~Pastor Greg
“What time is it?” How many times have you heard, or asked,
that question? Sometimes we ask because we are on a tight schedule and we don’t
want to be late. We don’t want to miss something important or, maybe, not so
important? Sometimes the question gets asked in the middle of the night when
the glowing numbers on our alarm clock mock our inability to sleep. Sometimes
it’s because the day at work is dragging and we want to know how long before we
can go home. Other times we ask the question because our schedule is so driven
by the clock we can tell what we are supposed to be doing simply by looking at
the clock.
The different ways we ask that question highlight that the
answer isn’t so much about wanting to know where the hour and minute hands of
the clock are pointing. Instead, the question is a way of conveying our
attitudes or situation. That simple question “what time is it?” is a way of
communicating to people that we are bored, or busy, or overscheduled, or
important, or overworked, or truly engaged in something, or many other things
as well.
But the question also reveals our priorities. How we spend
our time shows what is important to us. Asking the question “what time is it?”
can be a way of asking what is really important to me. Think about the ways you
answer (or have heard others answer) that question. It’s time to: go to work or
school, go to the game, go to the gym, watch my show, go to bed, hang out, go
to class, practice, study, go to church, relax … There are as many ways to spend our time as
there are minutes in a day. And we spend our time on what’s important to us.
Two weeks ago I had the opportunity to attend a 2-day
spiritual retreat called Deeper Journey.
It was the first of what I hope will be many retreat experiences over the next
few years. The primary goal of the retreat, focused on the discipline of
prayer, was to provide an opportunity for the participants to spend some
uninterrupted time with God. This included two extended periods of silence and
solitude – hours spent without I-pods or I-pads, no email or texting, no T.V.,
no radio, no conversation with someone else. Nothing. Just silence. Just me and
God. It sounds inviting, even refreshing. What it turned out to be, for me, was
disturbing - at least at first. I was surprised how challenging silence can be,
even frightening. What I realized was how much of my day I spend consumed by
both sound and busyness. And it is that sound and busyness that keeps me away
from God. Sure I pray every day, several times in fact. But I realized that I
am often squeezing it into some small slot between other things I need to do.
Does God get my best time? Honestly, no. Often he gets my left-over time. I was
confronted with the realization that the relationship I say matters most, my
relationship with God, is the one which most often takes a back seat to
everything else.
This brings me back to the question “what time is it?” If
the answer to that question reveals our priorities, what are those priorities? Where
are you spending your time? What are the things that are so important to you
that you give them your time? What time is it?
