Time

We think a lot about time as we transition from one year to the next. Was it a good year? Will I find more time to do the important things in the next? We are such busy people. Will God have room to enter into our fullness of time? I have a relative who is due to give birth in the in next month. Her pregnant shape gives added meaning to the fullness of time. When her time is full, the child will come. We each came into the fullness of our mother’s world. We each interrupted the normal. In the fullness of our own time, we will each exit this world. Unless the Lord returns before then. In the final getting up day, we shall all see the fullness of human history and its final transition to something new. Until then, we need to be mindful of the time that has been given to us to do thing of eternal value.

Jim Collins’ book, Built to Last: Successful habits of Visionary Companies (Harper Business, 1994) speaks about how successful business leaders are “clock builders” as opposed to “time keepers.” That is, instead of merely trying to manage a situation, they set out to build a new reality. This new reality requires steady and selfless work. Flashy, manipulative, and creative individuals may achieve short-term success, and detail oriented, skillful managers may coach the maximum revenue out a lack luster situation, but neither brings about the systemic change that leaves an organization better than what it was before they came. 

For: 
December 31, 2017
Galatians 4:4-7
Christmastide
New Years Eve

Too often we think that time management involves finding tricks to multi-task or get everything done efficiently. I want to suggests that time management  begins with two simple understandings:

Today, we have a problem with Time. Not just the lack of it, or our capacity to waste it in trivial TV watching, but in our very understanding of it. Today, we process Time in very short chunks. We abbreviate it, as we cook our food in the microwave. We truncate it, forsaking even the dumbed-down daily half-hour news show (17 minutes when you take out the commercials and feel-good fluff), for Facebook posts and Twitter-feeds. We rape Time by our reluctance to ask the big question about how history is shaped, and where it all will end. Apocalypse is not just a prelude to Zombies, it is one answer to the vital question, How will Time end?

 

We care so little for Time that we have stopped asking about it. Not so, the people of the Bible. John takes us back to the beginning, before the big bang, when the word was with God and was God. Later, John will take us to the end. Paul, in Ephesians 1:3-14, gives us the long-view on Time. In the beginning, God had a plan. Here and now, we experience Jesus as the mysterious manifestation of that plan. In the end, we will all share in God’s Glory as Time comes to its resting place.

 

For: 
January 4, 2015
Ephesians 1:3-14
John1:1-14
Christmas 2
1st Sunday of New Year
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