Eternal Perspective

3/9/13                         Darryl               about 45
While running errands I saw a man at the post office named Darryl intently reading some information on a wall, and I felt led to hand him a “million dollar” gospel tract.  He laughed in surprise and I went on to explain what it was. “It’s kind of a fun collector’s item, but it has a serious question on the back – ‘Will you go to heaven?’.  I know it’s easy to get caught up in our daily concerns and problems and lose an eternal perspective, so I like to remind people that tomorrow isn’t promised, that we need to keep eternity in mind”.  Saying all this helped Darryl get his mind off of whatever he had been reading so intently, and we talked shortly about what I was saying. He seemed genuinely grateful for the tract and the reminder, telling me he’d definitely read it later.  It was a short conversation, but a seed was planted, and all it really took was for me to keep an eternal perspective in mind myself.  This led me to have a Gospel tract on hand while running my errands and to see other people as souls needing the truth of the God’s word and an eternal perspective.  How can we keep that heavenly perspective in mind?  How can we avoid getting caught up in the cares and concerns of this present life ourselves to the point that we are unable to help others think about eternity?  In Hebrews 11 there is a list of  “ancients” – people throughout Bible history that were commended for their faith – and it gives us some clues: “They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth…they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.”  These people weren’t so heavenly minded that they were of no earthly good; rather they were so heavenly minded they were of eternal good!  And we have the opportunity to join them, even while doing something that can seem as far from having eternal significance as running errands.