The house was quiet when I unlocked the door. I could see Sue in her tan recliner chair, feet up, facing the french doors overlooking the back deck. The TV in the corner was black and I assumed the movie I had set up for her to watch had finished while I was out running errands, and that perhaps she had dozed off. Or maybe she was frustrated because I was gone so long. Rodney came bouncing over to meet me at the door.

His movement must have alerted Sue that I was home, because she immediately made this announcement from her chair. “I’ve just had the most wonderful time with the Lord.” She spoke calmly and matter of factly, but there was a visible radiance on her face.

I came around to her side so she could see me to read my lips. “I’m glad. I’m back but I still need to get the groceries out of the car. It’s hot out there.”

I kissed the top of her head in passing, but very preoccupied with saving wilted vegetables, restocking medical supplies, and preparing for supper.I was on overload from all of the efforts and constraints of getting through each day. I remember feeling a twinge of jealousy that she could sit there with the Lord while I had so much work to do.

Five months later that chair was achingly empty. I wish now that I had taken time to sit down next to her and asked her to tell me more.

I read a word picture this morning by Thomas Watson.“We have a long race from earth to Heaven ~ but a little time to run; it will soon be sunset. Therefore, so run…

Many have made themselves unfit to run this blessed race. They are too drunk with the pleasures of the world. A drunken man is unfit to run a race.

Others neglect to run this race all their life. Only when sickness and death approach, will they begin. A sick man is very unfit to walk, much less to run a race.

True repentance is never too late; but when a man can hardly move his hand, or lift up his eyes ~that is a very unfit time to begin the race from Earth to Heaven.”

First comes the baby steps. Then we learn to walk. Only after we’ve built endurance can we truly run!

Run.

Most of the time I feel like I can hardly pick up my feet to take the next step! Maybe they’re too weighted down with stuff and all the cares of the world. I stumble around, distracted by every little thing scrolling by me.

I think often of her words, “I’ve just had the most wonderful time with the Lord.”

Sue, when you’re on the Edge of Eternity, what does “having a wonderful time with the Lord” even mean?

She had spoken with such assurance and I could tell she wanted to share with me. If only I had lingered to listen!

But this I know, Sue did not wait until she was sick to begin a serious walk with the Lord.

Her spiritual strength came only after steadily exercising faith through many seasons of difficulties.

The calm confidence came because of constantly communing with Him.

It was knowing Him that filled her with the exuberant joy that carried her through thick and thin.

1st Corinthians 9 says,

“So run to win!

All athletes are disciplined in their training. They do it to win a prize that will fade away, but we do it for an eternal prize. So I run with purpose in every step.”

The NIV puts it this way, “I do not run aimlessly. I do not box as one beating the air.”

Sue took those words seriously. Although, sick, stuck sitting in a recliner, she kept steadily and purposefully running the race before her with an increasing awareness that her Lord was running alongside her.

No wonder she could say, “I’ve just had the most wonderful time with the Lord!”