Bullet Soul

A fifty caliber bullet is fired from a rifle, heading towards its intended target at a speed of 2,800-3,000 feet per second. Waves of sound reverberate from the chamber reaching levels of 140-170 decibels, but dissipate within moments. Life begins when a child is born, nobody is aware that the moment his small heart starts beating, his time is running out. Years come and go, and everyone lives like life never ends. A bullet leaves the chamber of a gun, misses its intended target, and the stray bullet ends the life of a young man. One bullet impacts not just the victim, but its ripples effect everyone in his life.

Unfortunately, this is how life happens. Not all of us will get to live to be seventy five or older. For those of us that do, the amount of time we spend on this planet (in the timeline of eternity), lasts about as long as a gunshot. Our time is running out. Every New Year's Day that comes, reminds us just how quickly life passes us by, and this experience will just get worse as we age. Every year, on this day, we look back at previous years, and wonder where our time went. It's no surprise that our time is running out, but the sad truth is that, most of us live like we have all the time in the world.

The Bible tells us that when we die we will stand before the God of the universe, who died for us, and give an account of what we did with the short amount of time we had on this planet. Did we live for ourselves, our own selfish ambitions, or did we live our life to glorify God? There are no mulligans, no do overs. We get one bullet in our gunshot lives, and we're responsible to aim it wisely. But just like a gunshot,
one short moment can leave ripples which impact everyone in your life, in your community, and have eternal impact.

So, what are you aiming for? We are told that our adolescent years is the time to discover who WE are, not discover who God wants us to be. It's the time for us make brash decisions, because we have the rest of our lives to learn from our mistakes. Our middle and high school years are the time for us to live our lives for us, right? I think the unfortunate truth is that, for a lot of us, we're going to have to give an account of the time we spent in high school, and explain why we chose to aim for ourselves instead of God. I think most adults would tell you that some of the things they regret the most, doing or not doing, occurred sometime in their adolescent years. I know that for me personally, I regret the way I spent my high school career, and have deep remorse for the way I lived it out.

You could make a decision this holiday to live your life for Christ, instead of yourself. You could choose to make every moment count, and focus on God's will, instead of forcing what you want out of every situation. No one wants to stand before the One who sacrificed His life for theirs, and explain how their desires were more important than His. Do you want to explain how it was more important to spend time hanging out with friends or partying the night before so that you're so tired you can't go to church the next day? Do you really think that you can make God understand that it was a better idea for you to impress the people you thought were so important, and ignore the people that had no one? What if you made your New Year's resolution to live each moment for Christ? Maybe it wouldn't be cool or interesting to tell at parties, but maybe it would have a lasting impact, that you could trace back to New Year's Day 2010. So, what are you aiming for?

Explore
In order to be entered into the contest to win a fabulous prize, click on the title ("Bullet Soul") of this blog post, then when the new page loads, scroll down to the bottom of the screen, and post an answer to the following question in the white dialog box: What New Year's Resolution will you make that will have an eternal impact for you?

Pray
That God will grant you the bravery and self-control to live your life in obedience to His will.