I was reading Psalm 71 the other day and keep coming back to read it. The title is "Forsake Me Not When My Strength Is Spent" (I'm using ESV). The writer is just asking God, "Hey God, don't just leave me out to dry once I'm old. Stay here with me just like you've done for the past __ years." Throughout the passage he keeps saying things that talk about his lifelong walk with God:
v. 3: "Be to me a rock of refuge, to which I may continually come..."
v. 5-6 "For you, O LORD, are my hope, my trust, O LORD, from my youth, upon you have I leaned from before my birth; you are he who took me from my mother's womb. My praise is continually of you."
v.8 "My mouth is filled with your praise, and with your glory all the day."
You get the picture, there's a ton more.
The part that really gets me though is verses 17-18. It says, "O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds. So even to old age and gray hairs, O God, don't forsake me, until I proclaim your might to another generation, your power to all those to come."
"Even when I'm old, God, don't forsake me, so I can tell of your name to another generation." He doesn't want God to leave him when he's an old fart, but not because he's afraid of dying. It's because he wants to keep proclaiming God's name.
Wow. That is PURPOSE. That is LIFE. When I'm old and falling apart, I want my prayer to be that God continues to let me live solely for the purpose of making his name known. But that doesn't start when I'm old. That starts now. I said I always wonder about how and when I'll die. Well if that ambulance hits me tomorrow I'd better be praying NOW that God is using me to make him known!!
Our purpose is to keep chuggin along for God, even when we're old, even when we're young. THAT is life.
