Lisa, my daughter’s friend, memorizes people’s final words as a hobby.

Take Lady Nancy Astor, for instance, who roused from a fitful sleep to find her room full of loved ones and wondered aloud, “Am I dying, or is this my birthday?”

Actress Ethel Barrymore, gracious to the end, said, “Is everybody happy? I want everybody to be happy. I know I’m happy.”

“Friends applaud,” said Ludwig von Beethoven, the composer, “the comedy is finished.”

Novelist Charlotte Brontë, married less than a year, pleaded, “Oh, I am not going to die, am I? He will not separate us, we have been so happy.”

General John Sedgwick, a Union Commander during the United States’ Civil War, died in battle exclaiming, “They couldn’t hit an elephant at this distance.”

And writer William Sydney Porter, known to many as O. Henry, commanded, “Turn up the lights, I don’t want to go home in the dark.”

Today’s verse contains the final words Jesus speaks in the Gospel of Matthew. He has already been resurrected, but He knows His time on earth is over. He must go home to His Father. He longs to see His friends again — soon. So, He speaks words He knows they will remember until we are reunited.

He reminds us to keep our eyes open, to follow His commandments, and promises to never leave us. What wonderful words to live by!