Sept.24.03: Light For The Day - "Time" Ecclesiastes 12:1 (NIVUS) "Remember your Creator in the days of your youth,  before the days of trouble come and the years approach when you will say,  + "I find no pleasure in them" + ---------------------- Time  I laughed when I was twenty,  My life was froth so bright;  Time was mine for living,  For dancing in the light.  I worked when I was thirty,  So much to do and buy;  I had no time for worry  Nor duty to catch my eye.  I hurried, though, at forty,  My mark I sought to place  In prominent positions  And every lofty trace.  Success! I thought at fifty;  I've little more to want.  I scarcely could imagine  How much my boast would haunt.  The day that I turned sixty,  I noticed something strange;  My aches and pains were telling  Of time and loss and change.  My path stretched far behind me,  Ahead was a tapering strand;  And when I looked around me,  My name was written . . . in sand!  At last I understood that life  By precious moments is tracked,  And hurtles on relentlessly  And cannot be turned back.  How many times I couldn't count  I'd said, dear Lord, don't worry;  I know you have some work for me,  A moment more - then I'll hurry.  All those careless months and years  Had very little worth,  While zealously I sought to find  The perfect life. . .on earth.  As panic overcame me,  I cast about in vain  For reasons I could beg Him  To write my name again.  I fell upon my knees then  And sought His loving grace;  Entreating Him with promises,  Turn back to me His face.  And then He showed me sadly  Things He'd planned for me to do,  And all the years he'd given me  So I could see them through.  The strangers who'd brushed by me,  Alone and sick and scared;  I should have told about Him,  Their burdens gladly shared.  The acts of kindness, faith and love  He showed me never were done;  Instead I'd lived my life for me  And from His will I'd run.  Hot tears of shame flowed down  My cheeks as then as last I knew,  I should have often inquired of Him  what plans for me He drew.  I wept for all those wasted years  And in a dream so sweet,  I dreamed somehow I got them back  And laid them at His feet.  But ah, those years are gone for good  And won't again be chartered;  For sorrow's tears from wiser eyes  Cannot for time be bartered.  Yet hope springs up, all isn't lost!  His grace unbounded, free;  And Majesty with love unplumbed  Still welcome, . . . even me!  Though service to my Lord  And King abbreviated be;  Forgiven much and loving much,  I'll face eternity.  -- Helen Hamrick  ----------------- -- Psalms 71:17,18 (NIVUS)  "Since my youth, O God, You have taught me,  and to this day I declare Your marvelous deeds. 18 Even when I am old and gray, do not forsake me,  O God,  till I declare Your power to the next generation, Your might to all who are to come." -- Proverbs 22:6 (NIVUS)  "Train a child in the way he should go,  and when he is old he will not turn from it."