There are some travelers who like to board an airplane at the earliest possible moment. There are others who prefer to board at the last. Some rush the gate the very second the gate agents announce that boarding has commenced, while some linger until they have sounded the final call. I fall firmly in the first camp since, for whatever reason, I can rarely relax until I’ve found my spot and securely fastened my seatbelt.
It’s a funny thing to do, though, isn’t it? There is no good reason to rush aboard. The gate agents aren’t going to slam the door shut when half the passengers are still waiting in line. Everyone who is at the gate and holding a boarding pass will eventually be welcomed aboard. And hours later, when the plane has reached its cruising altitude and begun jetting its way beyond the distant horizon, will it much matter who boarded first, second, third, or last? When the plane touches land, will it make any difference who boarded earliest and who boarded latest? Obviously not, since all will arrive in the same location at the same moment.
It has often struck me that the pain of losing a child would be made easier to bear if we would be diligent to hold a better sense of proportion and have a better perspective of the glories to come.
The better sense of proportion comes when we understand that life at its longest is very short and that, when compared to eternity, the longest life and the shortest will prove almost identical. What is the difference between 10 years and 90 years when compared to 10,000 times 10,000? Every moment of this life is deeply significant, but every moment of this life will be surpassed by billions of moments in the life to come. In comparison, even the deepest pain and the longest trial are but light and momentary.
Every moment of this life is deeply significant, but every moment of this life will be surpassed by billions of moments in the life to come.
The better perspective is that marriage, children, maturing, growing in wisdom—all these matters that are associated with mature adulthood— are only shadows of glories to come. They are great and glorious gifts of God, but those who go to heaven without them have missed out on nothing that is essential to the human experience. They will lack nothing in eternity because they had no spouse, no child, no diploma, no career. Their experience will be as full, as satisfying, and as awe-inspiring as the one who died an old man, full of years, and surrounded by generations of his descendants. There are no losers in heaven, no second-class citizens, none who rue the short time God gave them on earth or who wish he had given them a greater number of days.
In the moment we board a plane, it can seem very important which of us heads down the jet bridge first or last, but it does not take long to realize that it actually makes little difference at all, for each of us will reach our destination at the same time. And just like that, on the day of Christ’s glorious return, all of his people will be resurrected together, instantly, in the very same twinkling of an eye. Together we will set out into the true life, the unending life, the life in which the largest gap on earth will be seen to be utterly inconsequential.
