Time's Role in Growth based on My Love of Cooking

I like to cook.  Actually, I love to cook.  There is something so rewarding about making a good meal and sharing the table with family and friends.  It is one of the truly great joys of life.  I have cooked many meals, but my favorite thing to cook without a doubt is meat.  And whether its bacon, a burger, a steak, ribs, chops, or meatloaf, the key to great meat is still the same: time.

The best meat takes time.  Whenever you try to rush cooking the meat, you run the risk of overcooking, burning, or rendering it too tough and dry to be fit for use as anything other than a doorstop, let alone for human consumption.  Strangely enough, sanctification and godly character require the same sort of patience, the same kind of focused endurance.

Time is often the primary ingredient in sanctification.  True, focused prayer and Bible study are also necessary components but there is a definite reason that overseers need to be elders.  It is the passage of time, paired with the consistent pursuit of Christ that produces sanctification and growth.  This is what James is talking about when he says that we should let steadfastness have its full effect, meaning that only once perseverance has been met with the passage of time will it serve its intended sanctifying purposes (James 1:2-4).

This is one of those truths of life, that the passage of time is one of the primary ingredients in all good growth, be it the flowers of the garden, the braising of a short rib, or the maturation of spiritual character.  Let us then strive to remain steadfast over time so as to let perseverance fulfill its work so that we may be drawn closer and closer to God through Christ!

Consider again the words of James: "Be patient, then, brothers, until the Lord's coming.  See how the farmer waits fro the land to yield its valuable crop and how patient he is for the autumn and spring rains.  You too, be patient and stand firm, because the Lord's coming is near." (James 5:7-8).

All But a Mist

James writes: "What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes." (James 4:14b).

Or consider the psalmist who writes: "For my days pass away like smoke, and my bones burn like a furnace." (Psa 102:3).

The preciousness of human life is but a vapor that appears to be blown away by the wind.  Solomon calls it but a vanity of vanities, a truly fleeting thing.  But this has never stopped humans from delusions of grandeur, from exalting our paltry lives to the heights of the created order.  We constantly and continually attempt to own, to conquer, to claim, and to name all that is within our reach.  But, in the end, mist cannot keep the time, vapor cannot hold anything.

Instead, all that we have has been given us by God.  We are but stewards to the grace that has been given.  This includes above all else the resource of time; we cannot own it our keep it but we are held accountable to how we use it.  We should never forget this reality, for how we use the precious little time that we've been blessed with is of the utmost importance.  Let us, then, never forget this truth but let it be the bedrock for our devotion and discipline to the Lord!

What Love is all About

Love is a wonderfully loaded word.  It can mean anything from gushy feelings, lustful passions, or those forbidden words.  It fills our greatest songs, is the content of the best films, and is the words of the finest greeting cards.  But when it comes down to defining love, another standard may be in order.

The Scripture speak of love definitively, leaving no question as to what love is and how we are to do it.  Th apostle and elder John wrote more on love than perhaps any other New Testament writer.  He writes this about love in his epistle:

"In this is love, not that we have loved God but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.  Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another." (1 John 4:10-11).

He also writes in his Gospel:

"Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me.  And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him." (John 14:21).

"This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.  Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends." (John 15:12-13).

These are but a snapshot of the Scripture's definition of love; but even so, it is clear that how God has loved us in sending His Son, Christ Jesus, as a sacrifice for our sins should compel us to love each other in a like manner.  This is what love is all about.  It is an action with intent.  It is a purpose with feeling that plays itself out in deeds that support word.  In the end, it is all about God, what He has done and what it means for us.

Philippians and Pressing On to the Prize

Philippians 3:13-14: "Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it known.  But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on towards the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus."

By the time Paul had wrote this, he had been stoned, beaten, imprisoned, slandered, shipwrecked, and been hurt by countless other ailments and infirmities.  But even through all of this, Paul was committed to staying the path that he had been called to and commissioned for.  That is to say that no matter the circumstance, Paul would not let himself be derailed from his purpose.

Today, as in the day before, I woke up to a full-bodied ache paired with a lovely fever.  Having had to call into work for the second day in a row, I crawled back to my bed and tried my best to fall asleep  past the cold sweats and hacking coughs.  The day was spent basically in and out of sleep and coughing fits.  And though my thoughts were, admittedly, quite hazy, I did manage to utter some simple praises and prayers for the gifts that He has and continually bestows.

To be certain, I do not mean to compare my flu-like health situation with Paul's struggles.  But I am trying to show how the principle applies to me personally in practical ways.  My earnest prayer is to always take time to praise the Lord no matter the circumstance.

Trained by Grace

Titus 2:11-14: "For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce all ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives, in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself up for to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for His own possession who are zealous for good works."

This passage is, admittedly, more than a mere mouthful.  But beyond its density is an acute truth worth contemplating.  Paul is saying that God's grace actually trains us.  It is the grace of God that sanctifies and purifies.  This flies in the face of our human propensity towards meritorious Christianity, i.e. the harder one tries at devotion the more grace they will receive applied to his/her life.

The aforementioned passage warrants some meditative contemplation.  It would serve us well to spend some time with it, chew it, and, when we feel we can see its depth, we should read the whole chapter again for the richness of context.  This simple practice is the path for the Word of God taking root in our hearts so that it becomes the very core of our very lives.  It would behoove us all to take heed.

Sweet, Precious Time

Time is the most precious commodity.  It cannot be saved.  It cannot be purchased or bartered.  It cannot be kept.  Above all else, though, time is not an inherent right; it is a gift, the most precious of gifts.  Time is immaterial, yet real.  It is a passage of moments, a sequence of successive events.  Time is, at its heart, how we measure and quantify this phenomena.  Yet to think of time as merely a ruler for gauge the length of sequential moments would be to betray the fundamental nature of time: namely, that we only have so much of it.

Every human being is allotted the same 24-hour day.  We take this profound truth without much thought and little philosophizing.  In reality, we only ever consider the passage of time when its scarcity conflicts with our own convenience, or when our schedules seem "overstuffed" like pouring water into a full glass as it continues to overflow.

There is a rarity to time.  Because there will never be more now that there is.  No one can ever have two minutes in a single second or a year saved up for later use.  This is a simple and deep truth.  However, despite this reality, many people neglect the ramifications: if a person has only so much priceless time at his/her disposal, how he/she chooses to use that time is of the utmost importance.

This is what Paul means: "Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil." (Eph 5:15-16).

Pair that with the psalmist: "O Lord, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting I am!" (Psa 39:4).  And again, "So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom." (Psa 90:12).

In the end, there is no greater resource to any person than the resource of time.  It is necessary for all growth, for all healing, for all learning, for all relationships.  It could be said, with certainty, that without time--one of the great gracious gifts of God--no life could be, for it is in the confines of time that life occurs and is experienced.  Let us then never forget this startling truth, but let it burn within us an urgency to our devotion to the will of God!

New Year: New Creation

Paul writes this: "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.  The old has passed away; behold, the new has come." (2 Cor 5:17).

2013 is here.  At this transitional time, people around the world look back at the past with a critical eye.  We all want to make this year progressively better than the last.  We want to lose weight while earning more cash, and be, generally, greater than this year compared to years past.  But, beyond that, all of want this year to be at the very least a good year.

For this, I want to make a proposal to Christians to claim our identity in Christ, to stop dwelling on who we were apart from Jesus and live as we are in Him.  Claiming this identity is key.  It means that we will no longer think of ourselves, but we will earnestly set our sights on discovering who we are in Christ Jesus.

"The old has passed away; behold, the new has come."  Christians run the risk of forgetting this basic fundamental reality.  We are creations in Christ.  Our task now is to discover who we are, not in ourselves or based on what we have been, but in Christ.  This requires a good deal of personal flexibility and a certain level of selflessness.  For God wishes to surprise us by challenging our preconceptions of ourselves.

Who we think we are is nothing compared to who we actually are in Christ.  This year my prayer is to continually be impressed by God's imprint upon my life as a new creation to Him.  To be sure, this is not a passive process but is an active endeavor; a pursuit of devotion as God reveals who we are as new creations in Christ.  With this as our focus, 2013 will be a great year.