There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill and a time to heal
I'm talking about the one thing that all of us have taken for granted... Time. I can't think of anyone who hasn't used the phrase, "I don't have time..." We all felt in one way or another that we've always exhausted every second of every day doing things that we thought were"necessary". I, for one, have been pushing aside things because I was too busy. I can't set aside a few minutes to talk to the Lord in the morning because I was in a hurry to go to work. I don't have time to talk to Him before I go to bed because I was too tired so I'll tell myself, I promise I'll just do it in the morning. But then again, the cycle goes on until I feel so depleted and on the edge that I do not realize that what's lacking in my life is not the extra seconds, minutes or hours that I wish I had but the intentional stewardship of the time that was given to me in the first place.
This crisis that we are experiencing right now has finally backed us into a corner and forced us to rethink and internalize about our priorities. Have we truly thought about what matters most in our lives? We have been slaving for years for that job under the pretense of providing for our family, sacrificing the time that we could've spent on actually having a relationship with the family that we were striving to provide for. The money that we have been trying to amass because we think it could give us the security that is so rare nowadays, would sooner or later destroy us and the very thing that would bring any relationship into a downward spiral of chaos and despair.
What will these things do for us now? Will our job protect us from the virus? Will our money get us across lock downs? These are not particularly bad things, I wouldn't even dare to tell you to leave your job or throw your money in the air. But these good things are exactly the things that could turn into idols. Idols that would corrupt our hearts and would, at the end of the day, reduce our lives into something that is meaningless. Then later in our lives, we would ask ourselves, "Where has the time gone? What have I been doing all along? Is this all there is to it?"
So what do we do with the time that we have now? I think, now more than ever, it is the time to reconnect to the One who is the owner of everything. In Psalm 24:1, David proclaims,
The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it;
The Giver of time and of life is asking us now to put Him first. Put our trust in Him, our security in Him. The Lord, who is faithful and is the same yesterday, today and forever is waiting for us to devote our time to Him. What if, at the start of our day, we talk to Him first? A good 15-minute conversation with the One who is merciful enough to provide the very breath that we are taking at the moment, I think, is a different way of facing the day. What if, before we sleep, we give thanks to the One who gave us another opportunity to go through one day unscathed...healthy. What if, as we go through each day, we think about a blessing or two that we have experienced and thank Him for it? Wouldn't it be a different perspective of passing time?
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing, a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.