There’s a particular Beatles song that’s going to have a very significant meaning on my next birthday, which by the way is coming up in September. (hint, hint…) If you’re not sure what I’m talking about, you’re either not a Beatles fan or you’re very young.
So, once again here’s a very unique, convoluted introduction to my main point, which is the consideration of the importance of time. Once I noticed that I was sometimes starting sentences with the phrase, “Well, ten years ago…” I realized hey, I really am getting older.
I’ve come to regard time itself as one of God’s greatest gifts to us. Of course, Christians will always say that God’s greatest gift is salvation through Jesus Christ. I regard free will as His second most important gift. Without that second gift, you can’t access the first gift.
I put the gift of time as God’s third greatest gift to humankind. “Ah, but what about good health? Isn’t that important?” you might ask. Of course it is, but consider this. Without adequate time, you can’t maintain your health or work towards healing when ill. God can heal instantaneously but usually tests our faith. This is where time becomes important. Even with God working through incredibly skillful doctors and modern medicine, He probably will choose to make us sit back, reflect and take the time to heal physically as well as spiritually and mentally. Healing the whole person takes the gift of time. Given adequate time, we can also “heal” any broken relationships, bad financial decisions and personal inadequacies we’ve always wanted to fix. It’s the awareness that undoing the bad takes patience…and time…that gives you ability to regard time as a resource and as a gift.
Scripturally, God has a lot to say on the matter of time. While God’s reckoning of time is eternal and not as we regard it (2 Peter 3:8: “Do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.”) God places a definite emphasis on our limited, mortal time.
Psalm 90 is a look at God’s dealing with humankind through the instrument of time. Verse 4 is the basis for the aforementioned 2 Peter 3:8. Verses 9-10 define our mortality: “All our days pass away under your wrath; we finish our years with a moan. The length of our days is seventy years-or eighty, if we have the strength.”
Because of our mortality and limited amount of time, Ephesians 5:16 tells us, “make the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil.” In the King James, this verse reads “Redeeming the time, because the days are evil.”
The use of the word “redeeming” in the older King James version gives this view of time a slightly different edge. According to my copy of Webster’s Dictionary, redeem means to “buy back, repurchase, get or win back, to free from what distresses or harms; free from the consequences of sin…”. Used in the Old Testament, redeem is in reference to deliverance from bondage.
These scriptures place an emphasis not only on the fleeting nature of time, but the importance of the stewardship of how we use our allotted time.
One more scripture reference I’d like to share is found in James 4:13-14:
Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business, and make money.” 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.
So why are these scriptures even vaguely important to what’s going on in the country right now? I’ve written before that I firmly believe we…meaning those of us in America who care about the future of this country…have been given a very specific window of opportunity to turn this mess around. This is a God- given opportunity. It might be only four years, but hopefully it can be eight and more beyond that. Regardless, we don’t know how long we really have. If the liberal/Democrat/communist anti-American crowd ever regains total power…we’re done. Doesn’t matter if Hillary is at the top of that excrement pile that calls itself a political party. It doesn’t matter who the top face is…they hate us, they want us gone, along with the Constitutional rights that allow things like Clash Daily to even exist. Conservatives and Christians will no longer be allowed a voice.
We truly have to “redeem the time because the days are evil”.
There are three things we all can do:
1. Learn who your congressional representatives are and pay attention to how they vote. Don’t be afraid to write, phone, fax, email or whatever and let ’em know you’re paying attention and their days of serving up BS are over.
2. Pray for the country. Pray for the President, his family and his staff. Pray for ALL who serve in uniform. Pray for yourself, your family and your community.
3. Redeem your time. Stop wasting it. We don’t know how much we have left because the days truly are evil.
Image: photo credit: Excerpted from: David G Murphy Omega via photopin (license)
