{"id":21450,"date":"2017-09-08T00:10:05","date_gmt":"2017-09-08T07:10:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/littlecountrychurch.org\/?p=11575"},"modified":"2017-09-08T00:10:05","modified_gmt":"2017-09-08T07:10:05","slug":"september-8-2017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/2017\/09\/08\/september-8-2017\/","title":{"rendered":"September 8, 2017"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

“‘And behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, to give to every one according to his work. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last.’ Blessed are those who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates into the city.”<\/em>\u00a0Revelation 22:12-14<\/span><\/p>\n

Firsts and Lasts<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n

Morning broke, and again I was bemoaning yet another change in life. This led me down the path of thoughts of being on life\u2019s side of \u201clasts.\u201d Oh, the glorious side of life\u2019s \u201cfirsts\u201d\u2014first breath, first smile, first step, first day of school, first date, first kiss, first love, first child and a myriad other \u201cfirsts.\u201d Time marches on and now it\u2019s time for the \u201clasts\u201d\u2014last child to leave the nest, last day of work, last day with a parent, last day with a spouse, and so many more. The pain of it all became overwhelming, and tears of sadness flowed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

But then, (don\u2019t you just love \u201cbut then\u201d?) my husband reminded me there is an even more glorious \u201cfirst\u201d coming. A \u201cfirst\u201d filled with things that no one can fathom the beauty or joy of, awaiting us on that final last breath as we pierce the veil between earth and heaven and see Jesus face to face. A day that God promises will have no more pain, death, sorrow, or crying. Jesus Himself will wipe away our tears (Revelation 21:4). Jesus will touch us, smile at us, and welcome us to our first day of eternity with Him! No more \u201clasts\u201d only \u201cfirsts\u201d!\u00a0 Selah\u2014pause and think on this.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What joy! I can move on through the day again. This life is so short and so temporary, but that shouldn\u2019t be my focus. I belong to the Alpha and Omega, the First and the Last. Everything in between is safe in His care and it is well.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cDear Jesus, thank You that life starts and ends with You. Thank You that You hold my world, my \u201cfirsts\u201d and my \u201clasts\u201d are in Your hands, and it is well with my soul. Amen.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“‘And behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, to give to every one according to his […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-women"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p92wjD-5zY","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21450"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21450\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}