Trivial pursuits

A good friend of mine is hanging on to life by a thread. He has undergone a bone marrow transplant and is receiving experimental stem cell therapy for the cancer that has ravaged his body. The other day his mother died and he was too sick from the aggressive chemo treatment to even attend her funeral. He is being monitored 24 hours per day on the hour to try and prevent infections in his weakened state. He has to take food much of the time through a feeding tube. He is in pain constantly and sick always.

The last time we saw each other we went quail hunting on his beautiful farm. We spent several days having fun hunting and just relaxing. We drove four wheelers all over the place like a couple of high school kids yelling at each other and racing down the dusty roads like Nascar driver want-a-be’s. In the evenings we would sit out on the porch and drink iced tea and listen to the Whippoorwills and look for deer emerging from the dark woodlands as the sun slowly sank. His farm is beautiful and he loves to go there and relax. God has blessed my friend enormously; he has a saintly wife and two good boys. He loves the Lord and is active in church.

He is just two years older than me and we are similar in many ways. We met through church when I first came to Jacksonville. We both owned software companies and we have many common interests. His Dad was of simple means and in fact his Dad was a cab driver. My friend wanted more out of life and started his own business. He worked hard for many difficult years, sacrificed and became a success. Financially he is very wealthy, having sold his computer business for some five hundred million dollars. (He got out at the right time during the Dot Com rage.) He owns a gorgeous Citation XL jet; I call it a rocket ship. He gave me a ride home from Atlanta to Jacksonville in it one time and it was quite the ride home.

Just a few short months ago he was pretty much set for life and now he is fighting for it. How quickly our situations can change. I pray that the Lord will have mercy on him and restore his health daily and ask you to do the same. He hovers each day close to death and fighting for his life. His wife said the other day that surely the Lord was not through with him yet or He would not allow him to go through so much pain and suffering.

I don’t know why I wrote about him today. We talked about heaven one time out on his farm. We both look forward to it, but want to get the most out of our brief period on this old earth. Life is so short on earth compared to eternity. It makes me wonder why we don’t try harder to make the most out of every minute of every day. It is such a waste of very precious and limited time to spend any of it fussing and fighting, or wasting it on trivial pursuits Isn’t it odd that the worst in life draws us close to the best in life, (God), during such sad times of trouble and anguish?

Psalm 23:6
Surely goodness and mercy
Shall follow me
All the days of my life;
And I will dwell in the house
Of the Lord
Forever.