Pastor's Blog: The Balance of Time
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I don’t know of many people who have time on their hands. Even the retired folk I know often tell me that they’re busier in retirement than they were during their working years. The truth of the matter is that each of us has the same amount of time in a day, and we base how we spend it according to our priorities.
If you’ve watched a deliberative body at work, such as the Congress, then you’ve heard members speak of their desire to reserve their “balance of time” for another statement or to yield it to someone else so that he or she might offer a lengthier one. While the house rules have granted each member the same allotment of time, members choose how to expend it or relinquish it as circumstances dictate.
All of this “time talk” has me thinking about how we humans have creatively crafted a way to give us more meaningful time in the course of a twenty-four day. While we can’t add any time to the clock, we have nonetheless devised a way to make sure we have more daylight. We call the effort “Daylight Saving Time.”
The idea of Daylight Saving Time in the US actually goes back to the late eighteenth century when Benjamin Franklin first proposed it. People at that time took it as a joke, and nothing came from it. But years later, during the OPEC oil embargo in the 1970’s, Congress enacted a trial period of DST, which ironically ran in the winter months. That trial period soon gave rise to more permanent legislation so that by 1986, the change in DST was made to the period of April to October, which subsequently has been extended to where we are today, from the second Sunday of March through the first Sunday of November.
This Sunday, March 14, is when Daylight Saving Time returns. Because we move our clocks ahead when we go to bed Saturday night, you’ll need to make sure that you do so as not to be late for worship and Bible Study the next day. I will say that of all the churches I’ve served, MBBC has the least number of people who sheepishly show up on the first Sunday of Daylight Saving Time having forgotten to set their clocks ahead.
Of course, like many of you, it always takes me a couple of weeks for my biological clock to get back in balance. So, I can appreciate how those first Sundays of worship might seem a tad disjointed for you until you have grown more accustomed to the change. They are for me, too. But I promise you that I will do my best to “spring forward” to the challenge this coming Sunday and give it my best shot when I stand to preach. I invite you to do the same in your worship. After all, we’ll have one hour together this Sunday morning, so let’s make the most of it. One thing is certain: Jesus will be present in our gathering. So, as we come together in his name, our time won’t have to be reserved or yielded; it will instead be time well spent.
“And do this, understanding the present time. The hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed” (Romans 13:11).