Quote: “Time is measured in minutes, life is measured in moments.” Mark Batterson
Scripture:
- Acts 24:27 “When two years had passed..
- Acts 28:30,31 For two whole years Paul stayed there in his own rented house and welcomed all who came to see him. He proclaimed the kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ—with all boldness and without hindrance!
- Acts 28:11 After three months we put out to sea in a ship that had wintered in the island.
Reflections
I hate being stuck in traffic more than almost anything. It seems to be such a waste of time. I can often feel myself getting tense, which I am sure is just a sign of the impatience God is working out in my life. Yet while I’m in traffic, I rarely see it as a refining moment.
We all have all the time in the world yet I think we all live under the pressure that time is slipping away. Mostly for me, its the realization of the projects that I want to get to that the current traffic jam is keeping me from accomplishing. I hate to admit that my mood is often dictated by whether or not I get a project done according to my timeline.
I’m glad that the Lord doesn’t share my daily battle with time. We can all comfort ourselves with verses like 2 Peter 3:8 “But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day”. The problem is that I do forget it, and I fully admit that I don’t see time the same way that God does. For me a wasted hour in traffic is a wasted hour never to be redeemed again. It seems like that time is forever lost.
Then I read in the Apostle Pauls life verses like Acts 24:27 “When two years had passed…he left Paul in prison, and Acts 28:30,31 For two whole years Paul stayed there (under house arrest), I am amazed that the Lord would keep his “star player” on the bench for over 4 years. These seem to be 4 years of Paul’s life when he was sidelined.
It’s like John Bunyan the famous Puritan preacher and writer who was arrested for preaching publicly without a license. He was jailed for twelve years. Bunyan, rather than seeing this imprisonment as a great tragedy, he took an optimistic view of it.
He is reported to have said, “I have been away from my writing too long. Maybe this is not so much a prison as an office from which I can reach the world with Christ’s message.” His ministry impact during this imprisonment is undeniable. It was during this time that he wrote The Pilgrim’s Progress, an allegory of the Christian life that is one of the most famous books ever written. Likewise, it was during Paul’s imprisonment that the Apostle Paul wrote Galatians Ephesians, Philippians and Colossians, some of the most inspiring books of the New Testament.
I think that for most of us, time will always be a challenge on this side of eternity. Maybe the challenge for us is in changing our perspective on time. Rather than have on focus being on time lost it should be on seeing the God moments that time brings our way. I may never see traffic as an office to reach the world like John Bunyan, but maybe my time stuck in the prison of my car is still a moment to embrace. The quote: “Time is measured in minutes, but life is measured in moments.” God can do more in one moment then all my angst about wasted time. For time is but a tool in God’s hand. Let’s keep our eyes not on the minutes lost, but rather on the God moments he brings our way.
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