Time Flies Word on the Week 20th February 2021.
“I’m not as young as I used to be” said the Chinese Christian worker. I had failed to recognise her (it had been some years). Then came the obvious reply “none of us are as young as we used to be!” Psalm 39 verse 4 reminded me of these thoughts. It reads, “Show me, Lord, my life’s end and the number of my days; let me know how fleeting my life is”.
It would be nice to know how we will end up and how soon that end will come! The added comment on the brevity of life hardly needs to be made let alone sung about as this indeed is a song of King David. It’s one of a number he composed for Jeduthun who, with his sons, played the trumpet, cymbals, harp and lyres. A musical family!
Of course, for those who have, by God’s grace, become followers of Christ the Apostle Paul says we are already dead to these thoughts. As the song puts it, “For me to live is Christ to die is gain”. Words inspired by the text in Galatians Chapter 2 verse 20 which says “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me”.
I had a boss whose management style was pugnacious! His personal outlook was “People are problems”! We were together on a long car journey and I thought it would be a good idea to share Galatians 2:20 with him. His immediate response – “What’s that in English?” was not too encouraging!
It did highlight for me the ‘great gulf’ there is between the lover of Jesus and the communicating of that life-changing love to another. Explanations may go some way but a note of incredulity creeps into the other’s voice which it requires the gift of faith to remove.
Lydia was a business woman but also a woman of prayer. Women from Philippi met for prayer outside the city on the river bank. As St Paul writes “The Lord opened Lydia’s heart to respond to Paul’s message”. She then ‘took the plunge’ and was baptised in the river demonstrating visually her death to the old life and her rising with Christ to the new life in Him.
The very expression ‘time flies’ is loaded with regret and in itself speaks of a longing for eternity. And that is exactly what every child of God looks forward to. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life (St John Chapter 3 verse 16). God’s gift solves the time problem!