old age is relative!

Yesterday I turned 50; or as my daughter put it, I reached the half-century mark. It’s interesting that ever since I’ve reached the age that I used to think was old (which is about 30); I’ve begun to see “being old” as something that is relative to where I am in life. In other words, now that I’m as old as I am I don’t consider myself to be old; old age is some age that is older than I am right now.
That doesn’t mean that my body doesn’t feel older than when I was 22 because it does. I’m pathetically out of shape… and I don’t really want to do anything about it. I can’t drop 10 pounds in a week by cutting back and exercising like I used to. My hair is turning gray… and loose… and wild. What used to grow freely on the top of my head now grows freely out of my nose and my ears. My eyebrows are starting to grow in odd directions. My eyesight is great… when I take my glasses off and hold the book up against my nose. I wake up in the morning with aches and pains just from sleeping in a different position. My hearing… is still selective. The list can, and does go on. The point is, while my body is definitely showing its age, its not as bad as I always thought it would be.
The biggest surprise however is that getting older, in my mind, was always synonymous with “having it all together”. The perception has always been that by the time you reached the “half-century mark”, you would have all of life figured out and all of your flaws, insecurities, quirks, personality disorders, and over all weirdness would be fixed. IN ADDITION, your spiritual life… your walk with the Lord would be nearly perfect with very few struggles with the flesh, or with the allure of the world, or with the evil one.
HAAH! That’s not even close to being true. All of the above? Yeah, they’re all still there.
Well, maybe it'll happen by the time I’m 60, but I kind of doubt it.
So what’s the point of living? What’s the point of living in Christ?
The point is just that… Christ’s life. Yeah I’m still quirky… but that’s who I am. Yeah, I still deal with the flesh, the world, and with Satan… but that’s just life in this temporary world. Of all that living to be 50 years has to offer (and there is much), the one thing that stands out the most is that I have 50 years of experiencing the faithfulness of my Lord Jesus Christ. He is the author of my faith and He is the finisher of my faith (Hebrews 12:2). He began a good work in me, He continues to do a good work in me, and He will continue until He returns (Philippians 1:6). I can truly… honestly say with the Apostle Paul, that it’s not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus. Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus (Philippians 3:12-14).
PRAISE THE LORD that there is so much more to life than this life, and it is to this end that we live.
Thank you Lord for the 50 wonderful years of your gracious provisions that pertain to life and godliness.