Friday, January 09, 2009

Time with God?

I found this article by Thomas at Everyday Liturgy informative and it really resonated with my experience.

My Personal Revolution of Time
January 8, 2009 - 4:10pm by Thomas

I remember how poorly I did my "quiet time" in high shcool.

I had the quiet part down. I even had the time part down. But it was not time well spent.

I had bought into the common notion that if I was quiet for a certain length of time with a Bible in my hand I was becoming a better Christian.

The picture in my mind of me opening the Bible to a random page and reading for 10 minutes is kind of pathetic when you think of it. How is spirituality dictated by random pages and quantity not quality?

I have been getting quality time now, and it has been due to a personal revolution of how I view time. I do not give God ten minutes like a mother gives her child ten cents to buy a Jolly Rancher. My spirituality is no longer self-centered, in that God has given me a new day and it is his anyway---I can give him none of my time because it was his to begin with---so I need to live within God's time and pray that he establish himself in my life. He is present. I need to make myself present in his presence. I travel to him, he does not get chump change from me.

I pray in the morning, at noon, and at afternoon. I have the times set in my Outlook to go off as a reminder. I have pages of the noon daily office at my desk and write in my journal at around three o'clock for a few minutes. I am not giving God my time. I am letting his time redeem me and the time between prayer, when my work is pleasing to him (even if it is not pleasing to me all the time). My work provides for family and the kingdom. That is enough in his eyes (while not always in mine).

I am sometimes haunted by feelings that I haven't spent vasts amounts of time with God. I am haunted by the voice of my pastor in high school who commented on how "new Christians read the Bible for 15 minutes, then grow to 30 minutes, then grow to one hour when they are really spiritual." I am haunted by the concept of time as an idol, but I must not let that control me. All time is God's, and I dwell within his time. May I always recognize this.

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