My Awkward Dance with Time

Time and I have always performed a kind of awkward dance together.

Too often, I try to lead. I try to push time forward—some call it future-tripping. When I was a teen, I couldn’t wait to leave home and attend college. When I was in college, I looked forward to getting married. When my kids were little, I thought “I can’t wait until he can sleep through the night…stop needing diapers…clean up after himself…”

Since I hit forty a few years ago—okay, five years ago—I’ve wanted time to slow down. Pause. Stop altogether. But instead, it seems to be on a downhill slide. Everything they say that happens to your body after you turn forty is true. My skin has turned treasonous. I pull muscles for no apparent reason. I have both a space heater and an additional air conditioner next to my side of the bed. Sometimes I use them both at the same time. You can laugh; my doctor did.

And I keep hearing that old Steve Miller Band song, “Time keeps on slippin’ slippin’ slippin’ into the future...”

When my kids were young, older women would tell me to treasure that time with them, because before I knew it, they would be grown. Even now, as I grumble about my life as a chauffeur and look forward to my oldest getting his license, older moms tell me how they long to return to the days of driving their children from place to place. The saying is true, “the days are long, the years short.”

Midlife is a strange season and one I find difficult to adjust to. I’m smack dab in the middle of life. It’s as though I stand on a timeline, where all the years to one side of me are that of my youth and everything ahead of me is that of aging. All the decades leading up to where I now stand were focused on achieving and gaining. Acquiring. Adding. When I look forward, life seems more about losing. Children take flight. Houses get smaller. Work becomes less, health elusive.

But at the same time, I feel more comfortable with who I am than I ever did in my youth. I have a sweet and tender relationship with the Lord that developed through time and experience. While in my younger days, I had a head knowledge of God’s love and faithfulness, I’ve since seen him work in countless ways and now know with certainty it is true. The prayer life I now have, I wouldn’t trade it for the one I had in my 20’s. The trust and dependency I’ve learned through trial and hardship is one I wish my younger self knew—rather than trusting in myself, plans, and systems to make life work.

Moses also knew how fast time flies, how our life is but a breath. He wrote in Psalm 90: “For all our days pass away under your wrath; we bring our years to an end like a sigh. The years of our life are seventy, or even by reason of strength eighty; yet their span is but toil and trouble; they are soon gone, and we fly away” (vv. 9-10). John Calvin commented: “men foolishly glory in their excellence, since, whether they will or no, they are constrained to look to the time to come. And as soon as they open their eyes, they see that they are dragged and carried forward to death with rapid haste, and that their excellence is every moment vanishing away.” I can relate to that “rapid haste” Calvin refers to. Though I know time moves forward in the exact same rate, moment after moment, day after day, it somehow feels faster these days. My kids seem to grow an inch a week. More and more they stretch their wings. They now find themselves where I once was: looking forward to greater freedom and life on their own.

Moses then prayed, “So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom” (v.12). It is wisdom to consider the brevity of life. It is wisdom to pause and look backward to realize all you have learned and then forward to see the finish line closer than it was before. But in so doing, not to panic and fear the death that is to come; rather, to focus the days we have left on living for God’s glory. For those who are in Christ know there is more to come in eternity where time will no longer be of consequence.

In my dance with time, I’ve learned that I can’t lead; it’s not my place to do so. Rather, I must follow the steps marked out for me. I must move forward, keeping along with time’s set rhythm. If I pay attention to his steps, I see he’s really not going any faster than before. And if I cast aside the distractions that cause me to stumble and focus instead on my call to live for God’s glory, I realize: I’ve got all the time I need.

Importance of Being Small

There is nothing I enjoy more than hiking in the mountains. I love being surrounded by towering trees, the musty smell of leaves under my feet, the sound of creatures scurrying in the brush. I enjoy the labor of a hike and then being rewarded with an amazing view: the panorama of craggy mountain peaks and the sweeping valley below. It's quiet and majestic. God's handiwork on display.

We recently took a trip to Washington to see the mountains outside of Seattle. The iconic view of the mountains surrounding the city was blocked because of smoke from fires in the north. As we drove farther out of the city and into the mountains, we started to see the peaks rise before us. We hiked beautiful trails, blanketed with wild flowers. One section of the trail had a magnificent view of Mt. Ranier. We marveled at it its snow capped peak, knowing that what we saw would have been even more amazing had there not been a smoky haze in the sky. 

Such experiences in creation remind us of an important truth: we are small.

In our daily lives as humans, it's easy to think that we are bigger than we are, that we rule our own kingdoms. The power of man seems invincible. We walk among the Babels our world has created—every day knocking down the old to build the new and better—and often marvel at their immensity. We develop amazing technology at a rapid pace, so impressive, we can't even lift our heads to look at creation around us. Humanity boasts of its discoveries, theories, and systems, and calls others to bow down in worship. With each check mark scratched on our daily lists, we can feel successful and accomplished. Some even look down on those who don't measure up or keep the pace or who aren't as "enlightened" as they are. Every day, we read accounts in the news of some new development or invention, some even going so far as to play the role of God in lives of others. 

And in all of it, we forget that we are dust.  

David wrote in Psalm 39: "O LORD, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting I am! Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath! Selah. Surely a man goes about as a shadow!" (vv. 4-6). 

Moses reflected on the brevity of life and the eternity of God: "Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God. You return man to dust and say, “Return, O children of man!” For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night." (Psalm 90:1-4).

Indeed, like the psalmists, we need to remember that we are dust. That we are not invincible. That we are the created and not the Creator. That we do not rule and reign over all things. That we are merely stewards of creation. That we are small.

As it says in Isaiah: "Do you not know? Do you not hear? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them like a tent to dwell in; who brings princes to nothing, and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness." (Isaiah 40:21-23).

Because we quickly forget, we need constant reminders. We need to be regular students of the Word, reading and studying to know more of our God and the splendor of his holiness. We need to get away from our carefully constructed lives and see the wonder of our Creator in the world he has made. We need to develop a right view of ourselves, as humble dependents, embracing our smallness and responding in worship to the One who rules, reigns, sustains, and determines the length of our days. The very same God who entered our smallness by taking on human flesh, "though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." (Philippians 2:6-8). 

We are small. That is the truth. It is an important truth. We are dependent creatures which exist solely by the grace of our Creator. May our heart's prayer echo that of Moses: "So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom." (Psalm 90:12).