Would you regret not making the most of the opportunities afforded to you? Would you have said everything your heart desired, or would you leave someone behind in confusion and pain?

Do you have some unfinished business? Are you putting it off? Are you avoiding some people and situations, hoping they will go away and magically work themselves out? Do you think that by confronting the truth of a situation, that it will leave you vulnerable and exposed? It probably will, but why not tie up loose ends? Why do we wait, putting off for tomorrow what we have the power to change today?

Beautiful One, tomorrow may never come.

I recently visited a friend who is also a co-worker. She has a beautiful smile, an adorable laugh, and she is one of the sweetest people I know. It was a visit I never anticipated; he was in the ICU in a medically induced coma, fighting for her life. Just five days earlier she was at work, smiling and laughing. Imagine my surprise when I found out she was in the hospital with a fifty percent chance to live.

It is a shocking and unbelievable turn of events. It took the reality of the situation for the truth to sink in; tomorrow may never come for my friend.

Beautiful One, the fact is no one is promised tomorrow. I think deep down we know this, but because we don't focus on it, we tend to put things off. Sometimes we allow wounded relationships to remain severed. We sometimes forget that any our untreated pain will fester and never go away.

We may even allow years to go by before picking up the phone and attempt to reconcile with someone. The wounds may be great and the anger may still be present, but our hearts long for mended relationship. Through the process of time we become either too afraid to reach out, fearing more pain through rejection, or we're just prideful. Neither will heal us. The two will only serve us spoonfuls of misery. Witnessing my friends situation has caused me to ponder life and the relationships that mean the most to me.

During our lifetimes, we will experience many fulfilling relationships; we also will experience being hurt and wounded. The heart we gave away to someone is sometimes given back to us tattered and torn in pieces. Love is wonderful and beautiful, but it can also be painful. Only until we experience the many faces of love for ourselves does this truth become real to us. Today let us examine our lives under the microscope of the here and now. Forget about yesterday, it's gone. The things that happened cannot be undone. Yesterday can only be learned from. Tomorrow may come, maybe not, which of us really knows? Are we willing to risk it, when we have the power to do something today?

Is there someone who needs to hear from you? Do you need to ask forgiveness of someone you wounded, even if you didn't mean to? Do you need to lay aside the family pride for a moment and call a family member? Maybe they have hurt you, but, have you yourself never hurt anyone? Can you cast a stone at anyone for something that you are guilty of as well?

Beautiful One, no one holds their newborn baby and hopes for an estranged relationship years later. Who walks down the isle one day and says "I do," only to embrace walking into court a few years later, regretting they did? Who loves a friend and confides in them then gets enjoyment out of turning their back on them? Which one of us wakes up one morning and decides to become an alcoholic, or drug addict by nighttime? Who really longs to hurt and push away the ones we love? But because we are hurting, we do, only what we know.

The truth remains that life will present many faces to us. We will wrestle with our own demons, we each will be hurt, and inflict pain on  others. We are people; flawed and fallible.The question we must answer is; can we effectively and objectionably judge ourselves accurately? Can we overlook offenses, because deep down we know we are capable of many ourselves? Or, will we continue to walk out this life, holding onto wounds, pointing our fingers at others actions, never looking to our own? 

Doing this will surely sew a patch of sadness over our hearts and ultimately cause us to be depleted of our joy and strength. It will taint and tear at the very fabric of our lives. Even a little bit of yeast in the dough will effect the whole batch. Really, none of us wants that. So why not change it? We might not be able to do everything, but we can do something, and deep within we know what to do.

So let's do it today.

Beautiful One, just believe, because tomorrow may never come.