REDEEMING TIME
By pastor Jim May
Ephesians 5:15-17 & Colossians 4:5-6
Today marks the first day of the latest time change as we went from Daylight Savings Time to Standard Time once again. Twice each year, we get the wonderful opportunity to either sleep an hour longer, or get up an hour earlier, depending upon which way we go.
I don’t know about you, but I just wish that congress would do away with all this time changing altogether. What difference does an hour make, one way or another today? There may have been a time, years ago, when an hour would matter in the amount of work you could do in the daylight, or how much more energy resources would be used if people had an extra hour of light to run around town. But those days are long gone now.
There was a time when our little town would “roll up the sidewalks” and turn out the lights at an early hour, but that time is no more. Right now there are stores that are open 24/7 except for a few holidays. I don’t care what time of day or night you have to get out; traffic is always on the move. Our society has developed into a non-stop society.
I can’t see where moving the clock forward or backward one hour makes much difference anymore. It seems to be much more of a nuisance than it is help.
I supervise a shop where we are required twice a year to go about 95 schools and change the clock and bell schedules. I can tell you that for at least 2 days we are tied up with nothing but changing those clocks. It’s a real pain, and a real inconvenience for those whose clocks are changed before the time change really happens. Many of the office personnel at the schools aren’t very happy when their clocks are suddenly an hour off and it throws the whole schedule off.
But regardless of whether you consider the time changes necessary or not, or whether they are a nuisance, or a welcomed change, there is something to be said about changing the time that I think might teach us all something from the Word of God today.
Time, we must remember, is something that none of us can escape from as long as we live upon this earth. I know that many retired people aren’t as driven by the time clocks as those who are still on the job, but we are all still driven by time limitations.
When we consider that most of us have to punch the clock, literally or figuratively, on the job every day, we must certainly confess that time drives us. Even in working for the Lord, time drives us, or controls us. There must be time to pray, to study, to prepare messages, to visit the sick and to do the work of the Lord. It must all be scheduled, planned and executed at the right time, or it won’t happen at all.
Time is a fact of life and one that we cannot escape. Even the “time of our life” has been established by God because of the effects of sin upon this body of flesh.
Way back, in the Book of Genesis, God had to set limits upon man’s time upon the earth.
Genesis 6:3, "And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years."
It is interesting to note that prior to this verse, people lived to be much older. Adam, Seth, Enoch, Methuselah, Jared and others lived over 900 years. None quite made it to 1000, but Methuselah came close. After that, life spans began to decrease rapidly and after Moses died, being 120 years old, there is no other person in the Bible who lives to be that age. Today the average life span is about 72 to 79 years in American and it’s different for men and women.
With all this emphasis on time, I think that Paul had it right in Ephesians 5:15-17 when he said, "See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, Redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is."
Time is marching on, waiting for no man. It won’t be long until 2005 is gone, and we usher in a new year. Every day we wake up is one less day that we have in this life. Each night when we lay our heads down to sleep, we are one day closer to that time when we will lay down for the last time.
What I want us to ask ourselves this morning is this, “What are we doing with the time we have right now?” “Are we redeeming the time as Paul said we should do? Are we allowing time to slip by unnoticed, wasted, used and abused? When we come to the end of this journey through time, will we look back with regret or will we feel that we have lived life to its fullest and done all that we could do?”
Day after day passes without a whisper of a prayer for so many people. Night after night passes, while we either “veg-out” in front of the TV or somehow manage to fritter away the time until we fall into bed. I know that none of us sit around with nothing to do. I know that life is busy, that your schedule is tight, that the demands upon you are heavy, and that sometimes it just gets almost unbearable. But what about the time you do have.
All of us have some discretionary time, some more than others, but all have some. What do we do with that time? Are you making use of what God has given you to do a work for Him or it being wasted and spent in taking care of our own things?
When was the last time we spent an hour on our face before God seeking for the salvation of a lost loved one? When was the last time we spent 30 minutes reading the Bible? When was the last time we gave a little extra time to the work of the Lord?
Time is the thing that life is made of and if we aren’t careful, time will past, one second at a time, one minute at a time, one hour, one day – until it’s gone and we haven’t accomplished even one thing for God. We can’t let that happen. We can’t our epitaph read, “He just never had enough time.”
One day we will have to answer for the minutes and hours we waste in frivolity and selfish pursuits. One day we will have to stand before God and explain why we never found the time to serve Him, or to witness to our neighbors, or to answer His call upon our lives. What will we say? What excuse can we give?
Can you honestly believe that God will accept any excuse at all? Can we believe that some people have more time for God than others? It’s not a question of having more time because we have the same hours in a day. It’s a question of priorities!
What is most important to you right now? Is it the job? Is it your hobby? What’s most important to you? It’s easy to tell. You can always know what’s most important in people’s lives by what they spend the most time doing! For some its being involved in sports. For some its being involved in shopping. For some it’s the job they have. For a few, it’s the work that God has called them to do.
I’m not saying that you can’t do work for the Lord and be involved in many other things. God will give us opportunities wherever we are. The question is, “Do we take those opportunities?”
There’s an old Latin saying, “Carpe Diem”, that simply means, “Seize the Moment”, make ever moment count. Don’t let the moment pass without getting out of it everything you can.
“Carpe Diem”, seizing the moment, is vastly important in serving the Lord, but it is also important in every aspect of life.
One fellow said it this way. Pulling into the Wal-Mart Supercenter parking lot earlier that night he saw that gas was only $2.49 per gallon. This was astonishing to us, since gas in his hometown (about 30 miles away) was $2.59.
His wife commented that he definitely needed to fill up before heading back home.
He went inside Wal-Mart to shop and then returned to the car. His wife reminded him that he should fill our tank with gas before heading home.
He didn’t want to do tit right then. He had one more stop to make first. It wouldn’t take but a minute and he would come right back. He was gone less than 15 minutes -- and then we returned he discovered that price of gas had went up 10 cents a gallon!
While he was gone the fueling truck for Wal-Mart had arrived. It was still refueling their tanks when he came back. And during that brief moment of time, the gas attendant had changed the prices!
As he thought about the situation, God once again had a lesson to share.
Over and over God gives us opportunities. Opportunities for repentance. Opportunities for witnessing. Opportunities for service. The Word used in the Greek is spelled, "kairos", and it means a "favorable opportunity that is open for a limited time."
In other words, DO IT NOW before the price goes up!
You see, when God gives us something to do, we never know how long we’re going to have to say "YES". If we wait, even a few minutes, the opportunity will pass.
We never know when the sign is going to change and our chance will be gone!
It’s not enough that we do what God says do. We must do what He says do WHEN He says do it.
And when He shares it with you, remember this: Opportunity may knock - but sometimes it doesn’t wait very long at the door!
Some people will even come to church and still not “carpe diem”. Their minds will wander, and maybe they will even fall asleep, and miss the very thing they came for. If that’s the way we are, we may as well stayed at home and took a nap.
We can’t go back and reset life. There is no turning back the clock to relive that last hour. No matter whether we change the clock or not, that hour is gone forever, never to be lived again. We can find the time to do so many things but can we find the time for God?
Paul also said the same thing in Colossians 4:5-6, "Walk in wisdom toward them that are without, redeeming the time. Let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man."
How can we redeem the time? How can we make sure that the moments when our opportunities come to witness, or to work for the Lord, are not wasted? There’s only one way – get prepared in advance of the moment’s arrival.
We can’t redeem the time to witness if our witness isn’t already strong? How can we tell others about Jesus, if we haven’t taken the time to really know Him? How can we answer a question from the Bible if we haven’t taken the time to study it? How can we do a work for the Lord if we haven’t prepared ourselves to answer the call?
That’s part of what Paul is referring to when he says to “walk in wisdom”. We must allow the grace of God to do a work in us on a consistent basis, and we must learn to relate to other people in every type of setting and circumstance, and we must be prepared to always give our testimony and present Christ to everyone we meet.
The moment of need must be met by prior preparation for at that moment there will be no time to prepare and the moment will be lost forever.
The engineer who is required to build a bridge must have spent many years in study and preparation for the moment to build.
A Teacher must spend time studying and preparing a lesson if it to be effective.
A preacher must spend time in prayer, study and preparation, if a sermon is to reach the hearts of the people.
Likewise, each of us must spend time in preparation if we are going to do anything for the Lord.
How many times have we failed to witness to a lost soul because we weren’t prayed up and ready?
How many times have we missed an opportunity to do a work for the Lord because we failed to get prepared for the moment?
Did we spend time before this service today seeking God for a move of the Spirit? Did we spend time in His Word, getting ready for the message? Did you spend time practicing if you are a singer; or playing if you are a musician, or studying if you are a teacher?
How can we seize the moment and make this time together count if we don’t prepare?
How can we get the most out of our time in God’s House if we haven’t sanctified and consecrated this time to Him before we arrive?
Seizing the moment requires prior preparation!
Paul told us to “redeem the time”. You can’t redeem time by living it again or buying it back after it’s past. You can only redeem the time by being prepared in advance to make the most of every moment before it arrives and being prepared to give your best at every moment.
Are you redeeming the moments of your life, or are they going by each day and being lost forever? What answer will you give when life is over?
Examine your heart, examine your life and ask God to show you where you stand with Him. God will show you if you will listen.
It is my prayer that we will all be able to say in the day that we stand before God, that we have done our best and used our time wisely.
