I have not been his pastor for 21 years, but at least twice over these decades, my friend Rick has said, “Joe, I pray for you every week. I ask the Lord to grant you long life so you may serve Him for many years to come.”

Recently, when he said that, I thanked him and expressed my surprise that he would still pray for one out of his distant past whom he sees so rarely. I told him what someone said to our mutual friend Bill Hardy.

After a number of years as their minister of education, Bill was moving from Woodland Hills Baptist Church in Jackson, Mississippi, to join the staff of the First Baptist Church of Kosciusko, an hour up the highway. At the reception in his honor a little lady said, “Bill, I have had you at the top of my prayer list all these years.” He said, “I sure do thank you. And I hope you’ll keep me there.” “No,” she said, “let your new church pray for you. I’ll be busy praying for our next minister.”

I’ve reflected a number of times on Rick’s prayer that I would live long and serve well. Genetically, it would appear not improbable since my father is 95 and Mom will be 91 on July 14. We’re told that more and more Americans are living to be 100 these days.

The question comes: do I want to live to a ripe old age? Is this something one should desire?

In Isaiah 38, God sent word to King Hezekiah to set his house in order, that he was about to die. The Judean king was stunned. He sunk into a deep depression (“turned his face to the wall”) and cried out to God bitterly that “I’ve served you faithfully all these years.” Implying, it would appear, that the Lord owes him. And, since he actually had been superior to most of his predecessors, God heard his cry and granted him 15 more years of life.

Hezekiah was thrilled. But it turned out not to be a blessing for the country.

During this extension to his life, Hezekiah did two things that brought great misery to his nation. First, he fathered Manasseh, the greatest disaster of a king the little nation of Judah would ever know. And secondly, when a delegation from Babylon visited Jerusalem, Hezekiah overdid the hospitality and ended up showing them all the wealth he possessed and the vast collection of treasures in the Temple. The Babylonians’ eyes bulged out, they recorded this for future reference, and they went home to tell others what they had seen. Eventually, their descendants would conquer Judah, loot the treasury, and destroy Jerusalem.

When the prophet Isaiah confronted Hezekiah about his foolishness in showing the Babylonians his wealth and what the long-range implications would be for the nation, the king made one of the dumbest statements in history: “Well, at least there will be peace in our time.” (Isa. 39:8)

In late 1938, Britain’s Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain returned home from a conference in Munich with Adolf Hitler in which he had caved in and given the Nazi leader everything he wanted, all in order to avoid a war. “There will be peace in our time,” Chamberlain said to the cheers of the crowd. He would live just long enough to eat those words.

Just because someone in the Bible said something does not make it righteous.

Faron Young of country music fame used to sing, “I want to live fast, love hard, and die young–and leave a beautiful memory.” James Dean, Elvis, Marilyn Monroe, John Lennon, Princess Diana, and JFK come to mind as some who by their early deaths have been immortalized and glamorized by this crazy mixed-up culture.

“My times are in thy hands,” David said in Psalm 31:15. I take that to mean the length of my life is up to the Lord.

We believe that, and yet there seems to be another aspect to the matter. Receiving the right nutrition, getting proper exercise, staying active, and keeping a good mental attitude all seem to figure into the business of living long. Some would add to that, surrounding oneself with loving family members.

“Lord, teach us to number our days so we may apply our hearts to wisdom,” is the other verse that comes to mind on this subject. (Psalm 90:12) “That we may present to you a heart of wisdom,” the New American Standard translates that.

Walking through an ancient cemetery, one reads the tombstones and is struck by the great diversity of lengths of lives. This one lived a few days, this one died in his teens, another lived into his nineties. And yet, all of them are gone now. And from the threshold of eternity, it would seem to matter very little whether one received a hundred years on earth or just a handful. The only thing that counts is what one did with the days he was given.

So, the object is not to focus on death but life. Not to preoccupy myself with thoughts and plans of dying, but a task more manageable: what to do today.

George MacDonald, who was a great influence on C. S. Lewis, said, “Many a life has been injured by the constant expectation of death. It is life we have to do with, not death. The best preparation for the night is to work diligently while the day lasts. The best preparation for death is life.”

I think it was Edith Schaeffer who said her father had long prayed to live into his nineties. “But he lived to regret it,” she said. Eventually, when his health failed, his mind became imprisoned in a body that no longer worked.

Bottom line: “Lord, have thine own way.” If you should choose to give me another year or another 30 years, let me praise you every day and serve you all the way. If it becomes your choice that this day should be my last, let me thank you for that, too, for your way is always best.

I received a note from Patricia, the daughter of my friend Rick, who said, “I’ve decided to join Dad in his prayer for you.”

Am I blessed or what?