What's In Your Dash?

Forty-eight years ago, I met Ki Sung Kim at the Torchbearer Bible School in Holsby Brunn, Sweden. I was a young believer, not yet one year old in my faith. Ki Sung was a fire-breathing Jesus-follower who was the first believer from South Korea to be given permission to travel to Sweden for Bible school.

Our hearts were knit together during early morning prayer meetings. Ki Sung’s spiritual roots were forged in the prayer kilns that Korea was famous for in the 1960s and 1970s. Ki Sung knew how to pray with fervency and passion and he carried me along in his wake during our eight months together in Sweden.

A few years later, while I was in seminary in the Chicago area, we reconnected briefly while Ki Sung served in ministry in Grand Rapids Michigan. After that, we lost contact.

About a year ago, Ki Sung tracked me down via Facebook. It was a sweet reconnection! This past week, Ki Sung and his wife, Sara, visited Pam and I in Costa Rica. We’ve had beautiful moments reminiscing and catching up on the past 45 years of our lives and ministries.

One thing has become clear to me. Life goes by quickly. In the blink of an eye Ki Sung and I are no longer “spring chickens.”

At graveside services, occasionally, I ask people to reflect on “the dash.” A tombstone usually has the name of the deceased with their date of birth and the date of their death. Between the two dates is a dash. That’s all the time we live here on earth. For some it is a longer period, for others it is shorter. But all of us only live once. We only have one “dash.”

This week sharing with Ki Sung has made me reflect on my “dash.”

How about you? What’s in your “dash?” Are you doing anything that will make any difference in eternity?