12.7.22 2 Corinthians 6:1–2 (EHV)
1 As fellow workers we also urge you not to receive God’s grace in vain. 2 For he says: At a favorable time I listened to you, and in the day of salvation I helped you. Look, now is the favorable time! See, now is the day of salvation!
What Time is It? The Time is Now!
When I was in college, our tennis coach was a guy in his 30’s by the name of Eggenberger. He was a great guy and a lot of fun to be around and have as a coach. I remember one day for practice he made us all run a lap around the soccer field. We all started grumbling about it, but he said something to the effect of, “I WISH I could run like that.” And that’s why he made us run, because we could. I appreciate what he was saying now much more than I did back then. When you’re young you assume you can do things forever, but you can’t.
The writer of Ecclesiastes makes the same point in the Bible in chapter 12:1–4,
1 So remember your Creator in the days of your youth, before the bad days come and the years arrive when you will say, “I have no delight in them,” 2 before the sun and the light of the moon and the stars are darkened, before the clouds return after the rain, 3 before the day when the watchmen of the house tremble, and the strong men are bent over, and the women who grind grain cease because they are few, and those watching through the windows can barely see. 4 Then the double doors to the street are shut, as the grinding of the mill grows quiet. A person wakes up at the sound of a bird, but all the sounds of music are muffled.
Because of the brevity of life and the nature of decay while we live in a sinful world, make sure to enjoy the gifts God gives you in this life when you can. There’s no better time than NOW. Things change constantly in life. Take for instance even this church. Who knows how long we will be able to worship here freely? Who knows how long our Synod will survive, especially with the way our country is headed? We best enjoy it while we can.
However, sometimes now is NOT the time. Timing can be everything in life.
Take cooking for instance. If you don’t cook chicken long enough it will be raw and you could get sick.
A baseball player has to use his eyes and time the swing at an exact time so as to connect with the ball. If he swings a hair too early or late, he could strike out. He has to wait until the exact right time.
Because timing can be important, we often stress about time, especially when we have a lot to do. When we were over in Germany we tried to make sure we got as much in as possible during the limited amount of time we were there. But in our rush to get so much done, I fear that we didn’t enjoy the moment as much as we could have or should have either. Sometimes it’s better to SIMPLIFY and PRIORITIZE what’s really important in life instead of trying to do everything.
So in life we have to prioritize what is really important and schedule our lives according to our priorities. What can wait, what can’t wait? If something is really important to you, if you don’t have the time, you will MAKE the time. And that’s somewhat of a misnomer as well. You don’t make time. Time remains the same. You simply prioritize and make sure that you TAKE the time to do what’s important to you. You then deal with the consequences as they come. If I push this off, how much work will it cause me afterwards?
Tonight, for instance, you probably had options that you had to weigh. How much effort will it take to prepare some food to come here? Does my child have sports practice tonight? What if my child misses practice? Will I be able to leave early from work? Does my child have homework for tomorrow that he won’t be able to study for?
Timing was so important in Israelite history during the Exodus. At one set night they had to have a calf slaughtered with its blood put over the doorpost. They couldn’t wait for it. They had to have it there ON THAT NIGHT, or their firstborn son would be put to death. They needed to be ready to go with a full meal in their stomachs, their staff in their hands, and their cloaks tucked into their belts. It was an URGENT situation. The Israelites were ready, and they left in haste.
Then when they left Egypt were on the brink of entering into the Promised Land. But when they had the quick opportunity to pounce, they paused. They sent spies. They saw how huge the people were. They panicked, and they MISSED their opportunity in FEAR. Later on, when they realized they messed up, they tried to go on up and fight, but by then it was too late. They had sinned against the LORD and missed their chance. They were doomed to spend the next 40 years in the desert so that the unbelieving generation would die off and the next generation could enter the Promised Land in FAITH. There was no going back. The train had left the station.
This leads me to tonight’s text and the simple three letter word, “now.” Two times Paul repeats this word to the Corinthians. 1 As fellow workers we also urge you not to receive God’s grace in vain. 2 For he says: At a favorable time I listened to you, and in the day of salvation I helped you. Look, now is the favorable time! See, now is the day of salvation! Paul was quoting from the prophet Isaiah. Seven hundred years before Jesus was born, Isaiah had prophesied that the Lord WOULD hear their cry for salvation. The Israelites would have to go through 70 years of captivity in Babylon. They’d have to be subject to Rome. They’d have to suffer. But God promised not only would He save the Israelites, but He would save the WORLD through them by the Messiah to come - in the FUTURE.
It took hundreds of years, but their prayer for salvation was fulfilled in Jesus as Paul wrote in Galatians 4:4-5. When the set time had fully come, God sent his Son to be born of a woman, so that he would be born under the law, in order to redeem those under the law, so that we would be adopted as sons. God, who is above time and above the law, chose a time to come under it, to subject Himself to it. There’s a law that says, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.” Jesus did that. There’s a law that says, “The soul that sins is the one that shall die,” and “The wages of sin is death.” Jesus came to fulfill that death for us on the cross. This work of Jesus is a done deal. He has finished His work of salvation. No more laws that need to be met. No more promises that need to be fulfilled. It’s done, and it’s done freely, without charge, by grace. We don’t have to earn it. God earns it. God gives it.
So when it came to Isaiah’s PRAYER, God listened. God acted in time when Jesus came. Paul was saying, “It’s done right NOW.” But there’s more to that NOW in these verses. Why does Paul emphasize the NOW? Let’s hear it again.
1 As fellow workers we also urge you not to receive God’s grace in vain. 2 For he says: At a favorable time I listened to you, and in the day of salvation I helped you. Look, now is the favorable time! See, now is the day of salvation! To receive something in vain, that basically means to have “a complete lack of insight.” It also means “foolishly” or “stupidly.” Here you have this precious gift of salvation, and you treat it as if it were nothing special. Or you actually take the gift and you abuse it - you use it for something it wasn’t meant to be, like taking an expensive and rare stamp and actually licking it and using it for postage.
I think of one of the Back to the Future movies, where Biff traveled back in time and gave the younger Biff all of the results of sports games for the next 50 years or whatever it was. The younger Biff then took the magazine and just tossed it in the back seat, as if it were nothing special. The older Biff yelled at him for being an idiot. Think about what we have in the Word of God. We have God’s revealed word of salvation, a FREE WAY to escape from death and hell in Jesus Christ. We have a free way of discovering how to live a God pleasing life so that you can have improved relationships with your spouse and children. So we don’t fall into temptations and we can know good from evil. This is a precious commodity of FREEDOM in this book. Don’t receive it in vain. Don’t treat it as if it were a license to immorality. Don’t regard it as boring and irrelevant. Learn it. Know it. Apply it.
When? Do it NOW! Look, now is the favorable time! See, now is the day of salvation! Now has a sense of urgency to it. Life can find thousands of excuses to put off your faith and your God pleasing life. I recently baptized some children, where the father had told me that he and his wife wanted to take Bible Information Class and get involved in church. Shortly thereafter, when we had started a Bible Information Class, I was eager to invite him to the class. Sadly, he told me that they decided to wait a year when the children were a year older. I tried to talk him out of it. What difference will a year make? Will they be less busy then? Of course not. I’ll be happily surprised if I see them in a year, but I’m doubtful.
That’s the way sinful nature works. It likes to put things off, things that are difficult or call for sacrifice and dedication. You put off your morals or your church attendance because the person you are attracted to “doesn’t believe in that stuff.” You abandon everything you’ve learned because your sinful nature wants what it wants right NOW. You know you should make it to church more often, but you need to make work a priority right now because there are deadlines that need to be met. That hour on Sunday morning is just too much. Bible study on top of it? I just don’t have time. There are ALWAYS excuses to make NOW become LATER. All it takes is a little bit of indifference, a week or two, which leads to a month or two, which leads to a lifetime of indifference. Before you know it, you, your children, and your grandchildren, know nothing of God and His Word at all. Your kids saw it wasn’t a priority for you, and so it becomes less than a priority for them. Why? All because you put it off NOW, and you assumed that it could WAIT. You had other priorities. Now becomes LATER, and now your family is in shambles.
What can you do now? Repent! Turn around! The good news is that NOW is still NOW, and you can change that TODAY. NOW is the day of salvation. Now is always now. It’s now yesterday when I lived yesterday and it’s now when I live now and it’s now tomorrow when I live tomorrow. Now is ALWAYS now. If now is always now, it means there is NO TIME to put it off. There’s a sense of urgency here. You’ve got one shot at this. One life to live. If you change now, your future will be changed as well. There’s no better time than NOW.
But now also means now in another sense also. How often do we catch ourselves looking back in regret or looking forward in hope without enjoying the NOW. Now is the day of SALVATION. It’s not a day of damnation. How about we enjoy the here and now also, instead of being in a hurry to get through it? Think about your worship time? Are you obsessed with the clock? Or are you taking time to enjoy the songs, enjoy the fellowship, concentrating on the prayers? This is a precious time of grace right now. Are you thankful for the family you have? Are you appreciative of the mercy you are given every day? Do you appreciate how God is caring for you in the here and the now? For the family you still have left? For the church you have? Do you live in the now of God’s grace, appreciating the gifts He has given you and using them to the glory of His name right now?
Now is the day. Paul calls it a DAY. A day is less than a year and a decade, but it’s longer than a second, a minute, or an hour too. There are 24 hours in a day. You might wake up in the morning and say, “I have to get this done, then that done.” It might be stressful to you. You might be dreading it, depending on what you have to do. So you look at your schedule and try and figure out when to do what. If you’re a good steward, you want to make the most of your day.
Obviously, it doesn’t seem that Paul is referring to a normal 24 hour day. He’s referring to a day as in, “Back in my day.” This is the era, the time, right now, to be saved. It’s an era where we no longer have to look forward to a Messiah to come with vague shadows of what the Messiah would do. We know what He’s done. It’s clear in the Bible. The day has come. It’s been here for over 2,000 years. So it’s a day we can enjoy. It’s a day where we can get to know Jesus better. But it’s also a day we can be active in. We have plenty to do, by the grace of God. We have families to feed. We have friends to care for. We have jobs to do. We have prayers to pray. This is the day the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it.
So today, as we prepare for the coming of Jesus, we do it NOW. Even though Advent is a season that only lasts about a month, preparing for the coming of Jesus, it really is a lifelong event. It’s more than a day, a month, a season, or a year. Paul wants every day to be NOW. Even though it’s lasted for many lifetimes, treat this day with urgency. Act as if today were the ONLY day you had, expecting Judgment Day right now. Give it priority. Cling to Christ all the more! Cherish this day, all the more, in Christ. For it is a day of salvation. Let’s listen to it one more time.
1 As fellow workers we also urge you not to receive God’s grace in vain. 2 For he says: At a favorable time I listened to you, and in the day of salvation I helped you. Look, now is the favorable time! See, now is the day of salvation! Amen.
