TIME WELL SPENT

Last Saturday, like most Americans, we set our many clocks back to Standard Time. (It's said that a man with many clocks never knows what time it is.) Did you happen to count how many clocks you had to re-set? At our home the clocks number 16, including two computers and two cars. Actually, the computers re-set themselves, as do our cell phones every time we turn them on. It's amazing that we now can have our clocks set exactly to other clocks around the world.

Time may march on, but sometimes it seems to fly. Then again time just drags. The New Testament speaks of "time" in at least two ways: "Chronos" is clock time ("It's time to eat!"), and "Kairos" is general time ("It's about time you did that!"). In any given day each of us is given 24 hours of "chronos" to use as best we can. We also have important periods of "kairos" in life: Time to make a decision, time to fix that problem, time to do what's right.

Time is a bank account we're all given, and none of us knows when the account will be closed, so we need to be good caretakers of our time. It's sad when we hear someone say they have "time to kill," as if those minutes or hours were worthless. Yet we all waste some time, don't we? Waiting may seem like time wasted, as can time spent in uncertainty or indecision. All time is valuable and irreplaceable.

Psalm 31:15 says, "My times are in Your hands." St. Paul warns us there will be terrible times in the last days (2 Timothy 3:1), but Nahum the prophet encourages us, "The Lord is good, a refuge in times of trouble. He cares for those who trust in Him." (Nahum 1:7) Here's a poem with a great thought:

The clock of time is wound but once, And no man has the power
To tell just when the hands will stop, At late or early hour.
Now is the only time you have; Come now and do God's will.
Wait not until tomorrow, for Your clock may then be still.

Let your time count for God and His people.