82. Releasing Our Times
R
My times are in your hands.
Psalm 31:15T
HISyear I am having one of those birthdays. You know, the kind
with a really high number attached to it. The kind when people
blow up black balloons and come bearing cards that are supposed to
be funny but are really basically unkind.
Suddenly I’m seeing my whole life in the rearview mirror and I’m
overwhelmed with a desire to do the whole thing over. But as we all
know, that is not an option. In fact I’m realizing how few choices we
really do have in life.
We do not get to choose our looks, our brains, our families of ori-
gin. We have very little control over the length of our lives. My sis-
ter Alix is already gone—“swallowed up in victory,” as Paul put it (1
Cor. 15:54). She is already singing hymns I’ve only guessed at,
blinded by radiance I can only imagine. She has already laid her
crowns at the feet of her King. And I know she’s in a far, far better
place than I am today.
But if it had been my choice to make, I’d have said, “Let her stay