TIME

What is time? It has been said before that time is money. But that is not the kind of definition I am speaking of here. In its essence, what is time? Let me help you out a little here. If I were to take all watches and clocks away from you and put you into orbit around the earth in a space ship of some sort, what would time be then? Sunrise and sunset would lose much of its earthly application. If sunrise and sunset were removed from our present understanding of such, what would a day be? What would a week be? What would a month or even a year be then? You might would argue that a year is the time it takes for the earth to complete a revolution around the sun. Okay, let us back our spaceship a little further into space, let us say, outside of the Milky Way and let us re-ask ourselves the previous questions. Time, as I understand it, is very earth and sun relative. Even baking cookies with modern equipment is dependent upon this earth/sun relationship. You can set a timer and your coffee might be waiting for you when you wake up. You can set your alarm and you can make it to the doctor’s office “on-time”, whatever that means. Never-the-less, time as we know it, is very earth centered.

Try this on for size now. Outside of our “world”, does time even exist? Or maybe from another angle, is time, as we know it, in the big picture even relevant? There will be no night in heaven. Heaven is for eternity. Time, seems to me, would sort of lose its relevance at that point for sure in the broader scope of things.

Jesus, when speaking to the Jews, made this incredible statement. “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am.”(John 8:58) A statement that speaks of his deity as much as his eternality, both ideas being mutually inclusive. And yet we cannot overlook the implication that time does not constrain God. God does work within the time construct. He moved the sun back a few degrees in the Old Testament. Surely time was affected. He stopped the sun from going down for Joshua. Surely time was affected. And yet Jesus’ statement speaks that he is so much greater than time itself.

I surely have just begun to embark on my personal journey of attempting to understand something I am sure only God fully knows. But none-the-less, it does have at least one spiritual, practical application. God is never early, never late and dare I say never even “on time”? Why? Simply because God is! My comfort is not that God is going to show up, but that God is ever present. If He chooses to reveal himself through visible activity, that visible activity should not become the expression of my comfort but rather the affirmation of my comfort. Why do I say this? Because so often, we construct scenarios in our minds that God has to show up when we say or ask him to show up. Should not it be enough to acknowledge that He has always been there (and will be) even when Balaam's donkey does not speak.

Luke

PROVERBS 17:14

The beginning of strife is as when one letteth out water: therefore leave off contention, before it be meddled with.

It is kind of like trying to eat "just one" cookie. When I was little, we used to get our slingshots and look for wasp nests. Needless to say, some things you just have to experience to understand when we say, you just shouldn't go around messin' with certain things.

Blog land is kind of like that dammed up river or even the wasp nest. Some things/posts are just better left untouched. Otherwise, might I suggest that you either have your life jacket or some benadryl handy.

May God give us wisdom indeed to be a voice for righteousness and truth in cyberspace.

Luke

SATAN'S SMORGASBORD

Have you ever gone looking into the pantry or cabinets for something to eat? You were starving and you had to feed that empty pit in your belly. No matter where you looked on the shelves, everything was appealing you were so hungry. It was simply a matter of deciding which particular shelf to raid.

I wonder sometimes if that is how Satan views our churches. I wonder if he considers us as nothing more than a big pantry. The difference, I suppose, between our rummaging through the pantry and his is that he is willing to destroy the whole pantry while we usually just take the item or two we are interested in. I suppose another difference as well is that we can be satiated, if but for a few hours, while he, who is destined for the bottomless pit, has an insatiable desire, a bottomless pit for a stomach, to devour even after just devouring something/someone else.

The problem however lies not so much in that he is insatiable when it comes to destruction. Rather, the problem is our lack of vigilance. You see, he can be resisted. You can avoid being devoured by Satan. You can avoid being the entree or even the dessert. Satan desires to catch you unaware. Charles Stanley has pointed out that this can be when we are tired, sick or even celebrating a great success in our lives.(Heard from a sermon on the radio) We are to be ever watchful and keen of vision if we truly desire to avoid being Satan's next meal. (I'd even go so far as to say that a "SALTY" Christian is undesirable to Satan as well.) To avoid being on the menu, Peter writes:

Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour: whom resist stedfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are int he world.

Are you what's for supper?

Luke