Contending with Time

One Sunday morning in early 2007 as I sat in the second row of the children's church and listen quietly as the other kids around me during one of our Bible stories teachings. I got to hear an amazing story that I will recount today. This story turned out to stick in my memory and offered the basis of my perspective of time in this writing.

As usual, our Sunday school teacher took his position in front of us standing with the wooden pulpit that held the large Bible and the pamphlet that always went with it. After we took a brief prayer section, he kicked off with a story that lived in my memory to this day.

The story was about a brave man in the Bible whose name was Joshua. Joshua went to battles for his country Isreal as the leader in Isreal at that time. The battle was great and Joshua needed more time to defeat his enemies.

Our Sunday school teacher painted the perfect warrior picture every child would dream of, his fierceness, bravery, and total commitment to God and the service of his people but that was just the icing on the cake.

He told us how Joshua prayed for the sun to stand still till the battle was won and all the enemies were conquered. After the teaching, one of the boys sitting close to me asked a question.
He said, “Sir if the sun was standing still all day, was there any night”. Our teacher simply laughed and answered him “yes” that the daytime was just prolonged.

Image by Shevacreations on Pixabay

Today I still wonder what it will be like if we could prolong time. What effect would it have on our daily lives? Would it improve our productivity? Make us conquer our battles? Or will it not affect us?

I remember when I was working on my thesis back then in school, I wished I had 48 hours in a day as I was running late and submission time was already at the door. Just like the submission time for this post.

My take on time is that we can’t get it back. I don’t see God doing another prolonging for anyone again either. We just have to make good use of the time we have. We have to cement every good memory on the walls of our hearts. That’s the way to go I think.

So, can we contend with time like Joshua in the story above? The answer is yes, we are already doing it unbeknownst to us. We hurry to work and make it in time, that’s a win against time. We enter that trade just at the right moment to snatch a profit, that’s also a win against time.

Image by Dariusz Sankowski on Pixabay

We don’t lose against time except when we feel that we have lost. Then, we beg to back in time, to make changes, to do things differently. Since time can’t be paused and the clock won’t just stop ticking except the battery is dead.

So, we are responsible for working diligently and spending the little time we have wisely as it always seems smaller as the day goes by. Time can be contended with, you only have to choose your battles wisely.

This post is written for the dreem-wotw S1R2