Now is Time

Time.  Everything takes time.  The earth takes time to turn.  The earth takes time to revolve around the sun.  The seasons take their time to warm us, the shower us, to cool down, to feel like death, and to bring new life.  Even our days take their time to rouse us from our slumber, to engage the world, to return to rest.  It all takes time.

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While I am a big fan of the Harry Potter novels, I know that I will never receive a letter from Hogwarts inviting me to study and learn how to manipulate the things outside of my control.  I will never be able to make it rain.  I will never command the sun to shine.  I can never speed up the day to make it pass in the blink of an eye.  Nor can I plant a seed and have a thriving plant in hours.  I can only live my life each second as it happens.

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Much the same can be said of churches.  I, or any other pastor, cannot make a church ‘successful’ or ‘thriving’ or ‘burst at the seams.’  I cannot wave a wand or say an incantation that will bring people to our community and have them experience God in our midst and the world.  I can only use the time I have to sit with you, to pray with you, and to encourage you to realize God is already working in and through your life through the love you know, through the graces you show, and through the embrace of the Holy Spirit stirring within us.

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The burning bush is just that, burning about us.  The community we share is one of the places and ways in which we help each other experience the heat of God’s presence burning in our lives.  And it takes time.  Moses himself shepherded the places around God’s mountain for years before he realized the bush was burning and came to understand that it was holy ground.  God’s people throughout history have needed time to wrestle with who God is, why God chose them, and what kind of life God invites them into!

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While time has passed, and God has added to our numbers in many ways; do not give up the holy work of waiting for God to do what God is leading us toward.  When my family goes on drives, I hear my own childhood voice echo across the decades through my daughter asking, ‘Is it time?   Are we there, yet?’  We must stop thinking that we are waiting for a destination.  God is always at work in time to continuously grow us in many different ways.  All I have is time, and the chance to ask God, ‘Where to next?’  As God continues to move us in this time, let us pray that our eyes, spirits, and whole beings are open to living now in this time with thankful hearts ready to wonder, ‘What’s next?’