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Vol. 12 No. 1 January 2010 |
Page 7 |
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Vol. 12 No. 1 January 2010 |
Page 7 |
Editor's Note
Marilyn LaStrape
For those of us who have lived a few years, it seems as though we have just blinked a couple of times and the first ten years of this new millennium are now history! One of the many definitions of time according to Vine’s Dictionary is “a signified, fixed or definite period, a season, any period fixed by nature.” The year 1999 had so many “last” things and times to consider and acknowledge. Now we are referring to that time period as “back in the ‘90’s.”
Very early in the year 2000, my husband made this statement to me: “Honey, we have got more time behind us than we do in front of us, so we have got to make the rest of it count.” I remember being ever so thankful to have still been alive in the year 2000. Without a doubt it was a momentous occasion for all of us old enough to appreciate what we were witnessing—the beginning of a new millennium!
However, as the year 2000 approached, virtually the whole world was consumed with what was then being referred to as the Y2K Bug. This was the bug in all computer software that programmers had not realized to be a major shortcoming. It was the widespread practice in all computer software using two digits for representing a year rather than all four digits. This year representation between January 1, 2000 and December 31, 1999 could have been calculated as 100 years rather than 1 day.
Almost everybody raced around to make himself or herself Y2K compliant before the fast approaching year 2000 deadline. One source said, “When the clock ticked January 1, 2000, no major problems were reported. Almost every bank worked fine, no major power outages were reported, airplanes still flew and the whole world went on with its normal life.”
Why did the whole world go on with its normal life? God is in control, and He works in the events of this world! God spoke this universe into existence including the times and seasons, and He will be the One who will bring times and seasons to a halt! After Noah and his family came out of the ark, God said, “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, winter and summer, and day and night shall not cease” (Genesis 8:22). There is nothing that man can do by his design or by oversight to ever upset the precise and unique balance in God’s creation!
Psalm 90:10 tells us, “The days of our lives are seventy years; and if by reason of strength they are eighty years, yet their boast is only labor and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.” It is not so much how long we are here, but what are we doing with the time God is giving us?
Verse 12 of that same Psalm says, “So teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” We are numbering our days in the wisest manner when our lives are lived in glory and honor to God, when we are in service to God and other people and when we are preparing daily to spend eternity with God. We often hear and say that time is of the essence. However, when God ushers in eternity, we will never hear anyone asking the question, “Do we have enough time?”
Solomon said in Ecclesiastes 9:10, “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might; for there is no work or device or knowledge or wisdom in the grave where you are going.” David may have had a similar thought in mind when he penned Psalm 39:3-4, “Lord help me to number my days and know how frail I am. My days are as handbreadths, and my age is as nothing before You. Surely every man at his best state is but vapor.”
We sing that song, “Each Step I Take” and part of the sentiments of that song says, “…until some day the last step will be taken. Each step I take just leads me closer home.” Those of us who have crossed the 50+ mark become more and more aware of our mortality as the days quickly pass into weeks, months and years.
We are all going to die since the only requirement for death is that we be alive. Psalm 144:4 says, “Man is like a breath; his days are like a passing shadow.” Whatever we are going to do for God, we have got to do it now because now is all we have.
Peter spoke of how he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin and he should no longer live the rest of his time in the flesh but for the will of God. He further states in 1 Peter 4:3, “For we have spent enough of our past lifetime in doing the will of the Gentiles—when we walked in lewdness, lusts, drunkenness, revelries, drinking parties, and abominable idolatries.”
If God has given us the time of the entire year of 2010, or any part thereof, resolve now to seek, maintain or renew that relationship with Him, because for a great majority of us, we truly do have more time behind us than we do in front of us!