How We Use Our Time Matters

 

     Have you established a routine to look back over your course (in time) to recognize what the Holy Spirit is trying to teach you?  If you read my blog, you’ve heard me ask this or a similar question before.  This year I was blessed to receive a check from my mother to buy anything I wished for my birthday.  I looked at a specific Christian planner advertised on social media that several of my friends shared over this past year.  To my fortune, this planner went on sale just before the end of the year, so I purchased one.  I planned to use it to track what I’m learning.  There are several varieties of these planners or journals that one can use, but I purposely chose one that looked like a calendar.

     On the very first day of the New Year, the time when I start my Bible reading plan once again, I found my way back to the beginning of Genesis.  My Bible reading plan takes me through the Old Testament once and the New Testament twice each year.  We want each pass through the Bible to offer more in-depth understanding, not just repetitive stories.  I decided to record key concepts along with my daily homiletic.  On the very first day of the year, my key concept was time, and the homily I shared with friends read, “Time was created before mankind, allowing us to observe relationally.”  What I discovered on this day was that God intended humanity to have experiences.  Until we could make use of our memories or relationships, we wouldn’t have a past, present, or future.  I also found it interesting that God created time on Day Four of His orderly Creation.  In other words, the first three acts of God’s creation were measured outside of our concept of time, or in whatever image of time God chooses.  Since we read the creation story as a story of Days (evening and morning), God decided to communicate a finite measurement to begin and end each object of His creations, Light, Sun, Moon, Stars, etc.  Our Universe was created in what God chose to call a Day.

     On day two of this New Year, I found myself exploring additional passages in the book of origins (Genesis).  On this day, I read that God invoked consequences for bad conduct.  The concept that I focused on was ‘the curse,’ specifically the curse applied to man.  God didn’t curse humanity (Adam); He cursed the ground.  By condemning the ground, God made Adam’s work hard.   Initially, work must have been a pleasant experience in the garden because everything was in cooperation with everything else; then sin entered.  With sin, the ground would no longer cooperate with mankind.  Later, I read about Cain and his sacrifice that was not pleasing to God and in comparison to Abel’s gift.  In the past, I always looked at this as a quality issue; however, what stood out to me this pass through the story was, Abel’s sacrifice involved ‘blood,’ whereas Cain’s offering came from the vegetation (from the cursed ground).

Had the curse ‘blemished’ what grew from the ground?  It was after Cain spilled Abel’s blood on the ground that the curse moved from the ground to him (man).  The homily I shared, “God cursed the ground, then the ground cursed man.”  (For support, see Genesis 2:7, 3:17, 4:10-11).  It is not far-fetched to believe that many people who read the Bible read story to story.  [For example:  In Genesis, we have the Creation story, the Fall of Man story, the Flood story, etc.]  Could we instead, read the Bible as a book of principles or concepts that can be applied to our lives?  From the beginning of 2021, it appears that God may wish to impart different wisdom as I pass through these familiar stories once again.  I am ready for a richer experience of the Bible, are you?

     As I started my second week of the New Year, these additional key concepts have come to light:  (1) Submission to God Matters, (2) The Motivations of Our Hearts Matter, (3) How We Measure Significance Matters, (4) How We Respond to Opposition Matters, (5) How We Trust God Matters, (6) How We Respond in a Storm Matters, and (7) How We Establish our Priorities Matter.   It is my prayer that God will allow my daily reading to become an inspiration to you more frequently in this New Year.  May God use my writing to inspire others to place Bible reading as a priority.  May you find your eyes searching Scriptures more often.  May it help you build a firm foundation that lasts into eternity.  Do you believe that God has a plan for your life?  May God bless you today and into the future with the time He has given us to measure, with knowledge of His Purpose, so that we each pursue God’s Agenda. 

Comments

Unknown said…
Before I was a parent, I worked as an accountant. It was my first "real" job. My work hours were billed to whatever audit I was performing. I had to account for my time in six minute increments. Every day. Every hour. Every six minutes. That practice of counting every minute helped me make every moment count. I need that mindset with all of life. Every moment matters.
January 9, 2021 at 9:33 PM
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