from Our Daily Bread

“Man is immortal,” Augustine said, “until his work is done.”

This quotation immediately made me think of my Grandmother. She lived a long life and knew that in it, she had work to do. At 80, she led a Russian man to Christ in the street in Estonia. In the last year of her life, she was teaching a younger woman about the Old Testament Prophets. She was immortal, until her work was done.

I'm including more from the Our Daily Bread devotional...I thought it was really good.

The time of our death is not determined by anyone or anything here on earth. When we have done all that God has in mind for us to do, then and only then will He take us home—and not one second before. As Paul put it, “David, after he had served his own generation by the will of God, fell asleep” (Acts 13:36).

As long as we have the light of day, we must work—not to conquer, acquire, accumulate, and retire, but to make visible the invisible Christ by touching people with His love. We can then be confident that our “labor is not in vain in the Lord” (1 Cor. 15:58). —David Roper