Every morning, I get up an hour before I have to leave the house. I get up, use the restroom, wash my face, put on my eyeliner, let it dry, put in my contacts, put on my foundation, crunch my hair, then change. Then I do my eyeshadow, take my medicine, brush my teeth, use mouthwash, then sometimes brush my teeth again. I then spend five minutes searching for a clean pair of socks. Once I've found my socks I put everything I need in my purse, then I grab an organic granola bar or some sliced apples to eat on the road. Each day I either loose my keys, or my shoes (usually my shoes) and then spend ten minutes looking for one or the other.
I leave on average five minutes early, after getting up a full hour before I have to leave. I have to get up an extra forty five minutes early if I want to curl or straighten my hair. And don't even get me started on what happens if I choose to take a morning shower instead of my usual habit of showering the night before.
But every once and awhile I hit snooze one too many times, or I (only twice in my entire life) sleep literally through the alarm. And when I finally wake, slide the alarm on my cell phone off, and check the time, I get that sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach, you know that feeling, and I realize that I only have fifteen minutes before I need to be pulling out of the garage.
Sixteen minutes later, I am sitting in my car. I may be wearing mismatched socks, and I probably don't have eyeshadow on. I have my lipgloss with me to put on upon arrival (or, perhaps at a stop light, just kidding), and I probably only brushed my teeth once, but I am ready. My hair looks just fine, I'm dressed, I have what I need for the day. And I did it in fully forty-five minutes less time than normal.
Welcome to life. A sense of urgency does wonders for our life. So here's my sense of urgency.
In April of 2012, the Sunday before the second week of finals, I am going to meet my friends at a diner in downtown Syracuse. I know another group of my friends is at a cafe and pub down the street. I stopped by to see some of my friends. Abby told me that Maria was running late, and that they hadn't heard from her. Since Maria always answers her texts promptly, my friends Marjade, Abby, and Francis were a little concerned.
Now Maria is one of my dearest friends, we had known each other since her sophomore year which was my freshman year. I introduced Maria to my other friend Abby the beginning of our Junior year, and they rapidly became best friends. Eventually two of my three groups of friends collided and we were one big happy family.
But at the moment I was only mildly concerned. I promised to stop back by in a few, asked them to keep me updated, and headed back over to meet my other friends at the diner. When I returned to the cafe and pub, Marjade was the only one left. She looked near tears. As we rush to my car she explained that they had become so worried about Maria (even to the point of taking she had been kidnapped or something) that they had finally sent a text saying that if she didn't answer the next text they would call the police. This was not overreacting. I don't think I had ever had Maria take more than a half hour to respond to a text. Even when she was in class she would at least respond that she was in class and would talk later.
Apparently, when they had finally made the call, a man answered. While there was a moment where they thought their fears of kidnapping had been justified, it turns out this was a police officer, and Maria had been in an accident. Francis had a car, and had rushed with Abby to get Maria's brother, who thankfully was over eighteen and attended school with us (as they needed a family member to approve medical procedures). They had not had enough seats for Marjade. So I called Abby, made sure they had gotten to Andres (Maria's brother) and drove Marjade and I to the hospital. When we arrived, there were police everywhere. Andres had to give permission for the rest of the group to even go to the waiting room, as she was in an emergency surgery.
We waited through the night and the doctors came in shortly after midnight to inform us they suspected Maria would not make it through the night. While the group dissolved momentarily, spirits rose shortly after. The doctors could not have accounted for Maria, we said, none of us had ever known anyone with as much spirit as Maria.
I left the hospital temporarily, knowing the surgery would be several more hours. I picked up all the blankets and pillows in my entire house, and my medication. I stopped at the store and picked up wipes, two packs of toothbrushes, and toothpaste. I grabbed some basic meds for headaches and the likes as well as my contact solution and prescriptions, and headed back to the hospital to settle in for the long haul, armed with meal bars and Gatorade.
I handed out the pillows and blankets to members of our party, and everyone settled in for the night. We didn't sleep well, but when we woke, Maria was still alive. She was in her third surgery. Hopes rose and we took shifts leaving to shower. It was Sunday. Maria's parents arrived Monday. The university paid for their plane tickets and their accomodation.
I missed a final on Monday. The school allowed us to retake them. I took it Thursday while Maria was in yet another surgery. I kept wondering when she would be out, worrying if she would be ok. Needless to say my usual A/A- turned into a C on that particular final.
Maria had many true friends and people cycled through the hospital all the time. The main group of us was about seven, but we saw many people more than once. By three weeks many of us had had to return home. I was renewing the lease on my apartment so my parents had said I could stay as long as I needed to.
By over a month, they were talking about turning off life-support.
SO let me tell you, life is urgent.
Maria was 22 and was hit by a car walking down to have a meal and a beer with friends.
Maria had dual-side closed-head trauma. She had almost innumerable surgeries.
And she woke up. Maria got a second chance. She had some fake skull implanted to replace the parts which were irreparable and had to be removed. She was expected to be physically and mentally handicapped due to the severe fractures to her right arm and leg as well as her scull. Maria walked, in wedges, across the graduation platform a little over a year later. She was mentally fine. While today Maria walks and maybe thinks a little slower still, she lost a total of 3 months of memory when she could have lost her life.
We are blessed beyond belief that we have her with us today. But not everyone gets her second chance. Life is urgent. We think we have an unlimited amount of time, but we do not. The likelihood of a young death is pretty slim. but still about 12% of people (8% men, 4% women) die before the age of 50 in the US. In the world as a whole 12% of people die before reaching age 25. While that's still pretty slim, its a little over one in 10 people (data based on 2006 census records).
God put us on this earth to share His love. And we have a limited time to do it. We need to live like there is no tomorrow for us to share His love, like we only have today to do so. Not to be morbid, but there may be no tomorrow for us either, and yet we act as though we have all the time in the world. That is simply not the case. We all have a limited time on this earth, and while, if we repent and choose Jesus the next life is a better one, we are still held responsible for what we do in this life.
I once asked a friend a question. "Say a lawyer walked up to you today and handed you a disposable credit card with one-hundred dollars on it. He said that your great-great-uncle on your mother's brother-in-law's side whom you have never met decided to leave you his fortune of one-million dollars. And that was after taxes. But before you can have the fortune, you must use the one-hundred dollars. It didn't matter how, as long as you used up the hundred. And it didn't matter how long you took, the rest of the money would still be guaranteed to be yours. Would you throw that one-hundred dollar card in the gutter to get to the million sooner? Or would you go spend that hundred. Maybe buy the biggest steak dinner you've ever had and then head back to the lawyer's tomorrow? Or even better, take it to your favorite charity, after all you're about to get one million dollars. Or maybe spend it as you like, since you plan on spending part of that million on those who need it?
I know I would spend the hundred dollars, and I like to think I would spend it well.
The hundred dollars is this life, and the million is the next. Whether we like it or not, we have to spend the hundred dollars before we get the million, so spend your hundred well.
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