There’s a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven (Eccl 3:1)
Can you believe we’re halfway through May already? Where is 2020 going? Hey, it’s almost Christmas (or at least, Roger thinks so)!!
How often have you heard someone say things like this, in apparent unbelief? Or perhaps, ‘the older I get, the faster time seems to fly!’
Dr Who was known as a Time Lord, because he knew the secret of time travel. Does that sound appealing? Do you fancy going back in time? Or forward perhaps? Which period of time would you choose to visit, if you had the choice? Maybe one day …..?
When God set the world in motion He gave us regular changes: day/night, summer/winter, 365 days in a year. (Did He also give us 24 hours in a day, and 7 days in a week, or did we break things down that way ourselves??)
The writer of Ecclesiastes declares that there’s a right time for everything. Jesus seems to agree; He tells His mother ‘My time has not yet come’ (Jn 2:4), and later in prayer to His Father ‘the time has come’ (Jn 17:1). Paul tells us we are living in the time of God’s favour (2 Cor 6:2) and that ‘now is the day of salvation’. In other words, although things seem to proceed just the same way, day after day, week after week, year after year – yet actually, we are in a period of time that will one day come to an end. Now we are living in the ‘day of salvation’. Right now He is being patient, longing for more people to come to repentance and faith (2 Pet 3:9). But that is in God’s schedule. He has a timetable, and the day will come when He brings it all to a glorious conclusion.
When Muriel and I lived in Glasgow we used to attend large meetings in a huge venue called the Tent Hall – I seem to remember that it seated 2200 people. At the back of the hall, facing the speaker’s lectern, was a big circular clock that must have been at least 8 feet in diameter. Its purpose, presumably, was to remind the speaker not to go on too long! But around the rim of this clock, displayed for all to see, were the words IT IS TIME TO SEEK THE LORD.
There’s a time for everything – for school, for employment, for rest, for lockdown ….. But it is always the right time to seek the Lord.
