I saw the musical RENT again this week and I was brought to tears by the combination of reality and music. My spirit is easily moved by music, it has been a part of my life for as long as I remember. I often say that I live my life to a sound-track, I am always humming or listening to a song from the time I wake up in the morning to the time I fall asleep. RENT won all kinds awards and has a theme: “No day but today” running through it at various stages and background to many other songs.
The day after I saw RENT I read in one of our local papers how one of the communities outside Las Vegas is running out of water and will have to start “importing” water from other communities to keep up with the housing boom already started there. They gave permits to 60,000 homes to be built knowing they have water for only half that. The elected leaders of the community were wondering how they are going to get water to these houses when the under ground aquifers run out. Being a town of western rebels the people won’t control their water usage, they never had to before and they won’t change now. If they raise the price of water they will be recalled and voted out of office. A city water system will take years to build and connect, by then they will have run out. All I could think of as I read the article was that this was a result of RENT-type thinking. No day but today.
“Eat, drink and be merry; for tomorrow we die” comes strait from scripture but both Isaiah the Prophet and Paul the Apostle use this as an example of foolish thinking. This RENT thinking only leads to pain and heartache. Right-thinking, correct/smart thinking tells us that we need to sacrifice now so that we will HAVE all those things we crave TOMORROW. “No day but today” tells us there may be no tomorrow but we know that is not true no matter what our philosophy or religion. Even in the musical RENT they let it slip that there is a tomorrow when they find the hero Angel, though dead, waiting for them in a bright light and “looking good!”
Just like in your finances sacrificing today makes for comfort tomorrow; in every aspect of your life you find that true. It holds true in your water usage, in your relationships, in your job, and it is preached in your health club: “No Pain, No Gain!”