Mission

So much of my life seems to be lived in the future. "When we are in a nicer, bigger house...", "When the next baby comes....", "When summer is here and I can be home with JJ....", "When our church gets its act together...", "When we decide where it is we really want to settle down and put permanent roots....". I live so much in the past as well, nostalgically reminiscing about people, places, events in my life that have impacted me. The question I now find myself faced with is, "What about today???" Lately I will come to the end of a day and visions of Christ returning will bounce around in my brain, and I feel....panic. Not peace...panic. Because I have to confront myself with the fact that I did not truly live this day to its fullest in the name of Jesus Christ. I was too busy pondering what I'll do tomorrow. That is scary to me, that I would fear meeting my Savior face to face because I don't feel confident I will hear the words, "Well done, good and faithful servant."
Also, this world captures me up in its ugly arms far too often. The materialism that we are bombarded with essentially every second of our lives sucks me in like a black hole of avariciousness (ok, I TOTALLY used the Microsoft Word thesaurus to come up with that word....isn't it fun? Now go look it up; you know you want to :) ). But it's no wonder, when I lose focus and allow myself to be bounced around from one want and misplaced desire to another.
I always think I'll pull it together when I finally am where I am "supposed" to be and will there fulfill the mission I'm "supposed to have", but it was pointed out to me this weekend (thanks for this wisdom, Robs) that perhaps that's backwards. First I need to recognize what the mission of my life is. What is God calling me to do with my life, and where is He specifically calling me to lay my allegiance? I have all of these obligations in my life, but how many of them are drastically misplaced? Not to say that God can't use any of my well-intended actions or acts of service, but to me the rubber really hits the road in whether I am fulfilling His call in my life day-to-day. And I desire so much to recognize what specific mission God has placed in my life. I desire to see him work today through me and not in some far-off future. To me, the intentional Christ-likeness with which I live out my daily tasks must be the measure of my success as a Christian, far above any grand gestures of service that may come to pass once every three years, or in this far-off future. I am working on developing a life mission statement and, by God's grace, I will see this life a little clearer and be His faithful servant daily.