Bishop's letters; September 03 +James Time

When I worked at Chester Cathedral, I occasionally stopped to read the poem by Henry Twells that is inscribed beneath a large clock.

Called ‘Time’s Paces’ it goes:

When I was a child and laughed and wept - Time crept.
When I was a youth I waxed more bold - Time strolled.
When I became a full grown man - Time ran.
When older still I daily grew - Time flew.
Soon I shall find I’m passing on - Time gone.
O Christ! Will thou have saved me then? Amen.

Having arrived at the ‘time flew’ stage, I can identify with some words of Michel Quoist in one of his ‘Prayers of Life’. We pass through life running, he says - hurried, jostled, overburdened, frantic and we never get there. We haven’t time. Even modern technology doesn’t help: since as the economist E F Schumacher observes, ‘The amount of genuine leisure available in a society is generally in inverse proportion to the amount of labour-saving machinery it employs’. The poet Eleanor Farjeon makes a similar point in one of her poems: ‘There isn’t time, there isn’t time to do the things I want to do..’ Most of us know that feeling: not least the 20% of us who, according to recent surveys, do 80% of the work in our churches, often on top of busy working and domestic lives.

Part of the problem is that we tend to think of ‘our time’ as somehow ‘belonging to us’. So, we treat it like any other commodity, ‘saving’ it, ‘investing’ it, ‘buying’ it and ‘spending’ it. After all, as everyone knows, ‘Time’s money’. And that, according to C S Lewis in ‘The Screwtape Letters, is exactly how the Devil wants us to think. But the biblical picture of Time is rather different. In the Bible, all time is God’s time; and we are stewards just as much of this gift as of any other.

That insight has several important implications for the way we live. First of all, it is a reminder of the importance of discovering what God wants us to do. Jesus did ‘only what he saw his Father doing’, and we need to find the same sort of guidance - both as individuals, and as congregations. One of the marks of a healthy church is that it does ‘a few things well’ - and recognises the difference between hyperactivity and success. The same applies to healthy people. Like Mary, sister of Martha, we are called to sit at Jesus’ feet and listen - and that must go alongside serving him in more practical ways.

Second, we must learn to obey the ‘Sabbath rest’ principle and make enough time for ‘recreation’. As the composer, Hector Berlioz once said - ‘Time is a great teacher. Unfortunately, it kills all its pupils’ - and it kills them a great deal faster if there is no space for reflection and relaxation. This is basically a matter of attitude; and if able to cultivate that attitude (which I admit to finding very hard), we actually become more rather than less productive.

Third, because all time is God’s, we should live in the present rather than being weighed down by the past or burdened with anxiety about the future. There is no time that can’t be redeemed, because Jesus lived, died and rose again ‘in time’ - and Screwtape is instructive on this as well.
Fourth, we should make other people a priority when it comes to making the best use of time (Ephesians 5.15). Once again, Jesus set an example here. He knew he couldn’t meet every single need of every single person around him; but that didn’t prevent him from singling out particular individuals such as Zacchaeus; and the woman with a haemorrhage; and a blind beggar. He gave them time to tell their story - and experience his transforming power. This was more than the so-called ‘quality time’ which is such a myth in our driven and frenzied society. It involved the sort of attention that is often found in other cultures. ‘You have clocks’ said one African, ‘but we have time’.

Finally, because all time is God’s, we need to be patient when things don’t happen as quickly as we might wish. Christian discipleship involves a counter-cultural lifestyle - which in this case means being prepared to stand out against the expectation of ‘instant gratification’. God knows best, because he can see the big picture. And that is why, with the Psalmist, we can truly say, ‘My times Lord, are in your hands’. (Psalm 13.15)

+James Newcome, Bishop of Penrith