The measure of life's worth

I saw the movie "Rent" last night. Its about a group of friends living in New York City, most of whom have AIDS. Some die, some live. The message of the movie is that life is short - so live each day for all you can. Live each day to its fullest, and love for all you're worth.

When I look around, I can see life all around me. I can see laughter and love and gratitude and strength. I see the wonder of creation in each person, and how infinately valuable life is. The problem is that while life is so wonderful and precious, life is also bitterly short. No matter what we have here, someday it will all be gone. In the blink of an eye, everything will one day come to an end - no matter how much we love someone, no matter what they did with their lives, no matter if they had a quality to them that was never seen before and will never be seen again. So what do we do with that knowledge? How can we really take joy in something when we know how truly fleeing it is? And what's the point?

I'm 26 years old, and I'm now just grasping that life is short. Life comes and goes, but we weren't designed to come and go. We were made for permanency. We were made to last. You, me, all of us - we're all so beautiful and unique. We're all worth so much, and we all deserve so much more than the fleeting years that are granted to us here.

I've never found it all that comforting when people say "Its ok, Laura. We'll all be together in Heaven someday." I can think of Heaven, but I can't feel it; its just so difficult to picture. I have faith that we'll all be together with God and live forever, but its a life that's in such contrast to this one that I can't quite grasp it.

But I do know Jesus, and He is my comfort. I know how just, yet gently and patient and loving He is. I've heard His voice and feel His touch in my life. He lived, and though He was infinately valuable, He died so that we could have the chance to live eternally with Him, as we were designed to do from the beginning. We're worthwile because we're made in His immage - in the immage of an eternal God. We're deserving of love because He first loved us. We deserve so much more than to shine so brightly and then be snuffed out so quickly, because God says that we are. He let His light go out to ensure that we could shine for an eternity, and now He is my light forever and ever. So, I can trust and hope and dream in Him.

People are easy to pass off when they're faceless - if you don't know where they hurt, how they laugh, or why they cry. But the second you take a deeper look, the second you can understand where they're coming from - its in that second that you can glimpse yourself in that person's eyes, and ultimately get a glimpse of the God who created all of us.

So, what do we do with our days here - fleeting as they are? What do we do with the people in our lives? Do we cease loving because everything that we love we'll eventually lose? Perhaps loving is its own reward. Perhaps instead of just loss after loss after loss, gouging holes into our lives until all we have left is the empty space and memories of what we used to love that has long since been ebbed away; perhaps those spaces are filled with something else. Perhaps life, being infinately worthwile though mortally brief, is always worthwile because the one who created life and gives life its meaning is eternally alive and will be steady and sure forever. If that's true, then the saying is also really true: Come what may, the risk of not fully loving is far more dire than loving fully and losing it all. In the end, its better to leap from the cliff, ensuring certain collision and pain, than to be remain "safe" on the ledge.

The heart may freeze, or it can burn
The pain will ease, if I can learn
There is no future, there is no past
I live this moment as my last

There's only us, there's only this
Forget regret, or life is yours to miss
No other road, no other way
No day but today

I can't control
My destiny
I trust my soul
My only goal is just to be

There's only now
There's only here
Give in to love
Or live in fear

No other path
No other way
No day but today
No day but today