Another Trip Around the Sun

We have come to the end of another year. It is a time to look back and celebrate our blessings, reflect on our failures, and recognize the shortness of our own lives as time marches steadily on. Many of us will make new commitments, renew our hope for a better year, or simply strive to survive another trip around the sun!

In the Old Testament, the people of God we called to many observances related to time. According to one writer, “Beginning in the spring, the seven Jewish feasts are Passover, the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of Firstfruits, the Feast of Weeks, the Feast of Trumpets, the Day of Atonement, and the Feast of Tabernacles. The Jewish feasts are closely related to Israel’s spring and fall harvests and agricultural seasons.” Additionally, the people of God had to keep the Sabbaths, observe several fasts, fallow the land every seven years, and observe a Year of Jubilee, (every 50 years). Almost every feast, fast, and fallowing of the land had a specific time frame in which it was to be accomplished. Clearly, God knows about the passing and measurement of time!

 However, God does not measure time in the same we do – and we must not wait until “certain times” to do what God has commanded. The Bible reminds us that, For he says, “In a favorable time I listened to you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you.” Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation, (II Corinthians 6:2, ESV). II Peter 3:8-9 (ESV) expands our understanding of God’s relation to time, and His purpose in its measurement, “But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.”

 I encourage all of us to take a moment to read Psalm 90, (which is a Psalm of Moses), and think about God and time. It helps reveal God’s Nature, His Power, and even our purpose. Yet, it is the last verse I want to share with you, “Let the favor of the Lord our God be upon us, and establish the work of our hands upon us; yes, establish the work of our hands!” May we ever be about our Father’s business as our time here on this earth quickly passes.