When Lasts Become Firsts
A year ago today, I left Europe on emergency leave to go to my father’s bedside. It would be the last time I flew home to see him.
In the weeks that followed, there were many lasts. Last conversations, last words of comfort and gratitude, last touches, last hugs, and last looks…last moments, last prayers, and last breaths.
We sang around his bed in the evenings, and he tried to sing along…voice gone, eyes teary, holding our hands in his for his last earthly songs of praise to his God.
We knew those were our last times with him. I’m so grateful for those lasts.
But it made me think about all the last times I didn’t realize were lasts.
As a mother, I think of the last time I held my child’s hand or bandaged up a knee. The last time I washed his hair or spent time in the car on a road trip. The last time we went hiking, or the last time I fussed at him to hurry up in the morning. I had no idea those were lasts, and so the moments passed.
We live our lives expecting there to be more. More time, more opportunities, more moments to say what we need to say or do what we need to do. I’m a master procrastinator; it’s a skill I’ve perfected and one that comes from the idea that I will have more time in which to do the things that need to be done.
And yet, we are promised nothing and warned that each moment may be a last. Throughout the scriptures, we are reminded that our lives are vapors, mists here for a moment and then gone (James 4:14). We are like the flowers that wither quickly and then blow away in the wind (Psalms 103:15, I Peter 1:24). Certainly, as we age, we feel the speed of time. And yet, we just assume there will be more.
When we know a moment is a last, does it change the way we approach it? I think so.
In John’s account of the Last Supper, Jesus tried to prepare his apostles for what lay ahead of them. Jesus tells his apostles in John 13 that He is going away, and that where He’s going, they cannot follow. I can’t imagine that any news would be more distressing to them than this.
He has washed their feet, he has identified His betrayer, and at the end of the chapter, He tells them He’s leaving them and that they can’t follow. These men who left all to follow Him for the past three years - now they are told their time with Jesus is coming to an end…this is, in fact, their Last Supper with Him before the crucifixion.
Jesus knows how troubling this is to the twelve; the thought of this separation from Him was horrible.
In John 14:1-4, Jesus responds to their fear: “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. And where I go you know, and the way you know.”
Jesus tells them to trust Him. The idea of being without Him…of this being their last meal with him was unthinkable. And things are going to be terrible, but Jesus assures them that it will not always be awful. This is actually NOT the last.
He tells them that they will come to His Father’s house where they will be reunited with Him.
With God, there really is no last. There will always be last times in this physical world until it too will have its last moments of existence.
But for the faithful, there will be a new life.
In the face of lasts with my father, we were all so very grateful for the promise of firsts. His first glimpses of the heavenly realm, first reunions with loved ones gone before, first real rest, and first experience with true peace.
I know that we don’t know what happens when the spirit leaves its fleshly tabernacle; it is still a mystery for us. Does Jesus receive us, or do we wait to see Him at the judgment? Are we with others, or are we in a state of rest? I’m so curious about it. In fact, I went in and sat with my father’s body just after he died, and I just couldn’t help but whisper to him, “What are you doing?” I wouldn’t wish him back in that body for anything, but I would love to know what he knows and hear about what he sees! My brain just can’t imagine what it will be like.
But I’m eager to find out, and I will - when I breathe my last here on Earth and my new eyes open up for that first glimpse of glory.