The oldest person alive

"Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. But you said, ‘we will not walk in it.’ " – Jeremiah 6:16

At age 85, she took up fencing lessons. At 100, she was still riding her bicycle. At age 110, she decided that living alone was too hard and moved into a retirement home. At age 121, the Guinness Book of World Records crowned her queen of all living beings–the oldest person alive. When she celebrated her birthday, they baked a cake and put on it more than ten dozen candles. Think of it: 121 candles!

Jeanne Calment, who says that the keys to her long life are olive oil and port wine, says she is afraid of nothing. She has no complaints and still has a sense of humor. "I have only one wrinkle," she told reporters, "and I’m sitting on it." Wow! What an awesome lady. She’s the town’s biggest attraction since Vincent van Gogh spent a year there in 1888. When asked about her opinion of the great artist–for she met him when he came to her uncle’s shop to buy paint, she would recall that he was "dirty, badly dressed and disagreeable".

Whenever I hear about someone who has beaten the odds and lived well beyond the "three-score-and-ten" or seventy years Moses talked about long ago, I always ask, "What is the secret? What allowed the person to outlive almost all his or her contemporaries?" How do some folks develop a positive attitude whereas others die of bitterness and strife that literally chokes the life within?

No matter how the other factors vary, there is one quality apparently possessed by all who live to a ripe old age. Nothing really gets to them. They have lived long enough to know that no matter what goes wrong, life is going to go on.

I’ll make another observation though. There is a connection between the way people live and how long they live. Of King David it was written, "He died at a good old age, having enjoyed long life, wealth and honor..." (1 Chronicles 29:28). Then God promised Solomon, his son, "If you walk in my ways and obey My statutes and commands as David your father did, I will give you a long life" (1 Kings 3:14). How you live physically also has a connection with longevity. Live right, eat right, and think right and you have an edge over the person who debauches himself and abuses his body.

Christians are not immune from the physical consequences of ignoring the rules, either. I’m thinking of one highly respected Christian leader whose life was fast ebbing out in his early 60s. As he lay dying, he told a friend, "I’ve abused my health, I’ve never taken time to eat right and now I’m suffering the consequences."

When Paul wrote to the Romans, he told them to give their bodies as a "living sacrifice" to the Lord, realizing that God indwells His children. Good advice yet today. Resource Reading: 1 Corinthians 6:12-20