We kept a list inside our pantry door when we lived in the mountains. It was an evacuation list. And like the earthquake supplies we stored under the stairs, I kept it updated, just in case.

When smoke billowed over the ridge, we packed our papers and our treasures in case we needed to leave. Birth certificates. Pictures. The computer. Our memories, laid alongside our necessities. Photo albums. The address book. Medications. The list kept us organized under the stress of a sudden leaving.

We lived in a high-danger area for forest fires, and that list came in handy a few times, as we loaded kids, pets and memories into our cars and joined the stream of vehicles creeping down the mountain to safety. We watched from a distance as airplanes discharged their loads of fire retardant along the borders of our little town, listening to the distant thump-thump of helicopters ferrying huge buckets of water to the flames.

We lived with the tension of summer heat and fall winds and one spark that could bring disaster to our doorsteps. We lost neighbors in the battle: the Engine 52 crew, and just recently, another local boy grown to be a man and protector.

I remembered our list as I absorbed the terrible news from Maui recently. Who would have guessed that a wildfire could wreak such devastation in a town built by an ocean? The people of Maui were prepared for a tsunami, but not for the hot breath of fire from the other direction. It could have been us, I knew.

The list on the door reminded me, every time I reached for the flour or tomato sauce, that my safety was tenuous. That bad things can happen in the blink of an eye whether you live on a drought-parched mountain or a beachfront paradise.

The life of mortals is like grass, The Psalmist said, they flourish like a flower of the field; the wind blows over it and it is gone, and its place remembers it no more. (Psalm 103:15-16)

A vapor. A wisp. A flower quick to wither.

Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.

James 4:14

We all live in the shadow of death every day, unperceiving. Not knowing when the fire will come. If we accepted that reality, how would we plan for it?

Heaven’s evacuation list works differently than the one on my pantry door. Our treasures cannot be packed, but instead must be sent on ahead; investments that pay off in glory beyond all imagining. Kindness. Mercy. Visiting the hurting. Comforting the suffering. Encouraging the faint-hearted. The quiet, unseen sacrifices of time, finance, and prayer. Investments kept and remembered after the fire sweeps through and our time is done.

God’s evacuation list is also much shorter than ours:

One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”

Mark 12:28-31

These moments matter. These are the days—right here and right now—to invest in what lasts. To spend our strength on what is truly important. We don’t get a practice run at this life, but are forced to actually live it, each day a gift and an invitation. How we prepare now determines our destiny.

I no longer have a list on my pantry door, since I now live in a place without the daily threat of earthquakes and forest fires. I’ve learned, too, that bitter losses often birth sweet gains. But most importantly, I believe that however and whenever the fire comes, it won’t have the final word.

But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything done in it will be laid bare. Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat. But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness dwells.

2 Peter 3:10-13