Live Like You Were Dyin

Country music singer Tim McGraw has a song that became something of a crossover hit a year or two ago that has really stuck with me (it had to be "crossover" because I don't listen to country music and even I heard the song enough to sing along) . "Live Like You Were Dyin" is about a guy in his early forties who gets word from his doctor he has a terminal disease. After the initial shock, the lyric asks, "How's it hit ya', when you get that kind of news?"

The response is a litany of things this guy might not have ever done but chooses to try... skydiving, rocky mountain climbing, going 2.7 seconds on a rodeo bull... The terminally ill patient then decides to "love deeper, talk sweeter, [and give] forgiveness I've been denying..." Another couple lines include, "and I became a friend a friend would like to have." A great lyric and great thoughts we should consider way before we face the inevitability of death.

I've had an amazing week this week. It has been one of those weeks of inexpressible joy that only God can generate. Nothing outwardly amazing has happened... we didn't win the lottery or anything like that... it's just been a spiritually very tight week for me. I've really felt God working on my heart and some junk in my personal trunk is continuing to get reorganized and cleaned out. Becoming the person God really wants you to be is a long, hard and often painful process. Don't let anyone tell you differently. Like working out in the gym really hard and then hardly being able to move two days later (it's always the day after the day after that is the toughest), the pains of life will most often work for the good if we let God have control of them. It is like we mess it up... then God cleans it up... then we let Him "work us out" through the junk to enjoy the healing only He can bring.

Back to the lyric... this week I was blessed with two extremes of friendship. Early in the week I was honored and blessed to spend time with a friend with whom we've shared life for 20 years. There has been pain on both sides of our lives... but our reunion this week just made more sense out of our past. Lord willing, we're going to get to spend more time together over the next few weeks. I am very thankful. Late night conversations with old friends is the best!

Then later in the week, my family and I spent an evening with another family we hardly even know. In fact, I had to introduce myself to their children as we entered the house due to the fact I had never met them. We had a conversation filled evening, but it was radically different than the one I'd had with my old friend. The contrast was stark in my mind... and then I realized how often my friendships have been on my terms. I've taken advantage of so many elements of friendships. Sometimes to the detriment of those friendships for which I am very sad and sorry. Sometimes I've just invested only what I was willing to give at the time, as if I was guaranteed tomorrow. But what if tomorrow never comes?

I'm resolving to pursue relationships (whether deep or merely casually social) as if each word could be my last. To live in friendship with anyone... as if we were dying... might be an even greater adventure than "going 2.7 seconds with a bull named Fu Manchu."

I want to be a better friend... "a friend a friend would like to have." How about you?