Planning your life from your final destination backwards is the key focus of this podcast episode. I emphasize the importance of living a life that has meaning and value, especially as we consider our eventual meeting with God. Drawing from biblical insights, I discuss how our actions and choices today impact our eternal rewards. It's essential to recognize that what we build our lives with truly matters, whether we are just starting our journey or nearing its end. Ultimately, I encourage listeners to invest their lives in eternal significance rather than getting caught up in trivial pursuits.

Takeaways:

• Planning your life with an eye towards your final destination is crucial for meaning.
• Our future meeting with Jesus won't be about judgment but about how we lived our lives.
• Investing in eternal values leads to rewards, while neglecting them leaves us empty-handed.
• Engaging in activities that reflect our faith can give our lives deeper significance and purpose.
• Consider using your passions to serve others and glorify Jesus in practical ways.
• Living intentionally means consciously choosing actions that will matter in the light of eternity.

Links referenced in this episode:

• bible805.com

Welcome to the Hobo Soul Podcast of Road advised from the Bible and from me, Yvon Prehn, someone who's a little further down the road of life.

I'll talk to you every Tuesday and Thursday for about 10 minutes, and if you'd like more in depth information on walking with Jesus, you can find that at my www.bible805.com website. For now, let's get started on our topic for today, which is

Episode number 47 Plan your life from your final destination backwards.

Our verse for today comes from Romans 12:1 2 in the Phillips translation where it says, "With eyes wide open to the mercies of God. I beg you, my brothers, as an act of intelligent worship, give your bodies as a living sacrifice consecrated to him and acceptable by Him.

Don't let the world around you squeeze you into its mold, but let God remold your minds from within so that you may prove in practice that the plan of God for you is good, meets all his demands, and moves toward the goal of true maturity."

Now, along the same line, Stephen Covey, in his famous book the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, recommended that we begin with the end in mind.

Now, that advice isn't original with him, but original or not, it it doesn't diminish the value of this point of view for life.

Now I'm sharing this not just as one more encouragement to plan ahead, but the reason that I'm doing this podcast is I want you all to live lives that really have meaning at the end of your life when it counts the most. Now to go into that a little bit more, I'm going to be a little bit serious at first and then I trust much more encouraging and hopeful near the end.

So hang in there with me as I go through all this. Now the planning ahead that I'm talking about again looks toward the final destination of all of us hobo souls as we travel through life.

This is what C.S. Lewis described in this way, where he talks about our final meeting with God.

Well actually the end of our life meeting with God, not our final one as we'll walk with him throughout eternity. But anyway, this is how he puts it. We do not know the play. We do not even know whether we're in Act 1 or Act 5.

We do not know who are the major and who are the minor characters, but the author knows.

But what we are to expect is that the author will have something to say to each of us on the part that each of us has played, and playing it well is what matters is infinitely. I want to help you Play your part well. And so to do this, let's think for a minute.

What might we anticipate in this future chat with the author of our lives? Now, before saying anything else, it's incredibly important to understand that our future meeting with Jesus is not a time of judgment for sin.

That was taken care of fully on the cross when you accepted Jesus as your savior. Romans 8:1 tells us there is no condemnation to those of us who are in Christ Jesus. Your eternal salvation is secure.

But that's not really all that matters in our relationship with God because we need to go on a little bit more and consider again what all the Bible says about how we live our lives and then how we present it to the Lord when the time comes.

And in 1st Corinthians 3:10 through 15 again in the Phillips translation, it describes describes this a little bit more.

This one on one time meeting with Jesus where it says

"The foundation's laid already and no one can lay another for Christ Jesus himself to repeat the foundation of all our forgiveness and acceptance with God. That's been taken care of by Jesus.

But then it goes on to say, but if any man, any person builds on this foundation, using as his material gold, silver, precious stones, or wood, hay and stubble, each one's work will one day be shown for what it is. The day will show it plainly enough, for the day will arise in a blaze of fire, and that fire will prove the nature of each man's work.

If the work that the man has built upon the foundation will stand this test, he'll be rewarded. But if a person's work be destroyed under the test, he loses it all. He may personally be saved, though, rather like a man rescued from the fire."

In summary, what you build your life with matters.

Whether you're young and you're just starting to put the whole structure together, or whether you're finishing, you're putting the finishing touches on the life you've built.

You'll either face Jesus with a life built from investing in things of eternal value which will receive a reward, or you'll just face him empty handed.

Now I realize this might not be the happy, encouraging Rah Rah sort of podcast you like to listen to, but I want to emphasize that it is extraordinarily important because how you live matters. Now. I was really fortunate when I was young to get an invaluable reminder of this from my grandmother. And let me share this with you.

It was just a little plaque that said only one life will soon be passed. Only what's done for Christ will last. And I've tried to keep that in mind during all of my life.

And I want to talk about that a little bit more now, and not just because I want you to quit sinning or whatever, because I'm sure you want to too. But I'm not so much concerned for those of you listening to the podcast, that you're indulging in what I call the big sins.

You're probably not selling or doing drugs or cheating on your spouse or stealing from the irs, or maybe, if you're younger, your local convenience store.

What I'm really concerned about are the little, what I call the nothing sins, the doing nothing of eternal value with the precious life you've been given. Sometimes it's literally doing nothing.

Hours spent blankly staring at TV or social media, scrolling or attempting to find the funniest or the most snarky meme to share. That's nothing. That's wasting your life.

But instead of wasting your life on nothing sins, consider doing something great for the king, for Jesus in his kingdom. And that really isn't hard to do at all. Here are some ideas.

Remembering that what is great in the eyes of the kingdom might not necessarily be great in the eyes of the world, but that doesn't matter. Here's my suggestion.

Take something that's a little love in your life, something you enjoy doing or are drawn to, and make it trophy to present to him. If you love music, compose a praise song, learn to lead worship, study the ancient chants and create ways to sing them today.

If you love art, create images that turn hearts and minds to God. You can reproduce and sell or give them away online.

If you love sports, you can volunteer or start a sports outreach team for kids, maybe for some who never had a chance to do club or team sports. Dance camps can do the same thing.

If you love to bake, make your very best cookies or cupcakes, and with a good escort, take them to a homeless encampment and give them away with notes that remind people that Jesus loves them even more. Do it on a regular basis and give a special group of people a goodie to look forward to simply because someone loves them in the name of Jesus.

If you love to write or speak or act, the options are endless of what you can create and share online about Jesus. Simply tell your story. It won't be like anybody else's.

Share your thoughts, what you are reading in the Bible now, your prayers and dreams for your world and the kingdom of God. Put it up on TikTok or Instagram or Facebook or whatever else you like to look at and you use and your friends use.

People will watch it and you never ever know what little thing Might Turn Hearts Towards Jesus Now, I'm kind of saying this from experience, surprisingly old lady that I am, I automatically post excerpts from my podcast on these channels and oddly enough, I get hundreds of hits a day and my followers are growing, even on TikTok.

Now I know what I do isn't much in the big system of social media, but I look at those hits as a beachhead, a guerrilla incursion for the Kingdom of God, and imagine how we could turn the conversation of these platforms to so much more positive areas, Godly areas, eternally significant areas, if even a fraction of the millions of Christians out there created content for them. Invest your life in the things that will last and look forward with joy to sharing them with Jesus.

That's all for this podcast, for transcripts, links to related material, and much more to help you learn to know, trust, apply and teach the bible. Go to www.bible805.com for now, let me end with this benediction and prayer.

May you walk each day surrounded by the gracious love of the Father, guided by the gentle wisdom of the Holy Spirit, and conscious of the astoundingly real presence of Jesus, who will walk with you until you're no more a hollow soul, no more a transient wandering heart, but at home in the Kingdom prepared for you with your God forever. Amen.