Time

It seems that in today’s culture of abundance, the one thing that we fall short of is time. We can apply ourselves to all sorts of tasks and interests and jobs. I’m 36 now, actually 36 1/2. I have not made a mark on the world amidst all my strivings, strivings for various seemingly important things. We, the collective culture “we”, are so busy with this and that, distractions, interests, paths, ladders, hobbies, extra curricular events, jobs, second jobs, parenting, spousing, eating, watching, that we really don’t get all that deep in any one thing. We are generally spread thin, running from here to there. Time is not spent in gaining full knowledge of anything or mastering a craft. Rather, our time is often spent learning enough to get by, grabbing a snippet here, learning a tidbit there, putting it together into something that really has no depth or meaning, especially in light of eternity.

I have become aware that I am a shallow survivor. I run and run from here to there doing things and I have somehow determined that action and motion must be synonymous with progress and value and therefore constitue depth. Not so. I have little depth these days. I am worn thin. My children are growing, getting older, becoming more independent. Soon, in 10 years, the first might actually leave, but not likely. 10 years. I have been married 12. Where did the time go. Time.

Cliche though it may be, I have to consider what my children will say of me when I pass away. Today they would say that I was a busy man, stressed, anxious. Always doing something. Would they know any depth? Probably not. Probably not. They know I love them and their mother, but I show it through busy-ness and provision, not through depth of relationship and knowing me.

Let me take this a bit deeper. I’m busy, very busy and that busy-ness keeps me from having an intimate, personal relationship with God. I know this because I spend little time cultivating that relationship as I believe I ought. Many reasons for that and we’ll keep that for another future topic. So my busy-ness translates into me not knowing God and an excuse for not knowing God as I should. But this sin goes further than that. it also translates into an impression of God upon my children. It shows them a man who is too busy for them to know. They could apply that to their initial impressions of God as someone who is too big and too busy for them to know well. It also shows them a man that says he loves God but is too busy to have a relationship with Him himself. The lack of time shows what I really pursue and it must come off as I neither pursue them or God. In both ways I hinder them.

The cool thing, I have time to change it and turn it around. I hope and pray that I do. We need boundaries. Lines in the sand. Defined borders that help us figure out what is important, and what isn’t. I need help in seeing through their eyes and in approaching God as a child, believing that He will and wants to help. I need to revamp some areas of my life and I need to be real and be honest and slow down and enjoy the life I have been given, the wife I have been given and the children that I have been given. How? It’s time to start looking at the plate and scrape things off. It’s time to reevaluate things for their value and their eternal value and re prioritize.

What in your time schedule needs work?