Between Birth and Death

It's comforting to know that there is a family who loved you when you came here on earth. But it's even more amazing to witness how much others, including complete strangers, learned to love and miss you when you left the earth. And finding out how to do that is a challenge for everyone. The fact is, the only time you have to manage is the period between your birth and death. 

How do you earn someone's love?

You are developing "mindless" productivity if you scurry from task to task, constantly checking e-mail, organizing something, making a call, running an errand, and so on. You live for yourself, not for others' sake. As a result, you will be showered with compliments rather than love. You aren't making a difference in other people's lives, and you're not having an effect on them.

When Jesus said, "Love your neighbor as yourself" (Mt 22:39), He meant that we devote time to others. Like Abraham, Isaac, Moses, Jacob, David, Mary, Mother Theresa, and other prophets and saints, God has given us 24 hours a day. As a result, it is not a matter of how many seconds, minutes, hours, days, months, or years we demonstrate our value and concern for others, but of whether we are willing to spend time with them to show them that we care and that we empathize with them.

The question is how will you manage your time here on Earth. You can either continue to focus your attention toward finishing your jobs and errands, or you can choose to put them off at regular intervals to make time for your connections because you value relationships above all else—the decision is always yours.

However, as we heed Jesus' command to love our neighbor as ourselves, we will establish a lifelong fulfillment of loving and being loved in return that will last beyond time, past age, and into eternity. Simply put, love is a seed that bears fruit. Sow it, reap it.

So, how do you spend the time of your life in between your birth and death?

Let us not 'live to lust,'

But...live to love.

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