What will you do with today?

I woke to a silly love note from my husband. A melon sticker on my fridge. It's probably been there for a few days, tucked amidst the chaos of birth announcements and children's drawings under the magnets on the fridge door.

...if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children,
how much more will your heavenly Father give
good gifts to those who ask him!
Matthew 7:11

Being sick induces many people to doubt God's love, faithfulness, or even his existence. In my life, the opposite has been true thus far. Because it has made each moment sweeter, each blessing more fragrant, each day longer and brighter and more cherished. The way the sunlight glints off the drop of sweet watermelon nectar falling from my son's cherry lips, the way he holds his fingers just like his father would...this man-child glimpse into my husband's past and my future...

In the day of prosperity be joyful, and in the day of adversity consider:
God has made the one as well as the other.
~ Ecclesiastes 7:14a

I can lament that the fruit is gone, that my days pass so quickly and I wonder how many more are left. Or I can see the beauty in what's left. The pink glow on the edge of the rind. The glossiness of the wet fruit lying akimbo in a pile of discarded beauty. The joy that is left in each of my days, between ambulance rides and chest pain and exhaustion. The sweetness of each kiss from my children, the warmth of my husband's embrace in the wee hours of the morning. What's left is different, not less.

Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.
Psalm 90:12

Sink your teeth into today. Slip into my skin for an afternoon, and bring the beauty of today into focus. The sunlight of this glorious morning warming your child's hair, bringing each strand (which He has numbered!) into focus out of the shadows of this dawn. Perhaps the cool dew on the ground as you weed your garden. Or the tang of the orange juice - miraculous fruit! - as it assaults your taste buds with breakfast.

Living like you're dying doesn't mean completing your Bucket list. It means realizing afresh the gift this life is, that each breath is a miracle in itself, and means that there is something left in the purpose and plan God created for your life that you have yet to accomplish.

All the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be.
Psalm 139:16

I became a friend a friend would like to have.
And all of a sudden going fishing
Wasn’t such an imposition.
Well, I finally read the Good Book,
And I took a good long hard look,
At what I'd do if I could do it all again,

I loved deeper and I spoke sweeter,
I gave forgiveness that I'd been denying.
Some day, I hope you get the chance,
To live like you were dying.

Like tomorrow was a gift,
And you got eternity,
To think about what you’d do with it.

~ Live Like You Were Dyin', written by Craig Wiseman