Mike’s Musings …..

I Just Don’t Have Time … Or Do I?

   What a common statement for us to make! “I don’t have time,” is so often stated, so often used as a reason for our undone tasks, that we’ve come to think it is the truth! (And for some, it might be … but everyone?) I find myself guilty of saying it and then reflect on what seemed to be an exceptionally busy day. Did I need to do this or that which occupied so great amount of time? What if I had awakened just an hour earlier, or stayed up an hour later? Did I need to talk that long on the phone, or devote so much time to visiting with a friend just to visit? How much time did I use rightly (which is the kinder way of asking how much time I wasted.)

   As I child, I was taught “there are sixty golden seconds in every golden minute, and sixty golden minutes in every golden hour.” The problem is we’ve seemingly let some of those golden minutes and hours tarnish! What time we seem to have, we want to use for ourselves instead of the purpose for which they were granted. Every day grants precisely the same number of seconds, minutes, and hours – no more and no less. (O.K. for the extreme critic I’ll concede the “Leap Year Day” theory.) The point is the same: there’s only so much sand in every day’s glass and when the day is done, you can’t turn the glass over and start again! The value of each second, minute, and hour is based solely on our use of that time!

   One wise man mused, “Time is life; and since you don’t want to waste your LIFE, why waste time?” How true! But we seldom equate the two when we’re struggling to find just a few more minutes for this task or that pleasure. We all remember pleading “just a little longer,” or “just one more …” When it’s fun, we can’t get enough; when it’s rough going, we don’t want to continue. Both have one thing in common … TIME, and time is LIFE.

   I muse on time quite often, and the older I get, the more thankful I am for time, which is life! I realize the grains of sand in the glass are fewer now than they used to be, so I treasure them more dearly. Further, I find I have time/life to do what I TRULY want to do! I muse especially on that reality! Too many in time/life do what they want to do, and often much less! For the Christian – don’t you WANT to devote your time/life to Christ and His service? What better use of time/life? Rather than fret on what you’ve NOT done for Him, take courage in doing something for Him every day. Then you can rest in knowing you’ve given that much time/life to Him joyfully … and you’ll soon notice you’re returning to Him more and more time/life each day!