Today is National Pigs In A Blanket Day! That’s not the topic of the devotional but I just thought I would share that wonderful and blessed information in case you were wondering what to fix for supper tonight. Dip them in some nacho cheese or ranch dressing and prepare to have your taste buds blown!
The devotional topic for today is actually another National Day Calendar event. This is National Bucket List Day. I know that this is an indelicate way to put it, but this is the day to make your list of things to do before you kick the bucket! It’s probably best to start a bucket list early in life because some items on the list might be time and health sensitive (ie. having children, getting healthier, climbing the Himalayas, starting a career as a NASCAR driver, etc.)
“National Day Calendar and Cindy Rhodes of Bucket List Coach Travel & Tours and the Bucket List Coach Web Show formed a collaboration to create National Bucket List Day to be celebrated each year on April 24. Using her own personal bucket list, Cindy thought the ultimate bucket list item for 2023 would be to have her own National Day.”1
Each person is unique so their bucket list might contain a variety of things from the serious to the silly. For instance, your bucket list might say, “Before I die, I want to…
- Visit the Grand Canyon
- Learn to paint
- Ride a hot air balloon
- Travel to all 50 states
- Skydive
- Surf in Hawaii
- Volunteer at a homeless shelter, crisis pregnancy center, or hospital
- Make balloon animals
- Solve a Rubik’s cube
- Take a clown class
My unofficial bucket list has stuff spilling over the top. I know that I will never live long enough to do everything that interests or intrigues me. My only recourse is to make sure that I do everything that the Lord wants me to do. That’s the only list I can accomplish.
Paul spoke those famous words to young Timothy in 2 Timothy 4:6-7. “For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. (7) I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.” Paul finished the work God had given him to do. But how can we reach our final moments with the same confidence?
To the church of Ephesus, Paul said, “And now, behold, I go bound in the spirit unto Jerusalem, not knowing the things that shall befall me there: (23) Save that the Holy Ghost witnesseth in every city, saying that bonds and afflictions abide me. (24) But none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry, which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God.” (Acts 20:22-24)
In order to accomplish God’s list, Paul had to die to his list, whatever those things might have been. He had to remove anything from his life that might have been a time waster that could interfere with his ministry.
By no means am I telling anyone what their bucket list should contain. That’s between you and the Lord. I’m just encouraging each of us today to maybe empty the bucket and sort through the items that are there. Is everything absolutely necessary? Does anything in the bucket keep me from doing other things that might be of more value and importance? And, I see no problem whatsoever with having pigs-in-a-blanket on my bucket list for tonight!
If you need help organizing your bucket list, allow Philippians 3:7-8 to guide you. “But 
what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. (8) Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ, (9) And be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith: (10) That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death; (11) If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead.”
1https://www.nationaldaycalendar.com/national-daynational-bucket-list-day-april-24
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