August – Pondering Time.

Recently, I have been looking back at old photographs...

During August we are offered a time to step back from the frenetic activity of the rest of the year, (that is unless you are part of the wonderful work force who serve the hospitality industry, directly or indirectly), and take leave.  Thinking about this, I am aware of how quickly the year is passing. 

Recently, I have been looking back at old photographs.  Each is a moment of time captured and held for me to look at, which transports me to that place, that person and that moment.

Time is a concept so fundamental, so omnipresent, and yet so elusive that it has captured the fascination of philosophers, scientists, poets, and dreamers for millennia. It is the silent current that carries us from birth to death, the invisible architect shaping the contours of our lives, the mysterious dimension in which change becomes possible.

It is referred to as one of the constants in life with its ruthless march of seconds, hours and days stretching into unchangeable regularity; the sun rises and sets; seasons change; we live and we die.

Yet, despite this outward 

constancy, time is also deeply personal. Each of us experiences it differently, shaped by memory, emotion, anticipation, and perception. An hour spent in boredom can feel like an eternity; a joyful afternoon with friends slips away in the blink of an eye. The paradox of time is that it is both absolute and relative, universal and subjective—a river whose flow is at once constant and inconstant, depending on where one stands along its banks.

As a Christian, as a human being limited by time, I am in awe of a God who ordered creation with time;

a God who entered into time itself as Jesus of Nazareth and accepted the limitation that it brought.  He lived among us, died and was buried, but because he is God, rose from the dead.   I don’t have a photograph of Jesus to look at and smile at, instead I have something much more.  As the invisible architect made man, we can still have a living, real-time relationship with him; in fact that is his deepest desire.

Time, for all its mystery and power, is ultimately a gift. It is the dimension in which we grow, love, create, and dream. Its passage is inevitable, yet its meaning is ours to shape. We can squander it or cherish it, fill it with resentment or with kindness, let it slip by or seize it with intention. To ponder time is to engage with the deepest questions of existence: Who are we? What do we value? How shall we live?

I pray this August that you will have time to wonder.  Revd Susan

Revd Susan