THE DASH

A young boy accompanied his grandpa to the cemetery. They walked about looking at tombstones and the flowers that loved ones had left. What caught the boy’s attention most as they looked at the tombstones was the dash between two numbers. Each tombstone had different numbers but there was always a dash between two numbers. The boys asked grand pa why the dash was on every tombstone. Grand pa seized the moment and explained the meaning of life as symbolized in the dash. He explained that the dash stood for the length of one’s life on earth. The first number stood for when the person was born while the second number stood for when the person died. The dash then was an expression of how long someone lived. ’God will demand an accounting of how the dash was lived,’ he went on. “A dash lived for self is worthless. As well, a dash that did not recognize God as the giver of life and Lord will face judgement. It did not matter how long one lived.” The young man got very scared and wondered how he could avoid the judgement. Grandpa asked the boy to open his heart to Jesus. The boy was born again in the graveyard.
This story is an adaptation of Pastor Grabke's sermon on August13, 2006 at Faith Baptist Church in Regina.