Last Day On Earth

Running along San Francisco's waterfront Embarcadero on a breezy, but bright Friday noon-time work break, I worshipped on my iPod in a fresh way following his daughter's untimely death to some of Stephen Curtis Chapman's older tunes. Serendipitously, about a mile into the run the next song began with a slow and somewhat melancholy melody. The words he sung went like this;

I pull over the side of the road and I

Watch the cars pass me by

The headlights and the black limousines tell me

Someone is saying goodbye

I bow my head and I whisper a prayer, "Father,

Comfort their broken hearts"

And as I drive away there's a thought that I

I cannot escape, no I, I cannot escape this thought

I can't get away

Oh, if this should be my last day on this earth

How then shall I live

Oh, if this should be the last day that I have

Before I breathe the air of Heaven

Let me live it with abandon to

The only thing that remains

After my last day here on earth

Rounding the corner of a small brick building next to AT&T Park, I saw ahead a faded, but still somewhat colorful wreath tied to a palm tree encircling a picture of a young man dressed in a baseball uniform. Drawing closer, the letters of his name came into focus and I stopped to read some of the notes from childhood relatives attached to Anthony's memorial. "I don't miss you a little, I miss you a lot..." And, "I know you cannot hear me because you're dead, but I'm still going to say it, 'I love you'..."

The timing of the song and the encounter with this lifeless stranger were no accident. This San Francisco Giants fan lived a short 19 years and something, I know not what, took his life. How did he live his last days here on earth? Did he know his last day(s) would be his last?

Now, two men I've never met, one grieving and one deceased, have left indelible marks of grace upon my life. Today I live as if it were my last day on earth. So I say to my mother and my father, to my sister and my wife, to my sons and my daughters, and to my Jesus, "I love you". May tomorrow come so that I may do it again, "... with abandon to the only thing that remains after my last day here on earth", Him and us.

Life is good,

Tom