Good Morning Everyone,
Our theme for this month: “Perseverance”
Our Bible verse for today: “There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build, a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance, a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain, a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away, a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.” Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 (NIV)
Our thought for today: “God is always on time.”
Life unfolds over time and in seasons. One season is necessarily different from the previous one and almost always involves change. There is a time and a season for everything. But often we’re impatient, especially if things are changing, and especially if we want the change to be over quickly.
The key of course, is to relax and allow life to progress at it’s own pace. But that’s easier said than done because … well, because we tend to be impatient, at least I am.
I remember back in the 1970s when microwave ovens were beginning to become common appliances in many households. We were all amazed at how quickly it could cook our food for us, but others were concerned about the quickening pace of life that the microwave oven represented. This was at the same time that the comedian Joan Rivers was rising to fame. I remember she had a comedy routine that poked fun at our growing sense of impatience and at the accelerating pace of life. In the skit she was standing in front of a microwave oven, drumming her fingers on the kitchen counter and then suddenly, in an explosion of impatience and anger she shouts at the microwave, “Hurry up!!!” Yup, that’s me sometimes.
There is a season and a proper length of time for everything – including cooking our food. One of my personal complaints is that although I am often in a hurry, the Lord never is. Sometimes I want to shout at Him, “Hurry up!!!”
In Psalm 90:4 Moses wrote, “For a thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night.” Well, that explains it then because sometimes it seems like the Lord is taking a thousand years to answer my prayers!
The Apostle Peter repeated that thought more than a thousand years later when he wrote in 2 Peter 3:8, “But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.”
I’ll leave you this morning with one final thought from Peter on this subject of time and patience and perseverance. In 2 Peter 3:9, right after his observation about how the Lord keeps time, Peter wrote this, “The Lord is not slow in keeping his promises, as some understand slowness.”
Yes, there is a season for everything, and God is never late. He is always right on-time. So persevere. And when you think you’re done persevering, persevere some more. God will show-up; He will be on-time; and He will show-up in His time. And when He does you will discover it to have been the right time.
God Bless,
Pastor Jim
Oak Hill Baptist Church 